Encouraging a love of reading in children: Raising Kids Who Read.

I recently read this book called Raising Kids Who Read: What Parents and Teachers can do by Daniel T Willingham. > You can buy it here <

The book provides practical solutions for cultivating a love of reading that lasts into adulthood.

For me it is important that the kids love reading, our house is full of books and we spend a lot of time reading books, the kids love reading, especially Oliver.

This book resonated with me as some of the techniques he talks about I have done with the twins and I can tell you categorically that it works.

The science-based approach in Raising Kids Who Read applies to kids of all ages.

Education expert Daniel T. Willingham's Research-based, concrete suggestions to aid teachers and parents in promoting reading as a hobby Age-specific tips for developing decoding ability, comprehension, and motivation in kids from birth through adolescence Information on helping kids with dyslexia and encouraging reading in the digital age Debunking the myths about reading education,

In the book William's suggests to parents to not just give commands, but ask a lot of questions to show that the purpose of language is to acquire new knowledge, not just communicating one's own wishes. 

There are many familiar ideas that I have always put into practice such as family reading time, having lots of books accessible around the house, using silly voices and changing names, letting the children choose their own books,  magazine subscriptions. For us it was the Free Lego Life magazine which they love, this is for children aged between 5-9 years old and they receive 5 copies a year, my two love the arrival through the door of their Lego magazine > FREE LEGO MAGAZINE SUBSCRIPTION <

This is not a book about teaching reading, but about trying to create reading habits, it is an informative, smart, and yet simple book!...

Big First Aid Lesson 2017

 
It is almost time for the yearly Big First Aid Lesson 2017.

The Big First Aid Lesson 2017 is an engaging show hosted by a well-known personality and school children. It will include practical elements, animations and interactive activities that will give thousands of young people life saving skills.

This years theme is a Bonfire night theme, to join up and take part click on the st Johns Ambulance logo below.

For some books on first aid for kids click here >Children's first Aid books< (Flat Stan First Aid Guide For Younger Children is my favourite), you can get that here > Flat Stan <

For first Aid Supplies click here > First Aid Supplies <

Explore Learning Creative Writing Workshop!.

We went along to a creative writing workshop today, run by explore learning.

Explore Learning run drop in sessions (no booking needed) for their Maths, English and 11+ exam preparation sessions.

The great thing about Explore Learning is that they are voluntary OFSTEAD registered, which means if you are a single parent and work 16+ hours a week or you are a couple working 30+ hours a week, some of the tuition cost is covered by Working Tax Credits, they also offer a limited number of scholarship places which gives a 50% discount to parents receiving Income Support of Job Seekers Allowance in addition there are other various ways to get help funding the tuition sessions which you can find on their website.

Explore Learning have branches all over Greater Manchester and beyond right across the country in various towns and cities.

The twins really enjoyed the session today as it was very play based and both commented on how much they enjoyed it... I watched them in the session quite closely, the group was a small group of 7 children and the twins were the only ones home educated.

They took part joining in with the team work involved with great gusto and made their own considered contributions to the group.

This was the first time I have witnessed them in a formal school type class setting and they looked right at home, there was no shyness or trying to shrink into the background, they took lead roles within their group and were focussed throughout the session.

Once we got home I asked them what they thought about the session and they both said they loved it, in fact they loved it more than Badgers.

Badgers is the only other school type formal learning environment they have been in and have enjoyed going for the past few years, although parents are not allowed into any of the sessions so I have never witnessed how they get on in there.

I asked why they enjoyed it more than Badgers and they said it was fun playing the game, at Badgers it can get boring.

I was a little taken back by that because the only game I could see was a theme of an  animal detective and trying to get him home, this was brilliantly done, the game element was very subtle but obviously very powerful in it's delivery. It certainly made an impression on the twins.

I have looked across the web at some reviews and it seems they have a good reputation and get good results.

We have signed up to have a free session, so I will update on our verdict and let you know if we partake on a paid subscription.

I would love to hear what you think if you have used them or alternatively follow the link below to learn more!..

http://bit.ly/2o5F26p

Summer Holiday Educational day trips

I hate School holidays as it get so busy everywhere you go, but I also love it for the amount of extra learning events that go on.

We usually slack off around July and enjoy ourselves without focusing on learning too much, but as we are very autonomous it is now inbred into the kids and they tend to spend most of their time naturally finding new topics and ways to learn every day, so it is hard to switch off but we go all out during August and take advantage of the myriad of learning opportunities that spring up to keep the school kids entertained during their long summer break.

Strangely enough we generally find that most of the events are lightly attended if they contain anything educational so we find them not too badly overcrowded.

I started to post a load of day trips with an educational slant onto the group page but there are so many that I decided to collate them all here in this blog post to keep them all in one place, this makes it easier for me to keep up with, you can also click through and get to the booking forms for each one and I will update the list as I become aware of other events, if you pop along to any and we are there and you see us, give us a wave....



