Gcse textiles:ideas for using felt.

Whilest Christina was answering a GCSE textiles question about handmade felt, we discovered an interesting pintrest board with gorgeous ideas for things made from felt some of these ideas we're going to try making as project ideas for Christina's sewing lessons and possibly christimas presents as we both like the idea of another handmade christmas after we did a handmade christmas last year with handmade soap cake slices.


http://pinterest.com/tinselfairy/felt-home-made-felt-fabric-arted-and-crafted/


                     



                 



From

Dominique.

My First Sewing Lesson.

At first I was really scared because everyone in the room  was bigger/older than me, however everyone turned out to be really nice so I forgot how much older they were and start talking alot more.

Michelle is my sewing teacher she show me how to pin right, she taught me loads of tricks of how to hide rough

edges and make the final project good but with less steps.

I also got loads of comments like:

She has got good control of her machine

Christina's bag looks really nice.

And many more great comments so I felt really proud of myself.

I'm working on my strap next week and hopefully I'll have a finished product.

 Today Michelle showed me how to:

 . Hide raw edges

 . That sewing/textiles involes maths beacause you have to find angles, measure to size and much more.

 . How to cut out my strap and I cut it all by myself I didn't need any help at all.

                                                                  

                                                               

                                                               

                                                             

From Christina.

Sandsend beach amazingly educational, read what we learnt and how.

We went to sandsend near whitby in the morning yesterday and christina, storm and I played on the beach a wonderful opportunity to run as well as jump and run away from the waves as the waves break.
Apart from being fun, it gets the kids active (it could count as PE as its exercise (if you're thinking how a trip to the beach could possibly be educational) and it counts towards their enrichment activities, as well as contributing to their fitness and their fitness contributes to health and also sunlight produces health benefits of natural vitamin D, very important nowadays as rickets is returning as so many children are spending so long indoors on computers and rickets in more advanced forms can cause lifelong health problems for the sufferer).

The girls also had fun writing messages in the sand (English skills) and looking at all the different types of pebbles further down the beach all the different colours and patterns and shapes (rocks can be counted as both science and geography) then we had great fun seeing who could throw the pebbles the furthest and get the biggest splash in the sea (if you think about that it involves judging distance so some maths involved and using the right amount of force to throw with to get the pebble to go the furthest and forces are science) Christina found some beautiful sea glass and both girl found gorgeous pebbles storm found a pebble which was grey with white wavy lines across and I even found a gorgeous, small bright red pebble.

Christina was able to recognise that washed up along the tide line if you look you can see sea coal, fine dust like particles of coal if you rake them together they can be collected, dried out and used. Our neighbour collects sea coal from saltburn beach after its dried its contained within  newspaper rolled up in a cone or tube shape this allows her to run her coal fire for free in the winter.

Overall a wonderful morning had by all and a lot learnt by both girls. As well as everyone had lots of fun  and all thoroughly were worn out.
Such a lovely morning.

From

Dominique.

Egton bridge stepping stones and egton bridge to grosmont toll road walk through egton estate.

After Christina's sewing lesson in ebberston which she'll blog about we all went to egton bridge (where we used to live) in the north Yorkshire moors.

By popular request everyone wanted to the stepping stones across the river esk.

As we walked down broom house lane I found a small pine cone which storm really enjoyed looking at and feeling with her hands (learning about nature) this was added to our treasures to take home along with the pebbles we collected from sandsend beach earlier in the day.

Storm was amazed by the river there's part you can see that drops down a little making a small waterfall like rapids section which really interested her. 

The bigger three children and poppy our border terrier were all able to cross the stepping stones easily and quickly. 

Then daddy held both storms hands and helped her step across even she was able to confidently step between the stones (all have good balance and coordination skills a good opportunity to practice them).
I however am not very confident at stepping stones and find it hard to judge how far to step between stones. I was certain I'd misjudge it and fall in! Much to the amusement of my husband.
Giselle and Christina however helped a very slow and uncertain mummy across. I kid you not it took forever!! (The kid learnt lots about helping, cooperation and teamwork all valuable skills for life and the workplace)
Poppy our border terrier in the mean time decided she'd like a swim in the esk wet doggy but she enjoyed it and all the kids laughed at her.

We walked up the path and under the bridge and up the steps coming out near the bottom horse shoe inn (as there's one at the top in egton) before we got to the actual bridge in egton bridge we stopped to talk to some dog walkers and had a lovely chat they were on holiday then we all stopped by the field to watch the sheep and their new spring lambs all of which were very sweet running and playing in the field.

