A Magical Investigation: Part One

Excalibur!

Harry Potter!

The Neverending Story!

Folk of the Faraway Tree!

Bedknobs and Broomsticks!

Kids throughout the ages have been entranced by magical themes and all the mystery and endless possibilities that lie within them.

Why not utilise their fascination with this theme in your homeschooling plans? We've found that almost any learning area can be incorporated into a magical theme. In fact, it's quite easy to pick an activity and spice it up with magic terms and magical story to go along with it. It can change the potentially boring into something enticing and exciting!

Below are some of the activities that we have created, along a Magical Theme.

A Magical World
Creative writing, combined with art/craft.
Create your own magical world. Describe this world in a literary work.
Then, paint or build a scene depicting your magical world.

A Tapestry of Magic
A craft and creative writing activity.
Magic weaves a secret tapestry throughout the universe.
Design and make a wall hanging depicting a magical scene, symbol, or pattern using embroidery, patchwork, collage, weaving etc.
Write a story or descriptive article about your completed project.

A Wizards Guide
Creative writing, art and photography.
Make a guide book suitable for a wizard taking up a position as a teacher at a School of Magic.
Illustrate your guide with drawings and photographs.

Wand Cauldron
A creative craft activity.
Make a cauldron to keep your wands, fancy pencils etc in.

Broomstick Users Guide
An activity which uses creative writing, plus artistic illustration or photography.
Create a users guide for the latest broomstick.
Illustrate your guide with drawings, or posed photographs.
For an extra challenge, make a video version of the guide!

Famous Wizards
A creative writing project.
Write about a famous wizard in movies or books... or write a guide to several famous wizards.
you can even create your own wizard, and make him/her "famous" in your own work of fiction!

If Only They Were Wizards
A creative writing activity, using current affairs.
Find articles, in newspapers or magazines, which show muggles (non-magical beings) struggling with some situation or other.
Re-write it as it might have occurred if the main person had been magical instead!

The Great Gnome Caper
An imaginative photography activity.
Create a photographic display of what these magical little beings get up to while their owners are away!
You might even like to make your own paper mache gnome.

Wizard Totem Pole
This is an activity containing practical artistic and craft skills, geographical and historical elements.
Research traditional totem poles, their purpose and design.
Explore your own family history and your own talents and ideals.
Design and create your own totem pole!

Wizard Explorers
A creative writing activity, which also incorporates reading comprehension and mapping skills.
Read the journal exerpts of one of the greatest wizard explorers of all time! From these, create your own map of The Great Lost Lands! Fill in the missing journal entries to finish your map!

Have fun!

More to come in future posts!

HOW, WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, WHY?

How could you represent these concepts photographically?

Think about each of these words,what they could mean and how you could illustrate them.

Brainstorm some ideas, such as:

How?

How do you do it?

How is it made?

How does it work?

How many are there?

How could this happen?

How could I make it better?

What?

What is it?

What if...?

What does it mean?

What is it used for?

What next?

What on earth?!

When?

When did it occur?

When could you do that?

Where?

Where am I?

Where did it happen?

Where next?

Why?

Why not?

Why did it happen?

Why is it this way?

Now, decide what pictures you are going to take to represent each of the words... and go out and take them!

Display your pictures.

PHOTO HUNT

Grab your camera and go hunting- for some unique photos!

Try to make your photos something a little bit different, not just the obvious.

Once you've got the shots you need, make a display of them.
You could do a PowerPoint type presentation, a poster, or present them scrapbook style.

Can you take a photo to represent each of the following?

• Upside down
• Inside out
• Before and after
• Round and round
• Seeing is believing
• After the storm
• At the top
• Beneath the surface
• Why is it so?
• Less is more
• Too late
• Too soon
• That's life!
• Brute strength
• My hero
• Stating the obvious
• Do you see what I see?
• Happily ever after!

LIBRARIES FOR LEARNING

Libraries can be invaluable sources of all kinds of learning opportunities and resources.

Most homeschoolers visit their public library on a regular basis. But do you know just what a variety of services a library often provides? Here's some basics of what may be available, which of course will differ depending on your actual library.

