Today I learned about a fantastic give-away of Montessori materials.
Have a look: http://www.mommymoment.ca/2011/02/birthday-bash-montessori-print-shop.html
I have entered as well and hope for the best :-)
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Friday, June 26, 2009
education (also posted on my TCC blog)
So.... today I feel inspired. I need to write about education.
What is education and how does it happen.
Obviously not necessarily in a school setting or just on paper.
I find that a school education is inferior to a home education, the reason is that one on one education brings much more than education in a group setting where there is the same stuff educated by one person to a group of on average about 30 children. I do think that that will not bring the best of results.
We educate a group of 4ish children. Our youngest is 1 and is learning on her own, she does not need any help. Which is the way the majority of people let a 1 year old learn. Nothing wrong with that right? So why does it all of a sudden become wrong when they become 4, I find that amazing as a child learns more the first 4 years of their life, than ever after.
Now how does learning work you might wonder.
With having 4 children and the oldest being 14 I have seen from upclose how learning works.
Nor really on paper. Doing things makes it a lot more clear to kids.
Maths for instance is learned much quicker and faster in the real world. This involves shopping and cooking.
Biology, outside looking at the plants, going to the zoo, brings so much more than just pictures in a book.
Chemistry, love that, experiments, that really gives a clear picture :)
And then geography. There I have a wish, traveling the world, okay, not reasonable for us, so we just learn a lot from films and going outside checking out how the land has been used and what uses are for what, that is really working out superb, for lack of traveling the world :)
So what else do we have for things to do.
There are great projects to do with the kids once they express a certain interest in for instance a certain country. That is just totally cool.
What we love doing is picking a country and then working through it in various ways.
We go for the history and the present and th future, we discuss it and read about it, watch DVD's about it etc.
Then we go for the food from that country, make it, and eat it, not just the present food, but also the old stuff. F.i. the Roman food was really really good.
And then we check out the plants and animals from that particular country, that can be amazingly interesting, also the past if we can find it,as in some countries there have been animals going extinct. When possible we go look at those in a museum, or check out the alive ones in the zoo. A botanical garden is great for looking at the plants actually originating from that particular country.
What else is there, there is music of old and new from the country, the language, the perfumes, the scents of flowers, the religious of old and new, etc.
I am sure this gives a good picture of how I feel education works.
So what did we do with the Italy:
Latin (and we have continued as its a great language) and compare it to Italian and other langauges.
the food of then and now and ate it.
the animals of then and now
the religion of then and now including the etruscan
how the romans conquered europe, where they went.
the culture of then and now, including the etruscans
the contacts with the greeks and egyptians
we went to musea to see things
This is a similar way that young children learn, touch, feel and try, so why all of a sudden work only on boring paper, and take the fun out of learning.
Learning needs to be fun, as it needs to last a life time. When I look at kids in school its amazing how bored they are with learning. Most will not touch anything that has something to do with learning as soon as they are done with it. I find that sad and do not want that for my children.
I also do not want them to think that I have the ultimate wisdom, or a teacher has the ultimate wisdom. I want them to question me and things, so they learn. There are so many things that I learned in school as a child that really are not a given fact, but it was presented that way.
Even history, you'd expect that to be factual, but unfortunately with new research and different researchers with different thoughts and opinions plenty is really not a given fact.
Take for example the dark ages, those are taught in school as a given fact, but then there are researchers who have w written books with very good arguments that the dark ages have not happened, as in the dark ages there was no progress, this is not the way humans live. They argue that the dark ages were an invention by an emperor who wanted to base his right to the crown on ancestry, which wasn't there.
That kind of questioning is very important for children to learn to do, it keeps them inquisitive and curious.
I also do not believe in grades or rewards or so.
This does not bring a child an interest in the topic, but only in getting the reward or the grade, so they will not look into the topic in dept, just in fixing the score and then forgetting the lot again. Counterproductive I'd say.
Well folks, this is all for now, I take it you enjoyed the read :)
What is education and how does it happen.
Obviously not necessarily in a school setting or just on paper.
I find that a school education is inferior to a home education, the reason is that one on one education brings much more than education in a group setting where there is the same stuff educated by one person to a group of on average about 30 children. I do think that that will not bring the best of results.
We educate a group of 4ish children. Our youngest is 1 and is learning on her own, she does not need any help. Which is the way the majority of people let a 1 year old learn. Nothing wrong with that right? So why does it all of a sudden become wrong when they become 4, I find that amazing as a child learns more the first 4 years of their life, than ever after.
Now how does learning work you might wonder.
With having 4 children and the oldest being 14 I have seen from upclose how learning works.
Nor really on paper. Doing things makes it a lot more clear to kids.
Maths for instance is learned much quicker and faster in the real world. This involves shopping and cooking.
Biology, outside looking at the plants, going to the zoo, brings so much more than just pictures in a book.
Chemistry, love that, experiments, that really gives a clear picture :)
And then geography. There I have a wish, traveling the world, okay, not reasonable for us, so we just learn a lot from films and going outside checking out how the land has been used and what uses are for what, that is really working out superb, for lack of traveling the world :)
So what else do we have for things to do.
There are great projects to do with the kids once they express a certain interest in for instance a certain country. That is just totally cool.
What we love doing is picking a country and then working through it in various ways.
We go for the history and the present and th future, we discuss it and read about it, watch DVD's about it etc.
Then we go for the food from that country, make it, and eat it, not just the present food, but also the old stuff. F.i. the Roman food was really really good.
And then we check out the plants and animals from that particular country, that can be amazingly interesting, also the past if we can find it,as in some countries there have been animals going extinct. When possible we go look at those in a museum, or check out the alive ones in the zoo. A botanical garden is great for looking at the plants actually originating from that particular country.
What else is there, there is music of old and new from the country, the language, the perfumes, the scents of flowers, the religious of old and new, etc.
