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Jax Blunt

Etsy gift guide (because every day should be a handmade gift day)

15th March 2021 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

The following post contains affiliate links and is my entry into the Etsy affiliate competition.



We’re past the buying window for UK based Mothering Sunday, but it’s always a good time to buy someone a handmade present, no?

Check out the Etsy mother’s day gift guide here

I’ve recently got into TikTok (I know, I know) and have found a wonderful supportive community of small businesses and artists. So I’m compiling this gift guide with people I’ve met through the app, and my favourites of their products. They’re mainly UK based, I’ll try to highlight where they aren’t, have some fun browsing through.

First of all, how about a fantastic Dolly Parton print from StephHoweStudio? Let’s face it, Dolly is an icon, and who better to offer life advice in your kitchen along with an uplifting song or two?

Terrachuu Art are based in Eastbourne, UK, and have a range of Kawaii Horror Illustrations and crafts. Most of them look more on the cute side than the horror side to me though, like this A5 Luna print.

Dream of Luna is making ethereal art for ethereal people, and I’m particularly in love with this custom acrylic painting – the example illustration is of a galaxy and it’s just gorgeous.

Isobel’s Creatives have a range of knitted and sewn gifts, with the latest range including tie dye wheat bags. (Why does it always take me several attempts to type tie dye?)

See Paul doodles has a range of doodle based stickers, my favourite being this cup of something reading room.

Brushed Earth Home has a range of hand painted boho home decor, which look wonderfully calm and friendly to me. Definitely worth checking out for plant pots that are a bit different to those from your local DIY superstore.

If you’re looking for individual cards or gifts, Vanessa at Stitched by V will do you cross stitch cards/ bookmarks etc. Really unique and very good value.

Geek Mind Creations has some somewhat less cutesy stickers in their range, but I also really love the watercolour style, like this rather fabulous bee.

I’m in love (see what I did there) with this heart shaped tufted wall hanging from Sarah at Sarah Hack Art. Her portraiture prints and cards are fabulous too.

And finally, Vexican art launched today, and what could be better than a crochet mushroom gift box? Come on, you know you have that one friend that would love it!

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what do you need to know to appreciate beauty?

12th March 2021 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

When you’re scrolling through twitter, and you come across a discussion on education and creativity and you hear…

“we can’t think creatively in the abstract, it’s a seductive proposition, but it just doesn’t work that way..[some stuff about needing to have a deep understanding of science to grasp climate change]…similarly, take the national gallery we have an amazing set of pictures in the national gallery, but you can’t go and look at them, and understand the beauty of them, to understand the technique the artist has used without a deep understanding of the discipline, without a deep understanding of home they’ve done these things.”

“It is important to teach children the knowledge of a subject, and of a discipline, before they can think creatively. We can’t think creatively in the abstract…” @jonathansimons pic.twitter.com/bqyOQVRAAT

— Parents and Teachers for Excellence (@PTE_Campaign) March 12, 2021

Um.

What even?

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BBC Woman’s Hour Tuesday 9th March – Electing to home school.

9th March 2021 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

Listen again here on BBC sounds (you need a BBC login) From 33.55 ish. My comments in italics. Presenter Emma Barnett. Be aware that incoherencies and typos will be due to my inability to type as fast as people speak.

Emma: Now, children all across the UK are returning to school this week but an increasing number of parents are choosing to educate their children at home.

Note that education is devolved in the UK, and therefore the rules are different in each country

Emma: It’s been a growing trend over recent years, but the latest statistics show some regions have seen a huge increase in numbers and yet it’s unregulated, there’s no government database monitoring the exact numbers of children being educated in this way. To shed some light I’m joined by Gail Tolley from the Association of Directors of Childrens Services departments in English councils, and also by Hannah Titley who runs the Home Schooling Association, one of many bodies which advise woparents on how to educate children full time away from school.

The Home Schooling Association was a new one on me, and when I looked it up, it appears to be basically a way of organising tutors. I can’t see that it’s run by home educators at all. And take their checklist with a pinch of salt, do your own research on the legalities of deregistration in your area of the UK, and how it applies to different children and different schools. For example, the process in England for children in special schools is different to mainstream state schools.

Hannah, if I start with you, just to be clear here, we’re not talking about people home schooling in the way we’ve been doing or people have been doing I should say across the UK during the pandemic are we?

Hannah: No no, that’s absolutely right. So over the last five years we’ve seen that home schooling has become increasingly popular. It’s estimated that there are around currently 75,000 being homeschooled in the UK, up from 37,000 in 2015 and Covid certainly seems to have accelerated that trend.

Emma: And what does it look like for most people. You know I nearly had a slip there to say that you know to educate, women educating children full time away, do we know if it’s mainly women who do it?