• Book, books and more books! If it's not on the shelf, check the catalogue or ask a librarian. Some libraries have storage facilities, so not all the books available are in the actual library at one time. but you can request these items to be made available to you. Most libraries also have facilities for you to request to be put on a waiting list to borrow an item when it comes back from loan. Libraries will also try to obtain items for you, through inter library loans, or even purchasing the item, if it is thought to be of general interest. This can be a slow process, however, so not much good for urgent needs.
• Children and teens collections
• Large print books, for sight impaired.
• Magazines
• Newspapers
• Some library collections have various club newsletters
• CD ROMs
• CDs
• DVDs
• Videos
• Language Kits
• Audio Books
• Toy Library
• Engraving equipment
• Energy saving kits
• Electricity timers
• Pedometers
• Printing and photocopying
• Scanning
• Computers and internet
• Fax
• Laminating
• Badge machine
• Free home library service for housebound people
• Justice of the Peace service
• Community information
• Displays
• Book discussion groups
• Storytelling groups
• School holiday activities
• Guest speakers and visiting authors
• Library "Friends" groups
• Meeting rooms

Libraries are usually open most days of the year, though often not public holidays.
Home educators can make the most of using the library at less busy times, when other kids are at school.

A wealth of fascinating information about almost any topic, as well as imaginary happenings to get lost in, are at your fingertips!

WORLD MICRO GOLF CHALLENGE

Are your children budding golfers? Or even enthusiastic mini-golfers? Or do they just love games, and creating them?

This foray into geography might be just the thing to stimulate some creativity... and some learning about countries of the world!

Have your kids create a mini size golf course, to suit marbles or ball bearings…or even Jaffa’s… as golf balls.

Each hole should be made to represent a different country in some way. Have your children research what might be some of the most appropriate representations for each country, then narrow it down to one for each. It doesn't need to be the most obvious theme... use a bit of imagination.

Some simple examples:

• A Pagoda and garden for Japan.
• A Totem Pole (Native American, New Zealand or whatever.)
• An icy scene for Antarctica.
• Pyramids for Egypt
• A mini Uluru for Australia.
  
  
  An information card listing the country represented and describing what the scene depicts, should be included on each.
  
  Holes should progress from easy to hard.
  
  It might be easier to make each hole on a separate backing piece/frame, for ease of moving and putting together.
  
  Use paper mache etc to make it 3D.
  Paint it and add objects to make it more realistic, eg sand and shells on a beach, tiny animals etc.
  
  Make your own set of mini golf clubs and challenge someone to a game!
  
  Modify your course, if needed, after your game.
  
  You could also try this with cities, using famous landmarks.
  Or come up with your own theme to follow.

FINANCIAL FREEDOM

Whether they want to be financially rich beyond our wildest dreams, or live a simple self sufficient lifestyle, one of the greatest learning gifts we can provide for our children is an understanding of financial issues and how to achieve financial freedom.

Robert Kyosaki's richdad.com is a site well worth visiting. This is the USA one, but there are other international sites as well. Robert Kyosaki is a forward thinking genius in financial matters. He has a great belief in the importance of educating our future generations (and us big kids too!) about money and financial freedom and the huge lack of this kind of material taught in schools. Schools teach kids to be employees... Robert's aim is to teach them to be entrepreneurs and in big business. To create financial freedom for themselves and their families... and to be in a special position to be able to give back to the world in whatever way they feel it is their destiny to do so. The site itself offers various info, plus some fun things. You can also download a school's version of his pc Cashflow game. I registered as a homeschool and had no trouble. Robert also produces various versions of his game for sale, plus several books, a couple of which relate especially to young people. These books can also be found in various bookstores, and are often available at public libraries.

Someone else who has some interesting things to say is our very own Aussie self taught financial mastermind, Anita Bell. Her site is anitabell.com and is worth a look. There are some excerpts from her various books, and some other useful stuff. These books are well worth reading. You can order them though her site, or probably find them in most book stores. Public libraries should also have some of them.

Below are some fun ideas that might enhance kids interest and understanding of money.

• Encourage your child to help plan, and carry out, a family budget, or their own personal budget.
  
• Have your child start a regular savings plan. Depending on their age, this may have to be done through a parent's account. Look into the best way to do this. Have your child set some goals for what they'd like to save for, and how they might achieve it.
  
