Blackbirds!

We had a pair of Blackbirds in our garden who in May had 3 baby blackbird chicks.We have been helping the new parents by putting out extra food for them and it has been very interesting watching the blackbirds gather the food up in they beak and take it back to the nest for the chicks to eat.Did you know that blackbird chicks are ready to leave the  nest from about 3 weeks old and will continue to be taught and fed on the ground for about 3 to 4 weeks after this the young blackbirds have to fend for they self and the new parents will breed again!The  2 pictures are of  the female and   the male blackbird which always has a yellow beak feeding the young blackbird.The blackbirds trusted us a great deal and would come very close to get more meal worms! which you can buy from most pet shops or garden centre.The young blackbirds go off and find new homes and we often wonder how they are getting on but of course we will never know, but do hope we have giving them a good start in life.We still see the parents who come into our garden looking for more meal worms and we think they have had more chicks so maybe we will see them soon!  The blackbirds also like to watch me dig in the garden and when i go in for cup of tea will come down and take any worms i have dug up!

New reply from Damian Hind M.P

We had anther email from our M.P Damian Hind over the 20 day off rule. We think you should lobby your M.P over this matter at least you can say you did everything you could to stop it. Our M.P is new and is still learning his trade but it does him good to know that we are watching him! Over all Damian is a good M.P and at least he replies to you he also does  listen to what you say.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Peter,

Thank you for your further message.

First of all, may I congratulate Peter on his recent successes – and I hope he will be equally successful in the British competition.

I am once again bringing your concerns to the attention of the Minister and seeking his answers to the specific points you have made and  his confirmation that your objections have been noted.

Kind regards,

Damian

here is our email to Damian

Dear  Damian 

Home education is undermined by the 20 days the child name stays on a school register  as it is parents in law  who are responsible for seeing that a child receives a suitable full time education.

We ask again where is the evidence that we need this change? Show us?

Why the rush to bring it in via Statutory Instrument?

Why where home educators not consulted about this and only found out about it by chance? In other words the Department for Education was hoping to just sneak it in! Time can always be made to consult!

What is to stop the 20 day rule being extended to say 30 days or 40 days?

Will a child name stay on a private school register  for 20 days if parents says it is home educating?

None of these question have been answered

It must be recorded    by you as our M.P(we can only lobby you) that we are against this change and we know of other home educators as well who do not agree with this change.

If that was the only change in the pipe line I guess home educators could live with it but we have a feeling this is just the start of  attempting to change the law on home education? Thank goodness Peter will soon be 16 and not be affected by any of it.

Peter won  Uxbridge Adult chess open and qualified again for the British Adult chess championship for this yea.r 

Best Regards

Peter Carol Peter

Peter new FIDE chess grade is 2196

Peter new FIDE Chess grade is 2196 here is the link  http://ratings.fide.com/card.phtml?event=2275740
Well done Peter! to get an international chess grade you have to play in a chess tournament that is FIDE rated not all chess tournaments are! Peter gained 23 points when he won the Uxbridge Adult chess open and also drew with 2 grandmasters Mark Hebden  and Keith Arkell.

I don't think people understand how hard it is to get your grade to this level it takes a lot of work study reading of chess books which Peter does and then you have to do it on the chess board in a real game where if you slip up you will lose rating points!

Peter wants to become an IM(international Master you need a grade of 2300 and 3 master norms which you can only get in certain events!

Peter still only 15 so hopefully in couple of years he achieve this.

Any one else out their Plays chess or would like to ask question then please leave a comment on here and we will do our best to answer you.

Damian Hind M.P

Damian Hind M.P has sent us an email in which he believe the 20 day rule of child staying on the  school register helps home education! It is quite clear that Damian has not listened to anything we have said to him. Any way here his the email he sent and our reply to him.We think you do have to attempt to lobby your M.P  so that he knows you as the voter do not agree with him and you can know you have done everything you can to try and stop this 20 day idea.

Dear Mr  &  Mrs Williams and Peter

Having discussed this with the minister, as well as reading the Permanent Secretary’s explanatory letter, I must say it seems an entirely sensible move to me.  I am not sure what your objection would be to making such a move by Statutory Instrument.  The Permanent Secretary makes it quite clear that this does not adversely impact the right to home educate – indeed if anything I would have thought at the margin it would strengthen it.

