Hey Blog! This week I want to give you an insight to a typical Wednesday out for me. This Wednesday we went to Derby, my local city.

For about a year, we have been meeting two other families nearly every Wednesday. We visit places, such as parks and nature reserves. This week, we decided to go to Derby for two reasons: first, to see the Peregrines, which nest on Derby Cathedral, and the second to visit the “peace doves” exhibit in the Cathedral. The morning began early.

As we go out for the latter half of the day, Wednesdays are usually lighter on bookwork than the other days of the week. I only had to do maths (45’) and piano (40’). In this maths unit we are learning about directed, or negative, numbers, and I was doing ‘algebraic equations with directed number’. As I’m rather a lazy moo because I take a while to start lessons after getting up and having breakfast, I only just finished the little video before it was time to leave, and had to do half the worksheet on the train there. I did get almost all of them right, so I must be able to work just as well on the train! However, I did do my piano, which included making notation of a new piece of music for my practice, called “The playful puppy”. We got into Derby quickly, and then walked from the station to the Cathedral, to find our friends. There was already a small group of DWT (Derbyshire Wildlife Trust) people with scopes up, which they let passers-by use to look at the peregrines. And to all those wondering, they do not only eat peri peri sauce, and smile all the time, they are falcons which eat pigeons and other birds. In the ’70s they were very rare, because of persecution, pesticides, and other nasty things. Now they’re back, nesting on many tall buildings around the country; one of these buildings is Derby Cathedral. By now, the chicks are well grown, and getting ready to fly, mostly by wing flaps to warm them up. I saw all three of them at the same time, and the ‘falcon’ or female sitting on the edge! We also saw the tiercel, or male peregrine, flying around.  

After watching the peregrines, we went into the cathedral to have a look at the peace doves. These are about 8000 white paper doves suspended by ribbon, each of which has messages of peace, hope and love on it. They are accompanied by music and colour-changing lights, which makes it a really stunning display. If you live nearby, I recommend going to see it. Then, after admiring the doves for a time, we went over to the silk mill. It was built in the 1700s, and predates the cotton mills at Cromford. At the time we visited it, there was a model railway going, which was quite cool. Shortly afterwards it was time to go home, as I had a cricket match in the evening. This one was an away-from-home game, and we won! Then, yesterday, we played another match and… WON AGAIN!

I am going away this week, so my next post shall be all about where we’re going – Stonehenge and London! Look out for further posts!

Hey Blog! After seeing my first swifts of the year today, I have decided to tell you about some of the most incredible creatures in existence, animals that survived the last mass extinction and who rule the skies today.

Birds are a class all to themselves. They are feathery, winged creatures, and contrary to many ideas, not all birds can fly. Though most flightless birds are not so well known, such as the Rea and Kiwi (not to be confused with the fruit, which is a plant!); the penguin, a very well-known bird, is actually flightless as well. Evolution has changed the penguin’s ancestors to be better swimmers, an adaptation many species alive today went through in the past. But it’s not just aquatic changes birds have gone through. Winter moults (the scientific name for shedding old feathers and growing new ones) can change birds like the ptarmigan, that lives in the Highlands of Scotland, to pure white over winter to camouflage with the snow; and summer moults give it a mottled brown plumage to blend in with the rocks. Some birds, called birds of prey, have remained in evolutionary terms closer to dinosaurs as they eat meat, contradictory to their name which suggests they are prey. Another quite literally weird thing is that swifts, which come to the UK every summer to breed, are more closely related to hummingbirds (a small group which feed on nectar, can fly backwards and beat their wings faster than any other bird) than the birds that are most like them in appearance. I totally recommend the RSPB handbook of British birds if you are interested in birds and live in the UK, as it helps to identify both common and rare birds that live in the UK.

As I said in “A bird in the hand” back in March, I ringed several common garden birds (I mean giving them ID rings, not calling them up on the phone!) and released them. This was one of the best days of my life, as I got up close and personal with small, living, breathing creatures, closer than I had ever been before. Every year since we moved to this house we have watched the blackbirds build a nest in the hedge, the ivy, or next door, and the sparrows nest in the eves every spring. However, my first interest in birds started in Ghana, West Africa, where I really wanted to see Turacos and Glossy Starlings. We went out on long walks over the weekends, going to parks, as the city was busy and had no wildlife. Once, we saw a Northern White-faced Owl, which is one of the few wildlife encounters from Ghana I still remember, the others being the snake, monitor lizards, a kingfisher, an unidentified sunbird, night-herons, purple herons, and red bishop birds. It was very cool. When we came back to the UK, my bird interest continued, sparking a lifelong passion for wildlife.