• Is your child interested in creating their own home business?
  Possible ideas are odd jobs for family or neighbours, pet care while owners are awy, dog walking, designing and printing stationery, washing cars, growing produce, craft items or lots of other possibilities.
  Make sure you check into all safety and legal considerations of whatever they decide on and supervise your children throughout the process.
  Keep financial (expenses, profit etc.) and other records of the business.
  
• Creating a coin collection may spark an interest and lead to deeper insight into money. It's also an enjoyable hobby. The child will also need to save money towards the purchase of coins, if so desired. However, they might also consider getting some pen friends overseas and exchanging with them.
  
• Get together regularly as a family, or with a group of friends, and play a game of Monopoly Cashflow, or one of the many other money games available.
  Challenge your child to design and make their own money game. Invite others for a game!
  
• Have your child make up some money related maths problems for someone else to try.
  Make sure they know the answers!
  
• Have your child research the currencies of other different countries.
  Can they find some other countries that use dollars and cents, like we do?
  Find out what main currency units other countries use.
  Choose a country and make an illustrated poster about their currency.
  
• Find out some interesting historical facts about money and its development. Make a display poster, or scrapbook.
  
• Find out what you can about bartering.
  Invite friends over for a bartering market day. Make some things, such as craft or food items, to exchange, or use the opportunity to swap some things you don’t need any more for something different.
  
• Do some reserach on the stock exchange. Have your child try "buying" (just pretend, unless you can afford to lose it!) some shares, and watch their progress.
  
• Have your child look into "buying" some real estate. Research houses on the internet, newspapers etc. Work out what loans might be best, and delve into interest, repayments etc. Look into what rent various houses might bring. What expenses might there be? Are they good investments, or not? Maybe you could even go to a few open days and a couple of auctions. But be careful... don't get caught up in the excitement and bid!

Have fun with money ideas. Remember, talking about money with children is good... don't hide it away as if it's something that shouldn't be discussed, or something they don't need to know about yet.

Their financial freedom may depend largely on the view of money matters they learn from you!

CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY FUN!

Photography can be a wonderful tool for all kinds of learning and discovery.

In general we like to try and approach topics from a slightly less usual angle... a bit more creative and thought provoking.

Before you get inventive, you can first make use of the basics...

• Explore what a camera is, different kinds of cameras, how they work, basic photography principles, use of light, lenses, composition etc.



• Maybe you could make a pin hole camera.
  


• Research the development of cameras throughout history. Are there any museums in your area with examples of early cameras?
  


• Can you access any darkroom facilities and discover how photographic processing works?
  


• Get an image editing program, such as Photoshop, and have fun! You can do some weird and wonderful things to digital photographs! Change colours, stretch faces, make parts of the photo disappear, make it seem like people can fly or cows have wings! Your creations are basically only limited by your imagination.

Once you are feeling ready to get out in the field and experiment, grab a camera... and go to it!

A digital camera is probably the easiest for photography projects. They are usually easy to use, not as limited as film cameras in numbers of shots available, you can delete what you don't want to make room for more, and you only have to print what you really want. Kids usually love to take lots of shots... and why not? That's often how professional photographers get that "perfect" shot... it can take dozens (or more) shots, just to end up with one that is just right. The photos are instantly available. Also, you can easily edit the images... sometimes even on the camera itself. A lot of digital cameras also allow you to shoot short videos, which can be useful. Some have special settings for panorama photographs and other specialty photos. Of course, there are some things that can't easily be achieved with most digital cameras (such as long exposures) but for most uses they are ideal.

Following are some links to fun ideas I created for exploring photography.

Nature's Magic: A Different Light
Many good photographs use light as an important feature.
Here, a selection of photos of nature are to be taken, enhanced by different forms of light, such as reflection, changing light, moonlight, star trails.

Nature's Magic: Colours of Earth
When looking at the Earth you may just think that it is brown… or green if covered with vegetation… but there is actually an immense variety of hues if you look for them.
Take photos showing this great variation.

Nature's Magic: Hidden Beauty
Things of great beauty can be hidden where they are not immediately obvious. Just like a pearl in an oyster, kids will discover (and photograph) amazing things under, inside or otherwise obscured from immediate view.

Nature's Magic: Infinite Diversity
A collage of photos showing amazing diversity within a theme... such as trees, rocks, clouds, webs.

Nature's Magic: Spirit of Endurance
A challenge to create a display of photographs showing things in nature which show “The Spirit of Endurance”. Things that have survived against odds… things that are fighting for survival.

