Summer is Finally Here!

Finally after such a dismal summer we have some good weather. Good weather always seems to make home education easier, especially for natural sciences.




Although I do pine for those early days of HE where Ram was so eager and excited to get outside. Today he is not only displaying the usual grumpiness of being a teen, but he has the aches and pains and lack of energy of the hypermobility syndrome , so it is much harder to get him outside.




However yesterday our ivy which covers most of one side of our house was in bloom and we had an assortment of various bugs, flies, bees and wasps, not to mention a few butterflies. It was noisy and interesting enough to get him out there. We took some photos so that we could identify the different species later.














Then of course we had to observe the chickens. Sometimes you can get more out of just sitting and observing than you can get out of a text book.






Last night was also the first warm night with a clear sky since we bought the telescope so we managed to see Vega. That was exciting as Vega is the star that Ellie from the film Contact was sent to by the aliens.

We have just finished reading Physics of the Impossible by Michio Kaku and he mentions Contact and Carl Sagan who wrote the book that Contact was based on, so it was a good way of tying in physics, astronomy, and fiction, all in one fell swoop.

Today I suggested that we go out for a walk or a wheel I should say. Ram begrudgingly agreed. I am sure he would much rather stay by the computer but pushing his wheelchair gives me some needed exercise. However once we were out we managed to not only have a look at the ducks in on the village pond (the two females seem to have turned into males!) and a chat with a neighbour, but we also walked down to the old badger set where I hadn't been since I used to walk the dogs there 10 years ago.

Again, watching things on TV or reading them in a book is one thing, but actually seeing a whole set, looking at the different bits of it to see if it is active, and seeing it in the context of the wider countryside is very valuable. Ram suggested that if they wanted to get rid of these badgers all they would have to do is get the Autumn Watch http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/uk/ people out there to film them!





On the way back we saw some sheep and again watched them for a while. We managed to get a couple of the beauties to pose for us which was lucky. They were still a bit flighty as they had only just been put in that field.










So all in all we have had two good days of learning. It might not be as intense as it was when Ram was younger, but at least he is still learning in informal ways.

Minecraft Meets Fibre Craft

I needed something to do while watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer (complete DVD set, series one to seven as Ram wasn't old enough to watch it when it first came out) and decided to weave a tapestry of a Minecraft Creeper.

Then we realised that it was just the right size to replace the broken fabric on our book chair. I just hope it doesn't blow up our books!




Book rest Creeper: That's a very nice book rest you have there. It would be a shame if anything should happen to it!



Detail of the weaving, done with offcuts of rug wool from a carpet factory, on an old Spear's number 3 loom. All mistakes credited to Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Joss Whedon.

The Code: BBC Does it Again

I have written before about how the hype surrounding science programmes on the BBC and beyond, are actually putting young people off science, and we have yet another example.

In the weeks before The Code was broadcast the BBC and Marcus Du Sautoy started Tweeting and referring to the website. It sounded fun and intriguing, so I applied for the postcard. It actually arrived while friends, including Ram's best friend, were staying and with a lot of effort I managed to get them interested in decoding the card.

What I couldn't do was get Ram interested. It was hard enough getting the other young people intersted, but Ram was impossible. I would tell him what was being tweeted, tried to show him the photos on the Facebook page, but to no avail. He wasn't just not interested, he actually started getting hostile. Eventually I had to back off a bit.

Never mind, I thought that maybe when the programmes were broadcast he would be more interested.

That was not to be either. I mean, he did watch them, but he refused to look for clues or go to the website and play the games. And I had to endure a high level of sarcastic comments throughout, far more than usual.

Eventually after the second programme, the truth finally came out. “It's the hype. I hate all the hype and it makes me want to have nothing to do with it.”

So there we are. Once again what was meant to get young people like Ram excited about maths and science is actually putting him off. Luckily he is actually watching the programme so hopefully something will be learned, but I am wondering how much longer it will be until he refuses to even watch science programmes on the BBC.

Who Said Computer Games Aren't Educational

Well, not a home educator, that's for sure! The current fascination is Minecraft.

I was a little dubious at first but another home educator told me it was definitely educational. Apparently it has something called red stone that makes use of logical components such as capacitors and logic gates as used in electronics. That sounded good as Dxh had been teaching Ram about logic gates.

We paid our money and off Ram went. Very quickly I realised that he was going to get a lot more out of it than just game play. Basically, it is a sandbox building game, where you can build a world, eat, sleep and get blown up! In no time he was building amazing castles with great detail. He even made guest bedrooms with chests (containing cake and explosives) for his friends. He has also built a library to die for, complete with three galleried floors, lighting and books.




The Minecraft world is based on cubes, which fascinated Ram, but it also means that he has to have a good understanding of how cubes work, as any other shape you want has to be made up from cubes.

Time management also has a part to play, which is something that doesn't come naturally to Ram. If you are not in a safe place by the time night falls, then bad things can happen!

