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Town Planning & Street Furniture (Home Education UK Topic Challenge) · The BIG Home Ed Conversations | Home Education

0:14
Hello everybody, welcome back to another episode of the big home
0:18
Ed conversations. My name is Kelly Rigg, I'm a
0:20
home Ed mum of two and a qualified mindset and ADHD
0:23
coach. I am really passionate about
0:25
supporting parents and neurodivergent families as they
0:27
navigate children not OK at school and ultimately then the
0:30
transition from mainstream schooling into home education.
0:34
I'm here together as always with my lovely Co host Ashley
0:37
Venerio. She's a fellow home Ed mum of
0:39
three and a former primary teacher.
0:41
So we created the big Home Med Conversations podcast with what
0:44
began as honest, heartfelt talks around the coffee table.
0:47
And it's now grown into a space where hundreds of listeners now
0:50
tune in for real, unfiltered conversations about alternative
0:53
education, mindset and some educational philosophies.
0:57
We cut through the noise and focus on what really matters to
0:59
home educating families. As you have probably heard if
1:02
you've been listening along this season we have been sponsored
1:05
for this, this sort. It's the word term.
1:08
I suppose. It is just a season, isn't it?
1:10
Isn't it? There's these group of episodes
1:13
by Strew. So strew is a home education
1:16
logging app that was created by a home educating mum and her
1:19
brother. They reached out to us to ask us
1:21
to review the app, honestly, to use it, enjoy it and to tell you
1:25
guys the features that are on there and obviously invite you
1:28
to go and give it a go yourself. So essentially we know that lots
1:33
is changing in the home Ed world in terms of legalities.
1:36
And hopefully the session with Jen has really helped you all to
1:39
understand where that's at. But ultimately we are looking
1:43
here at the way this app might be helpful in the future.
1:46
And one of the things that we were really reflecting on before
1:48
we got on today was how difficult it can be to kind of
1:52
consolidate the the learning that we do actually do with our
1:55
children. That So many of us follow a
1:57
quite an eclectic or project based unschooling kind of way of
2:01
doing things. And we see our children learning
2:03
and growing and developing ideas all the time.
2:05
But it can sometimes be quite hard, like if you were to ask me
2:08
to sit down and write a report based on the past three months
2:11
or six months of our learning, I probably would find that quite
2:14
difficult to just pull from my brain.
2:16
All of the amazing stuff that I've seen them doing and
2:18
learning about. I could do that, the highlights
2:20
for sure, but I would really struggle with that.
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And I think that can sometimes mean that when we're faced with
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a report to do for the local authority that we will find
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ourselves feeling a little bit at a loss of, of what to say,
2:31
like what examples to to offer. And obviously you always follow
2:35
great advice from like Heifer and education.
2:38
Otherwise, they have great kind of templates and guidance and
2:41
advice lines and stuff here to speak to.
2:43
But ultimately something like this throughout gives us the
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opportunity to keep that information handy.
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And I was having a look at the report functions this week just
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to kind of get my head around what they can do.
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And they're honestly really very helpful.
2:58
Essentially, when you kind of go into the reports, you can either
3:02
print or create APDF of what your learning has been.
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And you can obviously change the date range, which child you want
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to do it for. You can filter it by the tags
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you've been using or the study bucket it comes under, like
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literacy, et cetera. And you can obviously then order
3:15
it in whichever order you want it to do it in.
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But ultimately what you can do is you can obviously create that
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for yourself, which allows you to then just scroll through it
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and remind yourself of the things they've been up to.
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Or you can obviously have it literally PDF available to
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include with a report if that's what you want to do.
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And obviously it helps to then break down the the AI's
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assessment of what learning outcomes you've got in that
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particular moment as well. So I just found that feature
3:38
pretty helpful and something which I think is going to become
3:40
more and more helpful when we kind of get down the line a
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little bit. We're really loving the filter
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feature as well. I think for me, what I've been
3:50
finding is that while I'm a heavy pen and paper planner, I
3:54
can't filter my notebook. So it's requiring me to have to
3:58
go through and actually like start another spreadsheet or
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piece of paper where I'm tracking if I want to see all
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the math we've done or all the science we've done.
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So I think for me, being able to tag things as I'm entering them,
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and also sometimes I don't think about something being a in a
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particular category initially and it's me having to go, oh
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gosh, actually, yeah, this is also reading or this is also
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another topic, science or geography.
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And so if I were just to look in my notebook, I would be like,
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oh, we did history, but in actuality we also did a bit of
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science. We also did a bit of geography
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and we were doing that. And so being able to tag it that
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way in the app and then in the future be able to filter it just
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eases my workload and makes it a lot easier to see what we've
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actually done versus flipping pages in a notebook.
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I mean, you can, you can do that, but it's just about making
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our lives a little bit easier, isn't it?
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Yeah, absolutely. And I think there's there's so
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many different ways of keeping this information handy and
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absolutely whatever system you like to use might be absolutely
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perfect for you. I'm not telling anybody they
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need to change it, but if you are finding that this is a
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problem for you, and it has been for me, and I have been working
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on trying to like create ways of doing this myself.
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But it is a relief to be able to just plug it all into one place
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and to have this lovely kind of record of what we've been up to.
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So hopefully, like some of the features we've been explaining
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to you the past few weeks are sort of helping you to
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understand more about what this app can do.
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If you have any questions, do feel free to reach out to them
5:37
or to us and we're happy to answer anything you want to know
5:41
about it. So getting on with this week's
5:44
topic. So we obviously have been away.
5:46
We're doing our topic challenge still and essentially been doing
5:50
the town planning subjects, the town planning and St. furniture.
5:54
Now this one I felt like I was cheating a little bit because I
5:58
already had something that we've been doing recently.
6:00
So our local Co-op that I run has literally been doing around
6:05
about politics and town planning and it's like the concept of
6:08
leadership in a country. So that's already kind of teed
6:12
us in so nicely to this subject, which is really handy.
6:15
So literally the week before I had actually created a game
6:19
where the kids could basically sit as a team.
6:21
So they always had to sit there as like a council and they had
6:25
to run a town and they could score points or lose points
6:28
depending on decisions they made.