I am sure this gives a good picture of how I feel education works.
So what did we do with the Italy:
Latin (and we have continued as its a great language) and compare it to Italian and other langauges.
the food of then and now and ate it.
the animals of then and now
the religion of then and now including the etruscan
how the romans conquered europe, where they went.
the culture of then and now, including the etruscans
the contacts with the greeks and egyptians
we went to musea to see things
This is a similar way that young children learn, touch, feel and try, so why all of a sudden work only on boring paper, and take the fun out of learning.
Learning needs to be fun, as it needs to last a life time. When I look at kids in school its amazing how bored they are with learning. Most will not touch anything that has something to do with learning as soon as they are done with it. I find that sad and do not want that for my children.
I also do not want them to think that I have the ultimate wisdom, or a teacher has the ultimate wisdom. I want them to question me and things, so they learn. There are so many things that I learned in school as a child that really are not a given fact, but it was presented that way.
Even history, you'd expect that to be factual, but unfortunately with new research and different researchers with different thoughts and opinions plenty is really not a given fact.
Take for example the dark ages, those are taught in school as a given fact, but then there are researchers who have w written books with very good arguments that the dark ages have not happened, as in the dark ages there was no progress, this is not the way humans live. They argue that the dark ages were an invention by an emperor who wanted to base his right to the crown on ancestry, which wasn't there.
That kind of questioning is very important for children to learn to do, it keeps them inquisitive and curious.
I also do not believe in grades or rewards or so.
This does not bring a child an interest in the topic, but only in getting the reward or the grade, so they will not look into the topic in dept, just in fixing the score and then forgetting the lot again. Counterproductive I'd say.
Well folks, this is all for now, I take it you enjoyed the read :)
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Been busy
Lately we have been quite busy meeting up with other HE groups here in Switzerland.
There is a group that is located in the Romandie where there are a lot of English speakers in there. That group is meeting in the canton of Vaud quite regularly, 3x in June on a Friday.
The other left over Friday we met up with a German speaking group of Swiss homeschoolers about a educational coop. That part looks really promising. The homeschoolers are quite a tight knit group, as far as I can see and they are all very friendly and helpful.
There is a group that is located in the Romandie where there are a lot of English speakers in there. That group is meeting in the canton of Vaud quite regularly, 3x in June on a Friday.
The other left over Friday we met up with a German speaking group of Swiss homeschoolers about a educational coop. That part looks really promising. The homeschoolers are quite a tight knit group, as far as I can see and they are all very friendly and helpful.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Paul Klee
Short before going to the Neat Baustelle we went to the Paul Klee Center.
Paul Klee was an artist in the Bern area and in this center you see a lot of his work, but you can also take an art workshop.
We did both, we went to look to some of his work in the exhibition area, this was very interesting as he has used a lot of techniques. He also had to make do with the supplies he could get his hands on and had to make a lot of things himself, as he lives in war times when there was very little available. The tour of the exhibition are was during our work in the workshop, as things had to dry a bit.
The workshop was also very interesting as we learned a lot about techniques than can be used. All attending made interesting pieces of art :-)
I will see if I can make a pic of it and put it on here :-)
Paul Klee was an artist in the Bern area and in this center you see a lot of his work, but you can also take an art workshop.
We did both, we went to look to some of his work in the exhibition area, this was very interesting as he has used a lot of techniques. He also had to make do with the supplies he could get his hands on and had to make a lot of things himself, as he lives in war times when there was very little available. The tour of the exhibition are was during our work in the workshop, as things had to dry a bit.
The workshop was also very interesting as we learned a lot about techniques than can be used. All attending made interesting pieces of art :-)
I will see if I can make a pic of it and put it on here :-)
Neat Baustelle
Recently we have been to the construction site of NEAT, this is the construction site of the new tunnel through the Gotthard mountain. The site is massive, the work they are doing that is really really impressive. The trip was really educational. A lot was explained on how it all works and why.
Here you can see it: http://www.alptransit.ch/de/besuchen-sie-uns/infozentren/erstfeld/
We had a presentation about the building and we had a tour through the area of the construction site. Unfortunately we couldn't go into the tunnel as our group of homeschoolers had too many children under 14 years of age in there, which was a pity.
What was hard for us in particular was that this site is in the canton Uri, there they speak very different Swiss German from our local area, which is already not easy, so we had trouble understanding initially, but we weren't the only ones, therefore they asked if the presenter could please speak school german, so everybody could understand :-)
Here you can see it: http://www.alptransit.ch/de/besuchen-sie-uns/infozentren/erstfeld/
We had a presentation about the building and we had a tour through the area of the construction site. Unfortunately we couldn't go into the tunnel as our group of homeschoolers had too many children under 14 years of age in there, which was a pity.
What was hard for us in particular was that this site is in the canton Uri, there they speak very different Swiss German from our local area, which is already not easy, so we had trouble understanding initially, but we weren't the only ones, therefore they asked if the presenter could please speak school german, so everybody could understand :-)
Thursday, January 08, 2009
Switzerland
Recently we moved to the Canton Bern in Switzerland.
As we are a homeschooling family I found that this seems to be much more problematic than it was in the UK.
We need to find us a teacher who is willing to supervise us, as neither of us has a teaching degree - like that makes any difference.
Furthermore, it seems that we will have to resort to school-at-home now, which is not something I am looking forward to.
I started with school-at-home when we had just taken the children out of school as I had no clue how else to do it and this was a disaster. The kids weren't happy and neither was I. It was way way way too stressful.
We continued with unschooling and that proved to be very successful and didn't cause any stress. The result is that the kids are way way way "ahead" in some area's and "behind" in other area's.
In the past here in this canton children who were homeschooled had to be tested yearly based on the cantonal curriculum and they weren't allowed to to fail or they had to go back to school. They also had to show their worked, again needing to follow the work required bythe cantonal curriculum.