Avian species are a valuable contribution to our planet. They fill in many of the gaps that other animals leave empty. I hope people can care for birds, respect them, and build a more nature-friendly world.

Hey Blog! These last few weeks have been a riot of colour in the wood; the floor has turned blue! This year’s bluebells are in full swing, revealing plants that have been hidden as bulbs for the last year, and if they were new from seeds they were made four or five years ago! My local wood is full of them, so I decided to write about these beautiful flowers this week.

Bluebells used to be a wild plant, but now are common in gardens, but nowadays wild ones do not appear so often, and an entire wood carpeted with them is definitely quite rare. Here in Derbyshire we are lucky to have several such “Bluebell woods”, places where the entire area abounds with springtime life. There is a lovely feeling when standing in the midst of a bluebell wood, looking at the floor carpeted with plants; some of which could be several years old. During our recent walks, we have even smelt the scent of pollen from the small, blue, bell-shaped flowers! Seeing them is a true sign that spring has fully sprung. Here are some fabulous pictures of the wood, and one of me running through the bluebells!

There are two species of bluebell in the UK: the English Bluebell and the Spanish Bluebell. The English is the native species (as can be supposed by the name) and the more common, so it is probably the one in my wood. The Spanish is hardier, but is noticeable as it has less “droop”, however beware as the two can hybridise. Nothing matches their stunning beauty, and as half the world’s bluebell woods are in the UK, we are blessed indeed with the spectacle. Apparently, ants plant bluebells (do you think they count the number planted, as we saw they could last week?) so if you live near a wood you may find plants popping up in your garden. It was also said that the blue ‘bells’ of the flowers called fairies to the woods at dawn, but doom was upon any mortal who heard it, as it meant the hearer would die (In my opinion, it’s better to smell and look at the flowers but not hear them!). Bluebells are such a beautiful plant to have in the wood, they encaptivate you, so I can fully understand how and why they were considered magical. I hope everyone sees the “Bluebell magic” this year, and respects them – we can’t afford to tread on them, and they can take years to come back after foot damage!

Hey Blog! This week my lessons have been a bit more focused on maths than usual, so I’m going to write about maths today.

I learn maths with an excellent program called “White Rose Maths”, a website-based maths learning site. The lessons are structured with a short video at the start, a printable/displayable worksheet to practice on and other small questions like “True or false” – I’m fairly sure you can guess what happens in that!

We see maths in almost everything. It’s one of the very top subjects learned in education. But are we responsible for this, or is nature? Did humans invent maths?

Maths generally consists of numbers, and we have styled and named them. However numbers can be represented in many forms, such as physical objects, counters, tallies, spots… pretty much anything. This means numbers, a basic principal of maths, are actually really old, far older than humans. Other species can do maths as well. Some domestic, like cows, who can tell the time (we have tamed cows and therefore they run by our time) for when it is feeding time and when to milk them. Some ants, wild creatures, can estimate the area of a shape, and use patterns to find the optimal path; other ants can use the basic rules of addition to count their steps to calculate distance. Forewarning to anyone trying to train an ant to do your maths homework – they won’t understand multiplication, division, or algebra… which is the next thing.

Take Einstein’s equation E=mc² (Energy = mass x speed of light squared) for example. This is algebra – a form of maths – and the equation is as old as matter, as all matter has mass, and matter was first created at the beginning of the universe, 4 billion years ago, a LONG time before humans.

To answer my question, no, I don’t think humans invented maths, I think it was first created at the beginning of time, the beginning of the universe. However, we have discovered and defined it to suit our needs, one of which being… Making bunting for my shed! Inspired by the latest series of the Great British Sewing Bee (series 8, which started this week) I decided to make some bunting to decorate the front of the Home Ed Shed. We went to the fabric shop and got a few pieces, and I have now calculated the width of my shed, and made a design to show how my bunting is supposed to look. Here is the blueprint (even though it isn’t really blue!):

I’m going to start sewing this weekend, so look out another week for a new photo of my shed, complete with bunting.