Sincerely

Damian Hinds M.P

Our reply to Damian Hinds

Dear Mr Hinds

 

The response you have given in no way addresses any of the concerns we and others have made.  It is really just saying trust us and go away.

 

The truth of the matter is  that this is just the first tiny step in making it more difficult for people to Home Educate.  If as stated in David Bell's letter the aim is to  ensure that any issues  that may have led to the parent withdrawing their child from school then surely this change should be given much more thought, consideration and consultation - oh silly us people might have said they didn't agree with it and where would the Department of Education be then!  Government always rushes through things that it knows people won't like hoping that there is no time to object.

 

As you and/or the Department of Education have chosen not to answer the detailed questions we have asked then we can only assume that indeed ours and others concerns are well founded.  We once again give you the opportunity to answer in detail the concerns  we raised in our email below  and prove that we are wrong.

 

As our elected MP we must lobby you about the things that are important to us and this subject is very close to our hearts not just for ourselves but for the Home Educators of the future because the way the Education system is going there is going to be more and more of us.

 

Yours Sincerely

 

Peter, Carol & Peter Williams

A Home Educating Family

 

Pictures of our Tortoises enjoying the sun

Our Tortoises enjoying the sun today!

We have 4 tortoises 2 are leopard Tortoises and the other 2 are Horsefield

The Horsefield hibernate in the winter and awake in the spring! The leopards do not hibernate and have to be kept indoors over winter.
The other horsfield is hiding some where in the garden i can not find him to take a picture.

Pictures Peter has taken

Picture by Peter

Hi every one have not blog for a while as we have been so busy with Chess and other projects.We have been spending a lot of time in the garden geting the vegetables  plot ready. This year we are growing runner beans and broad beans.
Peter won uxbrigde Adult chess open a very strong event and also got 23 FIDE rating chess points his new rating will be 2199 only 1 point short of becoming candidate master!

hope you all like the pictures Peter took of the animals the thrush was in our garden this year when we had snow and it still visits us looking for grapes we sometimes put out.
Do leave us a comment so that we know some one is still following us!

New Letter from Mr Nick Gibb M.P(Minister of State for School)

Today 10 February 2011 We have had a new letter from Nick Gibb M.P(Minister of State for Education) We leave it up to our readers to decide what you think of Nick Letter!  see below!

Dear Mr.Mrs and Master Peter Williams

I am Replying as Minister of State for Schools to your email of 31 January following my letter of 26 January.I am sorry to hear that you are not satisfied with the correspondence that  you have received.


In your email you state you have not encouraged others to raise FOIs about Ms Penny Jones as set out in my Letter of 26 January.I have looked further into this matter and I am satisfied that the assertion made in my letter was correct.

I do of course,take your complaint seriously.If you wish to send the Department a formal complaint,you will find the complaints procedure on our website at
htt://www.education.gov.uk/aboutdfe/complaintsprocedure/a0016/how-to-make-a-complaint


Yours Sincerly

Nick Gibb M.P

Nick Gibb M.P(Minister of State for Schools)

We have received a letter from Mr Nick Gibb M.P(Minister of State for Schools)  i wonder why schools minister is writing to us? we did not get the email from officials and it looks like Penny Jones is  still upset

Dear Mr and Mrs Williams and Peter

I am replying to the letters that Mr Damien Hinds M.P sent to the Secretary of State on 23 September and 26th October 2010 on your behalf.Mr Hinds asked for a response to be sent directly to you.I am replying as the Minster of State for Schools.I am very sorry for the long delay.

When you sent your email to Mr Hinds on 22 September 2010 you stated you had not received a reply to the email you sent directly to the Secretary of State on 1 September 2010,in which you asked whether there were any plans to bring in new laws on home education.The Department receives a large amount of correspondence and the Secretary of State is unable to responds personally to all letters and emails.I understand that officials replied to you by email  and i am enclosing a copy of that reply,in case you did not receive it.

The Government supports home educators and recognise that many deliver a good quality education for their children.The position on funding is that a parents who are home educating their children take on the full financial responsibility for doing so.However local councils can draw down funding where they provide significant support for home educated children with special educational needs,or to enable a home educated child to attend a college or further education.This might include attending college to study for GCSEs.Local councils have discretion to decide whether to provide such funding.