No wonder there are few homeschoolers around here.
They changed this law in August 2008, but did put the requirement of having a teacher supervise when you do not have a teachers degree (a full-time study of 4 years, not possible to do with distance learning - have thought about getting it), though nobody knows what this teacher will have to do.
Somehow it sounds more free depending on the teacher you choose, but it did get me pretty jumpy.
One of my kids is severely dyslexic and has a load of trouble with reading and writing, though she speaks 3 languages fluently. This could be used against us. She is also on the autistic spectrum, no clue how they feel about that.
In total where we live, our apartment and all its really nice, but this part has gotten me stressed for the moment. And it has resulted in me thinking about this school-at-home more and more unfortunately.
Well..... if all else fails we can always move to Aargau, which seems to be the most free canton of all.
As we are a homeschooling family I found that this seems to be much more problematic than it was in the UK.
We need to find us a teacher who is willing to supervise us, as neither of us has a teaching degree - like that makes any difference.
Furthermore, it seems that we will have to resort to school-at-home now, which is not something I am looking forward to.
I started with school-at-home when we had just taken the children out of school as I had no clue how else to do it and this was a disaster. The kids weren't happy and neither was I. It was way way way too stressful.
We continued with unschooling and that proved to be very successful and didn't cause any stress. The result is that the kids are way way way "ahead" in some area's and "behind" in other area's.
In the past here in this canton children who were homeschooled had to be tested yearly based on the cantonal curriculum and they weren't allowed to to fail or they had to go back to school. They also had to show their worked, again needing to follow the work required bythe cantonal curriculum.
No wonder there are few homeschoolers around here.
They changed this law in August 2008, but did put the requirement of having a teacher supervise when you do not have a teachers degree (a full-time study of 4 years, not possible to do with distance learning - have thought about getting it), though nobody knows what this teacher will have to do.
Somehow it sounds more free depending on the teacher you choose, but it did get me pretty jumpy.
One of my kids is severely dyslexic and has a load of trouble with reading and writing, though she speaks 3 languages fluently. This could be used against us. She is also on the autistic spectrum, no clue how they feel about that.
In total where we live, our apartment and all its really nice, but this part has gotten me stressed for the moment. And it has resulted in me thinking about this school-at-home more and more unfortunately.
Well..... if all else fails we can always move to Aargau, which seems to be the most free canton of all.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Conversation with a school child.
Last year one of my children had a conversation with Clara who lives in our neighbourhood.
Clara and her brother Mike were trampling mushrooms to pieces, which my children didn't like, so my oldest went up to them and asked them to stop wrecking nature for no good reason.
The Clara stated that it was important to trample mushrooms because mushrooms are a hazard to nature.
My child replies: "Mushrooms are nature you dope, the crisp bag and plastic bottle you just threw down are a hazard to nature." and left it at that.
Clara and her brother Mike were trampling mushrooms to pieces, which my children didn't like, so my oldest went up to them and asked them to stop wrecking nature for no good reason.
The Clara stated that it was important to trample mushrooms because mushrooms are a hazard to nature.
My child replies: "Mushrooms are nature you dope, the crisp bag and plastic bottle you just threw down are a hazard to nature." and left it at that.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
CBBC educational?
This afternoon there is a feature on CBBC about the nutrition of the caveman on tv. I figured that would be massively interesting. And its sure food for conversation as we found out there are several things mentioned in there which are simply not true.
One of them is that the caveman in the UK valued the rabbit meat. This surprising as the rabbit is not native to the UK, so how can the caveman in the UK have eaten rabbits then, when the vikings brought them over, or were the vikings historically before the caveman in the timeline??
So this is simply not true.
Just like hares weren't in the UK until the Romans, which means that hares were there before rabbits even. And in the time of the Romans there were no caveman anymore.
Besides the rabbits wouldn't have been valued that much as the meat is way way way too lean for the caveman to stay healthy on. They needed the fat from other animal sources and they made sure they got it, as the caveman was healthier than the majority of humans in the western world today.
The other thing that was mentioned is that the caveman first ate its food raw. Sure, very healthy. Then the comment came that by the time the caveman discovered fire there was a boost in healthy. I doubt that very much.
Of course there were more different types of food that became to the caveman, but those were not necessarily boosting its health. Its not for nothing that these days people are going back to the caveman diet to become more healthy, as simply their food was very very healthy.
There was also a fear mongering bit in there about eating meat raw, even my kids know there is nothing wrong with that and they started complaining to the tv :-)
So much for educational tv. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. It became clear to me again that I have to be with them when they watch something "educational" to make sure they also get the other side of the politically correct story.
I keep being surprised about all the inconsistencies.
Good that they didn't go on about the caveman only becoming about 30 and then mentioning in the same phrase that girls didn't get their periods until 16, 17 or 18 and that is the reason why women get more cancer these days in the reproductive system as they get their periods earlier and earlier and are therefore exposed to the hormones much longers.
UGH??? How can that be, mom dies at 30, but you weren't born until she was like 17, so you are 13 when she dies, how can mankind have survived then?
As you are with yr 13 the oldest, the rest must be much younger.
Its soooo stupid those comments.
There is research that shows that stone age people didn't go through puberty like humans today and reached adulthood by about the age of 12 to 13, but then the periods must have come sooner to women and not like around 16, 17. Because that doesn't make any sense then at all.
In a way I am convinced that its all still quite a lot of guess work in stead of real factual stuff, as its very difficult to find real information, as nobody wrote anything down.
I am, however, convinced that the paleolithic diet was a healthy one and that it was not the diet which made people die very young, there must have been more that had to do with it. And maybe it was just more genetically and that we grew older with the centuries.