6:30
And it's completely free form. So they were given scenarios,
6:33
they had to discuss it, decide how they would solve it, what
6:37
they would factor in. And then they would either like
6:39
lose money points if it was expensive to put into place,
6:42
they would gain environment if it cleaned up the environment,
6:44
it would gain trust if it made people happy, etcetera.
6:48
And they basically they got to play kind of three or four
6:50
rounds, but it definitely needed more.
6:52
We ran out of time, but it was a really great game.
6:54
They all really found very engaging and they worked really
6:57
well as a team. It's lovely hearing them
6:58
listening to each other and respecting each other and and
7:01
giving each other a chance to give their ideas.
7:03
And then they had to elect a mayor, like who was going to be
7:07
the one who called it in the end and decided what they actually
7:10
did, which they did really respectfully and then honored
7:13
the person who that they weren't getting annoyed with.
7:15
The person who did then obviously have to say, look, I
7:17
loved your idea, but I don't think that's the right one in
7:19
this case. And I think we'll do this one.
7:21
It was such a fantastic way of seeing that children really
7:24
should be respected an awful lot more for their ideas and for
7:27
their their ability to understand this stuff that
7:29
actually they are incredibly intelligent and they see and
7:34
observe an awful lot. And I think it really showed us
7:37
that it was really fun to do. But I think I need to like
7:40
properly Polish off that game and sell it because I think
7:42
people would love it. It's it's a great kind of play
7:44
around the table as a family kind of game, an educational
7:46
game. So I think I'll probably try to
7:48
actually make it. It sounds like a great and yeah,
7:53
it's really good fun. But yeah, I think initially we
7:56
found ourselves this week talking about it as a like what
8:01
we can't run the initial conversation like we do in the
8:03
car, like trapped audience and all that.
8:06
Basically found myself talking to about this idea of let's just
8:11
go back for a minute. So when towns and groups of
8:13
people like just starting to settle down and start to think
8:16
about some of the problems they might have started to face and
8:19
therefore why towns have evolved how they have and obviously
8:23
immediately descended into poop because everything always does.
8:27
And I was like, where do you think they pooped?
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And they're like, I don't know. And I'm just like, you've got a
8:32
little Hut and you're a little tribe of people or kind of
8:35
gathering in one area. Where do you poo?
8:36
And he's, like, in the forest. And just like, yeah, but like,
8:39
where in the forest? It's on the floor.
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Like, do you bury it? Do you make pits?
8:43
Do you have a communal poo place that everyone goes to to poo?
8:46
Like, how do you think they'd have done it?
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And obviously, I don't even really know.
8:50
We didn't actually end up looking up how they used to do
8:51
it. But we got, we just had some fun
8:53
kind of imagining how these things would have started.
8:56
And then obviously get back to like Tudor Britain, where they
8:58
were just chucking it out the window into the streets, which
9:00
is grim. But it kind of really evolved
9:03
the conversation. And they thought it was really
9:05
hilarious to kind of think about kind of how like all the stuff
9:10
that we have now that we kind of take for granted, like toilets
9:12
and fridges and all these different things.
9:15
Actually, there would have had to be really creative solutions
9:17
for these things that we could use as a people in our little
9:22
towns or tribes. And ultimately, yeah, it was it
9:25
was a really fun conversation. That was just a load of kind of,
9:29
I don't know what's the word conjecture.
9:31
So I'm just just thinking about it, not actually necessarily
9:33
researching it or finding the actual facts out, but just
9:36
sharing ideas as to what they maybe would have done.
9:39
And that was a really fun way to start it, I think.
9:42
Oh, yeah. And I mean, he doesn't love a
9:43
conversation like that. I mean, that is the most
9:45
interesting part when we go visit any castle or historical
9:49
structure is like seeing how that would have been in like the
9:53
royal wiper and like all the stuff that was done for the
9:59
kings and and Queens of the time.
10:01
I mean it's just so interesting and like, yeah, that's going to
10:04
definitely repeat kids interests.
10:05
We didn't get quite that in the weeds, but I love that.
10:09
We definitely took a more modern day approach.
10:13
I guess in that I was just sort of like again, in the car, of
10:18
course we were driving like why do you think the stop lights are
10:21
here? Why do you think they have a
10:23
circle? You know, and my kids are always
10:26
on me to go faster, go faster. And like they'll be like, oh,
10:29
there's the lights green. Like, why aren't you moving?
10:32
Oh, well, this person's turning. And then we ended up missing the
10:35
light. And I was like, well, this is a
10:37
place where probably they should have a green turn arrow because
10:40
otherwise you never go. And what do you think goes into
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that kind of decision making process?
10:45
And who even decides? And I didn't know all the
10:48
answers to that, especially being in a different country.
10:52
So I was like, OK, at this point, let's see if we can find
10:56
a podcast. And I'm telling you, the buck
10:58
stops here because we found one. It's like it's funkidslive.com
11:03
and it is all about town planning for kids.
11:08
It's like a series, but I was like, could this be any better?
11:13
And it is geared towards kids. There's kids on the podcast.
11:16
It's super cute. And so we started listening to
11:19
that and then I was in the show notes because I wanted to
11:24
recheck what I had heard. They mentioned that in the UK
11:29
they need to build half a million homes a year to keep up
11:33
with the growth. Yeah, the growth in families.
11:36
I was like, that is a huge number.
11:38
Like, is that right? And right now in the UK they're
11:41
only building or at the time of this podcast, they were only
11:44
building half that. And So what does that mean?
11:47
I always feel like they're building too much.
11:48
So like I just, I feel like my, my initial thought and reality
11:52
were not in line because I'm always thinking like, oh,
11:56
another cookie cutter community. Like, do we need that?
11:58
Like, do we need another set of townhomes like squashed in and
12:02
like taking the, the forest away and like all this?
12:04
So, but maybe we do. And so I went to the show notes
12:09
to double check that number and I saw at the end that there was
12:12
a website. I never thought to go to the
12:14
website. So I did.
12:15
And there are on this website. It is amazing.
12:20
So you can actually cut out your own town and then make your own
12:25
town. So it's like interactive in that
12:27
way. You can obviously listen to the
12:30
podcast, you can download a comic book about it's all about
12:35
agent plan and that's like their superhero and agent plan helps
12:40
to design and and build all these new towns.
12:43
There is an interview with a town planner, like how what it's
12:48
like to be a town planner. And that's like not a cartoon,
12:51
right? It's actual person.