July 2017 

• All ages - The Clock Stops -  Nostell Priory and Parklands Wakefield - Fancy yourself as a clock craftsperson? Have a go at putting together cogs and levers to see exactly what makes a clock tick. Various dates until September

• All ages - Ongoing Archaeology events for the festival of archaeology
  

• Age Unspecified -  Lancashire Reading Journey from 14th July

• Ages 7+ Engineering Open House Day at Huddersfield University. 28th July  

•  All ages - Spodden Valley Explorers 28th July

•   All ages - Thackray Medical Museum in Leeds has some great things going on between 24th July and 1st September..

•  Age 8-10 years - Creative Writing Workshop 26th July

 August 2017 

• All ages - Be a ranger - family volunteering - The outdoor team at Hardcastle Crags invite you to roll up your sleeves, become rangers for an afternoon and help us give nature a helping hand. 2nd August

•  All ages - Peterloo massacre anniversary events starting from July until 20th August, get involved and adopt a name and attend a banner making workshop on 16th August...

• Age 7-15 - Complete Science Forensics Workshops 4th August

• All ages - Twelf Night - William Shakespeare - Little Moreton Hall Congleton - 8th August

•  No age specified - Science busking with Mad Lab on 15th August, competing in teams to create the tallest tower, seeing who can give the best instructions to our resident robot, and battling it out to see whose boat can hold the most marbles before sinking.

• Age 14 years + (too old for mine but looks great ) - Tech Theatre Open day 5th August. Have a go setting up and running a gig, cover everything needed for the event including understanding lighting and sound projection and H&S

•  Age 15 + (Too old for mine again but still looks great) Access to music open day  1st August - 3th August)

•  All ages - Fire Station Museum Open Day events

•  All ages - emergency services open day. 

•  Ages 5+ - Imagination Gaming Board game Workshop 17th August

•  All ages - hat works family tour 23rd August  

•  All ages - Horses at work - Ellesmere Port National Waterways Museum 

•  All ages - Lytham 1940's War time weekend

•  All ages - Memories of Partition 15th August followed by various dates at Manchester Museum

• All ages - Living History Museum Performance Anniversary of the Peterloo Massacre

 September 2017

•  Age 4-8- Junior Jam: Ceilidh Workshop!.. develop musical skills in a fun, friendly and accessible way. 2nd September - 2nd December.

•  Age 8+ Greater Manchester Recycling Open Day 7th September

•   All ages - 7-10th September Heritage Open days, events to be found all over the country.

•  Shift Coding workshop Pattern craft at Tatton Park celebrating Alan Turing. 10th September

•  All ages - Lytham Windmill - Various dates

•  All ages - 2-3rd September Manchester Thai Festival 

• All ages Celebrating the arrival of Genesha Manchester Museum 2nd September.

•  No age specified - Fungal Hunt at Crompton Moore (aimed at conservation not consumption) NB* this was advertised as free but a £3.50 charge has since been added, I am awaiting clarification on cost!..

•  Dinosaurs In The Wild - transport you back an astonishing 67 million years by time machine to encounter living dinosaurs as they’ve never been seen before.

October 2017

•   Child of the divide @ Z arts 20th October

•  All ages - Black Tudors Miranda Kaufmann 28th October

November 2017

• All ages - Digital kids show 18th November 

• Age 7-16 Fiddler Ferry Coal Powered Power Station (HE Educational Session)  7th November  

Writing practice!

I have been looking for some new creative ways to encourage the twins to write.

They are very good with their reading skills and have picked up a lot of the basics of recognising punctuation from the more advanced books they read.
 
We talk a lot about the structure of books and have learnt about the components of what makes up a book, from the front and back cover formats to the  introduction page and indexes etc and we do a lot of dictionary work to correct spelling or find alternative words and meanings.

Their knowledge is growing but their writing skills I feel are lacking as they are very reluctant to write at the moment, I am sure this is just down to a lack of confidence as the knowledge is there, so I have been looking for some creative ways to encourage them to put pen to paper more often.

I purchased the Diary of a Wimpy Kid book for them to have a look at the format of a journal which I am hoping will encourage them to start to write their own daily journal.

I also came across a website that enables the user to send postcards across the world called postcrossing which entails sending and receiving postcards.

We have also talked about writing to their favourite person and sending them a letter, Olivia picked the Queen and Oliver picked Dr Who.

I also found some writing prompts websites that are very useful when they decide they do not know what to write and have writers block, these are great to also give me ideas on what themes we can use whilst thinking of some creative writing ideas.

We have also played the game where one person says a word and writes it down and then the next person carries on and says a word to follow and then writes it next to the original word and so on and so forth taking turns creating a funny story.

I purchased a great board activity called Sentifix Sam at the Seaside to create sentences, the game helps the child by providing words on Multilinks and there are some great teaching ideas included.

I am looking for more great ideas that will allow the twins to write in an non-pressured way.

Book Of The Week The Magic Faraway Tree

The Magic Faraway Tree by Enid Blyton

We decided to read this book after a recommendation by Brian Cox that I found whilst looking for some good reading inspiration.

Joe, Beth and Frannie as they move to a new home next to an Enchanted Wood, follow Moonface, Saucepan Man and Silky the fairy as they discover which new land is at the top of the Faraway Tree each day.