Day twenty three - books, baking, a fire and some songs

Today has been a good day, well lived in spite of colds.

We started with book work - their idea, not mine! 

J did a bit of everything - Maths (area / perimeter) Science - human organs and anatomy, Reading - My Dad's got an alligator, Hand writing practise and English - using powerful words.

Then A did a lot of everything Maths - adding and subtracting, totalling 20, counting up in 3 4 or 5, counting down in 3 4 or 5.  Science - human body, food chains, nutrition.  English - Capitals and full stops, complete the words and then she read another book.

M was reluctant to move from his youtube videos, but didn't like the idea of not doing anything, o eventually he did Maths - ordering decimals and fractions, English - root words, Science - conductors and insulators, hand writing practise and reading.

L worked happily on approximating, rounding, significant figures and limits.  This is another fairly big thing for him.  Maths does not come particularly naturally to L, and he tells me he finds any sums as easy or hard as any other, so the idea of approximating first to get a ball park figure is alien to him - as he says, why not just do the maths right the first time?  We have encountered this A LOT over the years, and finally he seems happy to do it, regardless of his almost philosophical objection to the idea.  Then he looked at persuasive texts (or manipulation and propaganda as he called it!) and ICT.

Later the kids each cooked a savoury pastry for their dinner - here are the obligatory pictures :

After that, we ate them :)

Then the younger three went to their scouting activities - A and I to a campfire, J and M to the school for more "normal" evenings.

Ready for bed and story now - we're reading "My friend Walter" by Mr Morpurgo - gluttons for punishment!

Day twenty two - whose idea was that then?

The younger three got up and ready fairly smoothly this morning, all of them seemed keen to get to their weekly sports session, and they even left the house on time!

L and I settled down to some work as soon as the others had left - looking at powers and roots, which is the interesting sort of maths he loves.  He was just about finishing when the others got home.  Then we spent a while talking over a story he is writing for a mine-craft game he is working on.  He is creating lore for a world, and then quests, and has it fairly nicely mapped out.  He has put a lot of time and effort into the story, and it's a nice bit of creative writing. I have never managed to get him writing fiction happily, so I will quietly take this as a victory of intrinsic motivation, and enjoy seeing how it progresses.  Later in the day he also showed me a design for a steampunk cat to go on a t-shirt, that he had created on his PC.

Once everyone had eaten and had a short rest, we moved well and truly out of our comfort zones . . .

All the children are growing, and so we went on a mass clothes shop.  J and M do not shop well.  They get bored, they are very choosy over their own clothes and complain everyone else is taking too long to find things.  In essence they become the epitome of the saying "the devil makes work for idle hands"

It was a mercifully short trip, only about 3 hours (including a lunch break), and we ended up with almost everything we needed.  Even then, we were not happy bunnies on the way home.

Because we had cut the shop short, we had nothing in for dinner, and went to Macdonald's before dropping L off at one of his weekly games.

Now it's bedtime and story time for M, J and A, and internet shopping for me to get those last few bits.

Day ninteen a new group, and a fun day :)

A good day, well lived :)

L spent a long time today working on video editing - he's mastered a lot of interesting techniques, and is thoroughly enjoying it.  Best of all it's all autonomous :) Neither his father or I have any real knowledge about "modern" video editing, I wouldn't even know where to start looking for info to be honest, but L has found several sites that have resources and software, he's worked out how he needs to upgrade his PC, he's choosing when to research this, and how long to spend on it, and is basically just being very self motivated. 

On a similar note L has started working on his drawing skills - after talking through the negative impact nursery had on his desire to draw (and that was almost 12 years ago now!) L has been watching other people sketch on you-tube, and rebuilding his confidence.  He's asked for some specific supplies, and tells me he's feeling happier about drawing.  He also feels he is getting better at it, but isn't ready to share his work yet.   This is actually a BIG THING.  I cannot easily put in to words just how angry I am that pre-school workers destroyed L's confidence and that it has taken us more than a decade to rebuild what was a burning desire to draw.

A, J and M went to a new club this afternoon - it's a skills sharing / challenge club.  A and J really engaged with the idea of creating a club badge, and they co-operated with the other children well, drawing along side them, then working on combining all the pictures into one badge.  Both of them were happy and chilled all afternoon :)

M felt out of sorts - he has been off for a week now, not quite right just needing more "handling" than normal.  He struggled to engage, perhaps it was the new setting, a new group of people, an artistic challenge, or a hold-over from previous events at other places, but he was clinging to me and wanting a lot more reassurance than he generally does.  That said he wasn't naughty in any way, not disruptive or irritating to anyone other than me, so it was a manageable afternoon, even with his unease.

The children are all looking forward to the next meeting, and M is hoping to join in more.

When we got home there wasn't much time before we were due to go out again, there was some TV time (a growing rarity, even though we don't limit it, the children generally choose to play minecraft together rather than sit and watch the TV.)

Then it was off to Chess for M, a friends house for A and a church youth group for J.  L skyped friends and played on his Xbox in peace :)

When we got home Uncle N was skypeing the kids (he does that every week, which is awesome!) A went out to play until it was dark, then we ate and got the younger three to bed.

Apparently someone died in the Morpurgo book . . . not a surprise really, but there were tears :(

Then L, my husband and I played Lords of Waterdeep (a cool board game :) ) I won (again!)

We enjoy playing games once the younger three are in bed - it gives us a chance to play a bit more ruthlessly, to play more complex games, and it's a great way to spend the evening with L, making sure he gets his time with us not distracted by random demands from the little ones.

Sometimes it is hard balancing the needs of four very different children, but at the moment we're doing OK.

Have a happy weekend :)

Day eighteen

Another quiet day - I was tied up all day running an online game, so it was a day with Dad for the kids.

There was mine craft (as ever!) a few games, a walk to try and see the Vulcan fly over, L cooked something with eggs that smelt yummy, the dog was walked, L did some ICT.

In the evening A went to girls brigade, and they had a teddy bears picnic in a local park.

Kinda slow, but lots of relationship building from the kids.

I love hearing the younger three playing mine craft together - listening to them co-operate and build awesome structures together is great :) Their communication skills are improving and whereas at first there was lots of arguing, now they tend to play calmly with no need for adult intervention (or refereeing!)  A tends to build and furnish houses, J gathers resources and fights stuff, but also helps A with a farm, M builds grand structures and plays survival games. 

So, that was Thursday!

Day sixteen, erm . . .