12:53
It just, it goes on and on. Why can't you build houses
12:55
anywhere? Find out why your town was
12:58
built. And these are all little videos
12:59
that you can watch. Floor flood plans.
13:02
Like, yeah, it was amazing. How do planners decide where to
13:06
build? And like, what happens if
13:07
there's archaeological items underneath?
13:11
Like then what happens? How do we get transportation?
13:14
How many forms of transportation are there?
13:16
I mean, this just goes on and on.
13:17
I was like, all right, this is great.
13:19
We're just going to plow through this.
13:20
So we're. Just going to enjoy this
13:21
website. Like, This Is Us, yeah.
13:26
So I highly recommend it. It's super cute.
13:28
And just. And then obviously it's based
13:31
here in the UK, so it is pretty relevant to anyone living in
13:35
this area. But also just in general, it's
13:37
super informative. So yeah, I definitely recommend
13:39
that. That sounds really fascinating.
13:41
I'm definitely going to have to dive into that myself as I think
13:43
my kids have enjoyed that a lot. We did find some good videos as
13:46
well, actually. So so you tend to reach for
13:48
podcasts, I tend to reach for YouTube.
13:51
We're going to see this pattern emerging a lot.
13:53
I clearly enjoy my visual things, but because we found
13:56
some fantastic videos and we will link them all in the blog.
13:58
Don't worry, we'll get around to the blogs, I promise.
14:01
But ultimately the, there's a few that we found.
14:04
One was kind of like what's underneath New York City, which
14:07
was really cool. So it literally showed you like
14:09
layer by layer, like what are all the things that are
14:12
underneath? And there's a tunnel, I don't
14:14
know if it's done now, but they've literally been building
14:16
this tunnel, like a third water mains tunnel for 50 years.
14:22
It's still ongoing so that they can rest the first two tunnels
14:26
that were built, the first two pipes, they can turn them off
14:29
and actually go in and repair issues with them, but they
14:32
literally can't turn them off right now because they need this
14:35
third one in place. And like what a what a like a
14:38
constant rush of like, we need to get this tunnel done because
14:41
that came and then we're talking like 800 feet below New York.
14:45
So the last thing you obviously want is a burst pipe down there
14:49
just gradually eroding like sediment rock and all the rest
14:53
of it. There's underneath it like holy
14:54
moly. But it was so fascinating and
14:56
all the stuff that's they found a ship in the mud like 600 feet
15:02
below New York, a whole ship that had obviously sunk at some
15:06
point. And I'm just like, I don't even
15:08
get it. Like it's like how it's
15:10
underneath the modern city. That's crazy, but we found it
15:14
really fascinating and that led us to another one that was all
15:16
about about these sort of like mass heating kind of plants that
15:21
literally heat water and send it out to people's homes.
15:24
So it's very different to how we have it in the UK where everyone
15:26
has their own boiler. And it kind of talked you all
15:28
about how it's how they keep the water and how they reuse heat
15:31
from things like data centers. Obviously, we're worried about
15:33
the heat that is being given off by kind of like big computing
15:36
centers, like AI centers and stuff like that.
15:38
But there are countries that are currently kind of using that
15:41
heat and reusing that energy to heat the water to send it back
15:46
out into the world. Like the heat from the subway
15:49
stations underground and all that kind of stuff.
15:50
Like it's ever so clever. So we learned all about that.
15:53
But the one we found the most amazing was like a 3D graphic of
15:58
London evolving. And it was simply like, it just
16:01
looked like a person wandering around London as it was
16:05
literally founded all the way through to modern day.
16:08
And it just like you just see all the types of buildings
16:10
shifting and changing and massive walls being built and
16:12
massive walls being knocked down and like buildings being created
16:16
and like, even like modern places that you'd walk around
16:18
the streets of today, like what they looked like a few 100 years
16:23
ago. And my son was like, oh, it
16:25
looks like it does today. I mean, it was about kind of
16:27
like 1800s or so. And I was like, yeah, do you
16:30
know, it doesn't look like it's changed a heck of a lot since
16:32
then. Obviously, you've got lots of
16:33
like, modern buildings that have come in around it.
16:36
But yeah, a lot of those buildings that are built then
16:38
are still there. And he made some fantastic
16:40
observations and found it really interesting as we were watching
16:43
it, which is just really great. So I love that one a lot.
16:46
But I think those kind of videos helped us to get like a feel for
16:50
just the scale of invention and the planning that goes into
16:54
physically like building these things.
16:56
They're talking about in New York that all these pipes with
16:59
all the different like water and gas and electricity and all the
17:02
things, there's no map. There is no map of them.
17:06
There are things buried underground that the niche
17:09
people have no idea where they are.
17:11
And so when they're obviously like doing works and stuff,
17:13
they'll accidentally hit a water main and it all floods the area
17:16
and it will cause a whole like sort of like £300 million worth
17:19
of repairs need doing every year because of accidental pipes
17:23
being hit. But they they basically decided
17:26
in the end not to make a map because they didn't want people
17:30
to basically use it for for not very nice things.
17:35
That's fair, yeah. And it's like, OK, but wouldn't
17:39
it be helpful to be making sure keep it secure?
17:41
Like, I feel like it would be helpful today where they all
17:44
are, surely. But then we had a great
17:46
conversation about why, why there's no map?
17:48
Like, what's happened? Like, how long has it taken for
17:51
New York to be built? Like, how old is that city?
17:53
Like, how many layers of inventions have happened just
17:57
since it was founded? Like telephones and electricity
18:01
and all of it has all been founded since that has been
18:05
created. So of course they've had to like
18:08
patch these things in. Yeah.
18:10
And it makes a mess. It's like, but it's just
18:13
fascinating. And anyway, I just, it has, it
18:16
did lead to some really interesting chats.
18:19
Yeah. And yeah, quite, quite passive
18:21
learning in that sense, just like sitting and watching
18:22
something and just chatting about it.
18:23
But actually there was definitely a lot of engagement
18:26
coming from this subject, a lot of curiosity.
18:28
Yeah, it sounds a lot like that London video you mentioned is
18:31
something that I think we might look at because this Friday
18:35
we're going into London. And one of the things on my list
18:38
was that we were going to, we've walked around our town, but we
18:42
were going to walk around like obviously it's we don't live in
18:45
London. So it's a very different
18:47
experience and very different planning.
