Wednesday 23 March 2011

Coughing like crazy!

So yesterday Wiyot started complaining that his mouth was tickling...

I had no idea what that was supposed to mean! However, today (and throughout last night) all he has done is cough :(

Poor little fella sounds awful. Really wheezy and short of breath... He should be going to gymnastics on Friday, somehow I can't see it happening!

As I was getting him ready for bed, I mentioned that I would book an appointment at the doctors for him in the morning. I wasn't expecting him to suddenly burst into tears! Evidence that he's still traumatised from our trip to the A&E on our holiday to Florida.

For those of you that don't know the story, last year we went on holiday to Disney World, and Wiyot came back with a rather unfortunate souvenir. On our third day there he tripped over in the villa we were renting and cut his head open on the coffee table. Luckily, there was no fractures, concussion, infections, swelling, or even bruising! However, he did have a gaping hole in his head that looked rather like a third eye, allowing you to see through to his skull... Nice! I'll spare you all the grisly photo's in case you're eating while you're reading!

An ambulance ride, seven stitches and a week of antibiotics later... Wiyot has a lovely bright pink scar on his forehead, reminiscent of Harry Potter. I knew I should have bought him the accessories from Universal!

Well anyway, as you can imagine, it was not exactly a pleasant experience for the little fella! I guess I'll be finding out tomorrow just how big the doctor phobia is :/

Not much home ed-ing today, although I have been using the time to do some research. I've been trying to find some Montessori books that are available at our library. I've also been constructing word lists to help Wiyot with his reading. At the moment focusing on the vowel sounds of ay, ee, igh, ow and the two oo's (eg look and zoo). He know's them on our speed sound cards, but as of yet, hasn't got any books to put the sounds into practice.

As I was looking for word lists, I found a rhyming word exercise and realised I already have cards made up to do this exercise. It was basically a number of different pictures and you have to match up the ones that rhyme. As soon as Wiyot is feeling up to it I think I'll get him to give it a go.

For anyone that might be interested (as well as me if I lose my other list :/), here are the words that I chose to include in my lists:

Words with 'ay'



  • Day
  • Play
  • Stay
  • May
  • Say
  • Way
  • Lay
  • Bay
  • Hay
  • Pay
  • Away
  • Clay
  • Gray
  • Tray
  • Spray
  • Sway
  • Crayon
  • Holiday


Words with 'ee'



  • Bee
  • See
  • Been
  • Deep
  • Feed
  • Heel
  • Keep
  • Meet
  • Seed
  • Tree
  • Week
  • Cheek
  • Green
  • Sheep
  • Queen
  • Sleep
  • Sweet
  • Teeth
  • Sixteen
  • Street
  • Between
Words with 'igh'

  • High
  • Sigh
  • Fight
  • Light
  • Might
  • Night
  • Right
  • Sight
  • Thigh
Words with 'ow'

  • Low
  • Tow
  • Mow
  • Row
  • Own
  • Slow
  • Blow
  • Snow
  • Yellow
  • Bow
  • Bowl
  • Elbow
  • Show
  • Grow
  • Crow
Words with 'oo' (short u)

  • Good
  • Hood
  • Wood
  • Book
  • Look
  • Cook
  • Hook
  • Woof
  • Foot
  • Wool
Words with 'oo' (long u)

  • Poo
  • Zoo
  • Boo
  • Igloo
  • Shoo
  • Moo
  • Food
  • Mood
  • Roof
  • Hoof
  • Boom
  • Bloom
  • Broom
  • Room
  • Zoom
  • Cool
  • Pool
  • Tool
  • Balloon
  • Moon
  • Spoon
  • Hoop
  • Loop
  • Boot
Well that's all for now folks!

Tuesday 22 March 2011

Cruising

No we're not on vacation... although the new Disney cruise ship does look very appealing!! Rather, we are cruising through our days in a fairly autonomous fashion at the moment...

Funny, in the past I thought I'd follow more of a structured approach to learning. The temperament that Wiyot has though, definitely suits the more autonomous approach. 

As with anybody really, if it is something that he is interested in, he will sit and do it for hours! Otherwise he becomes very passive and defeatist. 

Currently he is interested in a number of subjects; tectonic plates, volcanoes, stars and planets, dinosaurs, human anatomy and physiology, among other things! He is also really enjoying helping me in the kitchen with a variety of tasks; peeling garlic and onions, doing the washing up, measuring ingredients, making breakfast and baking :9

Recently we joined an online maths tutor called Maths Whizz. He really enjoys going on there, quite often laughing while playing the maths games, such a great way to learn! Even better, at the moment I don't even have to ask him to play on it. All I do is turn on the computer and he comes over and requests to play on it :D

He's still doing well with his reading, often pointing out words when we're reading to him. Recently he has started reading to himself and requesting to read to us. Just this morning he got into bed with me and pointed out the rhyming words in one of his reading books!

Another thing we did today was making our own bread :9 He read the recipe, measured out the ingredients and discussed various things with me... what the yeast smelt like (Shoshone's poo apparently!), what the dough felt like, why the dough was rising, etc... 

The rest of the day he spent playing with his Thomas the Tank Engine Duplo sets, running around dressed as superhero's with Shoshone, playing hide and seek, and taking apart and fixing our Guess Who board game... 

Bizarre! :D

Feeling quite content at the moment though, was feeling fairly stressed about the whole "officialness" of it all since January... I got a book from the library on Friday called "Twenty chickens for a saddle" based on a home educating family in Botswana in the 80's and 90's. I'm only half way though at the moment, but so far am enjoying it. I think its really helping me to relax and have faith that what we are doing will work and will be for the best. I've also been watching various talks given by Ken Robinson, one called "Changing Paradigms" is particularly entertaining... very thought provoking! 

Well I think I've rambled enough for tonight!

Over and out!