So, Day sixteen, Tuesday, being caught up on several days after the fact . . .

The kids did some book work - to be honest I'm getting bored of listing what they've done, so I'll summarise . . .

Each of them did some maths, some English and some science, L also did ICT, A and M read.

J wrote a short story for Cubs - it was hard going, and messed with his head. He'd been told by the leaders he HAD to write a short story or poem.  He WANTED the badge (even though he had no idea which badge it  is for) but he hates writing and finds making up stories very very hard.

So, torn between following the rules, wanting the badge, but not wanting to do the work there was no way it was going to be calm and easy going. We went through repeated requests for me to do it for him - me to write it, me to make it up, me to type it, but I refused (because, really, I had to refuse.  It needs to be his work, and the leaders will ask and he will tell the truth.)

In the end he dictated the story, and I wrote it out, then he copied what I had written.  It still caused tears and stress, but the suggestion of not doing it caused those too.

I read a while ago about all the processes involved in creative writing - the positioning of the hand and pencil, applying the right pressure, forming the letters, planning the word, keeping in mind the sentence you are writing etc.  By breaking the task down - creating the story first, then copying letter by letter, we separated or removed quite a few of the processes.  It seems to have helped, but it made everything take longer!

Another part of this being hard was J desperately trying to make the story as true as possible.  He wrote about our dog escaping and going to the park.  He wanted the park to only have things that the nearest park has, he wanted the story to reflect something that had actually happened.

I am sure the Cub leaders have no idea how hard this was for J, or how much their words affect him, but in the end it is J himself that applies the pressure.  He wanted the end result but not the work, and somehow he needs to settle his mind with the fact that we need to work for things. 

The younger three went to beavers / cubs / scouts, A also spent time "playing out" and life continued as it generally does.

Day Fifteen, happy and normal - ish.

Today, as so often seems to be the case, when the children had to be up and out they slept in.  Maybe Sunday is too energetic a day for them, or perhaps they are picking up on the general societal dislike of Mondays, whatever the reason it seems that unlike most mornings when they are all up and moving well before 8, Monday mornings it's more like 9.

The younger three got up and out, enjoyed their sports session, and came home like a herd of elephants - same as usual really!

L and I looked at manipulating percentages, and later at autobiographical writing.  L had a whole pile of wacky ideas to discuss too - he spends a lot of time thinking about very odd stuff.  Blue sky thinking I guess.  Today's conversations were about reverse genetic engineering organisms. His theory is that since a lot of DNA is "switches" and many of the differentials between species are controlled by these switches, then perhaps it is possible to turn enough off / on that an organism could be made to revert (whilst in embryonic state) to a previous evolutionary level, and then, perhaps the offspring of said organism could have it's DNA manipulated to turn it into something quite different to the original subject . . .  We spent a long time rather distracted from Maths by talking through potentials.  Far more fun than percentages!  L makes connections between things that I have never thought of - I don't know if that's just a personal difference, or a different way of seeing things due to his dyslexia, but bouncing ideas around with him is a lot of fun, and we bring very different things to the discussions - but in a positive way :)

A blitzed through more maths - looking at money subtraction, chunking, and then more subtraction - once more getting her to stop once she was no longer focused was hard work.  Then we continued with Oz phonics, looked at capitals and full stops (again!), covered states of matter and read a book.

J was covering division, life cycles and scientific keys / classification.  He also worked on adjectives and handwriting practise.  He's enjoying reading "My dad has an alligator", but he is hard work to listen to.  He seems to skip every third or fourth word, although I think he's reading those silently, and he rocks and squiggles so much I can't sit near him - which is a pain as he wants me to hold the book!

M was looking at passive and active adjectives - which confused him for a while, but we got  there in the  end - then ratios, states of matter, hand writing practise and random conversation about black holes. M is still a little unsettled after last weeks events, and we have had a few disjointed conversations about friends and friendships, but I'm hoping that time will soothe his fears.

A spent most of the afternoon out with her  friends, and L is out now  at one of his weekly games sessions.

J has started a fitness badge for cubs, and is so far refusing sweets or unhealthy food  but I think we need to work on what he considers healthy (pasties instead of sweets?)

M J and A had a long discussion about a new bedtime story - they have chosen "little Manfred" by Michael Morpurgo - not a book I know, and their dad is taking a turn reading to them, so I will have to pick it up as they go.  The last Morpurgo book we read left us all in tears frequently.  Hope this one is less emotional!

Tomorrow is filling up with plans, and I hope the weather holds :)
Have a happy week folks!

Day twelve - not a good day, if I'm honest

Today has been less than perfect.  To be truthful it has been rather hard and a little upsetting.

This morning M, J, A and I headed off to our "forest school."  No-one woke up naturally, no-one wanted to get ready, no-one wanted to rush.

We got out of the door at the desired time, and a lacklustre bunch of offspring were loaded into the car.

We got to the site earlier than normal (!) and the kids perked up fairly quickly, but with some children having left and others joining the dynamic of the group was very different.

M wasn't coping well, the first session after a break is usually harder on him anyway, but the changes made him uneasy and he was hunting for the familiar interactions just and not finding them.

The session itself went well - once I managed to get M to focus and calm himself a bit - the children built a hibernaculum / hibernarium / bug hotel.  They all worked well together, and a nice structure was built.  There was a reminder of rules and boundaries and some catching up too :)

We stayed for a picnic afterwards, and the change in dynamic made things interesting there too - on the whole that was fairly quickly resolved, but the situation required more vigilance and talking than normal, and I felt rather drained by the time we got home.  The children, on the other hand, say they had a great time.  I guess it's all a matter of perspective.

Hopefully the next session will be easier, there is every reason to believe it will be, and our Fridays can be happy relaxing days again :)

When we got home L had had a nice quiet morning, and was both ready and willing to hit the books.  He looked at percentages in Maths - we were both relieved to find he remembered all the rules / methods, and the exercises were done in about 30 minutes, which isn't bad for 4 sides of A4 :)  In English we looked again at the poems from the other day, discussed and dissected them, looked logically at why they work and how, and all went well.  ICT is still in the very early "This is an input device . . ." stages.

A and I played a lovely game called Dobble, which always leaves us smiling, and was a good redirect for her.

J has gone to a church youth group, M skipped chess because he is still wound up from earlier events, A is in the bath and L is chatting to friends on Skype whilst they play online.