Hey blog! This week I had an Easter break. As it is different from my normal weeks, in this post I am going into detail about what I have been doing.

Friday

Today I went on a walk and had a picnic with my big brother. We visited Sherwood Pines, near Sheffield. It was a place where there had been training trenches before the first World War, and replicas of the training grounds have been made, along with Frisbee golf targets. On our walk we saw several deer, most likely Roe Deer, one of only two deer native to the UK (the other being Red Deer). A few had large antlers, more than a foot long! After the walk, we sat down near the car and had lunch. Then I amused myself by throwing pine cones at the grown-ups! Afterwards at home I took some time in my shed.

Saturday

Today I was invited to a friend’s party. It was her 13^th birthday, so a big one. We ran around in the field out the back of their house for the whole afternoon, and had a chocolate and marshmallow fondue: heat up some chocolate, get a few skewers, stick marshmallows on the skewers, then dip them in the chocolate. I knew all but one of the people invited, so the entire thing was great and one of the most fun days EVER! Again, afterwards I went to my shed, and did some wood carving.

Sunday

Today was Easter Sunday, so we went out across the Derwent (a river near us) for a long walk. We packed sandwiches, a bag of crisps, and some salad, and set off. We hoped to see some Little Owls, the smallest owl that lives in the UK and which we had seen the week before; also, we wanted to go to a local nature reserve with a lake that birds visit in winter. There were no little owls, but we did get to the nature reserve. In fact, we had our picnic lunch by the gate into it. It was a really nice walk, and like the two previous days, I went out into my shed after it.

Monday

Today we went to a friend’s wood to do some archaeology and metal detecting! Our friend has pigs, and they found a stone trough, with no obvious related features or artefacts. Since I am keen on archaeology (see my previous post: “A dig into the world of archaeology”) he invited me to dig the trough out. We had also bought a metal detector, a device which scans and finds metal in the ground. It runs by sending electric currents through the ground, which are received by sensors. If disturbance is registered in the signal, the machine beeps. After finding roughly where the object is located, you dig to find it. I dug the trough out, while Dad went around the wood with our metal detector. Believe it or not, practically the first thing he found was an astonishing large axe head, most likely 19^th century! The metal detector was beeping like crazy over it. We also found the glass front of a silver watch, which we cleaned up and it looks like new. In the end we decided the trough had probably come from an ecclesiastical building not far away from the wood, though we can’t be sure.

Tuesday

Today I had my Covid jab. It was in Derby, so we decided to spent the day there. I had book tokens and WHSmith tokens to spend, and everyone had been saying I needed a haircut, so we decided to kill three birds with one stone and do them all in the same trip. I bought two books in Waterstones with my book token, and a set of “back to home-ed” lessons utensils. The Covid jab was fine.

P.S. No birds were harmed during our day out, though some might have got upset when I refused them any of my sub sandwich!

Wednesday

Today I went to Ashover tulips, a new branch of the family farm that grows the pumpkins in Autumn (I told you about this). It was my weekly meet-up with my friends, so we talked, laughed, ran around like lunatics, etc. Mum and I picked eight differently-coloured tulips which are now in a vase on the table; and after saying goodbye, went swimming. Here is a picture of me with my friends, and you can see my new haircut!

Thursday

Today I spent a lot of time in my shed, mostly working on a trapdoor I’ve been making in the floor. It was meant to be secret, but then everyone found out… I’ve just got to support the cut boards to make it secure, but it’s not finished yet. In the evening I went to my second cricket practice of the year. Having a very hard red ball coming flying at you is a little daunting, but give it a good whack and it should be all right.

Friday

Today Ruth from Kids Invent Stuff showed up to see me and give me a small prize for winning the challenge. My post eight weeks ago documented my design, but what I didn’t know then was that they give a prize for winners of the competition. In the end, Ruth (one of the presenters) came to see me and give it me in person. I showed her the Shed, and we talked for a while; mostly about engineering. In the evening I opened the gift – a book called “Build it, make it” and a toolbox containing hammer, two screwdrivers, set square, pliers, hacksaw, tape measure, pencil and three-way spirit level. To crown it all was a pack of KIS stickers!

