Finding us on Friday

Fridays are our official 'outing day'. I say 'official' because we seem to be out and about most days, but Fridays, we have a wee excursion. Last week it was to the local 'dump shop' to find treasures (for the sand pit).

No two days ever really look the same in our house. Activity is determined by what time we went to bed, how people slept (or didn't sleep), the weather, the general temperament of the family, the activities of the day before...that's not to say that there isn't some rhythm to our days and week, but we are a bit of an eclectic mix of homeschooling styles and approaches, as we find our way and try out different things. Fridays are sort of 'unschooling' in nature...

This Friday we began with Akira's swim class and a lovely, long, library visit (where Akria enquired why it was called a library and the very helpful librarians talked about Latin words, Maori words and even sign language!) The library is viewed as a treasure trove of magic. Post lunch activities mostly focus on reading and looking through the 30+ books we've all managed to take out!

The library was followed by a perusal of the Kapiti Arts and Crafts Gallery. The Gallery is full of a huge variety of art and crafts in different mediums, from dolls beds to crochet knee blankets, oil painting to pottery. On Friday there were two lovely elderly women who engaged the children wonderfully. One let them paint a few strokes of paint on her canvas, the other explained what she was sketching and why, and let us take away her gum nuts she had collected so we can make gum nut dolls in the future. Just so charming. Add to that a playground for physical activity after and a glorious set of tall trees shedding leaves to collect for autumn collages, and it was a homeschooler's dream outing!

from: http://www.new-zealand-nz.net/new_zealand_kiwi_bird.html

We're usually home around 1pm, so that Tama can get a proper rest and I can have a cup of tea and a sit down for half an hour (okay, sometimes it's just 10 minutes). Keilani and Akira were engaged in a magnificent game of 'Kiwis', with Keilani explaining the need for more trees and the eradication of stoats and possums so that Kiwis will survive. Sometimes they include baby Tama in this, as a baby kiwi in the family burrow needing protecting. The Kiwi is 'topic of the moment' in our household, with everybook in the library on Kiwi being borrowed.They were so engrossed in the game, I managed the half hour sit down and got in some crocheting!

Inevitably, there was a squabble of some sort and the game ended... the remainder of the afternoon was a mixture of helping with chores (like the dishwasher and folding the laundry) so Mummy is free to read, read, read. We throw on one of the CDs: "Look at Me I'm Moving" and we wiggle and bop away - another hour gone...then it's off to dinner at Kiki's (the Man of the House's mother - the Maori word for grandmother is 'Kuia', but this has some how become 'Kiki', long before I joined the whanau (family)!).

So, that's what we did all day on Friday... But I kind of left out all the 'learning' stuff that happens inbetween as well -for example the discussions in the car with Keilani about drought and the need for rain. About a fortnight ago we finished reading 'Narni of the Desert' and last year, we came across a fantastic collection of Margaret Mahy stories in the local op shop that included one entitled 'Jabberwocky Rain', where a young boy recites this phrase and does a rain dance. Keilani made a connection between all these (unintentionally) related stories and the dying plants needing rain she's observed around her. She began her rain dancing on Thursday and uped the ante today!

There's a saying that for 'unschoolers, learning is as natural as breathing' (Mary Griffith) and a day like today makes it feel like it is so.