Last night we read about the Crimean war, the Great Exhibition and The Crystal Palace.  Tonight we have more from Queen Victoria's reign. 

All in all, today could have been worse, we got through it fairly well, but it has taken a toll on everyone's energy levels and mood.

Day eleven - at this rate I might make it to the weekend without having to do a mass catch-up post :)

Hmmmmm, today is hard to put into words.

Wednesday, as I said yesterday, is an awkward day.  It starts and ends too late really.

Today started late - again!  Everyone was tired, and we basically did nothing much all morning.

The kids played Mine Craft and Terraria, they chatted, discussed strategies, and basically got on with each other :) The younger three still do things together spontaneously during the day - a mass Mine craft building session (they have a pretty awesome town under construction,) bike rides, watching TV or youtube, and so on.  L finds it harder to engage with them, but will play with his brothers on his Xbox occasionally.

After lunch we played Pathfinder* together - it's a family campaign**, and we're are a year into it.  The session went well, but took most of the afternoon.

A went to Girls Brigade, not sure what else they did but she made a cup-monster filled with tissue paper and cress seeds, and there was a video towards the end.

After that the kids all chatted to Uncle N via Skype, we ate dinner, and now it's bed time - we've reached Queen Victoria in Our Island Story :)

So, life was lived, they all did STUFF, and the day passed.

* Pathfinder is a role-playing game***
** Reign of winter, if you must know!
*** Far too tricky to explain in a footnote - google D & D for more info :)

Day ten - these titles are really easy!

Wednesday, Wednesday, such an awkward day is Wednesday!

Well, it is in this house anyway!

Tueseday may be a part of the cause of Wednesday's troubles.  As the younger three go to various Scouting activities Tuesday bedtimes are *really* messed up.  Quite often dinner is late, someone isn't home until well after nine, and with the hurly-burly of sorting uniform, homework and requirements for the next week, it just all goes on far too long.

With Tuesday ending late, Wednesday always seems reluctant to get going.  This week was no exception with me being the only one up at 9.

After a very slow start everyone did some work - L worked on fraction multiplications, divisions and powers and roots, followed by poetry  his new least favourite thing ever.  J looked at factors and multiples, adaptations to habitats, comparative adjectives, along with handwriting practise and reading a new book.  A looked at totals, adding ten or twenty, filling in the missing letters in her Oz phonics book, capitals and full stops, and parts of a plant.  M did writing practise, read about solutions and emulsions, looked at grammatical agreements of tense, and I can't remember what the maths was . . .

That was all done by lunchtime, albeit a late lunch, then we all relaxed for a bit before the older ones went to their games club - they leave at four, and every other week stay to the second half of the club session, and play D & D with the adults as well as the "kids" (Who are mostly college age now.)  L and M generally don't get back 'till 11 when they stay to the second game.

Whilst they were out A went out to play and I rearranged and tidied her room.  Part way through she joined me.  It was a very odd experience - my youngest is putting away her toys!  The dolls, Barbies and My Little ponies are all headed to the great toyshop in the sky (AKA our loft!)  With them go all but a handful of her plush mountain, and a random assortment of "stuff."  She also filled two bin bags (willingly no less) with broken toys and general tat that just isn't worth keeping.

It feels very strange not to have to sneak the broken things out, and to have someone gleefully moving on.  The boys (even L to a large degree) have always held on to things until they are well beyond using them.  They all seem to have their fathers hoarding instinct.  That's not a problem until you realise they also have my untidiness and scatterbrain!  So too much stuff gets left in random places and then forgotten.

So, between greedy Tuesday ending later, and lazy Wednesday not getting out of bed and being squeezed around the games club, today was very truncated.

But hey! We did STUFF, and I even remembered most of it too ;)

Day nine - happy :)

Today is an easy blog post :) Today has been a happy day.

One of my favourite people on the planet came over, and she even brought her kids (all of whom are adorable and fun)

I barely saw A all day, since she was upstairs playing with two of our visitors, the day passed quickly for them, there seemed to be no major stress at all.  I *think* there were games with dolls, play food and Minecraft, but since they were happy I left them to it.

I got to spend a lot of time putting the world to rights with my dear friend, and playing with her youngest.  I'd forgotten just how much I enjoy making convoluted train tracks :)

At some point I made some loom band "charms" with one of our guests, and the GeoMag came out too.

Once our guests had gone A, L and J played with the GeoMag a bit more.

M and J are really enjoying a new game on their tablets, and have spent the day researching and playing that - perhaps not ideal, but they are engrossed and reading / socialising with each other. 

Later L tackled some maths - manipulating fractions, which he has had trouble with previously.  This time it all seems to have clicked and he whizzed through it.  He's got a headache so we talked about poetry (the next section in his English book) and discussed some principles of it rather than working through the book.  When L is tired / headachey he finds reading in artificial light hard work, so whilst I would have preferred to crack on with the course I doubt he would have retained much of the learning as he would be working hard to overcome the Irlen's Syndrome side of his dyslexia.  As this whole subject is way outside his comfort zone I am very aware that he is having to work much harder than it seems for the progress he is making, and I don't want to compromise that by pushing when I don't need to.  We have already covered about 1/10th of the course, and he's doing far better than I anticipated, if we keep going at this rate then we should be starting the IGCSE level work just after Christmas, which is about 6 months before I was anticipating :) So, slow days are not a problem!

The younger three have now all gone to their various scouting sections - A to beavers, J to cubs and M to scouts.

After a late dinner it'll be a quick story (we've reached Nelson in "Our Island Story now), then bed for all :)

Day eight - settling back into the swing of things

Generally I like slow starts to the day, waking up when I have slept enough and warming up to the day gradually.  So naturally Monday mornings are one of the earliest starts of the week . . .

The younger three headed off to their weekly multisports session - today they played Unihoc - the group is well attended and provides a team-sports aspect that we might struggle to source otherwise.

Whilst they were out L did some book-work, manipulating negative numbers, comparing post 1914 fiction, beginning his ICT course.  The text comparisons are a bit tricky, there is so much left to the interpretation of the reader, but he's getting the hang of this sort of thing now.  Once more I am struck by the fact that he is picking up things readily that caused so much stress a few years ago, and it's pretty reassuring to feel that we read the situation right in backing off from English as a discrete subject for him.  His vocabulary has exploded in recent years, as have his descriptive skills and deductive skills.

When the hordes returned we were still nose down in "Of mice and men" vs "A kestrel for a knave", so the others barrelled upstairs and explored a new game on their tablets.