In the afternoon we had Games Club. This is a home-ed group where all participating bring along their board games and share them. I brought Chess and also Pangolin Cards, a game based on Go Fish that I designed, which was inspired by the Derby Museum’s “Pangolin day” and made just before the first lockdown.

I’d better stop now because during the above paragraph I have reached my first >1000-word blog post. Yay!

Hey Blog! This is my second book review of the year, the first being in January. This one is about a new book that I was given in February. Its protagonist lives in “a hole in the ground” also known as Bag End…

Of course, it is The Hobbit, by J. R. R. Tolkien. This epic fantasy tale was one of Tolkien’s biggest and best creations, and came before The Lord of the Rings, which is kind of a continuation, featuring objects and places that were first imagined for The Hobbit. The story follows Bilbo Baggins, “a hobbit of good family and unimpeachable reputation” on a journey with thirteen dwarves to the Lonely Mountain and the treasure hoard of Smaug the dragon. The book was written around 1930 (no one can remember quite when it was started!). Very shortly after publication the first edition sold out – which shows you how good it was!

The story starts in Bag End, Bilbo’s hobbit-hole, when Thorin & co. and the wizard Gandalf arrive on Bilbo’s doorstep to ask him to join their expedition. After listening to a very inspiring song, Bilbo sets out with them the next morning. In a stop-off break just before the Misty Mountains, which they have to cross, it is discovered that the map has secret moon-rune-letters, which reveal the way to enter a secret side door to the mountain’s halls. In the mountains Bilbo finds the One Ring (Hmmm, lord of the Rings?!), which grants invisibility to the wearer. This proves his greatest tool on the rest of the journey.

Over the “Edge of the Wild” (just after the mountains) they continue to Beorn’s house, where Gandalf departs and the dwarves and Bilbo head through the forest of Mirkwood, defeating several dangers on the way. They are captured by the Elvenking on the farther side, and Bilbo’s magic ring helps them to escape unnoticed; they then proceed down the river to Laketown. With a little help from the people of Laketown, they eventually arrive on the mountain’s slopes, and Bilbo spies on Smaug. Smaug becomes enraged, and destroys Laketown, but is killed by a descendent of the Lord of Dale, a town that Smaug had plundered. Believing the dwarves dead, he and the Elvenking (who has also heard of the death of the dragon) march to the mountain and find Bilbo and Thorin’s company alive. They besiege the mountain until a relative of Thorin arrives with a dwarven army. The rest? Well, you’ll have to read the book!

I said that “a very inspiring song” encourages Bilbo to go on the journey, and this song is in fact “Far over the Misty Mountains cold”. In the first of the weekly posts on Home Ed In A Shed (My week) I said we try to do a poem every week, and two weeks ago, after I said I wanted to do ‘poems out of books’ we chose this one first. It tells of the desire of the dwarves, in their yearning for gaining back the gold the dragon had stolen. If you are a hobbit you will probably feel the magic of the words and tune, and if you are a human you’ll probably feel it as well! The poem has a strong beat, very reminiscent of the hammers that the dwarves used in their forges, shaping gold, silver and gems that were sent for them to make into beautiful things, in return for a share of the treasure. It also tells of the coming of the dragon, i.e. “the fire red, it flaming spread, the trees like torches blazed with light” and in the last verse, the wish to gain back what they had lost: “To win our harps and gold from him!”

I hope you’ve enjoyed our trip There And Back Again through The Hobbit. Would you like to go on a journey to steal gold from a dragon…?!

Hey Blog! This week I’m going to share with you a creative talent I have. That’s right, it’s sewing!

I do sewing quite a lot. All my Scouts badges have been hand-sewn onto my shirt, or blanket by me. We have a sewing machine and other sewing equipment, and these past weeks I have used the machine to do a remarkable sewing project, which shall be mentioned later. It’s really fun to do, watching a line of thread seemingly grow out of the fabric when you put the needle on top of it; and is really educational – who knows what you will make, or when you might need to call on your sewing skills!