Whatever was the real truth, its definitely great conversation material with the kids and they keep digging and digging to find out what scientists have come up with :-)
One of them is that the caveman in the UK valued the rabbit meat. This surprising as the rabbit is not native to the UK, so how can the caveman in the UK have eaten rabbits then, when the vikings brought them over, or were the vikings historically before the caveman in the timeline??
So this is simply not true.
Just like hares weren't in the UK until the Romans, which means that hares were there before rabbits even. And in the time of the Romans there were no caveman anymore.
Besides the rabbits wouldn't have been valued that much as the meat is way way way too lean for the caveman to stay healthy on. They needed the fat from other animal sources and they made sure they got it, as the caveman was healthier than the majority of humans in the western world today.
The other thing that was mentioned is that the caveman first ate its food raw. Sure, very healthy. Then the comment came that by the time the caveman discovered fire there was a boost in healthy. I doubt that very much.
Of course there were more different types of food that became to the caveman, but those were not necessarily boosting its health. Its not for nothing that these days people are going back to the caveman diet to become more healthy, as simply their food was very very healthy.
There was also a fear mongering bit in there about eating meat raw, even my kids know there is nothing wrong with that and they started complaining to the tv :-)
So much for educational tv. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. It became clear to me again that I have to be with them when they watch something "educational" to make sure they also get the other side of the politically correct story.
I keep being surprised about all the inconsistencies.
Good that they didn't go on about the caveman only becoming about 30 and then mentioning in the same phrase that girls didn't get their periods until 16, 17 or 18 and that is the reason why women get more cancer these days in the reproductive system as they get their periods earlier and earlier and are therefore exposed to the hormones much longers.
UGH??? How can that be, mom dies at 30, but you weren't born until she was like 17, so you are 13 when she dies, how can mankind have survived then?
As you are with yr 13 the oldest, the rest must be much younger.
Its soooo stupid those comments.
There is research that shows that stone age people didn't go through puberty like humans today and reached adulthood by about the age of 12 to 13, but then the periods must have come sooner to women and not like around 16, 17. Because that doesn't make any sense then at all.
In a way I am convinced that its all still quite a lot of guess work in stead of real factual stuff, as its very difficult to find real information, as nobody wrote anything down.
I am, however, convinced that the paleolithic diet was a healthy one and that it was not the diet which made people die very young, there must have been more that had to do with it. And maybe it was just more genetically and that we grew older with the centuries.
Whatever was the real truth, its definitely great conversation material with the kids and they keep digging and digging to find out what scientists have come up with :-)
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Fixed it
In the meantime I managed to fix it that way that the document that I have made is open for viewing for all. This means I will stop updating the blog post on the topic, as the document can be accessed through the link on the right side bar.
I have added the link from Germany and would love it if people would send me more links and information to expand this list. I would like to make quite a comprehensive list out of this and hope that with that other parents will have easy access to information, which most of the people who are home educating now have probably not had.
I have added the link from Germany and would love it if people would send me more links and information to expand this list. I would like to make quite a comprehensive list out of this and hope that with that other parents will have easy access to information, which most of the people who are home educating now have probably not had.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Home schooling
Home schooling around the world
Europe
In most countries of Europe it is legal to home school your child.
Austria
It is legal in all the 9 Austrian
provinces. It is not common, on the German languaged e-mail lists I
have been on I haven't met many, although there is a homeschooling
Yahoo group now. One of the requirements in some provinces
is that children follow the state curriculum and take an exam at the end of each school year.
weblinks (in German):
http://www.erziehung.at/haeuslicher_unterricht/index.php
http://www.diefreilerner.eu
http://www.zickler.net/homeschooling.htm
http://www.leben-ohne-schule.de/europa_oesterreich.html
http://leben-ohne-schule.jimdo.com/
http://jipli.free.fr/oesterreich
Yahoo group:
http://de/groups.yahoo.com/group/homeschooling_austria/
Belgium
Completely legal, usually with a yearly visit by a government official,
which is typically mainly about whether the children are socializing
enough and happy with being home schooled, not so much about their
educational achievements, although there are officially some rules to
that extent. I haven't heard of anyone who ended up with real problems
about the educational achievements on the various Dutch languaged
e-mail groups I am on.
Weblink (in Dutch):
http://www.thuisonderwijs.be/
and one in English
http://users.skynet.be/bcha/
Bulgaria
Illegal. Some special needs children get an exemption, but they will still have to follow the state curriculum.
Compulsory education age: 6-16
Cyprus
Illegal - penalties can be given.
Czech Republic
Five-year experimental federal law (began in 1999)
allows home education only ages 5-12.
No clue what things are at now.
Denmark
Legal. At present no further data
Finland
Legal
e-mail:Anne Lappalainen
France
Legal
Les enfants d'abord (since 1988) has been working very hard in France
to make things easier on parents who are home educating. It has become
a lot easier over the years. There are people who are also unschooling
there now. This was in the past not possible, parents had to following
the school curriculum.
Weblink:
http://www.lesenfantsdabord.org/eindex.html (English)
http://www.lesenfantsdabord.org/index.php (French)
Yahoo group:
http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/IEF_eu
Jean-Claude Verduyckt
Germany
Illegal, at the moment there is an exodus going
on of people leaving the country as children have been taken away from
their parents and other problems.
Educational age: 6-16
Weblink:
http://educatinggermany.7doves.com/
Greece
At present still illegal, although foreigners get
left alone usually. They are working on getting it legal though. No
clue where they are with this right now.
Hungaria
Legal, but uncommon. There is a "duty to learn", not to go to school. The parents have the right to choose the place of learning.
The parent can choose between schools (state or private), or to have its child be registered as "magantanulo", which means "private learner".
In practise, one has to be registered at a school, as a pupil who is attending, or who is private learner. It is the decision of the director, in which way he wants to verify the pupil is learning, mostly they choose exams.