After lunch A did some book-work, three sets of maths exercises based on addition and doubling again, work on capital letters and punctuation, Oz phonics, food chains and predator / prey in science, and then read me a book.

Unfortunately I had planned to invite J down next, but he made it clear he had no intention of doing that, but M didn't want to disrupt the planned order.  So I was faced with trying to talk J down from the top floor or talking M out of a meltdown because I was messing with the plans (M was happy to work, just not before J.)  I decided to work on M, because he was already with me on the ground floor.  It felt like a catch-22 situation, both of them wanted to work, just not before the other.  Neither of them were happy with *not* working.  Eventually I got through to M, there was a little shouting and a lot of stress, but we stopped just shy of meltdown.

Once he got going M was really happy and focussed - sometimes it feels like he needs to have a grumble in order to get down to business - I say to him he needs a good storm to clear the skies :)  We looked at place value in decimals and sequences using decimals, "words ending in vowels" (possibly the oddest page of work I've seen yet!) and then pluralising those words, flexibility and properties of materials, and some handwriting practise.

When M was done J came down happily, he did well and was very happy.  We looked at symmetry - another thing that seems to have been introduced in the books we skipped, but again it was easily mastered even though we were looking at complex shapes.  Then we looked at 3d shapes naming them, counting vertexes, edges, faces etc.  We tackled pronouns - a slightly tricky topic for a lad who struggles to keep he / she sorted, but he got the idea and was able to switch out nouns for pronouns with ease.  He also tackled food chains, but looked at seed dispersal too.  A chapter of the Life of Fred rounded out the afternoon, and off he skipped happily to hunt down his brother.

Most of the rest of the afternoon passed with the younger three playing together and occasionally asking L for help with things.  Later on A's friends knocked for her and she went out to play.

We had an early dinner (well, early for us!) and L has gone to one of his weekly roleplaying sessions.  The lucky whatsit has FOUR regular gaming groups, three weekly and the last fortnightly. 

So, A is still out, I need to go and recapture her soon, in our bedtime story (!) America has just declared her independence, and the children were aghast at the idea of a tax on tea.

Tomorrow we are having visitors - some of my most favourite people :) And that wraps up today really :) 

Oh, one last note - I have called time on the plum leather.  After three days drying it still wasn't right.  Not sure what to do with the gooey treacly stuff it became, and not sure if I'll try again!

Day five, museum Chess club and crashing out.

It was very hard to get up.  Not only for the children, but for me too!  After an enormously busy day and late night it was very tempting to conveniently "forget" that we had plans.

But I didn't forget, the children did get up and ready, and we did manage to leave the house.

Not only did we leave the house, we got to the museum in time too!

A local home educator had asked one of the volunteers at the museum to give us a talk about the Saxon period, and that is precisely what he did :) He talked about how things changed when the Romans left, and the timings of that, where the name Saxons comes from, where the Saxons came from and why, how they lived, how they traded, how we know those things.  He talked about how the Saxon period  ended, and about the interplay between the Saxons and the Vikings.  He even talked about money, trade and language.  It was a good talk, comprehensive, covering lots of things my guys knew about, other things they didn't.  We've not looked specifically at the time period, but we have read about it in "Our Island story", and they've seen various TV programmes like Horrible histories that cover lots of history.  We've also been to various other places that have Saxon artefacts, so this sort of joined up a whole lot of dots for them :)

After the talk there were replica helmets and swords to try on, and obligatory photos :

Once the session had wrapped up the children played with their friends - the museum has various outdoor games, and some old slot machines, and there was lots of general catching up and nattering :)

Once we got home the children went off to their various favoured activities, and later M went to the first Chess club session of the school year. J and A usually go out on Fridays but neither of those happened this week.

A is coughing a lot, and I am a little worried that the cough is hanging on for a long time.  I've started coughing now too :(

More Pics :) )

A shift in purpose

The original purpose of this blog was to document the ups and downs of seeking a diagnosis for the boys, when we set off down that road I struggled to find any real information and had very little idea of what to expect.

Now we have that diagnosis I'm going to divert to another project for a while . . .

Earlier this year I became aware of the idea of "100 days of home ed,"  the basic premise is to document 100 days of life in a home edding family.  There is a Facebook group collating blogs, and it is really interesting seeing the broad spectrum of home ed recorded there.

The posts can serve as raw data for those thinking about home ed and not knowing what they are jumping into, or as inspiration for those wobbling, or just as a way to build a sense of "we are not alone."

The days recorded range in style from formal to unschooling - scheduled days to free-form living.

So, I'm going to give it a try - I'm not really great at blogging regularly, but what can go wrong . . .

Today - Monday - day One!

We don't follow school terms as such, I often get a bit surprised when school holidays sneak up on me and there are actual *children* in the parks during the day, so whilst most of the children around us went back to school at some point over the last week, we waited for this week.  Mostly because all of the kids clubs restart this week, so we had to get organised and moving.

M, J and A started the day with a home ed sports meet - they played quick cricket with a fairly large group. The younger three all enjoy their Monday morning sports, but L dropped out as soon as he could.  He is not really into sport at all and at 15 1/2 towers over most of the other children there.

Whilst the younglings were out L and I hit the books for some Math and English work.  We've not done English as a discrete subject for a long time, L's dyslexia made reading comprehension very difficult, so we've worked on the skills in a sideways manner - reading for other subjects, spelling in other contexts.  We're aiming at a GCSE in the near future, possibly this year, more likely next, so we're beginning to formalise how we approach the subject.  I was pleasantly surprised when L aced the first two thirds of the reading comp exercise - an enormous improvement, and confirmation that we've built skills and confidence along the way - he was less sure of the essay type question, so we looked at that together, discussing technique far more than the actually answering the question (which he was able to cover himself once he understood how.)  The Maths was a breeze, but at this stage we're revising stuff he's already done to try and improve his grade (he took Maths IGCSE last summer, passed well enough but feels he could do better.  I'd happily leave it as the grade stands, but if he thinks he can do better then I guess I have to help him.)  After that we had a random conversation, and then L disappeared up to his room.

