Reculver Towers and a Day Off

I love home educating the boys; to teach them every day and see them make progress in a variety of different areas is always rewarding but there does come the negative of always doing something. 

The problem often comes with the fact that we are in such close quarters to each other and subsequently can easily annoy and wind each other up!

However, out of the three of us, I am the lucky one! Once the boys are in bed I get time to unwind and relax as well as having a couple of days "off" from them a week whilst they are with their Mum. 

I might spend my time working, writing, blogging or even just chatting on social media but either way the change of scenery makes a real difference to me. Just to not be on "teacher" mode is refreshing enough!

I decided last week then that the boys needed a change. No dedicated "sat down" lessons, no dedicated objectives, no organised and planned days out but instead to have a day out and see what the day brings. 

In principle a fun day with a strong sense of unschooling was exactly what we needed!

When we visited Whitstable a few weeks back we spotted in the distance Reculver Towers which is about 5 minutes along the coast. Once they had spotted it both boys were keen to head back another time. So off we went!

When we pulled up it was still a little cloudy but we noticed instantly that there was a little playground next to the car park. The boys immediately wanted to play rather than visit the towers and as it was their day that is exactly what they did!

Whilst the boys were playing the sun came out which put us all in better moods too!

James found a little den on the outskirts of the playground and in his typical inquisitive nature he went off to explore! Only to come back with a selection of pine cones. Which ended up being our first unschooling conversation of the day!

James originally believed that they were nuts and inquired if we could eat them. After explaining that they are seeds and you can get different types, either the male or female cone, he wanted to bring some back and see if he could make some grow! (I haven't quite explored it all so he make be disappointed!)

Then we went and explored Reculver Towers.

 

It seemed like a really weird placement and the boys questioned why there was a church on a cliff so we investigated a little more. 

We found that when the Romans invaded they originally had a fort here. During the 1st and 2nd centuries a settlement was formed around the neighboring harbour but the size of the site is unknown due to erosion. 

This actually fitted in really well with some of our rivers and beaches topic as we have discussed a lot about erosion and how it impacts the earth and how it forms the different beaches that we have. 

 

By the 5th century the Romans had abandoned their defence of Britain and the fort at Reculver had fallen into disuse. This was great to find out as the boys started discussing a lot of things that they learnt from our Roman topic last year, especially when we visited a Roman Villa and Museum.

We then found out that the Fort then become an Anglo Saxon monastery and later a church. With the cliff side eroding and the church no longer in use the bricks were taken away to form another local church but they left the towers.  

When we got home we discovered a picture of it and it looked like this!

After a lot of exploring and questions asked we decided to head back but we bumped into a lady walking her dog who brought another hidden lesson!

Apart from her and her lovely dog being a wonderful extra to the day she pulled this shell of a creature out of her bag that she had just found on her walk!

Like the lady, we had no idea what it was or still is! But she kindly let the boys and i investigate, hold and chat about it! We are under the impression it is some sea creature but still no answers. If you know then please tell us!

It was a great day out. I loved how we had fun and yet the day brought a lot of different learning with it too. Unplanned, unorganised and totally child lead but not only did we have fun we learnt along the way.

I think we should do more of this. It is nice to have organised plans to follow and for us to learn that way but we all really benefited from having an unschooling free learning day!