18:49
So that was going to kind of be like a contrast for us to look
18:52
at, like compare and contrast the differences.
18:55
But I think maybe it'd be valuable to watch that before we
18:57
go to give some perspective. We similarly, when we were
19:02
studying the Titanic, we found a YouTube video that literally
19:07
goes through layer by layer of the Titanic and how it was
19:12
designed and why things were done the way they were.
19:16
And it was lengthy. I was about, I think 25 minutes.
19:20
But I was like, no, guys, we're going to watch this because it
19:23
is so fascinating. And they were genuinely like,
19:26
oh, OK, that's interesting. And like, why?
19:29
Why did they have so many of these?
19:31
And it's like, Oh well, because back then the passengers were
19:34
very separated and so you needed like 5 different decks for each
19:38
class of passenger. And it was just really
19:43
interesting. And it seems like anytime we
19:45
watch kind of these like dissections of things, you
19:48
naturally spring, like you noticed conversations, like it
19:51
just naturally comes up with some questions and you kind of
19:54
go down a path. So I think it would just be fun
19:56
to do that. Yeah, that's a good.
19:57
That's a. Good.
19:58
And those sort of 3D models as well like that had it for like
20:02
Paris and LA and like loads of other cities as well.
20:05
So like you probably find your main city in it.
20:08
There's so many really cool ones so it's well worth looking into
20:11
that. But yeah, so then I mean, we had
20:15
another little side thing obviously with the local
20:17
elections coming up this week. Obviously I know people
20:21
listening to this a couple of weeks down the line.
20:22
So they have already happened by the time you've listened to
20:24
this. So don't don't get it in your
20:25
head. Yes, the 7th of May with the
20:27
local elections we had our local, well wants to be MPA guy
20:34
called John, knock on the front door.
20:36
Both the kids were obviously around and came over and we
20:38
started having a bit of a chat with him and he was telling me
20:40
about what kind of some of the local issues that the the
20:45
current party have been kind of managing or as, as he would
20:48
state, mismanaging as they do. And he really won over the kids
20:52
and they're like, are we going to vote for him mummy?
20:54
And I'm just like, no, no, like, why not?
20:59
He seems really nice and it tended to again, another
21:02
fantastic conversation, but truly intrinsically motivated by
21:06
the kids. They were so interested to
21:07
asking questions. He was so receptive to answering
21:10
them that he was obviously talking about a local kind of
21:15
housing estate that was meant to have taken a year and it's been
21:17
SAT nearly finished for three years as they do, it needs
21:22
sorting out. It's obviously hemorrhaging
21:23
money and everything, but ultimately it just, it was just
21:27
a really great opportunity to talk about obviously who it is,
21:30
who actually does do our town planning, who does the
21:34
leadership here like who's making the decisions, who's
21:38
influencing the decisions that are made, who decides what
21:41
values our local area holds and and how we obviously move
21:45
forward. So obviously depending on the
21:46
party that gets in, they will have a different set of values
21:50
and will fight for those values to be upheld in their area.
21:53
But that obviously they are still top down, have to follow
21:57
some of the values that will come from the overarching
21:59
government of the country. Obviously the if you can get
22:03
enough seats in parliament that are from a different group of
22:07
people and hopefully you will start to influence the
22:10
conversations that are being has in government.
22:13
And so I was saying about how obviously up until very
22:16
recently, voting Green wouldn't really have gotten you very far
22:20
because ultimately not very many people were voting for them.
22:23
And so they weren't getting the seats.
22:25
But actually they're predicted to get a few seats in London
22:27
this year, which is just unheard of.
22:29
So it's, it's quite fascinating actually, when they were doing
22:32
the predictions the other day that actually it's really well
22:34
split. So I was showing him that and
22:36
showing that obviously up until very recently would have been
22:38
very much Labour and Conservative dominating.
22:41
But actually now you're getting some of these other parties
22:43
taking some of those seats, they lose a significant percentage if
22:47
that happens. And so actually if more people
22:50
wanted to vote for like Green or Lib Dem or whatever and, and try
22:53
and get some different opinions in those in the room,
22:56
reasonably, that could be actually the case.
23:00
Now you might actually get that seat secured.
23:02
And he was really confused as to why more people aren't voting
23:04
Green and why some people are kind of voting reform or they're
23:07
voting for Labour and all these different things.
23:10
And he was asking loads of great questions about the different
23:13
parties and their values and what they stand for and what
23:16
kind of things that they push to have change.
23:19
And that led to an even better conversation is why children
23:22
aren't allowed to vote. And it goes, why?
23:24
Why am I not allowed to have my say?
23:26
Because even if only counted for like suggested votes, like the
23:30
half vote. So like a just to get my
23:32
opinion, like why can't, why can't we at least have some like
23:35
sway or some kind of influence on this?
23:37
But there should be like a a children's deciding vote or
23:40
something that the local kids will get to vote and that that
23:43
adds an extra nod in the direction of a particular party.
23:47
Because kids care an awful lot about the environment and social
23:50
welfare and taking care of people like food banks and
23:53
taking care of each other like that sort of stuff that they
23:55
tend to hold quite dearly, animals and like the
23:58
environment. And I think that they probably
24:00
would be voting for some pretty damn good parties, actually.
24:04
But it's interesting. I think it's really interesting
24:06
how how engaged he became with it.
24:10
He is getting older and it does keep these things remind me
24:12
sometimes of how much older he's getting with how much more
24:15
engaged he gets with these sorts of conversations.
24:17
Something that I really wouldn't have imagined that he would have
24:19
wanted to give even a second thought to a year or two ago,
24:23
that he's actually really fascinated by it all now and saw
24:26
the value in. I mean, I always make sure I
24:30
vote. But I said to Mike, I, I think
24:32
it's very important because we have to have our say.
24:34
Like we have to try and influence things as much as we
24:37
can. And it's a very small influence,
24:40
frankly, but it gives us a chance.
24:43
And then he was talking to his dad about it.
24:44
And I won't get him into too much trouble, but he's like, I
24:47
don't know. I don't even know who I'm going
24:48
to vote for this time. Like it's all load of rubbish.
24:50
And they're like, no, it's not daddy.