After a rest M was ready to do some work, so we looked at standard form in Maths, common and abstract nouns in English, materials and their uses in Science, and he read to me.  M is very driven by external rewards, and still (at 12) enjoys books that provide stickers for encouragement.  That surprised me a bit, but I'm happy to go with what works :)

A came down next, and slowly started to drive me mad.  She loves workbooks, I had to limit her to four pages of maths, which is a huge difference to the boys.  With them I seem to wind up encouraging them to just finish the exercise, with her it's more "that's enough lets move on to something else!"  so we looked at tens and units (again!) in various forms, and did some multiplication.  She worked through some grapheme exercises (looking at strings of letters that make the same sounds), did a spelling ladder (change on letter each time to make a new word from the clues,)  looked at life processes, and plants, read a book, drew some pictures about the book . . .

At that point I felt as though I'd been stuck in the dining room all day, although it was really only lunch time.  So the hungry hordes descended and ravaged the kitchen.

J stayed down after lunch, we did some handwriting practise - he still struggles with stamina in his hands, and has poor fine motor skills.  Slowly we're getting there, but it still hampers him a lot.  Then we worked on nouns in English, positive and negative numbers, place order, and words to numbers, numbers to words.  He found a science book and wanted to work through that, so we did life processes and parts of a flower, then he read a life of Fred book for a while.

Later the boys went for a bike ride, A went out to play with local friends, and L is currently at a weekly games night.

In between there has been cooking, Mine craft, and random drawings.

So that's our day one. The rest of the week looks manic!

Sunshine, writing and being us :)

It's been a while . . . So much is going on here that it's hard to find a quiet moment to marshal my thoughts, and I'm exhausted, which makes it even more likely that I'll end up writing nonsense ;)

A week or so ago we had to fill in the paperwork for L's exam entry.  Somehow that made us realise how little time he has left to get his head around the syllabus, even though we all knew the dates and he's doing fine.  That has mean that he and I are spending more and more time ploughing through his books - and that really is a time sink!  For the most part it's going well, even though it's a long way from the maths I know and understand.  As much as anything I am learning with him, and I find that gives L more confidence if he gets stumped. A phrase that keeps cropping up is that "it's not a test", so if he needs to work things through with me it's not a big deal. 

For a long time L was a perfectionist.  If he did a page of maths and got 19/20 he'd be upset about the one that was wrong.  Finally we're overcoming that - because so much of the syllabus is new to us, or takes things we know further, L is at long last accepting that he can do well without a perfect score.  That said he's usually hitting well above 90%, so all is good :)

We have begun working through Write from the start - a sort of hand-writing program.  All four children are doing it, mostly happily.  The exercises are designed to improve hand eye co-ordination, pen control, to work with the proprioceptive system, to develop visual discrimination and generally to come at things from a neuro-developmental slant rather than just a repetitive one.  All four children had difficulties with the first exercise  - though different difficulties (as ever!) 

The task was to put a single dot inside a small circle.  The aim was to improve precision, develop and awareness of how hard to press the pen(cil) down, to work on hand movements and pen-grip. The circles were in columns, and got progressively closer together. L was fine to begin with, when there was a lot of space around the circles, but as they got closer together he found it increasingly hard to see clearly what he was doing.  I'm guessing this is a dyslexia thing, and hoping that by working on it we can help other reading issues.  M found it hard to get the dots to be dots rather than lines.  He struggled from the start, but improved as the exercise went on.  J was very disorganised in his filling things in - he found it hard to start at the top left and "read" across, and kept missing our circles.  A found her hand got sore half way through, but otherwise was fine.

I'm hoping that since each of them had quite specific issues, working through the program will help them improve - if they'd all whizzed through it without a pause it might feel like a waste of time / money. And since the issues were so clear, it should be easy to keep track of how things are going.  We're on the eighth exercise now, all of them are still fairly happy to keep going - I think it helps that the sheets only take about 5-10 mins to complete, and aren't particularly hard. So far we've had an improvement in the tasks themselves, but not in their writing.  I'm hopeful though :)

I like the program, it seems very gentle in its increasing difficulty and short tasks are easier to fit in.  I hope that it will work - I've read lots of positive things about it - I'll let you all know how things go :)

In other news . . . the weather!  Wow! It's been so lovely here we've been out enjoying it :)  We went to a local rec' and L flew his quadcopter - he's actually really good - the rest of us just hit each other with foam weapons.  Then L joined in the melee.  We have a large number of weapons - all of them are designed to look like fantasy weapons, for use as costume in Live Action Role Play (LARP), and they are all safe for LARP fighting.  Made from foam, with a solid core, then coated in either rubber or latex they do sting, but rarely hurt (every now and then a freak shot catches someone badly, but really that's unavoidable in this sort of playing)

We all really enjoy this sort of "fighting" :) It's a great way to burn off energy, and it is a big adrenalin rush.  The kids enjoy ganging up on my husband and I, and it is just a very "us" thing to do.  There are probably all sorts of "soft" skills being learnt too though - hand eye co-ordination, consideration for others, not to charge from too far away or you'll be exhausted by the time you get there . . .

So, here are a few pics . . .





A didn't get hurt BTW, J is very good at not *actually* making contact :)




Someone's gonna catch her biggest brother . . . .



General Melee

Just to prove M was there too :)

The National Space Centre, Leicester

Well, we managed it :) As an almost last minute decision we decided to go to the National Space Centre in Leicester, a few weeks ago we went to a Live Action Role Playing (LARP) event in Leicester and saw some signs.  We've often wondered about going, but it seemed a long way to go and an expensive place to get into.

But we've been at home for a long time - lots of tired people, ill people, bad weather and other things have meant we just haven't "gone out" for ages.  Besides all that J is doing a project about our solar system, so it even works as an educationally appropriate event :)

As I said, it looks like an expensive day out for six people, but it didn't work out that way :) L counts as a child, even though he is 15 and taller than me, and my husband and I were allowed to go in as "personal assistants" for M and J, meaning we got in free. 

From the outside it doesn't look particularly awesome.  Tucked away on a housing estate, looking a bit more like an industrial unit than a museum, our initial impression was that maybe we had wasted the journey.

We needn't have worried though - the inside bares no resemblance to the exterior, and the trip was well worth it :)

The ground floor is divided into various galleries, there are a lot of interactive exhibits, and lots that you don't need to read extensively to understand.  That last part was crucial as M and J scattered and A was able to be pretty self sufficient.  There is enough detail in the info panels that L was intrigued and interested, but not so much he had trouble with word density. 

M and J disappearing was a bit of an issue - there were lots of school parties around, and the number of bodies milling about made it hard to keep track of the more random members of the family.  Thankfully everything is open plan enough that there were only two or three times we properly lost track of the boys, and even those were mercifully short.