The Secretary of State announced on 13 December 2010 that Government is not proposing to make any changes to these funding arrangements.Our priority is to target all available funding at schools.Tight fiscal restraints mean it is not possible for the Government to provide additional support for home educators at this time.

In your email to Mr Hinds,you raise the concerns that the Secretary of State is being advised on matters relating to home education by an official,Ms Penny Jones,who you allege appears hostile to home education.I understand that comments have also been voiced on various blogs/websites and that you have tried to encourage others to raise FOIs about Ms Jones.

An Officials role is to serve the government of the day and the Civil Service Code sets out the framework within which all civil servants must work.The code can be found at the following link
http://www.civil service.gov.uk/about/values/cscode/index.aspx

The Secretary of State considers it is unacceptable for civil servants to face criticism as a consequence of carrying out their official duties.It is important that civil servants are able to carry out their duties in accordance with the policies agreed with Minister.These duties may change from time to time particularly when there is a change following a General Election.

Yours sincerely

Nick Gibb


We sent a complaint back to him and copy to our M.P Mr Damian Hinds what do people think of the letter from Mr Gibb M.P?  share this letter with other home educators please

Damain Hind M.P and at last we will get a reply!

We have been told by our M.P Mr  Damain Hind that we will get a reply to our email of 1/9/2010 about home education  sent to Mr Gove M.P (Education Sectary)  see his email to us.It can not be right that you have  to wait so long for a reply? I will post the full letter when it arrives! here is our reply to Mr Hinds

Dear Damian Hind M.P

Thank you for your email.

Lets hope its  is a reply that makes sense and not just civil service speak! Having over the last few years had letters from the old Children's Department it often appeared that a few select civil servants where running the policy on all aspects of education!

Lets hope Mr Gove M.P who we rather like he a  very good speaker in the house does not have the wool pulled over his eyes over home education by a civil servant called Penny Jones! Or Chris Foster! 

One  should also not have to wait so long to get a reply I thought the department had to reply with in 20 days? We are  way over that time limit makes you wonder if some one was not playing cricket with us!

I don't blame you your new and learning the ropes I guess! how is life as an M.P is the job how you expected it to be?

One good thing for the  conservative party is Ed Balls being made shadow chancellor you should be able to tie him up with the public debt he helped run up and  he  still refuses to acknowledge   this! The public are not fools!

Best regards

Peter Carol Peter

From: HINDS, Damian

Date: 27/01/2011 17:09

To: 'Carol Williams'

Subject: RE: Home Education

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Peter,

I have been informed today that a reply from the Department is now on its way to you.  I hope this will soon come to hand.

Best wishes,

Damian Hinds 

No answer still from M Gove M.P Education Secretary

We have still had no answer from M Gove M.P Education Secretary over our concerns about his views on home education We first wrote to him on the 1st of September 2010 and so far we have not had a reply!.We contacted our M.P Mr Damian Hind who said on 23 9 2010 that he would follow this up but so far no word from Mr Gove M.P see the emails that have gone between us and Mr Hind M.P.

Any news?  Or has the snow held up an answer? Or is some one taking the "Mickey" out of all of us?   

Peter Carol Peter

-------Original Message-------

From: HINDS, Damian

Date: 23/11/2010 17:22

To: Carol Williams

Subject: RE: Home Education

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Peter,

My office has checked today with the Department and we are told a reply is in hand and we should hear quite soon now.

No doubt apologies will be offered for the long delay.

Yours sincerely,

Damian Hinds  

From: Carol Williams [mailto:carol@williams4939.freeserve.co.uk]
Sent: 23 November 2010 16:01
To: HINDS, Damian
Subject: RE: Home Education