24:53
And then they were like really convincing him that it was very
24:55
important that he goes and votes.
24:56
And if he doesn't care who he votes for, then he needs to vote
24:58
for the same as mummy because she does care about it and she's
25:00
doing her work about it. And he's like, OK, OK, OK, What
25:03
you guys are doing today, hounded about who I'm going to
25:08
vote. For and.
25:10
I was like, God, I'm so proud of them.
25:12
Look at them go they'll activists now.
25:15
But yeah, I think it's it definitely opened us up to like
25:18
the politics side of their conversation anyway, that that
25:21
is another big part of it. And but yeah, it is quite
25:24
difficult to influence what happens.
25:26
It is. We are allowed to have our say
25:30
and to try and influence it, even if it's only a tiny
25:32
influence. We've always said if you don't
25:35
vote, you can't complain. So if you're not happy with the
25:39
current government, but you didn't vote, then I don't want
25:43
to hear it. Because that's that's the thing.
25:45
And I mean, it's when you look at the statistics, and I know
25:49
this is like for the states, but like if young, if all young
25:51
people voted, those able to over 18 in the states, if they all
25:56
did, they could, There's a so many of them that they could
25:58
really sway the, the vote, the outcome, but they don't.
26:03
And the same with women. If all women voted, we could
26:06
have have a very strong presence.
26:09
I think this does make you think there is a reason why so many
26:11
young people don't vote or aren't aware or don't see the
26:15
importance of it. And I wonder if that is by
26:17
design, again, to some degree, because obviously if you've
26:22
grown up in a country that hasn't necessarily.
26:24
I mean, I know that obviously in the US it is quite political.
26:27
People do talk about it. Families do tend to have quite
26:29
staunch beliefs and stuff. But if young people aren't
26:31
voting, it makes you wonder like obviously how much education
26:35
they're getting around this in schools.
26:37
And like being encouraged to challenge the the government is
26:42
not necessarily something that's like if we put on the
26:43
curriculum, is it? But if you think about it that
26:46
way. Vote someone out of office One O
26:48
1. So it does make you wonder.
26:51
I mean, I don't remember seeing much political education at
26:54
school, but I do wonder how much there actually is these days.
27:00
So curious question I think. Probably probably gets more into
27:05
it at like the university level, I would imagine and and then
27:08
only if you choose to pursue that kind of a path.
27:11
So yeah, it definitely is something that I want to
27:17
continue to. I mean, we've kind of gotten off
27:19
of town planning. Well, there it obviously
27:20
intersects but and more into government and, and and
27:25
leadership and voting. But it definitely does make
27:28
sense that this is something we continue to come around to
27:32
because understanding the history of it and how we got
27:35
here and then what we want to see out of our future.
27:40
It'll just really underline the importance of voting and of of I
27:44
can personally tend to cast news watching aside because it can be
27:49
overwhelming and sometimes it's just about protecting myself in
27:54
that moment. But I can, once I come out of
27:59
that and get back into it, I'm like, Oh my gosh, yes, no, there
28:02
is so much. And I do want to make sure we're
28:04
doing this and like we should be doing these things.
28:06
And it, it does kind of rally you and, and make you feel a
28:10
part of your, your town and community and the country that
28:14
you live in. And it gives you that sense of
28:16
belonging that all humans really strive for.
28:19
So I think it there is definitely value and continuing
28:22
to have this as a conversation for us.
28:25
Yeah, in a big way. And I think it helps them to
28:27
actually remember that they are a part of a community.
28:31
Yeah, they are a part of a people.
28:33
And this conversation does come up in all kinds of different
28:36
ways, even just talk about legends of Dragons that we were
28:40
talking, talking about this morning briefly.
28:41
Even that comes up as a like some of the legends are based in
28:44
different invasions that might have happened and to certain
28:47
people having certain beliefs about themselves, etcetera.
28:49
And ultimately those values we hold as a community are really,
28:53
really important and being a part of our local community and
28:56
actually caring about and I know the welfare, the food banks, the
28:59
schools, the hospitals, the funding that it's getting, the
29:02
state of the roads, the state of the infrastructure issues that
29:05
might be happening. I mean, a few years ago down
29:08
near where where we are, there was some flooding that
29:11
infiltrated the mains water and shut down water for the area for
29:16
several days. And these were all things that
29:18
are important to be pushing local businesses to actually
29:22
like the water companies and stuff to be doing something
29:24
about and putting better protection in place and all
29:27
that, all that stuff. And obviously even that was just
29:29
fascinating seeing how automatic that was.
29:32
But as soon as there was even the slightest bit of
29:34
infiltration into the water, it shut it down.
29:35
It detected it and stopped it, which was really fascinating.
29:39
But all of the relief effort that had to go in afterwards,
29:42
like this is all stuff which needs to be planned and thought
29:45
about, like sort of risk of risk management.
29:47
And so disaster, is it disaster crisis management, that kind of
29:51
thing. So like, like actually
29:53
understanding what you're going to do.
29:55
So if the town floods, how do we help people?
29:58
Where are resources coming from? Like they have to have plans in
30:01
place for these things. And I'll see my kids are quite
30:04
macabre. They quite enjoy stuff like
30:07
that. My son was watching something
30:08
about meteors the other day and like, what would happen if
30:10
different sized meteors hit the earth?
30:12
And I went, are we enjoying this or are we a bit worried that
30:15
we're going to start like not sleeping?
30:18
I feel like I want to make sure before we carry on watching this
30:21
that we're enjoying ourselves. He was, oh, yeah.
30:23
It's really fascinating. And by the end of it, he was
30:25
just like, sat there like shell shocked, being like, oh.
30:29
To invest in more satellites. Well, this doesn't make me
30:34
laugh, but they do love stuff like that.
30:35
They like the kind of all the slightly grim bits of the
30:38
mythology stories and stuff, everything.
30:39
So I'm quite lucky in that way. They don't get too phased by
30:42
this stuff. But there is definitely some
30:44
interesting stuff around that that we could do as well.
30:46
The kind of town planning thing. Because actually just to think
30:48
about, like, what would we do if this happened?
30:51
Like what would, how would it affect our town?
30:53
Like let's look at our town and see what would happen if that
30:55
happened. Yeah.