As we crossed the bridge for some reason a stone has had to be removed next to the metal plaque commemorating the rebuilding of the bridge after the esk rose and swept most of it away. However this did afford a lovely clear view of the river for the children who spotted several fish that were 'jumping' up to the surface of the water the kids loved it. (more appreciation of the wonders if nature) 

As the others walked ahead storm and I stopped to look at daffodils and gorgeous forget me nots which seem to be all over egton and egton bridge making everywhere look so pretty. Storm loves pretty flowers. We also stopped to listen to the huge variety of different birds you can hear and looked up in the sky to watch them flying past. Ever since being a baby storm loves birds and gets so excited when she sees birds. We also saw pheasants which there are plenty of this time of year and they get really close to you they have no fear!

We walked up past egton manor house where Simon lives and turned down on to the toll road.

There are rarely ever any cars here so all the kids can run ahead and play. But first they stop to see the donkey’s that live in the field backing on to the manor they are beautiful and very friendly so all the kids get to give them a stroke.

As we walked along further we got to see sheep with their lambs and cows up in a further field back that you can see from the toll road and we saw quite a few pheasants:

  

The older girls were very sensible while they were running ahead someone had left a farm gate to a field with sheep and lambs in open luckily only one lamb had escaped they quietly walked it back towards the field so as not to scare it if you run towards them if frightens them. If sheep and lambs get too scared they can die 'sheep worrying' is horrid. The girls carefully checked the lamb was back with its mother as both have the same number marked on them then securely fastened the gate. The person who opened that gate and LEFT it open is highly irresponsible the poor farmer could've ended up with his flock all over the place between grosmont and egton bridge, anyone of the flock may of got lost or hurt (I'm glad my girl were so responsible and acted quickly, safely and appropriately).
The kids all shouted under the bridge having fun as it echos.
As we walked along further there was a gorgeous patch horse in the field which the kids watched.

Then they climbed over the gate part way down the toll road the main big gate is kept padlocked but residents and the postman have keys to it beside it is a smaller wooden gate that walkers can open and hopefully shut. Its very pretty down the toll road:

We stopped to talk to some walkers their dogs were both friendly one of which was elderly so the kids were able to ask to stroke their doggies and we all had a lovely long chat.
As we reached the grosmont end of the walk the children played on the tyre swing on the tree and climbed the big tree.
On the way back dad pointed out wild garlic to the kids and jack by the hedge which being edible the kids tried it has a mild garlic taste dad knows which ones are edible as he's a chef and they pick the edible wild resources around them to use in the kitchen (never do this if you don't know as you could pick something poisonous).
Storm was a little afraid of the farmer letting off gun shots on his farm, possibly to scare birds.
We had a lovely walk back watching the sunset by the time we got back to egton bridge to the car the kids were tired especially storm who walked there and back fab as she's only just turned 3.
It was a wonderful walk.

From

Dominique.

Today:

Today was meant to be maths and English lessons however we had some difficulties with our maths log in eventually this was resolved through customer services. We re-did our membership although it didn't run out until the 20th may as previously we'd missed out on the home education discount of 40% as my other children love conquer maths too each of the four kids has their own separate account for only £2 more than I was paying for Christina by herself such a fabulous saving and great for all the kids now I just need to wait for literacy planet to get back to me this is an English program you can access from the conquer maths website we may use this to assist with English as well.
Tomorrow in the morning drew will be going to see one of the two possible schools he likes as in September he will change primary schools. Then Christina will be going for her first ever professional sewing lesson with Michelle at the workshop in ebberston she's really excited and I'm sure will blog about it tomorrow afternoon.

From

Dominique.

My Textiles Work- How to make your own bag.

In Textiles I have been making a shoulder strapped bag, at first I thought  it would be easy sew all the seams and put the strap on but as I found it's a bit more than that.

As you have to:

1. Cut the fabric to the size you would like your bag.

2. Pin your fabric on 4 sides and sew along all side until finshed and poke the conners out and iron your seams.

3. Next measure the length of your shoulder to your waist diagonally (as I want my bag straps to go diagonally across my shoulder so I can't loose my bag) and cut out to your measurements.

4. Again seam your strap on all edges but this time it has to be very close to the edge so that your starp is not to thin.

5. Sew your strap to your bag to this, follow these steps:

1. Turn your bag inside out
2. than sew your strap to one side and then the other side.

Next you can decorate your bag with whatever you like or even leave it plain.
I have decorated my bag like this:

Hope you enjoy making your bag.

from Christina

Starting out home education.

This is our home education blog, started March 2013. Initially home education was meant to be temporary until September 2013, but home education has been so fun it now seems to be a permanent way forward.

My name is Dominique I home educate my daughters Christina, 12 and Storm, 3. I have two other children who are educated at main stream school Giselle, 10 and Drew, 8.

My husband, Ryan and I ended up deciding with Christina to look at home education as we weren't happy with solution's offered for the bullying Christina was experiencing. She had previously loved school and been happy and outgoing she ended up too afraid to go to school, miserable and crying all the time. Initially home education was going to be temporary until she could go to a different secondary school further away when her sister giselle went up in sept 2013.

However Christina's loved home education so much we've decided to permanently carry on with it and home school her younger sister, storm right from the start.

Initially we used the time table for the school she would go up to and taught those topics: Maths, english, science, history, geography, design and technology, PE, ICT, art, french and german.

Christina approached us and asked if she could stay permanently home educated after only a few weeks as she loved it so much and she also asked if we'd be very upset if maybe she looked into other qualifications as well as igcse's as she really wants to work in textiles possibly as a seamstress/ dressmaker.

So taking this into account we've tried out a different time table taking into account her interests but we still have a fairly structured format and work using the national curriculum.

Our current timetable April 2013-July 2014 is:
Mon: GCSE Textiles Theory work (edexcel)
Tues: Maths. English.
Wed: Practical sewing machine skills day.
          (in Sept this will be a lesson at a controlled assessment centre for her controlled unit of her gcse textiles 2hrs 20 weeks, 40 hours total for the unit)
          Professional sewing lesson.
Thur: Practical sewing day.
Fri: Science. ICT.

We have joined lots of home education support groups the last few weeks and we're even going on a 2 day trip. In the last few weeks Christina has gone from having 2 friends to about 15.
And we are continuing to meet new people.

We've learnt lots about qualifications and home education and found that many people were starting qualifications at my daughters age of 12 after many hours of research we found most people who decide on their children doing qualifications opt for igcse's as they have no coursework or controlled units. But Textiles doesn't have an option to do igcse so we spoke to edexcel and tracked down our nearest centres where she could take the controlled unit so she could do her gcse textiles.
She's also going to be working on igcse computer studies (http://www.cie.org.uk/qualifications/academic/middlesec/igcse/subject?assdef_id=844) as we discovered the ICT igcse has a practical part where as computer studies is all exam based.
We've reccently started using conquer maths (http://www.conquermaths.com/) for our maths lessons instead of our maths textbooks and TES resources (We use TES for a lot of lesson resources in all topics: http://www.tes.co.uk/secondary-teaching-resources/).

Christina has decided some topics that she'd be interested in doing qualifications in:

1.gcse textiles (edexcel- http://www.edexcel.com/quals/gcse/gcse09/dt/Textiles/Pages/default.aspx).
2.igcse computer studies (http://www.cie.org.uk/qualifications/academic/middlesec/igcse/subject?assdef_id=844).

We will use edexcel for most of Christina's exam's as their exam centre for private candidates is nearer to us than cambridge's however edexcel don't offer computer studies so this is why we're using cambridge for computer studies.

After these two she's interested in:
For these we will most likely also use edexcel (http://www.edexcel.com/i-am-a/student/qualifications/Pages/International-GCSE-specifications.aspx)

3.igcse biology.
4.human biology.
5.igcse chemistry.
6.igcse physics.
7.igcse business studies.
8.igcse french.
9.igcse german.
10.igcse english.
11.igcse maths.

 
12. City and guilds in dress making and sewing machine.

Although we've set out quite a formal, curriculum based approach and been quite methodical, within that we have flexibility in every topic and only go at her pace and remember to have fun. If a trip out or meeting other home schoolers comes up we can be flexible and look at our detailed weekly timetable planned ahead for the next year and rearrange what we're doing.

So onwards and upwards we are stepping forward on our home education adventure.

Storm is likely to have a less formal style of home education following a more interest led approach at least until she's 7.


I will be posting up blogs and so will Christina she will be posting up blogs on her home education, hopefully she can share all her likes and dislikes, interests and progress as well this hopefully blogging will improve her spelling for english :)

From

Dominique.