Any news? Or is it a state secret?( we have almost forgotten what we wrote to Mr Gove M.P) Peter Carol Peter   -------Original Message------- From: HINDS, Damian Date: 25/10/2010 11:06 To: Carol Williams Subject: RE: Home Education I am afraid I have not yet heard from Mr. Gove but I will send a reminder. From: Carol Williams [mailto:carol@williams4939.freeserve.co.uk] Sent: 25 October 2010 10:02 To: HINDS, Damian Subject: RE: Home Education Have you had a response from Mr Gove?  -------Original Message------- From: HINDS, Damian Date: 23/09/2010 15:39 To: carol@williams4939.freeserve.co.uk Subject: RE: Home Education Dear Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Peter, Thank you for your message.  I am sorry you have not yet had any response from Michael Gove but I will follow this up. You ask for my view, which hasn’t changed since I visited you at your home some time ago:  namely that I believe in a right to home educate subject to certain safeguards.  Although most home educating families don’t need safeguards, some do.. I would not worry about Mr. Gove being led astray by some adviser or other.  He is one of the brightest people in public life today and will certainly make up his own mind, having considered the full breadth of evidence and opinion. Yours sincerely, Damian Hinds ___________________________________________ Damian Hinds MP for East Hampshire House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA 0207 219 7057  //  01420 84122 damian.hinds.mp@parliament.uk From: Carol Williams [mailto:carol@williams4939.freeserve.co.uk] Sent: 22 September 2010 11:50 To: Damian Hinds Subject: Fw: Home Education Dear Mr Damian Hind M.P Can you help we have had no reply to our email to Mr M.Gove M.P over home education policy see email below sent on 1st of September  to  Mr Gove  M.P  he should answer within  20 days but so far he has not and we are quite surprised by this.We understand he is a very busy man but he did show a real interest in home education and appeared to grasp it! I.e. That we do not need any more new laws the last Labour government brought in far to may laws which I belive David Cameron made a point of saying last week at PM question time.Which we fully support! We also concerned Mr Gove is being briefed about home education by a Penny Jones who works for the education department she appears hostile to home education ! We like your view to? Best Regards Peter Carol Peter -------Original Message------- From: Carol Williams Date: 01/09/2010 12:00 To: ministers@education.gsi.gov.uk Cc: govem@parliament.uk Subject: Home Education Dear Mr Gove M.P We very concerned because Lord Soley has been writing that the house will return again to this subject! You appeared to have a good understanding of home education you where very helpful to home educators last year  so  we don't want  you getting the wrong advice from people who do not understand home education. Yours sincerely Mr Peter Williams Mrs Carol Williams Master Peter A Williams A Home Educating Family

Guernsey Chess International

We had a very nice time in Guernsey it is a really nice place and because Guernsey is so small you can drive to the sea and the beautiful beeches with in minutes.So it was really nice to drive along the coast line before going to play chess.some days we did not want to go in to play chess the weather was so nice and the beeches are really nice so clean great for sandcastles! Peter grandad and granmother came  to watch Peter and me play.I never won anything! I have to get Peter to coach me!

Peter won the Junior prize of 60 pounds in the open section of the event all of Peter opponents where adults.Peter played very strong chess and also increased his FIDE chess rating by 14 points.this system is what all players use to measure how strong a player is http://ratings.fide.com/ you can search Peter rating on this link or any other chess player who has a FIDE rating not all chess players get a FIDE rating has you have to score wins or draws against a FIDE rated player.Peter new rating will be 2178 when it come out on 1st of November.The ratings come out every 3 months'

We made many new friends at Guernsey and caught up with some old chess friends to.The Guernsey chess federation puts in a lot of work over the year to make this event happen.The Guernsey chess players are really nice and  friendly.It is the best chess event of the year.So we want to thank all of the people in Guernsey who make this lovely tournament happen.
I should mention that Peter chess coach Mr Nick Pert Grandmaster won the tournament.Nick is a really fine chess player i dont know how he does it.hats off to you Nick your the champ!

Guernsey Chess International

Peter Playing in the Guernsey chess International starting on Sunday 17th of October you can follow his progress on the Guernsey chess web site  http://www.guernseychessclub.org.gg/festival/festival.aspx  This tournament is a very strong event with a number  of grandmaster in it including Peter coach Nick Pert(GM) Peter hoping to improve his international chess rating at the moment it is 2132 .Peter is the 49 best under 14 in the whole of the world! 2nd best under 14 in  the United Kingdom.We really looking forward to the trip to Guernsey Peter Grandad and Gran mother are also going to come to give support.Some of the chess games can last over 5 hours! You have to do a lot of traveling to improve your international chess rating as not all chess events in England are international rated!.  We hope   to be able to blog  to let you know how Peter is doing while we are out in Guernsey.If you got any questions about this tournament please do send us a comment we will do our best to answer you.We hope to do a blog on why ALL children should learn to play chess.We would also like to help encourage home educated children to learn chess.So if any parent of a home educated child wants advice about chess do please ask!.