The lawtext:
http://net.jogtar.hu/jr/gen/getdoc.cgi?docid=99300079.tv
Please copy and paste the above link, otherwise it doesn't seem to work.
Although the law is liberal, homeschooling uncommon. There are school directors, who don't know about it, or at least they don't like it. The reason for this is, that for private learners, the school is not obtaining any funding. For learners at school, they get a certain amount/pupil.
Italy
Legal, but uncommon. Parents have to report to the schools, as you will
have to enroll your child in the school, but then you keep them out and
educate yourself. Foreigners who are not familiar with it, can often
stay out of that system altogether. In case you cannot stay out of it,
it is good to go around the various local school and interview the
principal to get a feel on how the principal feels about home schooling
and pick the school of which the principal suits you best :-) The
principal has to handle your home schooling paperwork.
Unschooling is very difficult, after elementary school. In year 8 there
is an intense exam. Some children, who are not ready, can wait a year.
MSN board for English speakers:
http://communities.msn.com/HomeschoolingFamiliesinItaly
Italian christian home schooling website: http://www.utilecomune.com
Italian language Yahoo group: http://it.groups.yahoo.com/group/scuolafamiliare
Ireland
Legal.
Weblink to the Irish home schoolers organisation:http://www.henireland.org/
Compulsory education age: 6-16
Luxemburg
illegal
Netherlands
Legal, but uncommon and sometimes difficult.
Officially illegal as soon as one has had their child in school the school year before school starts again.
When parents have not had their children in school yet, they can go for
an exemption based on religion. This means that there should not be any
school or their religion within reach. So parents have to come up with
an uncommon religion.
Once a child has been in school it is seen that the parents have made a
choice for a particular religion or lack there of in public schools and
it is not easy to change your mind on that.
This can result in court cases. Usually parents do end up having their
children home schooled, but it can take some money, work and stress.
weblink: http://www.lereninvrijheid.nl/index2.html
weblink for the national organisation: http://www.nvvto.nl
weblink: http://www.thuisonderwijs.net
http://www.thuisonderwijs.com
Compulsory education age: 5-18
Norway
Legal and on the increase, though still small.
Weblink: http://folk.uio.no/cbeck/OTH%20in%20English1.htm
e-mail: oth@bdd.no
Poland & Baltic States
Legal, but only when permission is granted
Portugal
Legal. The school system has problems and therefore they are happy to have children educated at home.
Russia
No data at present
Slovakia
No data at present
Spain
Legal. Protected under article 27, section 1 under the Spanish
constitution, however for some families things are made difficult.
weblink to national organisation: http://educacionlibre.org/inicimarc.htm (in Spanish - started in 2002)
Sweden
It is legal and there are rules which aren't always easy to take.
Sometimes parents have to get permission. Things differ per
municipality. It is very uncommon.
My Alternative to School (MATS) is the Swedish organisation.
E-mail: katarina.jadinge@translateit.pp.se
Postal address:
MATS
Katarina Jadinge,
Pl 2199,
370 10 Brakne-Hoby
SWEDEN
Switzerland
Legal in most cantons. Things are very
different per canton. It varies from being totally illegal in Ticino,
parents needing to have a teachers degree in Basel, to parents needing
a teacher to supervise them in Bern, to totally freedom in Aargau.
An overview of which canton has what requirements is here:
http://www.cruxmove.com/SwissHomeSchooling.htm (english)
however, this could potentially be out of date.
A list with all Cantons: http://www.cruxmove.com/kantonalSummary.html (english)
Weblink to homeschool association of Switzerland: http://www.homeschool.ch/en_index.html (english)
This is a weblink to a parents lobby for freedom of educational choice: http://www.elternlobby.ch/deutsch/ (german)
Forum in French and English: http://nyonweb.ch/homeschool/index.php?lng=en
weblink: http://www.leben-ohne-schule.de/europa_schweiz.html (german)
Compulsory educational age: 6-16
United Kingdom
Legal in England, Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland. Laws can
differ a big between the 4. In case exams will be done there are 2 ways
of going about it, one is the standard GCSE's & A-levels, the other
is going through the Asdan & Cope system.
The local education authority can be in contact with parents about
visits / reports, but when a child has not been in school before, they
are likely not to know about the family and will therefore not be in
contact, unless one gets reported in one way or the other.
National organisation weblink: http://www.education-otherwise.org
Mike Fortune-Wood:http://www.home-education.org.uk/
http://home-ed.info/
compulsory educational age: 6-16
Africa
Egypt
Ethiopia
Morrocco
Sudan
America's
Canada
Legal
Guatemala
Mexico
USA
Legal
Asia
Bangladesh
Birma
China
India
Indonesia
Japan
Malaysia
Pakistan
Phillipines
Sri Lanka
Taiwan
Thailand
Turkey
Australia & New Zealand
Australia
Legal
New Zealand
Legal
Please do contact me in case you have any additional information, additional weblinks, find that weblinks don't work, etc.
Thanks very much!
Diana
Europe
In most countries of Europe it is legal to home school your child.
Austria
It is legal in all the 9 Austrian
provinces. It is not common, on the German languaged e-mail lists I
have been on I haven't met many, although there is a homeschooling
Yahoo group now. One of the requirements in some provinces
is that children follow the state curriculum and take an exam at the end of each school year.
weblinks (in German):
http://www.erziehung.at/haeuslicher_unterricht/index.php
http://www.diefreilerner.eu
http://www.zickler.net/homeschooling.htm
http://www.leben-ohne-schule.de/europa_oesterreich.html
http://leben-ohne-schule.jimdo.com/
http://jipli.free.fr/oesterreich
Yahoo group:
http://de/groups.yahoo.com/group/homeschooling_austria/
Belgium
Completely legal, usually with a yearly visit by a government official,
which is typically mainly about whether the children are socializing
enough and happy with being home schooled, not so much about their
educational achievements, although there are officially some rules to
that extent. I haven't heard of anyone who ended up with real problems
about the educational achievements on the various Dutch languaged
e-mail groups I am on.