The galleries were well planned, and themed so that everything made sense, the first was about space travel, the second about observing the skies, the third about the effect of various things on Earth (though that might have been a subsection of the last gallery) and the final one was about the planets individually. 

A separate area followed the space race, with rockets and video clips, lost of time lines and ephemera to anchor the events in their time periods.  Once the school parties had left there was a lot of time spent exploring what happened when, and L was surprised to trace the history of rockets back through WWII to Germany.

We also watched a planetarium show - We are Aliens - which was very well produced and I was hoping would deal with a few long running "debates" we have . . . Sadly, all it did was make M join the debate! 

L has often complained that we are looking "out there" for life that resembles our own.  The fact that the search focuses on looking for water and oxygen, and assumes a carbon based life form, seems ridiculous to him.  He feels that different evolutionary pressures, a different atmosphere, a different beginning point could all lead to life that looks like nothing we've ever seen before.  To a great extent I agree, but I also see that if we are going to "look" then the scientists need to start somewhere.  So, the debate rumbles on.  And on.  I almost wish "we" would find carboniferous life out there just to stop the wittering!

So, in conclusion, we had fun :) with the exception of loosing a couple of children for brief spells, and a couple of meltdowns, the day worked very well.  Much better than it looks from the outside and worth the money :)

Assessments, letters, conversations, and more about pee :)

It's been a while . . . there are lots of reasons for that - life has been crazy, but yet there hasn't been much to say, I've not been well, we've dived head first into exam prep, you know how it is, Life just sort of happened and here we are weeks after I last wrote anything.

Of the things that have happened, most have been pretty straight forward :

J: After the appointment with the community paediatrician to discuss frequent "little leaks"  things have gone really well.  J has taken to peeing standing up pretty confidently and that, combined with increased "shaking" has pretty much stopped daytime wet spots.  He is also drinking more, and we are focusing on him drinking cranberry juice or water, and he is able to go for longer in between needing to go.  Biggest of all we are having virtually NO night time issues!  Previously he would have a small accident most nights, and a bigger one every few days.  He *did* have a few nights of proper bed soaking just after we saw the doctor, but within a week those had stopped, and in the month since we've had one night time accident.  Just one!  Yay! 

J also had an ultrasound on his kidneys and bladder, just to check that everything was fine, and it was.

So, *that* issue is pretty much sorted.

We had a response to the letter challenging the report of the last meeting we had at CAMHs (if you followed that!)  It was really just a place-holding letter, saying they would look at their notes and be in touch.  So that one is still on-going.

M: On the 4th of March M had an ADOS assessment.  ADOS stands for Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule.  He was nervous going in, we couldn't go in with him, but when he came out he was very VERY bouncy.  And really that's all I can tell you.  The two ladies who did the assessment said they'd be in touch, but couldn't give us any idea of when.  So now we wait some more.

L: Well, there are a few points for L.  Firstly he is doing very well with his exam prep, he is getting his head around tricky maths concepts, and remembering more names for Biology too.  He is working his way through the books, and we should be right on schedule for the exams.  What's not so great is that we have gone WAY past my own maths knowledge.  I got a C at school 20+ years ago.  This stuff is a lot harder than I remember and quite a bit of it is new to me.  Still, we're learning together I guess.

In a week and a bit L will be rejoining a local youth scheme that tries out various sports, they are kicking off with a roller disco, but last year they did canoeing, rock climbing and lazer tag (and a pile of other stuff before he joined.)  He's nervous but looking forward to it. It's interesting seeing his attitude to sport (that it's pretty pointless) given that he is probably the most physically able of the bunch. 

The most interesting point though was a random conversation.  L asked me when we first heard of home education.  I had to think quite hard, but remembered it was when I was having trouble nursing L.  For some reason home ed was mentioned on an old Usenet group, though as it was a US based group I suspect it was called home schooling.  So the conversation went on - when did we decide to try?  I explained that we had considered home ed before L went to nursery, but decided to give school a go first.  Things moved on and he wanted to know the reasons - that surprised me, I thought he knew, but he wasn't sure of the details.  He knew he wasn't happy at nursery but couldn't remember why - so we talked about those bits.

L didn't like nursery, he hadn't been keen since a week or so into things, but it just got worse and worse.  He didn't get stressed at being left, he just didn't want to be there at all.  He remembers doing "just enough" so they would let him go off, and that seems to relate to the fact that this particular pre-school nursery only recorded a child as being able to do something if the child did it when they were being assessed.  So once or twice a week they'd get each child to sit with their specific worker and do stuff.  L seems to have disliked performing (!) and so did as little as he could.  That will be why when he left - 8 months after starting - the nursery staff still thought he could only recognise the numbers   1 - 3, but at home he was working with 0-12 . . .

There were lots of other things, of course, specific incidents that stayed with me.  I mentioned one about drawing.  L - being about 3 - had done a drawing that was all scribble an enthusiasm, not so much actual drawing.  He'd shown it to one of the workers and she had said something along the lines of "Oh what a lovely XXX" - I never did find out what she thought it was.  Whatever she said though was NOT what L had drawn.  On the way home he ripped up the picture and threw it away.  He got very angry that he didn't draw what he had meant to draw.  And that was it.  No more drawing from L.  As we were talking I could see that he hadn't entirely remembered the incident, so I asked him what he did remember.  He said he remembers being told his drawing was rubbish, remembers enjoying drawing before that and not feeling confident enough to draw after.  He remembers trying to draw afterwards and just not being able to because he knew it would be wrong.  So he remembers the lingering emotional effects even now - 11 or more years later.  He feels that he would love to draw, but that he has lost years of practise and training muscles to do what he wants.  And it makes him sad.  Very sad.

We've talked it through, and he's going to try a handwriting program that is actually designed to train the hand, brain and proprioceptive system at the same time.  I hope it isn't too late, but I guess we'll see eventually :)

Lastly we have A.  She is bumbling along, mostly happily but every now and then extremely stroppily.  She has just learnt to ride her bike without stabilisers (still a bit wobbly though!)  She can read but is very reluctant to, she can write and is wanting to more and more, and she loves to draw and create.  Not much more to say really!

Maybe tomorrow I'll have a visit to tell you about - if all goes according to plan!

Projects abound!

Now we've been back for a while, life has resumed in full flow.

Of course that means barely a moment to sit and think, let alone write or plan . . .