30:55
It's fascinating stuff. Well, you can see some flood
30:58
planning on that website that I mentioned from the podcast.
31:01
So go look at that and then you can use that as a starting off
31:05
point. And I remember, I don't know if
31:07
it was last year or the year before, we did go to see how
31:12
like water is filtered and how it arrives in our houses.
31:15
Yes, that was. Amazing.
31:17
That was really, really cool. And they had a lot of like hands
31:21
on activities, like see if you can supply energy to the water
31:26
to all of the houses on the block and like how would you do
31:30
the piping? And yeah.
31:32
That was great. That was a free day out as well.
31:34
That was done at a Kent water plant.
31:36
So if you're looking for a day out like that, that was
31:38
fantastic. They yeah, it's completely free.
31:40
You can go and see the reservoir, go underneath the
31:42
reservoir like all the machines and behind the scenes.
31:45
It's so cool. Yeah, it was really, really
31:48
amazing. And just things I did not know
31:51
about how they filter our drinking water.
31:54
So absolutely worth it. But that's like a community
31:58
planning aspect, right? Like, yeah, how many water
32:01
plants do we need? If we're building all of this
32:03
new housing, how are we supplying it with water and
32:07
things that it needs? So I thought that that, yeah,
32:10
definitely was kind of played right in.
32:11
So we talked about that again. And just like, remember when we
32:14
did this and we pulled up the pictures and that was really
32:17
cool. And then we did our local part
32:21
or local playground is having new structures put in.
32:26
Nice. And it's been taking forever,
32:28
but I pulled up our annual town meeting notes from last year to
32:34
see, to show them like how it was approved and what they what
32:40
that looked like. And then now we can like go see
32:43
that it's being done, albeit quite slowly.
32:45
So they just had our annual meeting.
32:49
If not, I might have tried to like take them to it.
32:52
Yeah. I don't know if they would have
32:54
been allowed in. I'm not sure how strict that is
32:56
but but since it just happened, we've.
32:58
Got to imagine the constant interruptions the handset every
33:00
20 seconds. Yeah.
33:02
Can you tell me about this? Can you tell me about that?
33:05
Oh yeah, we go to that park. Yeah, that.
33:08
Sounds great. Five more swings, like, you
33:09
know, But yeah, so I do think there's a shortage of swings.
33:13
I don't know why people don't understand that they need a lot
33:15
more than they need. Like 2 is never enough.
33:17
Like I just do you have children?
33:19
Literally every playground I've ever been to, I've found myself
33:22
saying, do they actually get parents to come in and like
33:25
review these plans? Or do they just like, do
33:27
parentless people create these things?
33:29
Like I don't know who does this? Like some of the stuff they make
33:31
is treacherous as well. I'm just like he's thought, how
33:34
about this? There's one I went to that they
33:35
put a sand pit right in the middle of it, like a tarmac
33:38
covered playground. And the sand obviously just got
33:41
everywhere. And obviously where is that?
33:43
No one's clearly sweeping it back in every night.
33:45
And so as they were running across this playground,
33:48
especially if it's slightly wet as well, Oh my goodness.
33:50
Like it just fell over like every 20 seconds.
33:52
I'm just like, yeah, Nope, this is terrifying.
33:54
Get out. We're not using this playground.
33:56
This has got to go. So like, some of these things
33:58
are super important. I think these are great real
34:00
life examples for them actually to experience something.
34:03
They're like, is this planned? Well, like, would we have done
34:06
this differently? Yeah, and and that I think the
34:09
playgrounds, I just. You see the memes, right?
34:11
They're hilarious, but they're so true.
34:13
Like let's have this slide, it'll end 5 feet off the ground.
34:16
Are we going to put another piece there?
34:18
Nope. We like it like that.
34:19
I mean there are some that are just.
34:22
Horrible. That security guy going down a
34:25
slide once, I feel like I could remember like a funny one that
34:27
when he was like going bang, bang, bang, bang, bang gets back
34:30
to the floor and he's like Ouch, just like, are we signing this
34:35
one off? Are we happy with this one?
34:38
It's 1 slide that like like toddler did that said like there
34:44
was signage to keep your arms and legs in and you couldn't do
34:47
it without pants and like long sleeves and I was like she
34:51
means. Trousers for the English
34:52
amongst. Us.
34:53
Yeah, sorry. Definitely don't go trousers
34:57
without your pads. Trousers is not a word I would
35:00
ever use. It's left there with, like,
35:04
slacks. Put your socks on.
35:07
But yeah. So I was like, OK, well, you are
35:10
wearing long pants, but you're not wearing long sleeves.
35:15
Like, just keep your arms in. Girl got, like, rug burn on her
35:19
elbows. I was like, what's?
35:22
This is just at a park. And there's, like, warnings,
35:24
like, kids don't read this stuff.
35:26
No. So.
35:27
Yeah. But like me using a toilet
35:30
somewhere the other day, went in, locked the door, sat down
35:33
the toilet, looked at the door. You know how you have like signs
35:35
of the door, door says please do not knock this door because it
35:37
keeps getting stuck. And I'm just like that.
35:41
That should have been on. The outside.
35:44
Or like it's too late next. Handle.
35:49
It's like though, well it is fine don't worry I got out.
35:56
But no, you're totally right that these things need serious.
35:58
Like they need people to actually know this stuff and
36:02
think about it and might be able to just say no this will not
36:04
work. Well, I'm I'm curious how ours
36:07
is going to turn out because we had a pretty treacherous slide
36:11
anyway and they took it down and I was like, Oh my gosh, great.
36:13
They're replacing it. Perfect.
36:16
Or even they're just getting rid of it and building something
36:18
else somewhere else. Nope, they have a new one in
36:22
there and it doesn't look better.
36:24
So I'm waiting to see how it finishes because right now it is
36:28
like the five foot drop like did not put the bottom section on.
36:32
Fingers crossed that it's an improvement and not just another
36:36
ridiculous accident waiting to happen.
36:39
No, dear, Oh dear. But yes.
36:42
So, yeah. So the only other thing we did
36:44
this week really that I can remember at the moment in time
36:48
was I basically sent the kids. You can't have screens until
36:51
you've done something challenged because I had to go and do some
36:53
work and I love doing these because it's obviously gets me
36:57
super motivated. But once they started, they
36:58
ended up playing with it for hours.