New Hamsters/Tortoises

This Sunday we brought 2 new hamsters for Peter to go along with the 4 tortoises we have and the one Guinea pig! We did have 3 other Guinea pigs but they died.We have 2 leapord tortoises which come from South Africa and realy like very warm weather and will grow quite big in time.You need to be able to keep these tortoise indoors for part of the year or when it is cold but yesterday the Leapords where out enjoying the sun.We also have 2 russian tortoises these are easy to keep and are quite hardy!.Peter enjoys looking after his pets and helps to feed and clean out the encloses of all the pets.Leapord Tortoises can create a fair bit of mess! We think it is a good idea for children to have pets but of course not everyone has the room or time to look after Leapord tortoises!  We would recomend hamstesr the ones we have can live in groups ours are russian  hamsters but most hamster live on they own.Hamster are easy to look after need a small cage some bedding sawdust and of course hamster food! Over time you can train them to come to you and take food from your hand.Peter said the hamster where up in the night eating and playing.Here is a picture of the hamsters

Peter not given them a name yet but im sure he soon will!  Here is a picture of Frosty the Guinea pig he is now over 5 years of age which is quite old for a Guinea pig

Peter will put Frosty out this afternoon to enjoy the fine sunshine.Let us know of any pets you all have and hope you enjoy reading our blog!

No answer from Michael Gove M.P over Home education

We sent Mr Gove M.P sectary of state for education an email about home education on 1/9/2010 so far we have had no reply! We also have  asked our own M.P Mr D.Hinds to look into this which he has said he will. We find it very strange that just when we been hearing that maybe new wording or change in the  guidance is on the table  for home education Mr Gove M.P  has not answered last year he was very quick to reply to us and was very helpful  any way see email below.

: 01/09/2010 12:00

To: ministers@education.gsi.gov.uk

Cc: govem@parliament.uk

Subject: Home Education

Dear Mr Gove M.P

Can you confirm that you have no plans to bring in news laws on home education  for this parliament?  Can you also confirm you fully support a parents right to home educate by giving the child a full time suitable education?

We very concerned because Lord Soley has been writing that the house will return again to this subject!

You appeared to have a good understanding of home education you where very helpful to home educators last year  so  we don't want  you getting the wrong advice from people who do not understand home education.

Yours sincerely

Mr Peter Williams Mrs Carol Williams Master Peter A Williams

A Home Educating Family

Had reply from our M.P Mr D Hinds  who has said he follow it up but so far no word from Mr Gove  M.P

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Williams and Peter,

Thank you for your message.  I am sorry you have not yet had any response from Michael Gove but I will follow this up.

You ask for my view, which hasn’t changed since I visited you at your home some time ago:  namely that I believe in a right to home educate subject to certain safeguards.  Although most home educating families don’t need safeguards, some do.

I would not worry about Mr. Gove being led astray by some adviser or other.  He is one of the brightest people in public life today and will certainly make up his own mind, having considered the full breadth of evidence and opinion.

Yours sincerely,

Damian Hinds

Above  picture is of Peter with England Junior chess squad taking in Montenegro when Peter played for England in european junior chess championships.

Why we had to home educate Peter

It all started a long time ago but come to a head in the year 2003,In the months leading up to June 2003 Peter age 7  had won a number of chess tournaments including some adult chess tournaments.So it become very clear that Peter had a special  gift for chess so our idea was that Peter should get off site chess education with a private chess coach for one day a week on a school day.I  asked the head teacher if Peter could do this she agreed to this with out any fuss at all! i was quite amazed any way we did this with Peter taking time off from school with the private chess coach and it was working really well,So i thought lets get it all done right in writing that it is ok for Peter to do this.I asked the head to do this and this is when it all went wrong she started to stall and said she needed time to think about it all and would need to contact Hampshire County Council.Which she did and they wrote us a letter saying you could not have more than ten days off per year.The letter was from Hampshire County Councils barrister a Ms Keri Tayor.I spent a great deal of time at the school with the head trying to get her to allow Peter to have off  site chess education but it was in possible she had become scared of her LA! We where also told that if Peter took time off for chess it would count as missing school and Education Welfare would take action against us. so after a lot of soul searching we decided to home educate Peter and had no idea how you would go about it so on June 23rd 2003 Peter started home education!