A few months ago we discovered a TV show called The Great British Sewing Bee. Started in 2013, it is a spin-off idea from The Great British Bake-off, and a quest to find “Britain’s best home sewer” as they say on the programme (that ‘sewer’ is someone who sews, not your toilet waste removal pipe!). We are currently watching old episodes on BBC i-player, quite often with a “Daddy gü pot” alongside! Judged by two excellent, if slightly crazy judges from top sewing institutions, it is a fabulous programme and we are really enjoying it. Watching the programmes inspired me to do this next project…

Last Friday I started making a bag. It is in the style of a reusable shopping bag, with four sides and a bottom piece, and was made as a bag to use when I go swimming and to sew my swimming badges on. I drafted the pattern (a paper template around which you cut the fabric, commercial ones usually include notes on how to make the finished item), and stitched the entire bag in about eight hours, though it was done over three days. I used a basic stitch to do most of the sewing, but did two other ones in the making of the handles, one of which was for decoration and the other for attaching. Here is a picture of it:

The project I have not started this week is making myself a cloak, though I have all the measurements. My idea is to make a semi-circle cloak, the “older”, more mediaeval kind, which I can wear outside and not just for a fancy-dress outfit – albeit I’ve never seen anyone out wearing a cloak! I’ve decided to make a simple-ish kind of hood to go on the top of it, made of three pieces – two side ones and an over-the-top one. I chose a really nice fabric on an internet website, but when we went to the haberdashery to look at the fabric I found it wasn’t thick enough. For now we are looking out for a large blanket or pair of curtains to alter, but as yet haven’t found anything. When I make it I will very likely put it on Home Ed In A Shed, so keep looking out for posts!

Anyone can do sewing, as all you need to have is a needle and thread. However, if you want to invest in it, you can buy all sorts of fancy things. Hand-made gifts, home-made clothes…they all state who you are, and anyone can be proud of that. Sew why not pick up a needle?

Hey Blog! This week I’ve decided to tell you about some of my lessons.

I learn humanities with Humanatees. This is a tutoring business, and some of the subjects it teaches include geography, mythology, history and philosophy. The business is called Humanatees because “humanity” sounds a lot like “(Hu)manatee” (A manatee is a large marine mammal, sometimes called a Dugong or Sea Cow). Originally, it was an in-person business, but at the start of the pandemic the lessons went online. I have never met in person with Jake, the teacher, as I started in spring 2020.

The online lessons at the start of the pandemic were my first with Humanatees. There were four in a week: Modern history, Ancient history, Geography and Mythology. After these free lessons finished, I took the six-week courses. I took the KS2 courses first, and then the KS3 ones, which have an assessment. This is a set of questions about whatever we have been studying, mostly easy but with one ten-point question at the end which is always best to allow 30 minutes for…  I have always chosen to do the assessment, and it seems I’m actually pretty good at is, as I usually get a very high score. After each class I try to complete a “response” to it as further study, such as pictures, a piece of writing, or even just a some research and a discussion. These responses have included working out the power generated by wind turbines, discussing the French revolution in French, and doing some beautiful drawings of fairies, which I have reproduced here:

The most recent courses I’ve completed are Revolutions, about six revolutions through history – the American, French, Russian, Cuban, Iranian, and Arab Spring – and Energy. This second was a study of renewable and non-renewable sources of energy, from the fossil fuels to wind and solar; but from the geography side rather than science. Alongside this course, I have been watching videos from an amazing YouTube channel called Theatre of Science. The link is here: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheatreofScience. The videos we have been watching are from the latest series, all about energy. These are more on the science side, talking about where energy comes from and how we access it. We have sent in the assessments for both Revolutions and Energy this week, and I am hoping to get another high mark.

It would be great if Humanatees could do a course on either ‘wildlife habitat’ or ‘historical transitions’, as I would really like to do both of these topics.

Hey Blog! Last Sunday was one of the most exciting days in my life so far: I was actually able to hold a bird! This was all at a bird-ringing session. Last month I turned 12, and it happened that there was a bird-ringing session on my birthday. We booked it, but unfortunately it was cancelled because of the high winds. However, it was able to be rescheduled, and last Sunday was the day for it.