Before we went away I tidied up a lot of our resources, and took a lot of books off our "downstairs bookshelf".  Mostly the books were pre-readers, or very early reading schemes - somehow we seem to have collected quite a few books from random reading schemes.  Sometimes I've actually bought them, a large chunk came from my mothers school, some were gifts from well meaning relatives.  Now I have four children who can read (!) we don't need the "A is for . . ." books.  So they all migrated to the loft.  They took with them a whole pile of board books, for very similar reasons.  That made space on some of the "upstairs bookshelves" for story books that had been downstairs.  That meant I had space on the shelves for some more of the educational resources I have collected - we have lots of project packs, work books, and reference books.  Until now most of the resources have been hidden away under the stairs.

As I got them out I reminded myself just how many enticing things we had, and as the younger three came and got in the way they all spotted things they wanted to explore.  I've decided that having these packs isn't enough, we actually need to *use* them! 

So I filled a shelf with books and packs that were about the right level for one or other of the younger three, and let them browse.

A decided that she liked the look of a pack I'd sent off for in 2003 from the Cats Protection League, and we're three or four sessions into it.  We have another from Battersea Dog and Cat home, sent off for years ago, which we may or may not move onto, depending on how enthusiastic she is.

J wants to finish off his Solar System lap book, then move onto a Mini beasts pack we got from our local scrap store.  He was fascinated to see how much his writing has improved since we began the lap book in November. 

M has started the First class project pack from iChild - down loadable here, though we have a hard copy.  This one is a bit odd - it doesn't go into enough detail for M, so he's asked to learn about several things as a result - notably the British Empire, the second World War, and the Industrial revolution.  I'm pretty sure we have several books that cover those, so I guess that we're lining up future projects there :)

I'm torn now though - is this Autonomy?  I think so, because all three asked to do their respective projects, I didn't suggest them, or even ask them to choose one.  I guess it's not unschooling though, because all of these packs are designed to be used in a classroom setting, so it's very much a case of "Introduce, discuss, activity, conclude."  For M that's not enough information, he wants to go off at a tangent, to follow his interests and talk about *everything* - in that he reminds me of L - for A the structure is novel, she is focusing on stories, and whilst her writing is still emerging, she is enthusiastic to get her thoughts down on paper - much more so than any of the boys at her age.  J likes the structure, sticks to the facts and the task at hand, wants to do it, and get it done well, but there is no distracting, no related conversation, no tangents.  He is very much about getting down to business and then getting out of the kitchen.  I was a bit surprised that he wanted to do a project, but he did, he does, and we'll see if it gets completed.

There are lots more books and packs under the stairs, lots more on the shelf.  Will this be a one off?  Or is it a bit like strewing - a Montesorian principle involving providing interesting / intriguing activities and leaving them to be discovered rather than imposing on or inviting in the child.  I know strewing works with J and A, especially with art supplies, but it has never worked for L or M.  With both of them if I want to interest them I either need to say "hey, look at this . . . " or start doing it myself, where they can see and then be prepared to work along side them.

So, at the moment we're being bookish.  I wonder if that is in reaction to a cold wet winter, outside looks so foreboding, and forbidding, and even ASD kids can only spend so long buried in Minecraft before they long for something more.

I wasn't sure this day would come

Wins come in all shapes and sizes.

Last night we had a huge victory - might not seem like much to the outside world, but to me it was enormous!

L is very dyslexic - the lady who assessed him last year said his was the worst case she has seen in 25 years of assessing kids.

It took him a long time to learn to read, longer to become confident, and even longer to actually read spontaneously.

Now he's 15, he reads a couple of science magazines - both aimed at an adult market - he reads bits of role playing rules books, but never ever fiction.

Both my husband and I devour books.  Our house is full of novels, factual books, role playing books and any other sort of book you can think of.  To have a child who hated reading just felt odd.  Wrong.

Over Christmas L, his father and I listened to an audio-play, a new version of Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. L likes science fiction, in terms of films / TV programs / games, but Neverwhere isn't *quite* Sci-fi.  I wasn't sure how he would take to it.  But Gaiman is one of my favourite authors, so *I* wanted to listen to it, even if he didn't.  It took a while for L to get into it, but by the end he was thoroughly enjoying it.

We decided a few more audio plays might be a good way to introduce high quality story telling, so we've been looking for some more to listen to.

A few days ago I read "Fortunately the milk" to the younger three - it's a truly fantastic book.  It's a children's book, but well written and full of good humour.  Suffice to say it's also by Mr Gaiman, and L was in his room, sneakily listening.  After all he's far too old to be read to any more.

Last night we watched Coraline after dinner.  Another Gaiman story . . . L declared it "awesome."  I pointed out we'd seen another Gaiman film (Stardust) a while ago.

This morning L told me that Neil Gaiman was his favourite author, and that maybe he (L) might like to read some of his shorter stories . . .

And so, there we have it. A victory :) L not only has a favourite author, but also has some books he might like to read. 

You might think it a small win, insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but I'll take the smiles where I can find them thanks.

As a happy addendum, L today hit the books with renewed enthusiasm.  He feels he's getting somewhere with IGCSE biology, and has hit a patch of his IGCSE Maths that is deceptively simple.  For Mr L, right now, life is good :)

Home again, home again, Jiggety jig

Well, we're back :) Time to get life back on track and re-embrace our "normal".

Last week we were at one of our favourite places - ConCeption, a gaming convention on the south coast.  It was awesome :)  As with everything in our lives, this particular chunk of awesomness was coloured by the children's quirks and additional needs, but not always in a negative way.

When we go away M and J feel a need to plan.  That's pretty normal, but M in particular takes normal and magnifies it about 100X.  M's planning started back in October, and he has been telling friends about what would happen for a very long time.  In order to try and get this under control at the very start of January we wrote lists - what they both wanted to pack, what they wanted to play, even (in J's case) what they would wear on the way down.  Since there was some writing involved A decided to hop onto the band waggon - although her list was much shorter, and didn't actually get looked at once she had written it.

When it came to the time we wanted to pack, this was the easiest year yet.  We have now fully embraced M's sensory issues, so most of his clothes are ones he is happy to wear (this does change depending on his stress levels, but now we never buy something for him without his trying it on and approving it.)  So I was able to say things like "six pairs of trousers! Go!" and they did!  It was a bit chaotic, lots of clothes everywhere, I had to go through and fold things, quietly checking for holes in knees of trousers as I went, but all four children managed to sort things themselves.

