Hayati Homeschool

The Summer Begins

We had a fun and hot (!) end to the school year. With temperatures pushing 40C we cooled off by swimming in the paddling pool, running in the sprinklers, listening to stories and playing games under the shade of the olive trees. On the last day of school we made calendars to celebrate the beginning of Ramadan and held a dance party in the garden. The children raided the dressing up box and let loose dancing around the garden. A lovely end to the year.

Colourful pencil cases made for art on Arabic Day

Playing in the sprinklers on a hot day

Ramadan Calendars helped the children understand how Ramadan is marked through the month and the phases of the moon - they enjoyed counting out the days and trying to write the numbers but most of all they enjoyed pouring on the glitter!

With the heat of the Summer the children had a true appreciation of the changing of the Seasons, one of our topics this term. It was really interesting to watch them grasp the concept of seasons and the passing of time - from the beginning of the school year as we moved into Winter and the end of year as Summer began. We read and discussed Julia Donaldson’s 'Stick Man’ noting how the seasons change as Stick Man tries to get home, showing us how long he has been away from the family tree. We made Stick Man season art to show Stick Man in all the seasons and we used a laminated picture of a bare tree for the children to decorate by themselves according to each season. We focused on how some trees change over the seasons by doing several tree themed art projects and to make it much more relevant to them we discussed in which season their birthdays fell - they made art to show what clothes they wore and what activities they did on their birthdays according to the season.

The children gathered all the twigs, petals and leaves themselves to make the pictures. They sorted out the items from the garden into groups and decided which would be used for each season.

We split a picture of a tree into four parts and the children discussed how a tree looks in each season. After painting they arranged the four sections in order of how the seasons fall.

We also did a topic on birds and eggs this term and the kids had a great time, touching and exploring different kinds of eggs - from ostrich, goose, duck, chicken and quail. They were curious about the different sizes, colours and shape of each egg and we watched a short film about how chicks grow inside eggs. We also discussed what other animals apart from birds hatch from eggs.

The children have made such progress this year building on their knowledge and understanding new concepts, some have begun to read, others are building on their confidence with phonics and the alphabet. Everyone moves to their own timetable and because no one is pressured and we learn through doing activities and topics, they feel able, secure and happy. And that is the best place from which to discover the world around you.

Ramdan Lanterns

Monsters for art to encourage creativity, imagination and build numeracy skills

Art project for Arabic Day

Broad beans growing on our farm - the children helped to plant seeds, water and harvest this year

**Currently Hayati Homeschool is having some upgrades - we are adding a bathroom and art storage room near the school tent and a small swimming pool for the Summer months. Pictures of the new improvements will be posted at the end of the Summer. In the meantime enjoy our photos!

Spring Update

The start of every school day begins with play dough. We make it new each school term using natural colouring like turmeric. This time we added glitter to make sparkly fun play dough.

A seaside inspired play dough scene

After snack and playground fun we do a little work in our activity books. Instead of just doing worksheets the children cut and glue the tasks into their books. They enjoy this process much more as they engage physically with the work, practicing their skill with scissors and deciding independently where to fix objects into their books.

Most of our numeracy and literacy activities are hands on. Obstacle courses, games and sorting, and here threading beads to match the numbers on the pipe cleaners:

Phonics obstacle course - matching letters with objects: S for snake, B for bear, C for cake

We did a body anatomy topic this year where the kids learned about the heart, lungs, brain, skeleton and stomach. We put noodles in a pair of tights to demonstrate what a brain feels like, we made a model of how lungs work using balloons and we did an experiment using a plastic bag and lemon juice to mimic stomach acid to show how digestion works. The children each got a stethoscope to listen to their heart beats after resting and after doing different activities, like jumping on the trampoline and running. The children learned to identify the different organs and what role they played in the body. They really enjoyed finding out more about their bodies and how they worked. We related this to our numeracy and phonics activities too.

After the anatomy topic we started focusing on feelings. We explored different expressions and what emotions they communicated. We talked about why people might feel different things and how people can behave when they feel sad, happy, angry or excited.

Pasta faces showing different emotions

Emo Dolls - twisting the dolls around shows different emotions.
These were great for role play games we played to demonstrate why people feel different emotions.

We read a lot of books everyday and have dedicated story time after lunch as well as a story before home time. One of the children's favourite books is Michael Rosen's 'We're Going on a Bear Hunt', we act out the book in the tent and go on a bear hunt around the garden. We decided to an art project focused on different scenes from the book. The children each chose their favourite scene and we recreated it using paint, felt and paper and put their pictures into the scene.

One of our other topics was the days of the week. We started introducing the days of the week by making weather reports and daily schedules. Every morning we spoke about the day, the weather, how we felt and what we were going to do.

The children also made salt ornaments with their names carved in them, as they became more familiar with the Arabic alphabet.

Spring Baskets with Rabbit Cookies to celebrate the beginning of Spring

Cooking and eating are a big part of our day. The children love making cakes, muffins, biscuits, lasagnas, pesto, breads and pies - we love to try new recipes. Here are a few of our creations:

Almond Butter Biscuits for Spring Time

Carrot Cake made with duck eggs from our farm

Chicken, duck & goose eggs

Pistachio & Raspberry Sponge Cake

Spiced Apple & Almond Tart

Blueberry Muffins

Pistachio & Orange Blossom Biscuits

Chocolate & Orange Blossom Cupcakes

Chocolate Almond Muffins

Simple Snack: Cinnamon Banana Milkshakes with Fresh Strawberries

I hope you enjoyed our latest update. The Spring term is well underway and I look forward to sharing our new adventures with you soon.

Happy New Year 2016!

The wonderful chaos of the festive period is winding down and I found some time to finally update the blog with all the lovely photos I took from our Autumn Term (Sept-Dec 2015). We've had some new faces join us, the start of French days with our lovely new teacher Melanie, lots of amazing art projects, a trip to visit bee hives and taste different kinds of honey, plus lots of cooking, dance performances and lots of playing - the heart of Hayati Homeschool days! Last term we introduced different topics including healthy eating, bees & honey, animal habitats and conservation.

Enjoy our photos!

The children cook something everyday: