School and Education

Parent Failure

Pssst! It’s GG and the Bug’s Mummy here. *Warning – this post may contain square-words… The last week of school. It’s a nightmare, isn’t it? For the children it has been a week of excitement, drama (on and off the stage) celebrations, and gifts. For me it has been one parent failure after another. Lets start with the costumes: Old-fashioned bar owner in the Lemonade kid. She had to have curly hair apparently. As I struggled to get my pre-Romantics heated curling tongs (not seen action for 30 years) out of the matted burning mess of hair, I entertained the …

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School Trip

Overheard on a Reception year school trip…. “When are we going home?” “We just got here.” “Owen, I know you’re in love with me, but Fraser wants to marry me.” “Eeeuw that’s gross, I’m not touching that!” “Fraser’s cute, isn’t he?” “Yeah… there’s a hundred stones in my shoe.” Two bumped heads. Tears. Accusations. Packed lunches: berries in one, Kit-kat in another. Whining. Kit-kat consumed. Sugar rushes. “When’s lunch?” “We’ve just had lunch.” “What was it like?” “This is awesome guys! They’ve got diamonds and a dance ball!” “It’s a leafcutter. Look, it’s got toes.” “Now then children, this is …

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Face Britain Kids self-portraits on Buckingham Palace

Friday night saw us making a sudden dash to London to visit Buckingham Palace. Last-minute news told us that Face Britain were staging a 3-nights-only light show projection onto the facade of Buckingham Palace. Why the need to rush down there? Well, a while ago, our class made self-portraits for the Face Britain Kids website, and last weekend all 200,000 of those portraits were pixellated into an image of the Queen, and projected onto Buckingham Palace! Face Britain portraits on Buckingham Palace See all the self-portraits zooming into the Queen’s picture? We stood for a good while watching for my …

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Are Linky’s a thing of the past?

Friends, I have bad news. Sunfun is not well. It started off quite hale and hearty, then succumbed to the affliction that is Silent Sunday. It spluttered its way through for a while, laughter being the best medicine and all that, but in the end the virus took a hold, the Silent bacteria grew, and this linky could no longer resist the onslaught of flashlights and zoom lenses. Today the #sunfun linky will breathe its last breath and become a thing of the past. Don’t worry, we’re not bitter; the Lady of Silent Sunday is still our great friend, and …

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76/366 A strange piano lesson

I had a banging headache tonight. I didn’t mention it until we were on our way to piano lessons, and I didn’t play it up. It was a headache. Stuff happens. The Bug was off for 24 hours with a 40 deg temperature, but was fine afterwards. I did the classic sit down on a chair that wasn’t there any more thing at school and hurt my back. Either one could have been the cause of my headache. Who knows. My piano teacher had a headache too; wisdom toot troubles apparently. We practiced my Chante Arabe – trickier than it …

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How to tie dye with natural colours

Tie dye done with natural colours

Our school is twinned with a school in the African town of Kano. Often during learning we talk about Kano, and the things that children learn there. Sometimes we look at photos of life there and the things which are typical of people in the town. Our teacher is quite spontaneous and loves to craft (once she filled an entire table with school glue and got us all to throw glitter at it to see if we could make a clear collage!) so when we got talking about photos we had of the people in Kano sitting around pits in …

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How children learn to read and write at school

I wrote a post recently about my loquaciousness and use of intricate words, and the irony of the fact that I don’t always know how to replicate them appropriately in my writing at school. I sailed through my reading bo0ks and declared myself a ‘speed-reader’ to my year 1 teacher. Mummy hasn’t known how to read with me, because I prefer to read by myself, or to be read to while my brain switches off: so not up for a challenge before bed! Last week Mummy was a school pupil herself when parents were invited in to discover the processes …

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Why writing is so difficult – Dear so and so

Dear GG, I didn’t really know what to do. I couldn’t fathom how to help you. You have written so eloquently in the past that I was shocked by your first effort at a book review. Simple one-liners with poor spelling – that’s not my girl, what’s happening here? I tried to suggest improvements. I was met with coldness, anger, even rudeness. You’ve had these phases before, and you always come out of them and revert to the helpful, mature and funny girl we love. Sometimes we find the reason and help you out of them. Others we never know …

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Wot So Funee? The final post…

This is my final post on Wot So Funee? So it needs to be a spiffing example of my literary and phonetic genius so that I can exit this meme in true loquacious style! And if you make it to the end, I’ll let you into a little secret about where I am headed next! My teacher (let’s call her Mrs Coolcross – because she does occasionally read this blog, occasionally gets cross with me, but is actually quite cool) is a fan of craft. Craft, and the big outdoors. She has introduced us recently to Forest School, where we …

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Social Stereotypes in the Playground

I have a learning partner at school, someone with whom I must discuss challenges posed by the teacher, and create – amongst other nuggets of learning – pointilism pictures. This partner changes weekly according to a random draw of named lollipop sticks. This week for the first time in 2 and a half years, I was matched with my best friend. After hurling myself across the table in ecstaticness , I reflected on the somewhat different process used for allocating playground partners, and the possible reasons. My playground partner (the person I line up with when we come back in) …

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The Things They Teach in School These Days! Wot So Funee

I was having a chat with Mummy the other day about school in the olden days. She laughed when I asked her if they had school when she was young and if she went. I thought it was a pretty reasonable question given how little she knows about the things they teach in school. I am 7 and I already know more than her. This is a synopsis of several post-schoolday interactions we have had over the last few weeks: Mummy: What did you learn today? GG: Oh just Symbolism in Hindu worship…. GG: I was sad today because I …

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Bullies and Cliques

Are you a bully? Some types of bullying are less obvious than others

Last week Blogland was in a tiz about bullying. A lovely mummy blogger wrote a post describing something she felt bad about; someone else criticised her very harshly, and everyone kicked off! Amongst all the discussion about bullies, another theme arose: cliques. It seems people feel that there is a kind of hierarchy of bloggers. Well there is. Some people have been at it for longer, they know each other well, they have stuff in common. It is natural. Allegations of cliques were bandied about, implying that some bloggers are hostile to newcomers. I take issue with that. I am 7 years old, and …

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On not getting a puppy: Why show and tell is dangerous

Mummy doesn’t get out on this blog much,  as it is MINE! But allow me to indulge her today and read what she has to say for a change. Pleaaase? Dear The Bug’s Teacher….. We.Are.Not.Getting.A. Puppy. End of. Don’t believe him when he says it is really cute, and that he will be bringing it in for ‘show and tell’ soon, because it does not exist. Love, Mrs Bugged. Dear Schoolmums….. We.Are.Not.Getting.A.Puppy. You can stop texting me now asking when you and your children can come and visit our new puppy. It does not exist. Love, the harrassed one on …

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Top 5 Tips for Learning to Read

I am grumpy at the moment. Mummy is calling it ‘end-of-year-itis’. You know, that point you get to when you’re comfortable with the teacher, you know it all, your brother is like, sooooo annoying you, and school are throwing parties, assemblies, trips, DVD’s and treats at you because, well, just because. Add to that my teacher’s contagious ‘hayfever’ every time she thinks of us moving on (we are the best class in the school, after all), and a little bit of hysteria is inevitable. However, it is quite likely that I am also suffering from lack of sleep; this is how …

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