The biggest issue we had was space - with six of us, a weeks clothing, and *lots* of games, the car felt far too small.  There was quite a bit of negotiating about which games would be taken, which could fit into the same box and how we could keep them from getting damaged en route.  In the end we took far more games than we played, but far less than M wanted to.

For the first time in years not only Uncle N, but also Uncle M were there.  Uncle N always comes, staying in the same lodge as us, but having another adult about really changed the dynamic, and made for an almost stress free week :)

This is the perfect convention for us - for the first half there are very few children older than about 3 around, and those that are there we have known all their lives.  We often have the pool to ourselves, and the soft play is similarly exclusive.  That means that M, J and A get to relax when it's not at all busy, they get to do things without having to wait or take turns, they get to be in control.  From the Friday night onwards more children arrive - again mostly ones we have known forever - and the kids play well in groups, having already explored and done most of the things they wanted to do.  It's very interesting to see that all four of the offspring slot back into the social groups naturally, they know the other children well enough despite only spending one week of the year together, there is a tolerance of each others differences and very rarely any upsets at all.  We had no tears / complaints / grumps this year, not from our guys or any of the other children.  It really is a very relaxing place to be.

J and A played their first convention games that were not run by one of "us" this year - they played the Pathfinder Kids Track - and they both loved it.  There were two games, each lasted four hours, but had several breaks.  The guys running it were well prepared, very enthusiastic, and there were three of them to the two kids :)  It was great to see both of the littlies really getting into things, and one way or another they both played every day we were there :)

M and L played standard Pathfinder games with their dad and Uncle N.  They both cope fairly well at a table with random adults, and had a blast.

For M gaming like this is perfect - there are rules, which give his socialisation shape and form, he knows his character well, which makes him relax and feel able to contribute, and he is actually a very good tactician, which makes him an asset to the table.  L is shyer, finds it harder to speak up to strangers, but once he relaxes he shines.  Playing games like this helps both boys with reading / maths / writing, because there is a need to do all of those things quickly and independently.  It's good practise, even though neither of them are learning anything new.

L sometimes finds M too much (he's not alone there, TBH) so we organised a game with Uncle M running, and L, Uncle N, My husband and I playing.  L came out of his shell, and really enjoyed himself.  It helps that Uncle M is a really good GM, and that we were all having fun too.  One of those games where everyone hits the perfect notes and it just takes off.

On the Saturday morning M played a solo game with uncle N, using the Savage Worlds rules set, then in the afternoon I ran a game called "Little Wizards" aimed at children, and it was chaotic!  I'll write up the story and post it later.  J and A both played, as did 6 other children. 

On the Sunday I ran an interactive game (again for children.  Do you see a pattern!)  These games are generally called LRP's, and instead of saying "my character will do XX" you go and do it.  Mostly they are based around "talky" situations, and it is a great opportunity to get into a character and have fun.  Again J and A played this whilst the other two played Pathfinder with their dad and uncle.

Sunday afternoon J played a very old game called Star Wars D6, based in the Star Wars universe, with a very simple rules mechanic, I played with him as uncle N ran the game.  It took him a little while to settle, but he had a blast.

At some point M bought a new game - Cosmic patrol - and read most of the rule book in the down time between games.  As with most RPG rule books this one was pretty long - novel sized - and needed to be concentrated on.  M was his usual dedicated (obsessive?) self, and determined to read it before we left, I don't think I could have convinced him to read that much, even with the best novels we have here.

Monday morning came around too soon, and we had to say goodbye not only to the uncles, but also to the holiday park.  Both M and J cried, but that was to be expected, they hate leaving places / people.

On the way home we stopped at Marwel Zoo, but that is another post (with pictures!)

There is so much more to say, but I'll have to cogitate on it a bit longer, however -

we are back. 

Life resumes. 

J is off to the hospital tomorrow for an outpatients appointment . . .

Drowning, and juggling badly at the same time

There. 
I've said it. 
I'm drowning.
Drowning in a hundred things that need to be done RIGHT NOW!
And hiding from a fist full of things that should have been done a long time ago.

In a couple of weeks we are going away.  This is a good thing.  Really it is!

Every year we go to a fantastic games convention called ConCeption (yes, I know.  I didn't name it!)  We have been going since it started - this is our 14th year.  It is a place of happy memories, familiar enough to feel like "Home" and full of friends. 

The children are so far beyond excited it's scary.  In September M began asking how long it was until we went away.  Even the fact that Christmas was before ConCeption didn't stop the holiday being their focus.

I kinda feel sorry for a dear friend - S - who has been told about the event in detail every time we have seen her for months now!

So why am I drowning?  Well, this is a games convention, there will be much playing of role playing games there (as well as card and board / boxed games.)  And each year I run some children's games.  This year is no exception - I am scheduled to run two kids games, and one game for my brother in law (the infamous Uncle N who always comes with us.)

And therein lies the problem.  None of the games are written - one is very almost done.  Needs proof reading and a tiny bit of character creation.  The game for N I have no ideas for at all.  And the final game - a Pirate LRP - I have ideas for, but they are refusing to line up and be sensible. 

The main issue is that my creativity drains away when I am tired, and right now I am exhausted.  M is back to regular night terrors (though usually very short ones), and I am feeling run down :(

Add to that some organisational stress at Church (where I co-ordinate Junior church, no where near as grand / impressive as it sounds!), a bit of family stress, reorganising the kitchen as we have run out of work space (new microwave taking up too much room), a bookshelf needing drastic repairs, having to sort and archive home ed stuff, storing things in the loft - which then needed a bit of reorganising and The Letter, and that's why I'm drowning.  Too many balls in the air, and not one I can easily afford to drop.

Oh, The Letter?  Didn't I mention?  We got the report of J's last assessment, and it is full of factual errors.  We need to write correcting it - it's really that bad.  It says he had surgery to have grommets fitted - his hearing has always been 100%.  No surgery needed.  Some problems I listed have been minimised and trivialised, and others have been left out entirely.  The conclusions given look very much like a dismissal of our major concerns, even if they have agreed to further assessments.  The report made me feel really angry - like I had been to a different meeting than the person who wrote it - and I am struggling to work out how to phrase things politely but firmly.  We need these people to listen to us, not write off our worries.  I think I have written a dozen letters in my head, but none that really fit the requirements.

I am determined that I will get it all done in time, and if I don't it won't be through lack of trying!
 But I am starting to worry now.