Birds are marvels of nature. When the dinosaurs died out, they left descendants behind: birds! These modified-dinosaur, feather-winged, size- shape- and colour-varying creatures are an entire class (Avies, from the Latin word for bird) of their own, under the phylum Chordata. Birds have amazed humans for centuries, and still continue to do so – me included!

There are a few things to check before you ring and release a bird. These are species, age, wing length, weight, sex, and ring number.

• Species is the easiest, and comes first, as all the others depend on it. We had blue tits, a great tit, a goldfinch, a wren, and two long-tailed tits. Unfortunately, all these species require different methods for working out the other information!
• Wing length is pretty easy, you just have to hold the bird up against a ruler, and read the answer.
• With sex, you might be able to tell by its plumage, but otherwise it’s a bit harder – you might need to judge by brightness of the feathers and the weight for example.
• Age is the most difficult. For blue tits, you check the colour on the primary coverts, but most of the others required a whole-bird-lookover. In the nest, they concentrate on getting their wing feathers grown, and only at their first moult change their body feathers. By looking at the quality of the body feathers you can tell whether they are a second+ year bird, or only a first-year.
• It turns out that there is actually a good use for old camera film canisters (Get your grandparents to explain “film” to you!) and that is to put birds in to weigh them! With a set of mini scales, you can pop a bird in one of these tubes and find their weight. Most small garden birds are around the 10 – 15 gram mark, with wrens being more like eight grams.
• Ring number depends on the size of the bird’s leg, and whichever one you pull off the string it comes on. This ring is important because it is like an ID card for a bird, if you can imagine the avian equivalent of a something that weighs as much as a mobile phone and is permanently attached to your leg!

Holding the birds was the best part of it. It was so cute to feel their breathing and heartbeat beneath your fingers. It could be called kind of “emotional”! You had to hold their neck with your first two fingers and form a gentle cage with your hand. Here is a picture of me holding a blue tit:

At the end of the session we went to see the mist nets used to trap the birds. They are just like mist: hardly visible. If you didn’t know they were there, you’d probably walk straight into them! Fifteen minutes later, after the end of the session, we could see a small something flapping in the net, so the next group obviously had one bird at least to ring!

Hey Blog! This week being the middle week in March, I’ve decided to write about finding signs of spring this week!

On Sunday it was Watch Group. This month we were out by a very deep pond, hanging over the edge of a platform and dipping nets in the water. The reason? We were looking for frog- and toad-spawn, and few other small water-creatures. I’ve already talked about dipping for invertebrates in “Full stream ahead” two weeks ago, but frogs and toads are new. Every spring, amphibians travel out from their winter hiding places, and go to the ponds. There, or even on the way there, they link up with a member of the opposite sex, to mate with as soon as they get to the pond. The female then lays her spawn, which will eventually become tadpoles; and they either stay in the pond until autumn, or travel around the area, until they go back to their winter hiding places. “Amphibian” actually means “has two lives” denoting the land life, and the water life. Most amphibians only spend the spring and some of the summer in ponds, apart from the ones that overwinter on the bottom.

Currently our family are taking part in a “toad patrol”, where we go out in the evening and look on the roads around us for toads and frogs, which we take back and put down next to the pond. If you want to get involved, go here: https://www.froglife.org/what-we-do/toads-on-roads/tormap/ , to find your nearest group. Through them, you can find your nearest toad patrol. However, if you are a prince, I advise not taking part, just in case a witch has transfigured herself into a toad and is planning to turn you into a frog…

At the same session, we heard our first Chiff-chaff of the year. It’s super recognisable, as it repeats its name over and over again. Now we’re hearing them everywhere. The House-martins and Swallows haven’t arrived though, but the Redwings and Fieldfares are leaving. Flowers such as daffodils, snowdrops, and crocuses are fully out, as are a few Hawthorn leaves, but no one knows ‘weather’ to expect a splash or a soak, as the ash and the oak are not yet out. Birds are pairing up, and the blackbirds are taking nesting material into the hedge out the front, so a brood of young is to be expected. We heard a Skylark singing when we went on a walk this morning, and birds usually sing when they are defending their territory, or seeking for a mate, so Skylarks are busy too! Everything seems to be springing into life, and soon it will be sprung!