Weblink (in Dutch):
http://www.thuisonderwijs.be/
and one in English
http://users.skynet.be/bcha/
Bulgaria
Illegal. Some special needs children get an exemption, but they will still have to follow the state curriculum.
Compulsory education age: 6-16
Cyprus
Illegal - penalties can be given.
Czech Republic
Five-year experimental federal law (began in 1999)
allows home education only ages 5-12.
No clue what things are at now.
Denmark
Legal. At present no further data
Finland
Legal
e-mail:Anne Lappalainen
France
Legal
Les enfants d'abord (since 1988) has been working very hard in France
to make things easier on parents who are home educating. It has become
a lot easier over the years. There are people who are also unschooling
there now. This was in the past not possible, parents had to following
the school curriculum.
Weblink:
http://www.lesenfantsdabord.org/eindex.html (English)
http://www.lesenfantsdabord.org/index.php (French)
Yahoo group:
http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/IEF_eu
Jean-Claude Verduyckt
Germany
Illegal, at the moment there is an exodus going
on of people leaving the country as children have been taken away from
their parents and other problems.
Educational age: 6-16
Weblink:
http://educatinggermany.7doves.com/
Greece
At present still illegal, although foreigners get
left alone usually. They are working on getting it legal though. No
clue where they are with this right now.
Hungaria
Legal, but uncommon. There is a "duty to learn", not to go to school. The parents have the right to choose the place of learning.
The parent can choose between schools (state or private), or to have its child be registered as "magantanulo", which means "private learner".
In practise, one has to be registered at a school, as a pupil who is attending, or who is private learner. It is the decision of the director, in which way he wants to verify the pupil is learning, mostly they choose exams.
The lawtext:
http://net.jogtar.hu/jr/gen/getdoc.cgi?docid=99300079.tv
Please copy and paste the above link, otherwise it doesn't seem to work.
Although the law is liberal, homeschooling uncommon. There are school directors, who don't know about it, or at least they don't like it. The reason for this is, that for private learners, the school is not obtaining any funding. For learners at school, they get a certain amount/pupil.
Italy
Legal, but uncommon. Parents have to report to the schools, as you will
have to enroll your child in the school, but then you keep them out and
educate yourself. Foreigners who are not familiar with it, can often
stay out of that system altogether. In case you cannot stay out of it,
it is good to go around the various local school and interview the
principal to get a feel on how the principal feels about home schooling
and pick the school of which the principal suits you best :-) The
principal has to handle your home schooling paperwork.
Unschooling is very difficult, after elementary school. In year 8 there
is an intense exam. Some children, who are not ready, can wait a year.
MSN board for English speakers:
http://communities.msn.com/HomeschoolingFamiliesinItaly
Italian christian home schooling website: http://www.utilecomune.com
Italian language Yahoo group: http://it.groups.yahoo.com/group/scuolafamiliare
Ireland
Legal.
Weblink to the Irish home schoolers organisation:http://www.henireland.org/
Compulsory education age: 6-16
Luxemburg
illegal
Netherlands
Legal, but uncommon and sometimes difficult.
Officially illegal as soon as one has had their child in school the school year before school starts again.
When parents have not had their children in school yet, they can go for
an exemption based on religion. This means that there should not be any
school or their religion within reach. So parents have to come up with
an uncommon religion.
Once a child has been in school it is seen that the parents have made a
choice for a particular religion or lack there of in public schools and
it is not easy to change your mind on that.
This can result in court cases. Usually parents do end up having their
children home schooled, but it can take some money, work and stress.
weblink: http://www.lereninvrijheid.nl/index2.html
weblink for the national organisation: http://www.nvvto.nl
weblink: http://www.thuisonderwijs.net
http://www.thuisonderwijs.com
Compulsory education age: 5-18
Norway
Legal and on the increase, though still small.
Weblink: http://folk.uio.no/cbeck/OTH%20in%20English1.htm
e-mail: oth@bdd.no
Poland & Baltic States
Legal, but only when permission is granted
Portugal
Legal. The school system has problems and therefore they are happy to have children educated at home.
Russia
No data at present
Slovakia
No data at present
Spain
Legal. Protected under article 27, section 1 under the Spanish
constitution, however for some families things are made difficult.
weblink to national organisation: http://educacionlibre.org/inicimarc.htm (in Spanish - started in 2002)
Sweden
It is legal and there are rules which aren't always easy to take.
Sometimes parents have to get permission. Things differ per
municipality. It is very uncommon.
My Alternative to School (MATS) is the Swedish organisation.
E-mail: katarina.jadinge@translateit.pp.se
Postal address:
MATS
Katarina Jadinge,
Pl 2199,
370 10 Brakne-Hoby
SWEDEN
Switzerland
Legal in most cantons. Things are very
different per canton. It varies from being totally illegal in Ticino,
parents needing to have a teachers degree in Basel, to parents needing
a teacher to supervise them in Bern, to totally freedom in Aargau.
An overview of which canton has what requirements is here:
http://www.cruxmove.com/SwissHomeSchooling.htm (english)
however, this could potentially be out of date.
A list with all Cantons: http://www.cruxmove.com/kantonalSummary.html (english)
Weblink to homeschool association of Switzerland: http://www.homeschool.ch/en_index.html (english)
This is a weblink to a parents lobby for freedom of educational choice: http://www.elternlobby.ch/deutsch/ (german)
Forum in French and English: http://nyonweb.ch/homeschool/index.php?lng=en
weblink: http://www.leben-ohne-schule.de/europa_schweiz.html (german)
Compulsory educational age: 6-16
United Kingdom
Legal in England, Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland. Laws can
differ a big between the 4. In case exams will be done there are 2 ways
of going about it, one is the standard GCSE's & A-levels, the other
is going through the Asdan & Cope system.