37:00
Basically. I said to them they had to use
37:01
all the toys we had downstairs. They could use whatever they
37:04
wanted. They could get them all out if
37:05
they wanted to, Duplo, Marble run trains, whatever they
37:09
wanted, but they had to make a town.
37:13
And Oh my goodness, it was so cute, like just fantastic.
37:17
They got our we have like a road rug out from when they were
37:20
little and they put that on the floor.
37:23
They used the Duplo to make a fire station, a police station.
37:26
They found some little police cars and fire fire trucks in all
37:29
of that. The Duplo and everything, all
37:30
their cars they've got. They made a zoo with a train
37:33
with all the zoo animals being brought in from, from, from
37:37
somewhere else. Oh, it's just fantastic.
37:40
There's so many bits that they'd thought of and they had like
37:42
this train system running around it.
37:44
Like it was just fantastic. And they'd thought about it so
37:48
much and added so many lovely little touches and details.
37:51
I was like, I want to know those dinosaurs were infiltrating.
37:54
The farmer was eating a sheep. Like it was just really, really
37:58
funny. And it was obviously just really
38:01
fun. Like actual proper, honest play.
38:03
Like they're just like they're both getting older now and we're
38:06
literally at the point of being like, should we just get rid of
38:08
all this stuff? Because it literally never comes
38:10
out. Like you're never putting it out
38:11
anymore. Like they play with Lego and
38:13
they'll play with like the like my youngest still plays with her
38:16
dolls and things, but like all this sort of Duplo and stuff
38:19
just doesn't really ever come out.
38:21
And it was such a lovely opportunity to see it all out
38:23
and being loved again. And so to being so creative with
38:26
it as well. So that was really fun and just
38:27
obviously just a really simple kind of think about what a town
38:30
would have in it and and build some of the buildings and make
38:34
some of the things and yeah, there's the ball playing and
38:36
that was super cute. So that was well.
38:38
Worth it, Our town would probably have like 5 stables.
38:43
Just a full on horse town. Lesson This is our
38:47
transportation going forward. Yeah, I've realized as well here
38:51
that we haven't necessarily touched massively on the concept
38:53
of St. furniture. You did a bit to put truth.
38:55
I talk about things that the traffic lights and the junctions
38:58
and stuff like that. We did talk about it very
39:01
briefly. Like we, we noticed things like
39:04
the lampposts and the the benches.
39:06
And why do you think they might have put a bench there is Oh,
39:08
well, the views really nice. And I said it's possibly also a
39:10
point that like as people are walking, that's probably just
39:14
like a reasonable amount of distance from the last bench.
39:16
So maybe people who have got some mobility issues, it just
39:19
helps them to have a little rest and to carry on.
39:22
So there was a little conversation around that, but we
39:24
don't really do anything about that.
39:26
So that's going to be something to carry on and think about a
39:28
little bit more when we're driving around because we
39:32
haven't, we haven't done a lot of driving around together this
39:34
week. So that might be why that's been
39:37
a bit more of a struggle to kind of cover because you haven't
39:38
necessarily been spotting things.
39:40
But but yeah, I think that's, I'm pretty sure that's all we've
39:44
managed to do. I mean, that's a lot for one
39:46
week, to be perfectly frank. I'm quite happy with that.
39:49
Yeah. But obviously, as usual, if you
39:52
guys have got anything that you've found, please do come and
39:54
share it with us. Because I think like you were
39:55
saying earlier, there's a lot here that does feel like it's
39:59
something to keep bringing up because like we've got kids who
40:02
are very curious, very capable. They could be inventing the next
40:05
big thing one day. And also when you think about
40:08
the jobs that are available in this world, like often a case, I
40:11
want to be a vet, I want to be like, whatever.
40:14
They don't necessarily always realise that there's so many
40:16
really interesting jobs. And I know that, for example,
40:20
like town planning, I went to the local, I think it was
40:22
Rushmore Borough Council for a meeting about something else
40:24
recently. And they were talking about the
40:26
types of jobs that are really difficult to fill.
40:29
And town planning jobs are really difficult to fill because
40:31
nobody ever thinks to go and qualify as a town planner.
40:35
But they offer like courses and can literally on board people
40:38
from from scratch to get you into that career.
40:41
And it's incredibly well paid because it's such an individual
40:44
skill, like it's, it's very, very important to to do it well.
40:47
And so these these are jobs which you maybe wouldn't even
40:49
know exist, but actually a really interesting and would be
40:52
full of interesting challenges. Every day would be a new
40:55
challenge, right? Something new to figure out and
40:57
to factor in. And yeah, I think it could be a
41:00
really interesting career, something I probably would find
41:02
quite fun to be honest. I know, me too, love that.
41:08
So was there anything else that you came across Ashley or do you
41:10
think that's probably is that? Everything you talked to, Yeah.
41:13
Let's pick the next one, yeah? Amazing.
41:16
Brilliant. Well, I hope that was
41:18
interesting guys. I feel I could have fun with
41:19
this one, right? This one needs to be good
41:21
because I'm going on holiday next week and it needs to be
41:23
something that I can do whilst I was doing in a pool, not really
41:28
doing anything else. Oh God, help me.
41:31
It's going to be awful isn't it? Right, Let's find out.
41:36
Oh no, it's a great one. OK, so journaling, processing
41:41
thoughts and feelings. I love that.
41:45
Oh, that's a great one for a holiday.
41:46
Oh, fantastic. That's nice and nice and calm
41:50
and useful. Hopefully.
41:52
Yeah, Yeah. I like this one.
41:54
I've never really gotten into journaling.
41:56
I find it quite difficult to make myself sit and write
41:58
things. But I do like to take time to
42:00
reflect and to be quiet and on my own to think things through.
42:05
But I do an awful lot of work with people around this.
42:07
Obviously being a coach that is pretty much like what you do.
42:13
And I think it's so valuable. It's such an important part of
42:15
growing up is learning how to understand what you're feeling
42:19
and to know what our body's saying.
42:20
And not just feelings in the sense of happy, sad, etcetera,
42:23
but also like, what is our body saying?
42:26
Like it's not all about our brain.