Hannah: So I think, traditionally, em when people are thinking about home schooling they see it as a parent led activity, so parents teaching their children, however now there are so many different ways to homeschool than there have been before which has made it more accessible to families so lots of families consider online schools like InterHigh which are becoming increasingly popular and some children choose to learn in small groups called micro schools and others have one to one tutors. So there’s no rules on what a home school schedule should look like and parents can take their own approach.

this didn’t answer the question as to whether it’s mainly women who home educate. And if your child is signed up with an online school full time, I’m not sure that’s considered home education. If they’re on a school register, that’s being a pupil I think. Interhigh bills itself as an independent online school.

I’ve not come across the term micro schools. We usually call small groups either tutor groups, if they’re tutor led, or home education groups if they are mainly parent led. And the majority of home educators that I know are still mainly facilitating their children’s education themselves, not employing tutors, using online schools, or forming micro schools.(Again, there is legislation around what constitutes a school, be very aware of that, unregistered schools are illegal.

Do you think it should be better regulated here though? We’ve got a statement here from Baroness Berridge, the minister for schools systems, she was unable to take part in today, sorry, this statement, excuse me, is from the Dept for Education, which says for the vast majority of children, particularly the most vulnerable, school is the best place for their education. Home education is never a decision that should be entered into lightly and now more than ever it is absolutely vital that any decision to home educate is made with the child’s best interests at the forefront of everyone’s mind, any parent who is considering home education on the grounds of safety concerns should make every effort to engage with their school and think very carefully about what’s best for their children’s education, the protective measures in place make schools as safe as possible for children and staff. Do you think it should be better regulated, do you support a database?

H: So we certainly support a national register of homeschool students. And I think it’s really important that safeguarding is a top priority. With regards to the amount of intervention, one of the benefits of homeschooling is that there isn’t a national curriculum, so there are children who need to learn at their own pace, or they have extracurricular interests where they need a flexible schedule I think it’s important that we understand that balance, you know it’s very important that safeguarding is put at the top of the list, but then also that parents are given the autonomy to teach in a way that suits their child best.
?? Again with not really answering the question. This doesn’t sound like a parent’s answer, and as both the websites Hannah is linked with describe tutoring and professional home schooling, I don’t think she is home educating children of her own.

Interviewer: And does it result in good results as it were? I know it’s all different and it’s quite a surprise to some that they wouldn’t know necessarily that there’s no national curriculum.
The national curriculum doesn’t apply to academies or free schools or independent schools.

H: Yeah, so children need to achieve a satisfactory level of English and Maths. Lot of parents do follow the national curriculum to a certain extent or they teach parts of it. But lots of parents that have recently joined the homeschooling population, they are going beyond the national curriculum, they have chosen home schooling because their child would like to learn coding, current affairs, entrepreneurship and develop skills that aren’t necessarily being taught at schools so

Interviewer: So no exams, is that right?

H: So lots of children, there isn’t a requirement to take exams, however lots of children do sit exams their GCSEs and A levels as private candidates at exam centres, which keep higher education options available to them.
This would be a great place to mention how difficult that has been for private candidates over the last year?

Oh, I guess not then.

Interviewer: The point is you don’t have to do that, but many do. Let’s bring in Gail at this point, what do you put the increase in families choosing to do this down to Gail?

Gail: Good morning, thank you. Well, as Hannah said, there has been a steady increase, about 20% a year since the Association of Directors of Children’s services started collecting and reporting this information. But last september we saw, Last October, when we checked on census day, we saw an increase of 38% and a number of local authorities as reported, saw comparative figures from last september to the september before with increases well over 100%. So the link to the pandemic and parental anxieties around that is part of that explanation we believe. And of course we are looking very carefully this week, next week the coming weeks as to what/ whether there might be an increase again. Because we also think that some parents did confuse what I might describe as home schooling, that is delivering the school’s curriculum at home, with elective home education which is the legal position parents have to either ensure that their child attends school or elect to home educate. And we felt that some parents felt that they would still have access to the online learning and curriculum provided by schools and in terms of perhaps some of their own anxieties have opted to say that they will home educate but some are certainly now realising that that does not bring with it access to ongoing support from schools online, and so we do know that there have been some returns to school from a number of those families and children that elected to home educate in the early autumn. Nevertheless there’s been an increase.

Interviewer: Gail, yes, and it will be interesting to see if it sustains with some of these families. But you are also I understand in support of a national database. But some parents are not, some carers don’t want that. Why don’t they want it.

Gail: I think there are a number of families and organisations that have been positively home educating and don’t see the need for a mandatory register. As directors of children’s services where we have responsibility for oversight of wellbeing and safeguarding as Hannah has alluded to as well the importance of us knowing, because there is no requirement at all if a family for example might elect to home educate, tell the school if their child perhaps is in year 5 that they’re going to home educate. If that family then moves local authority, there is no requirement on that family to notify either the local area from which they are moving or the one to which they are joining so and if that family’s circumstances change such that the circumstances either where the child is learning and the conditions at home or the safeguarding elements of their lives change, no one has sight or support of that child, so as directors of children’s services we feel that a mandatory register is really important. If I may I could also support something that you’ve alluded to and that Hannah has suggested. We do not then want to interfere in curricula or you know the choices about learning, but having sight of that there is effective learning provision and a safe learning environment and that the child’s needs are prioritised as being paramount is where we think that a mandatory register would be essential.

