Wizard and Wand

After all these years of dressing up, Tiger is still fond of doing so (although I suspect not for much longer).  At Halloween, he often dresses up as a wizard, this year being no exception.

He has been fascinated by magic and wizardry so has been practising magic tricks using a few books and a "Magic Tricks Box" that I picked up from the charity shop.

While this is all just fun to a very imaginative boy, I have a strong aversion to conjurors and magicians as I find the idea of deception, a principle on which most 'magic' we are shown is based on, rather objectional.  Therefore, I tried to redirect Tiger's fascination with wizardry to more 'useful' outlets, such as studying the entire Harry Potter series using the related issue of The Arrow for discussion and other English-related work.

We were at King's Cross station the other day, so we went to look for platform 9¾ where Harry Potter boarded the Hogwarts Express for the first time in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

The station was refurbished a few years ago so it is now very bright and spacious, nothing like the dark and slightly dingy King's Cross station that I knew and missed from more than a decade ago.  The station is now almost too modern, cheerful and well-managed for the setting of the story.  While back in the dark and dingy days anyone could walk up and down the platforms freely and tried one's luck at running into a wall without bothering anyone else, there is absolutely no chance of doing that now without looking like a total fool to everyone in the station since there are now no dark corners in the station where one can hide in shame or embarrassment.  Moreoever, new and shiny electronic barriers are now up in front of all the barriers so there is no way to even walk between the actual platorms 9 and 10 to look for platform 9¾ unless you buy a train ticket beforehand.  In short, more progress but less spontaneous fun.

The station authorities have no doubt thought about the station's significance in the Harry Potter story, so a few feet away from platforms 9 to 11 is a wall dedicated to being the famous platform 9¾ , where tourists and fans can pose for photos and visit the shop.

As a result of our dislike for the commercialised aspect of the story, Tiger is adamant that he would not watch any of the Harry Potter movies despite my repeated encouragement.  I thought he might enjoy the movie's special effects so I started watching the first movie.

Tiger watched for 10 minutes and decided that, "The movie has left out too many details.  The book is better."  So that put an end to movie-watching.  Consequently, we need not go to the Warner Brothers Studio Tour too, which saves me a small fortune.

We used the time and money saved from not watching the Harry Potter movies and not going to the studio tour on some real magic, where Tiger made an electronic wand by soldering bits and pieces of resistors and other electronics bits to create a programmable wand using binary codes.

I have not captured the video very well, but the wand was programmed to display the word "bye".  Apparently the wand is able to be programmed to display different six-character words by changing the codes, but I don't really know how the wand works or how to programme the codes to change the word display.  Luckily Tiger paid attention in class and knows how to work it.

 

Summer is Not Over Yet!

We are still officially on our summer break, and I have made a deliberate effort to stop ourselves from signing up for too many of the tantalising summer courses available.  However, as I look at what we have been doing since we got back from Cornwall (that was a real holiday), it seems that we are on the go again!

We have been spending time in nature,

spending time in the garden,

Tiger's current interest/obsession is anything and everything nautical, so he has been reading up on this topic.

Fiction and non-fiction books.

As he read the books, Tiger became intrigued by how boats and ships work.  He then decided the best course of work is to build a model boat that would float.  After he figured out what materials to use for his model boats, we went to the craft shops and got balsa wood and some fabric (for the sail).  Tiger has been obsessively designing his models, cutting the various pieces out of wood, testing his models, and redesigning them in the sink.

Once he was happy with his final designs at home (after several unsuccessful ones initially), he asked to launch them at a pond to see how they would respond in the 'real world' (as opposed to the sink at home).  Tiger brought a net to catch his boats before they floated too far away from the edge of the pond.

Even with his new area of interest, Tiger is still very much engrossed in the study of military history, reading books, play acting, and resuming the mini lectures.

Recently, he has been playing around with PowerPoint by himself and is using it in his mini lectures, progressing from his previous use of the whiteboard for his presentations.

While I managed to stop myself signing Tiger up for a multitude of summer classes, I did take him to an electronics class, only because he got to solder his own circuit board and learn about its various components, which I have absolutely no interest in or knowledge of.

The end product is a small bug-like machine that responds to different light intensities.  That is pretty cool.

It looks as if we have started 'school', doesn't it?  Our days before or during the summer don't look any different, except that many of the regular classes that Tiger attends are on a break at the moment.  I expect our days to be much more hectic come September, in view of the various classes that are currently being organised for the new academic year. 

For now, I am still enjoying the relatively slow pace of what's left of the summer, while watching our diary gradually being filled up with activities for the new term.

A Preview of Summer

Summer is not here yet but what we have been up to this past week or so is pretty much a preview of what I envisage our summer to be.