The local education authority can be in contact with parents about
visits / reports, but when a child has not been in school before, they
are likely not to know about the family and will therefore not be in
contact, unless one gets reported in one way or the other.
National organisation weblink: http://www.education-otherwise.org
Mike Fortune-Wood:http://www.home-education.org.uk/
http://home-ed.info/
compulsory educational age: 6-16
Africa
Egypt
Ethiopia
Morrocco
Sudan
America's
Canada
Legal
Guatemala
Mexico
USA
Legal
Asia
Bangladesh
Birma
China
India
Indonesia
Japan
Malaysia
Pakistan
Phillipines
Sri Lanka
Taiwan
Thailand
Turkey
Australia & New Zealand
Australia
Legal
New Zealand
Legal
Please do contact me in case you have any additional information, additional weblinks, find that weblinks don't work, etc.
Thanks very much!
Diana
Burned school
Today I received the news that the school, which my oldest 2 have attended for several years has burned.
This school managed to get my oldest child from being able to read and write little words at the age of 5 to regress to being illiterate at the age of 10.
May I be happy about this?
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Burning
One evening last week we ended up burning paper napkins, we experimented a bit with it, like one piece was burnt while it was just plain folded open and in a single layer, that was going really fast, one big woosh and gone.
Another piece was burnt folded, slower.
Another piece was unfolded, but rolled in a big cigar, that took a bit of time.
The longest took the piece that was folded and rolled up in a cigar, that was very compact and really took quite a bit of time.
Afterwards we discussed the hows, why's and what's to that whole process, including how the oxygen reaches better when not compact and all that stuff.
Another piece was burnt folded, slower.
Another piece was unfolded, but rolled in a big cigar, that took a bit of time.
The longest took the piece that was folded and rolled up in a cigar, that was very compact and really took quite a bit of time.
Afterwards we discussed the hows, why's and what's to that whole process, including how the oxygen reaches better when not compact and all that stuff.
Chicken :-)
A few days ago I was going to make a chicken broth. I prefer using chickens with the feet on for that as that gives more nutrients in the broth. So I got myself one and asked my partner to please cut it up a bit, so I could put it in the pan, otherwise the chicken was going to be too big to put in, and we do not need to see the feet sticking out all the time *g*.
Then he invited the kids to have a look at the chicken and a feel. So they came and were interested. The chicken got fairly well dissected on its way to the pan, some stuff was given to the dog, other pieces ended up going to really little pieces to see what was muscle tissue, what was fat tissue, what is bones, where are bones, why is the chest bone so different than a human chest bone. The works. It was really interesting and even our 5yo was totally fascinated by the chicken.
Then he invited the kids to have a look at the chicken and a feel. So they came and were interested. The chicken got fairly well dissected on its way to the pan, some stuff was given to the dog, other pieces ended up going to really little pieces to see what was muscle tissue, what was fat tissue, what is bones, where are bones, why is the chest bone so different than a human chest bone. The works. It was really interesting and even our 5yo was totally fascinated by the chicken.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Wonderful blog post
Today I read a post from someone else's blog. It was a post by the son of the woman who's blog it is.
He has been to school for 1 year, after having been unschooled before.
Here is the link: unschool versus school
Have fun reading, I sure did. It actually did take some of my concerns away :-)
He has been to school for 1 year, after having been unschooled before.
Here is the link: unschool versus school
Have fun reading, I sure did. It actually did take some of my concerns away :-)
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Education in the woods
Yesterday a friend of mine came over. She is very knowledgeable about plants that you can eat and stuff. She actually teaches it. We went into the woods near our house to have a walk there and see what there is to eat out there, there was quite a bit that you can eat or work with.
Clover flowers - in your salad
Stinging nettle - new tips of leaves in your salad, tea from the older leaves, use the older leaves as spinach, use the branches to make rope of.
Black berry - eat the fruit, eat the young leave tips, make tea out of the older leaves.
Duizendblad - eat the leaves in your salad, use them on wounds.
Dandelion leaves - in your salad
Bilberry's - eat the berries
Goat's willow - make things with the branches
Prickly coconut smelling bushes - flowers you can make wine of and put in your salad, they taste like coconut, but they have to be prickly.
Pine - the bark was used to extend rye & spelt flour by the vikings, like they do with soya now. I think I prefer the pine bark.
Birch - the sap can be used to make a nice wine of - tap the tree for 2 weeks in the end of march, no longer, coz that can damage the tree. Use the sap to make wine with. The pink colour of the bark has also been used as dye.
She also talked about quite some stuff that wasn't supposed to be in our woods, as they aren't native and are wrecking the soil or something like that.
Rhodondendron - comes from Asia and wrecks the soil
Hypericum - comes from Japan.
We talked about the grey squirrel, as that is a native to the US and outnumbering the UK native brown squirrel.
Furthermore we talked about rabbits, came with the vikings for food.
And hares, came with the Romans for food.
Neither of them native here basically. In the meantime they sort of are though.
The vikings used to use rabbits like we do chickens now, which are actually also not native, they come from Asia.
The kids enjoyed the talking very much, it was quite hands on, we tasted various things and found most of it tasting quite alright. The berries were all very good!
Clover flowers - in your salad
Stinging nettle - new tips of leaves in your salad, tea from the older leaves, use the older leaves as spinach, use the branches to make rope of.
Black berry - eat the fruit, eat the young leave tips, make tea out of the older leaves.
Duizendblad - eat the leaves in your salad, use them on wounds.