Gail Tolley Association of Directors of Childrens Services department of English councils and Hannah Titley who runs the home schooling association, of course if you have experience of that do get in touch.

As usual, so much to unpick in this short segment. Once again, we return to the idea of a mandatory list of children to keep them safe. This has been tried before, see ContactPoint on wiki. The problem is that of course a list doesn’t keep anyone safe, and you would have to use the list. So how would you use it in such a way as to safeguard children without causing more problems that you solve? Or would you end up with a situation in which to justify having all the data, people on the list were subject to increasingly intrusive contact?

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Filed Under: home education review Tagged With: home education, radio 4, woman's hour

Space Detectives by Mark Powers, illustrated by Dapo Adeola

10th February 2021 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

Disclosure: we were sent a copy free for review and links to bookshops are affiliate links, where I may get a small amount of money if you buy through it.

Dog lost in space? Grown an extra head and don’t know why? Pocket money stolen by a green blob? You need the Space Detectives!

Connor and Ethan are spending their summer holidays aboard the world’s first orbiting city, Starville (basically Beverley Hills in space!). The amazing space station is bursting with celebrities and the mega-rich. But Connor and Ethan are too busy selling ice cream to see the sights.

However, neither of our heroes can resist a mystery and when they discover the space station is hurtling on a collision course with the moon (eep!) they know they need to step in. This is a case for the SPACE DETECTIVES!

Can Connor and Ethan find the culprit and save Starville from its impending doom?

Right at the moment Tigerboy is very into lively chapter books that he can read by himself. He likes them to have pictures, and a good sense of humour, and as soon as I saw the description of Space Detectives, I knew it would be right up his street.

I was not wrong. He was thrilled when it arrived (addressed to him) and opened it immediately, retreating to his den (aka bed) to read. He carried the book around for the rest of the day, and finished it very quickly, all of which are good signs. Note the following review may contain spoilers.

He says: Space Detectives was good. I really like the bit where they floated around in space for a bit (especially as that bit is on the cover of the book). I also liked the fact that someone had a stupid amount of cats and that one of the cats has the same name as a computer virus that their owner developed. I think all the illustrations were quite good – I like books with pictures because sometimes they are pictures of things that I particularly like. I would like to read more books by this author and illustrator.

I think other people my age (nearly 9) would enjoy this book.

Now for the technical bit:
Information about the Book
Title: Space Detectives
Author: Mark Powers
Illustrated by: Dapo Adeola
Genre: Childrens
Publication Date: 4th February 2021
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Goodreads Link Amazon affiliate Link Bookshop affiliate link

Check out the rest of the blogs on the tour here!

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Filed Under: Book club

Inscape by Louise Carey

20th January 2021 by Jax Blunt Leave a Comment

Inscape Inscape by Louise Carey publishes on 21st January. Available from bookshop (affiliate) and other booksellers. Copy supplied free for the purpose of review.

Warning: use of this gate will take you outside of the InTech corporate zone. Different community guidelines may apply, and you may be asked to sign a separate end-user license agreement.

Do you wish to continue?

Tanta has trained all her young life for this. Her very first mission is a code red: to take her team into the unaffiliated zone just outside InTech’s borders and retrieve a stolen hard drive. It should have been quick and simple, but a surprise attack kills two of her colleagues and Tanta barely makes it home alive.

Determined to prove herself and partnered with a colleague whose past is a mystery even to himself, Tanta’s investigation uncovers a sinister conspiracy that makes her question her own loyalties and the motives of everyone she used to trust.

I hate to publish a review post without finishing the book, but despite my best efforts, I’m not quite at the end of Inscape. This doesn’t reflect badly on the book – it’s a great read, rather on my ability to concentrate in current situation. (Please tell me I’m not the only person struggling with the focus needed to actually read a novel at the moment?)

The book is SF that rockets along, told in third person present tense. This isn’t one of my favourites, I usually find it a bit obtrusive, but it’s done very well in this book and has the effect of keeping the pace up and the story really flowing. I can easily see YA readers enjoying this as it sits in that crossover area with many similar characteristics to YA novels.

Tanta, the lead character, is great, and watching her character develop even in the short time span of the book (there’s a lot going on very quickly) is fascinating. I’ve just got to the part where it really starts getting involved, and you should all be impressed I’ve put the book down to write this review. Well worth a look, I recommend this for anyone enjoying futuristic dystopian fiction.

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Filed Under: 2021, review Tagged With: blogtour, Gollancz, Louise Carey

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