The Green Parent

Raising kids with conscience

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Blog / August 2010

Aug 09 2010

Calling home edders

Okay, so we are weeks away from finishing our education special – it’s looking super chunky with loads to get your teeth stuck into from articles about making own medicines from the backyard to stress-free parenting – yes really!

We also have lots of inspiring writing about education – different methods, how to set up your own home ed group, exciting green projects taking place in mainstream schools etc. One piece that I am still putting together is an article on different methods of home educating. We posted on the forums looking for families to talk about their experiences but so far have only had a few responses. Well, I figured that it might be an idea to answer the questions myself about our approach to learning at home. And that it might encourage others to get involved.

So here goes: Structured or autonomous and why?
A mixture of both. When we started out on our home educating journey my eldest was just four. I was over-the-moon excited that we had discovered a different path – I felt such a sense of relief that she didn’t have to go to school, it was all I could do to stop myself crying when I spoke about it. Anyway that first year we did lots of craft projects, reading together and trips. I recorded everything that we did and made books of all the books we read and the places we visited. After a year or so of this, we settled into a more organic approach and Jez started working on the Green Parent with me from home so I had a home educating buddy! This made a big difference – we divided our week and both got to spend time with the girls and time in the office. It took a while to get used to but I can’t imagine life any other way now. So now the girls are 11 and eight, we provide a little structure in the form of a workbox system that they can do in the mornings if interested and if nothing else is going on. This means they can work alongside us and we get involved in their projects. They have created much more structure for themselves than we have ever imposed upon them. They run a school for their bears with a timetable, certificates, school inspectors – the lot! After watching this regimented approach unfold for a couple of weeks, I brought in the workbox system as I figured that they needed to create something that was missing from their daily lives. So far, it has worked pretty well – they only have six boxes – not the twelve that Sue Patrick, the US based home ed mum who came up with the concept suggests. It is interspersed with physical activity, fun stuff like making raw fudge and some fairly dry maths worksheets from enchanted learning etc. However, we take an autonomous approach to this work and other classes that they attend in that they are free to decide whether or not they want to do it. This is based on the belief that if you don’t want to study something then it is unlikely that any worthwhile lesson will be learnt.

Do you have an educational philosophy?
I do have an educational philosophy. I even wrote it down when I was young and feverish about home education. I can’t remember much of what was written but it has boiled down to a sense now that I want my children to grow up with a sense of freedom and a belief that anything is possible. I also want them to question everything. Oh and to be able to listen to their own bodies and follow their own daily rhythms, rather than those suggested by the state.

Do you follow a curriculum or particular programme?
I go through phases of getting excited about systems and programmes, though I have lacked the ability to actually follow one. I like to look at the Five in a Row website and even treated myself to the book outlining the programme for 8-12 year olds recently but as predicted it hasn’t got further than me reading it and getting all excited about the possibilities – the organised projects, the neat workbooks etc. Then real life surfaces through the daydream and I remember that my children are mostly happier poking sticks in the fire, and setting up a charcoal making workshop than ticking neat little boxes.

Do you have a space set aside for home education?
This is something that I have always longed to create. I read Amanda Soule’s The Creative Family book and cried at the wonderful gift she gives to her children, in making SPACE for them and their interests. We have a dresser full of art equipment and projects in progress called “The Home Ed Cupboard” and the boxes take up an inordinate amount of space but this is in the office so it doesn’t really count. I wonder what a whole room would look like? When the girls were much younger I used to browse through the pages of the Community Playthings catalogue and look longingly at the handcrafted wooden desks and chairs made by an Amish community not far from here. Now, I think about an art studio out in the woods, filled with ideas and inspiration. Dream on, dreamer!

What does a typical home ed day entail in your house?
There is no such thing as a typical home ed day – why did we ask this silly silly question? In retrospect, I’m sorry. Sometimes, mornings workboxes and afternoons a cycle ride, trip out with friends, home ed group, art class or french lesson. Lots and lots of eating and a serious amount of play.

What are your children interested in and how do you foster those interests?
My eldest is interested in most things at the moment. She loves reading and has recently started expanding her reading choices beyond Jaqueline Wilson and the Lady Grace Mysteries to take in Mrs Frisby and the Rats of Nimh, Little Women and the Railway Children for example. She wants to be an author. In terms of fostering her interest, I make sure that some of the projects in her workboxes push the boundaries and get her thinking about new ideas and concepts. She is very good at pushing her own boundaries however and is v self-motivated.
Her younger sister is into more physical pursuits – she loves moving her body, playing instruments, cooking etc. I try and make sure that she gets a good dose of high octane activity everyday. I also make sure to make her boxes appealing to her sense of fun rather than relying on worksheets etc. She has recently decided that she would like to be a designer who lives in a caravan so she is drawing and creating a great deal at the moment.

Are there any particular skills that you would you like your children to gain from their home education?
There are lots of things that I would like my children to take from their home education – I think a sense of responsibility for self is very important. A knowledge of basic survival skills – how to make clothes, grow and cook food etc. How to be self reliant – emotionally as well as physically. And also the importance of deep connection with others. I’d like them to learn a new approach to maths that is both creative and practical. I love the concept of art within mathematics and the incredible structure of nature for example. I also want my daughters to have an understanding of living maths too though – things like running a business and managing household finances etc. Mostly I want them to have a thirst for knowledge and an understanding that we create our own reality – literally life is what we make it.

What does home ed look like in your house? Write and tell us and your story could be in our next issue!

Posted by Melissa Corkhill at 17:43 | 2 comments
Tagged as: home education, magazine
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Aug 05 2010

Off to Big Chill

We’re off to Big Chill in the morning so I thought I’d post a quick update before we go. Had an amazing time last year and am looking forward to experiencing some more good stuff this weekend.

Last year we cried to Lamb, discovered Steve Judd, watched a crystal healing and contemplated whether the sun is a conscious being. Other highlights were of course Orbital, the healing space and magical ambient tent hidden in a woody clearing.

The lowlights were mainly the loos, which were quite disappointing after a weekend at Sunrise Celebration and even Camp Bestival, both fully equipped with compost toilets. Perhaps they’ll have upped the green ante for 2010. On their website the green section suggests taking a coach as the cleanest method of transport closely followed by a carful of people, which is greener than a train, and advises festival goers to purchase a tent from the green tent company (Or perhaps borrow one off your mate).

Have had a great day finishing off sections of the Oct/Nov edition of The Green Parent and starting to take a look at new publication Green Events, which Jez and I are now officially the publishers of – woohoo! For the next edition of TGP we are doing a readers tried and tested with raw chocolate and we have been sent some to photograph for the feature from the lovely Jennie at Detox Your World, Lisa at the Raw Chocolate Company and also Emma at Consious Chocolate (my favouritest favourite of all raw choc bars ever!) so our office smells absolutely out of this world divine. It’s a hard knock life! Actually it’s blissful and lush and I’m loving it right now. So a big thank you to the ladies that have aided and abetted my wallowing in raw chocolate state.

Interested what the food will be like at Big Chill – have packed some superfood crackers and a basket of fruit to take with us and after that it’s pretty much what’s available on the stands – so let’s hope there are lots of adventurous vegan chefs who like experimenting with raw food. In a couple of weeks time we are going to Sunrise Off-Grid, which promises the Buddhafield Cafe and Pachamamas. Then in September we are going to Out of the Ordinary, which is just down the road from us.

I also really fancy Rivenstone on Dartmoor at the beginning of September with the lush and super earthy Carolyn Hillyer and also a yoga festival that I just got wind of around the Equinox, called the Yoga Groove Festival, which is based in Seaford, East Sussex.

So anyway, better go and pack some festival kit. Where are you off to this summer? Share your favourite festivals here…

Posted by Melissa Corkhill at 18:16 | 2 comments
Tagged as: events, festivals, magazine
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Aug 02 2010

Happy Monday

I’m sitting at my desk eating raw chocolate torte and trying to work out how I can get all my work squeezed into the first half of the week so that I can go and play at Big Chill this weekend. The line up looks super awesome and I’m very excited about going but it does mean a few hurdles to leap before Friday.

We have just two weeks left to finish the October edition of The Green Parent – it’s looking splendid already and there’s heaps of diverse, exciting articles in there but quite a lot still to be written so am beavering away while my girls are at Forest School for a week.

The pressures have been soothed considerably by some luscious raw chocolate torte made by a gorgeous friend of mine who has become our Raw Food Mistress. She supplies incredible cake, crackers and bread for us each week, all bursting with vitality and goodness and handmade with love and intregrity. It’s such a brill arrangement – I can’t quite believe it!

Had an amazing weekend – got struck by powerful cleansing energies on Saturday and cleaned out the kitchen cupboards putting together a box of non vibrant foods to freecycle and setting up a cupboard for high vibrational foods such as superfoods and the like. Filled it with crystals too – feels really good and a little bit out there. He, he! Also had the last session of my year long yoga course – it was amazing and really beautiful. Sad to leave but also a really opening experience as I have many new friends as a result. One lent me a beautiful binding of the Upanishads, which I’m looking forward to getting stuck into once this issue is finished. There was lots of talk on the yoga course yesterday about Eat, Pray, Love – I read this recently and really enjoyed it. Elizabeth Gilbert is a talented writer and it’s a heart warming, inspirational read.

This morning the postman delivered some gorgeous organic balms from The Green Grocery. The Face and Neck Daily Treatment will apparently reduce fine wrinkles and make facial skin plumper and healthier. It’s got one of my favourite essential oils, vertiver in it and plenty of rosehip oil to help firm the skin. I’m going to try it out tonight and with any luck will get mistaken for a cool twenty something on the dance floor at Big Chill this weekend. Also received a magical book called Environmental Arts Therapy and the Tree of Life, which explores the year in terms of the Celtic calendar and how to create art and ritual to mark the turning year. The chapter on August begins with a description of the first harvest, Lammas; it encourages readers to cultivate gratitude by collecting first fruits. “Gather some around you,” writes Ian Siddons Heginworth, “a hazelnut in your pocket, a crab apple by your bed, and ash key slipped into your diary. Every time you see or touch them, give thanks for whatever you can think of. Family, health, love, new opportunitities, even the harsh lessons learned, there can be much that we take for granted. The more we give thanks for what we have the more we invite life to bless us.” So true! What are you thankful for today?

By the way the beautiful picture of the Bhagavad Gita that I have chosen to illustrate today’s post is from Hermandadblanca’s photostream on flickr.

Posted by Melissa Corkhill at 11:10 | 0 comments
Tagged as: books, raw food, work
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Welcome to the new blog from the Green Parent office. Here we'll talk about what's going on in the small and quite leafy headquarters of the UK's leading green lifestyle magazine. We'll share news that interests us and talk about green issues and natural parenting. We'll share advice and information from our own experiences of living a green lifestyle. And we'll even tell you what we are reading, eating, drinking and thinking. Hope you get plenty of food for thought here.