42:27
We get told that education is very much about our brain and
42:31
actually most of us who are home educating I think are way more
42:33
aware that actually our bodies have a massive thing to say in
42:36
this fact. So they don't want to just be
42:38
ignored. They would actually quite like
42:41
us to do something about the need to move, or to eat, or to
42:44
drink, or to some rest, or when we're I'll to actually get
42:48
ourselves better instead of just ignoring.
42:50
It exactly. Carrying on.
42:51
So yeah, so I'm quite passionate about this anyway, but I've
42:55
already got some ideas of things I could do with them for sure.
42:57
But I think I'll try and challenge myself to go outside
43:00
my comfort zone with this a little bit and find some new
43:01
stuff to do. And yeah, I'm quite excited
43:04
about that one. It's quite a good one.
43:05
Yeah, I've been looking for a way to bring like gratitude into
43:08
our daily routine as well. And I feel like that kind of
43:11
always goes along with with journaling and that self
43:14
reflection and just mental awareness and health.
43:18
So yeah, I think this could be a good opportunity to do that.
43:21
In fact, I'm staring at a book that I got called Mine Fuel for
43:26
Young Explorers. And my thought was that we would
43:29
kind of start to bring that in too.
43:33
So maybe we can read something and then journal about it or
43:37
something like that. I don't know, love something.
43:39
To like make you a little diary or something.
43:40
I think they quite. Like that exactly.
43:42
Yeah, yeah. Kids always love that, don't
43:43
they? My kids write such funny things.
43:45
And they all have little, little Diaries upstairs with like the
43:47
little lock on it. You know, that's like universal.
43:50
So it opens literally every journal ever created, which is
43:52
great. Thank goodness whoever developed
43:54
that, I'm. I'm appreciative because we lose
43:55
those things black and right. So it's so good.
44:00
But yeah. And they just, they use it
44:01
usually to the right like funny stories and like or talk about
44:04
how they hate their sister in that particular moment.
44:07
So yeah, I think we'll try to channel to some more productive
44:11
thought processing, but hopefully.
44:13
Yeah, brings you back to the moment.
44:15
Talking to the, the MP to be outside where my kids were
44:20
basically listening to him and talking to him to start off.
44:22
And they started poking each other with sticks and then like
44:26
scribbling under my feet. And just like, mate, I'm trying
44:29
to talk to him about his opinions on home education right
44:31
now and making sure that if he does get in that he's going to
44:34
support us and continues to support us because our, our
44:37
current MP has been. So it's like I needed to make
44:40
sure that he was on board. And there's you squabbling and
44:44
poking each other with sticks. Really.
44:45
Can we like put on our most educated luck for a moment
44:49
please? No feral children in the moment.
44:55
Almost dignified. This is like when I was, yeah,
44:58
every time. This is like when we had the
45:00
conversation where someone said something, and I said this
45:02
before on the podcast, and my kid was like, what's Nebraska?
45:05
What's in Nebraska? And I was like, Oh my gosh.
45:07
You know, like a state. What's a state?
45:10
Guys seriously this isn't even funny.
45:12
Like. You are.
45:14
It's very funny. All credibility.
45:17
I look like an idiot. And you do know these things.
45:24
That's pretty. Because if I have a kid that
45:25
attends traditional school, so something like that, people
45:28
like, Oh yeah, you know, whatever.
45:29
But the second a homeschool kid does, it's like, what are you
45:31
guys doing? Like, what are you even doing?
45:33
I'm like she. Can tell you every.
45:34
Bread of horse ever and. Probably where they come from,
45:39
but do you know any horses that come from Nebraska?
45:41
Yeah. Well, let's try to reroute this
45:45
into something your brain recognizes.
45:47
Yeah, I know. It's.
45:49
That did tickle me quite a lot, to be fair.
45:51
I feel for you. But they have got so many
45:53
countries to learn. I mean, if I, if I'm going to
45:55
give any kids credit on keeping track of the different countries
45:59
and different parts of the country.
46:00
So I mean, literally, they've lived in three different ones.
46:02
So they they've had an awful lot of confusion there.
46:05
So it's fine. Yeah.
46:08
I think it was, it was, it was my son ranting about our Prime
46:11
Minister Donald Trump the other day that I had to have a bit of
46:13
a conversation about. No, no, he is the president of
46:15
the United States. And he's like, are we not part
46:17
of the United States? I'm like, no, we are part of
46:20
Britain, the United Kingdom. We're quite far apart actually.
46:24
Different parts they. Both have united in the title,
46:26
so I get the confusion, yeah. As I say, I think these things
46:30
are so normal. Like if you these are what
46:31
actually make you realise that these conversations need to be
46:33
had because, because it's like, no, we have a Prime Minister and
46:37
he's this and he's like, oh, OK, I've never heard of him before.
46:40
I'm like, no, no, no, yeah, We don't.
46:43
We don't really watch the news. As you say.
46:44
It's like doomsday over there. Like I tend to just live in my
46:46
lifestyle bubble but but yeah, it is important.
46:49
I think these conversations are so great because it is making me
46:53
want to cover things with the kids that much more and to kind
46:56
of really get into it and realising that they're old
46:58
enough to do this. So now.
46:59
So these are great little challenges.
47:01
They're fun and they are kind of the kids are really engaging
47:03
with them actually. But I think This is why it's so
47:05
important to be covering this stuff with our kids.
47:07
It's fascinating. They're really engaging with it.
47:09
It's definitely giving me a chance to mix things up as well.
47:11
So I think this has been really fun and I hope that you guys are
47:14
joining in a little bit. I know some of you are some of
47:16
you have been reaching out and letting us know some of the
47:18
stuff that you've been up to, but do keep that coming.
47:20
We want to know what you're doing.
47:22
Send us a message on Instagram or Tiktok or send us an e-mail.
47:25
But next week we'll obviously be doing journaling and processing
47:28
thoughts and feelings, so you can hear from us about that.
47:31
But we'll see you again soon. You've been listening to the Big
47:39
Home Ed Conversations podcast. Thanks for tuning in.
47:43
Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share with a
47:46
friend. Follow us on Instagram and
47:48
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47:52
Also, check out our new website at theycomedpodcast.com.
47:57
We'll be back next week to talk about our experiences, bringing
48:00
the topic of journaling, processing thoughts and feelings
48:03
to our children. We hope to hear your experiences
48:06
as well, so come talk to us about it on social media.
48:09
Thanks for listening.