Dandelion leaves - in your salad
Bilberry's - eat the berries
Goat's willow - make things with the branches
Prickly coconut smelling bushes - flowers you can make wine of and put in your salad, they taste like coconut, but they have to be prickly.
Pine - the bark was used to extend rye & spelt flour by the vikings, like they do with soya now. I think I prefer the pine bark.
Birch - the sap can be used to make a nice wine of - tap the tree for 2 weeks in the end of march, no longer, coz that can damage the tree. Use the sap to make wine with. The pink colour of the bark has also been used as dye.
She also talked about quite some stuff that wasn't supposed to be in our woods, as they aren't native and are wrecking the soil or something like that.
Rhodondendron - comes from Asia and wrecks the soil
Hypericum - comes from Japan.
We talked about the grey squirrel, as that is a native to the US and outnumbering the UK native brown squirrel.
Furthermore we talked about rabbits, came with the vikings for food.
And hares, came with the Romans for food.
Neither of them native here basically. In the meantime they sort of are though.
The vikings used to use rabbits like we do chickens now, which are actually also not native, they come from Asia.
The kids enjoyed the talking very much, it was quite hands on, we tasted various things and found most of it tasting quite alright. The berries were all very good!
Friday, August 29, 2008
Viking Dork Normansson
Today we visited the museum to have a talk with Viking Dork Normansson. This was very nice, we had a great time. Its a very nice guy who re-enacts the viking and he is quite a good replica.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Adolf Hitler on BBC Exclusiv on Vox
This evening we are watching an episode of BBC Exclusiv on Vox.
Its very interesting, as its a historical piece on Adolf Hitler and the people who tried to kill him over the years of his ruling.
The people who wanted to kill him and how they ended if, if they did.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Flint knapping
Today we went to the museum in Camberley - the Surrey Heath Museum.
There was an exhibition organised where you could see flint knapping being performed by Karl Lee. This was extremely interesting, as he really showed us how several stone age time tools were made. He also made the tools with the tools that they used back then.
He explained to us that in some area's people who do flint knapping will use more modern tools, but he doesn't think the replica's made that way are real replica's.
Karl is an experimental archeologist. Therefore he makes replica's. There aren't many people in the world anymore who can do. Some people like the Aboriginals in Australia still do it, they didn't stop doing it. This is really cool, they are still doing it the authentic way there.
In the US there are only a handful of Native Americans left doing it as unfortunately their culture is slowly but carefully dying out. Which is a pity. Languages dying out as well, its such a shame, our planet was so rich in a big variety of cultures and languages and there is so much gone. Just like animals and plants, so much gone.
What we also discussed was the film Dances with wolves, as its a very educational film. It shows a lot of things very well and pretty accurate historically.
The next thing we discussed was the attitude of the white people back then towards the natives. They first tried to kill them all, but when the natives proved to be too clever they resorted to other measures, trying to kill all their food. This is also pretty clear in Dances with wolves as you can see in the film how the white people killed a load of buffalo's just for their hide and tongue, with no respect for animal, earth or fellow human being.
Its pretty rude if you ask me, to do what happened. The natives were friendly, fed the white people, invited them into their homes, next thing, the white people just take their homes.
Pretty sick minds were around then I would say.
The other thing that was really interesting that Karl had to say was that back in the stone age times people knew lots and lots more about which plants people could eat and which plants were good ad medicine. These days we eat such an incredibly small amount of plants, compared to the people back then.
What he also told us, was that people didn't get much older than about 30. I wonder about that, as I have read bits and pieces here and there where people state that girls have never started their periods sooner than now, so how could that be then, coz the kids that the people get have to grow up before they can take care of themselves.
So if periods didn't start until 16 to 18, and they would die at 30, their kids would be like 12 or so. Doesn't fully add up to me, so I have to look into that a lot more.
The other bit is that their diet was much much healthier than ours, so if we get as old as we get, how come they died so young. They did have good hygiene contrary to medieval times.
That is a topic for some time soon, coz the kids were also very interested in that.
I think this was really super cool. He explained so much to the kids, they could ask away, the kids enjoyed it tremendously. I also think he enjoyed their interest in it all. He talked about how people lived and hunted and everything that had something to do with that. Really great.
And then lateron I ran into the following article which really says it all.
The title is:
The Objective of Education Is Learning, Not Teaching
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2032Have a read, I really enjoyed reading the article.
Next week we will go the museum to talk to someone who knows tons about vikings and who re-enacts them. I think that is pretty cool as well.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Play dough
Cooked.
2 cups of plain flour
1 cup of salt
2 cups of water
2 tbsp of oil
2 teasp of cream of tartar
Food colouring
Put flour, salt and cream of tartar into a saucepan and mix. Add water, oil and, if wanted, colouring. Mix then cook over a low heat stirring continuously, until the dough is a
very lumpy consistency and isn't runny.
Turn out and knead, adding colouring if not added before. Beware it is very
hot.
Store in a plastic bag or plastic container.
2 cups of plain flour
1 cup of salt
2 cups of water
2 tbsp of oil
2 teasp of cream of tartar
Food colouring
Put flour, salt and cream of tartar into a saucepan and mix. Add water, oil and, if wanted, colouring. Mix then cook over a low heat stirring continuously, until the dough is a
very lumpy consistency and isn't runny.
Turn out and knead, adding colouring if not added before. Beware it is very
hot.
Store in a plastic bag or plastic container.
Papier-Mache Paste
1 cup water
1/4 cup flour
5 cups lightly boiling water
Large saucepan
Mix flour into 1 cup water until mixture is thin and runny. Stir this mixture into lightly boiling water. Gently boil and stir 2-3 minutes. Cool before using.
1/4 cup flour
5 cups lightly boiling water
Large saucepan
Mix flour into 1 cup water until mixture is thin and runny. Stir this mixture into lightly boiling water. Gently boil and stir 2-3 minutes. Cool before using.
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