Plenty of Outdoor Playtime

When the sun is out (as it had been most of this week), Tiger spends much of his time in the garden, either playing, or doing some gardening work, or swinging on the rope swing that he made by himself.

If he was not in the garden, he could be found patroling the woods, or playing with other children in the hollow of a giant pine tree or in various playgrounds.

Being Physically Active

This year we see a marked improvement in Tiger's physical strength and stamina.  It gives me a lot of joy to see my boy healthy and strong, especially when he had been relatively weak and poorly up till 18 months ago.

A few of Tiger's regular activities (climbing and tennis) will take a break in the summer but others (table tennis, off-road riding, and swimming) will continue all through the summer.


Plenty of "Food for the Soul"

It is no secret that Tiger and I go to Shakespeare's Globe every summer.  To watch at least three Shakespearean play each year is a tradition that has been well established since Tiger watched Macbeth for the first time when he was six years old.  Since we cannot possibly wait until July/August to visit the place again, we have gone ahead to catch the performance of The Merchant of Venice.  We will watch a few more plays before the season ends.

Another venue that we love to go to is the Royal Opera House.  In a similar fashion to watching Shakespearean plays, Tiger started his annual pilgrimage to the Royal Opera House when he was five, to watch the ballet set to Tales of Beatrix Potter.  Compared to the ballet which always involves a lot of graceful movements, operas may not be the cup of tea for everyone.  Nonetheless, Tiger responded very well to his first opera, La Boheme, when we watched it live a few years ago so this year we are getting more exposure to the operas again.

Don Giovanni seems like a good place to start, with its action-packed plot and Mozart's etheral music.  To be honest, every opera I have watched is so full of passion (both in plot and in singing) that any opera will be able to keep a keen audience captivated, as it did us.  With any luck, we might be back for a few more performances before the end of the year!


Plenty of Food for the Tummy

A consequence of hanging out with his mother who is very fond of eating good (i.e. not necessarily expensive but must be interesting) food, Tiger has a well developed appreciation for different types of food.

As a result, Tiger has been very keen to learn to cook at home.  About two months ago, he volunteered to take over the responsibility for cooking our family dinner every Friday, which was welcomed and supported wholeheartedly by Tortoise and I.  I supervised him in the kitchen for the first two weeks, giving him tips on a few basics of cooking and reminding him of safety rules.  Now, he is able to take on the entire process from start to finish: from writing a shopping list for all the ingredients he needs (photo 1) to buying fresh ingredients (photo 2) to the entire cooking process (photos 3 to 5).

Tiger has gone from strength to strength in cooking over the relatively short period of time from when he first started taking over the responsibility for our Friday night dinners two months.  I must say that I am very impressed with his progress and the variety of dishes he is able to make from scratch, all by himself.  Below is a sample of his ever-expanding culinary repertoire:

The fact that he has even managed to cook rice just right (i.e. neither too soggy nor too dry) is very good going.  Then again, one can argue that Tiger has the advantage of having eaten rice all his life so he knows instinctively what a properly cooked pot of rice should look and taste like.


Informal Learning

While I believe that children learn all the time in their own ways, even when the learning doesn't tick any formal curriculum boxes, I want to make a conscious effort to let both Tiger and I have a proper rest over the summer.  However, just because I have saved some money by not signing Tiger up for summer classes, it doesn't mean that he won't learn things informally, just as he has done recently in a series of basic electronics workshops, which is cleverly disguised as toy-making (or toy-destroying, depending on your point of view) sessions.

In the session, the children did not use any textbook or any formal instruction.  All they needed are their enthusiasm to learn (which is plentiful) and an adult who is willing to show them the ropes.

Robotics - the beginning

I am becoming more convinced about the interconnectedness of the different "areas" in science, and this realisation is going to affect how we approach science for Year 3, but more about that in a later post on my plans for Year 3.

I arrived at the conclusion about science (and how it can be approached) by observing how Tiger has been enjoying the classes and actually understanding the concepts that were covered.  For example, the latest class was about robotics and circuits, two area that I did not expect us to cover until a few years from now.

First the class was introduced to the very basic components of codes, circuits, mechanics, and robots.

Working in pairs, children then made pressure switches which switch on when a weight is put on them. 

The switches were tested using a circuit board and then placed on an electric buggy (the robot). The robot was connected so that it could only move if the switch were loaded with its weight.

The children then ran ‘robot relay races’ using these in which the baton (the weight) was transferred from one buggy to another.

The experiments and results were recorded in a workbook.

After that, the class was presented with six tasks of increasing difficulty -- the most difficult task of all was to make the robot move backwards and forwards between two barriers automatically.

This post is linked up to several blog hops, where you can see what other homeschoolers have been busy with.