But the biggest thing is the development of social skills, something that Ram needs a lot of work on. How? He joined up with two other home educated friends, and the Dxh set up a server for them so that they could all play in the same world together. This meant he had to communicate, and the easiest way to do that is via Skype.

My boy, the one who once, a long time ago, attacked someone with a Stanley knife because I was talking on the telephone, has started communicating via phone! Mind you, it isn't a phone call as most of us would recognise. They sit there for hours not talking to each other, and forget to say goodbye! But we are working on it.

The funniest thing though is when the monsters, called creepers, explode. He always uses noise cancelling headphones when on the computer so I can't hear what is going on. The first time he was playing he suddenly jumped a mile. I looked over at him and he had a look of shock on his face. A creeper had snuck up behind him and exploded, startling
him! Because he is so immersed in the world with his headphones on, it was a whole body experience!



There is more to playing a computer game than just the game itself. One lad (not home educated) has even written a song so that allowed us to talk about music. We have discussed architecture, geography (yes, water does flow to the lowest point!) electronics, and how to retrieve a deleted home directory! That actually happened when Ram was installing a mod in the terminal window, and accidentally deleted his home directory. He now knows what cd .. rm -rf means!

Ramism

As Ram is now bigger than me, I have started wearing his old hoodies that he has grown out of. I hadn't said anything but suddenly today he noticed and said:

"I guess you are wearing a hand me up instead of a hand me down"

More Dyeing with Woad

While looking for something else, I came across two skeins of wool that were treated and packed away in the aftermath of The Moths and The Move. As I had also spotted some more woad in the garden, and Easter Sunday was such a lovely sunny day, I decided to do some more dyeing.



I did the same basic recipe as I had done two days before But as you can see it has come out slightly different again.




I also tried to get pink again but ended up with a very pale blue. I have no idea why that isn't working, perhaps not enough alum, but too much alum gives the wool a slightly harsh feeling.


It doesn't really matter what colour it comes out as, because we can always use small amounts of different coloured wools to make interesting things. Now all I have to do is find my carders and oil up the spinning wheel!

Dyeing with Woad and Stale Urine

Our terrible experience with moths last year resulted in having to track down every single bit of wool fibre in the house, and either boiling it, freezing it, treating it with chemicals, throwing it out, or in some cases doing all four. After treatment I had to put all wool in sealed bags with moth killing papers inside. This as you can imagine has put my spinning and weaving on the back burner for now, not just because I am trying to protect what is left, or that I had no time to spin while dealing with the moths, but also because after we had dealt with the moths we had to move out of the house to have the underfloor heating replaced! We had quite a traumatic year last year!



Rather than put everything in storage and live in rented accommodation which would have been very expensive, and we only just had enough money to replace the heating pipes, we decide to hire a portacabin to live in, and a shipping container to put all our belongings in. Ram and I had no problem fitting all that we needed to live for three months in the portacabin. All Ram needs is his computer, the TV and hard disk recorder, and someone to put a bit of food on his plate. A bed is helpful, and that fitted in perfectly to the cabin, but the one thing that it didn't have was a toilet.




Luckily I had an old commode chair that I rescued from someone who was about to take it to the tip, and we had a potty that fitted the hole perfectly. Although we could use the toilets in the house as we had given instructions to the builder and plumber that one toilet had to be working at all times, when it was raining, or at night, or even indeed when the men were working in the bathroom area, it was easier to pee in the potty, and dump it in a bucket outside.

Then came the question, what do we do with a bucket of wee! The first thing that came to mind was the compost bin. Lots of people urinate in their compost heaps, not because they have come back from the pub drunk and their wives won't let them in the house, but because it helps make better compost.


However, we also knew from watching Tony Robinson in The Worst Jobs in History that urine was used in the dye industry. Unfortunately I had foolishly packed away my favourite dyeing book, A Dyer's Manual by Jill Goodwin. Luckily I was able to get hold of her daughter and she told me what we needed to do. It is very similar to the way we did things with the chemical method, but instead of using sodium hydrosulphite we added bran and stale fermented urine to a bucket along with the water containing the woad and washing soda.

We then put the lid on and left it in the sun to ferment. After a few weeks, we decided to check on it and see if it worked:





We aired it that day, and found out just how pungent the smell really was! We had to stuff paper up our noses, and stand up wind. Strangely, the chickens seemed attracted to it though, and every time we opened the bucket they were there trying to stick their heads in! I had to wear my old lab coat and nose plugs as the smell even penetrated clothing.

After the initial few times, we had a spell of very wet and windy weather, and then we had the move back into the house. It bucket got left at the bottom of the garden, as no one really wanted to air the wool again. Eventually I took it out and left it in the rain and sun for a couple of weeks until the smell subsided enough that I could bring it inside to wash it properly. Although it started out being quite blue, because it got soaked for a long time in the bucket without airing it, it lost its colour.


The results were spectacular, not in colour, but as a learning experience, it is one that no one will forget in a hurry!