What learning looks like...

I'm the kind of person who worries about everything. I literally lose sleep over the smallest things and spend hours of my life planning for every eventuality. With home education, however, I'm starting to let that go a little. The main reason for beginning on our home ed journey was because we really felt that our son, at 4, was far too young to be starting at a school. Being away from us for such long days, being expected to follow rules and learn blind obedience, beginning to have structured lesson time included in his day... far too young for all these things. So it didn't make sense to begin a programme of learning at home which would have ticked all my anxiety-ridden achievement boxes of structure, order and routine. The only approach that made sense was just to carry on doing what we'd always done - play, read stories, discover stuff together, more play. Eighteen months later, that's still what we're doing - the difference now is that I'm confident that while we do this, the learning is happening spontaneously. Here's what our learning looks like:

Trips to the library are a favourite part of our week. The children spend a huge amount of time choosing a DVD for the week and less time choosing books - they both love reading but the DVD shelves are very enticing and they love this treat... My boy has always been very resistant to being directed. If I suggest reading, he always has a better plan. In the last few weeks, he's decided he really wants to learn to read - I think because he sees his friends reading - and is flying through books, reading every sign in sight and working very quickly through the Reading Eggs programme. That's the only thing we do that is a 'programme' of sorts, and he really enjoys it. He's got a flair for numbers and is very interested in maths, so although we do nothing formal there, just answering his questions is educational enough for both of us.

We spend a lot of time outdoors. We're very lucky that we're surrounded by amazing countryside and a brilliant home ed community, and we go to an all day outdoor learning group one day and a forest school another day. These are much more pleasant for me when the sun shines, but the children visibly gain so much from being engaged with nature and the land throughout the seasons. This experience inspires so many questions and ideas and I think their knowledge and understanding of the way the world works is certainly better - and more intuitive - than mine. This week we harvested beetroot and salad at one group, above, and made clay creatures at the other:

Our week also invariably involves a lot of bike riding. Again, we're lucky that we live somewhere that means we can just grab the bikes and go. Learning to ride confidently - over-confidently, sometimes! - has been wonderful for our boy, who whizzes around the bmx track in the nearby forest to the envy of children twice his age. Little sister is learning too, although often prefers chauffering her toys around in the basket of a very old trike. She's got a balance bike, which we didn't have for the others but it's working well for her and is interesting to see the different way of learning.

I didn't take pictures of the tantrums and bickering that are also a part of our week - they never feel particularly educational at the time, although I'm sure they are! I didn't take pictures of myself, watching them, exhausted, trying to summon up the energy and will to be the mother they deserve. I find pregnancy very draining and I'm desperately trying to boost my iron levels to stop the threats about refusing me a homebirth so this week I've spent a lot of time sitting, watching and going to bed early. I still feel lucky that life allows me to do this, that we have this flexibility and freedom within our days. And I'm sure that when I stop working as a childminder, in a couple of weeks, I'll be able to rest more and hopefully be more patient and relaxed again. For now though, this very informal approach to learning and to life means that I can muddle on, knowing that my children are learning incredible things everyday. And that feels good.