Nature's Magic: Sunrise, Sunset
A chance to take some glorious photos of sunrises and sunsets... plus a few thought provoking questions to answer in their display.

Scavenging Photographic Style
A photographic scavenger hunt that requires children to think and come up with photos that fit the required criteria. Sure to elicit some really creative and different ideas!

The Magic of Shapes
A photographic search for shapes hidden in the everyday world.
* This is a crossover Maths activity.

I hope you have fun with these!

There are a lot more exciting activities in many different topic areas on Barinya Family Site, so please go and have a look around.

Life Learning... a family journey.

FREE RANGE FAMILY- THE BEGINNINGS

Free Range Family!

That's our goal... to be free from as many imposed constraints as possible.
Free to learn... to discover... to explore... to live!

Our home educating journey began just over 12 years ago, with the birth of our son, Jamie. Naturally, as parents, we help our children learn and satisfy their curiosity for their new, amazing world, from the day they are born. At that time, we didn't realise just how involved we would become, on an ongoing basis, with this learning adventure. When Jamie was a year or so old I was already beginning to dread and fret about the idea of handing this precious, tiny little person over to other people at kindergarten, and then school. I literally felt sick to the stomach at the idea, and really quite terrified of what could potentially happen to him without someone who was specifically on the lookout for his safety and wellbeing. Tales of kidnaps, pedophiles, bullying, drugs, smoking, accidents... the list of horrors just goes on! It's enough to drive a parent crazy!

Around that time I just happened to be lucky enough... or more likely it was "meant to be"... to see a segment on a current affairs programme about a local family who home educated their children. I'd never even heard of it really, except in the case of distance type "school of the air" education. As I listened to the words from this wonderful family I instantly knew that this was the direction our journey would take. It was just right... fitted our hopes and ideals perfectly.

I was a little uncertain as to how my husband would take to the idea, although knowing what an open minded "outside the box" kind of person he was, I didn't think he'd dismiss the idea out of hand. And to my delight he shared my vision for this somewhat radical idea immediately. Not even a moment's hesitation! Neither of us doubted for a moment that this was the right way forward for us, and although there have been ups and downs and many changes along the way, we've never regretted this path.

Right away we stared to read everything we could on home education, and education in general, plus lots of books on ideas and activities. I couldn't resist buying all kinds of resources... many of which would not be used for years, some not at all... including books, workbooks, art and craft materials, science bits and pieces etc etc. He was the best equipped 1+ year old in Australia! :)

One of the best things we did, was make contact with a group of local home educators, including the most amazing and knowledgeable home educator you could ever meet... Beverley Paine. If any of you are active in the Australian (and even overseas) home education community, you have most likely heard of this incredible lady! And not forgetting her equally knowledgeable husband, Robin. We have had many chances to glean so much wisdom and information from them, which has helped us through some rough spots, and made our journey much more flowing and enjoyable.

It took us some time to actually attend some of the many outings and events run by hard working people in this group, mainly because I was shy and uncertain of what to expect. We needn't have worried however... the kids were delightful, and their parents so willing to share their experiences, and tips learned along the way. The outings were great, whether they were of a more educational nature, or purely social. We were soon so busy with these, you could hardly say we were "home" educating, as we were never there! :)

By the time Jamie was 5, we were more "old hands" than new educators. :) Normally at around this age, he would have started school and official structured learning, but in a home learning situation, nothing needed to change. We just continued exploring, experimenting, discovering, following our interests. And that's the way it goes forward... even now, all these years later. Of course the things he wants to know, and needs to discover become more complex, as his thinking processes develop. But now that he's approaching the time he would have "normally" gone to high school, it doesn't suddenly change and become a whole new ball game. We just need to be aware of his growing and developing, and support any areas in which he desires to specialise, as he follows what really interests him and will eventually (probably) lead to his career path.

The home educating lifestyle (which has many variations, from highly structured to totally unstructured... more on these another time) is not for everyone. There is no right way or wrong way, and finding just the right path through it can be difficult and time consuming. In fact, most home educators change their way of doing things dramatically, and often, throughout the years. Some try it for a short time, and decide it's not for them. Some try it... and just can't imagine life any other way! We did it right from the beginning, so for us there is no other way. It's just part of life... learning together as a family, each and every day.

Life Learning... a family journey.