Hen Houses -Slightly OT

[tensing]

We have decided that Hen Keeping would be great Home Education, that and I want to know where my eggs have come from, so we are going to get some chickens for the allotment that we have just got.

I need a Hen house though does anybody have any advice on where to get one or what to get.

If you don't want a nasty bit of plastic (eglu), then get a forsham ark; website is forshamcottagearks.com. We have the forsham 902 with extension.

Cleaning out isn't difficult - about once per week. Just put down loads of woodshavings as bedding topped with a little bit of straw, put on a rubber glove and scoop out the top layer of shitty straw and woodshavings and put fresh down. Takes about 10 minutes and not as bad as picking up dog poo imo!

I personally wouldn't keep chickens in 2 metres squared but that's not to say that you can't

thank you for replies to my queries and sorry for hijack. this is all for future ref as haven't moved in yet and have only just got an allotment and need to get my head around that first. but then it's onward and upward. What's BMC btw?

bad mothers club?

oh. thanks.

Well the bantams are here now.

Dear Husband customised the old huge dog kennel, it now has an opening roof, a pop hole, Nest boxes, a rosting perch, ventilation windows and a huge run attached to the side.

We picked up 4 hens an a cockrel from a local hobby breeder, very nice man, very helpfull, willing to swap cockrell for a hen, should the noise be an issue.

We have white polish silkies, very sweet and just 17 weeks old, so not old enough to lay yet, but not to long.

how exciting. bit of a (nother) stupid question. does Home Education replace school or is it sometimes in addition (when referred to in this sort of context)? Just interested as i'd never really heard of it before...

short answer, in this context, it replaces school.

there are some flexischoolers (attend p/t) but I don't think they'd seen themselves as home-edders?

i sort of assumed that and hadn't really twigged i'd posted on a home ed thread as i always look at last hour. it just hadn't even occured to me to consider home ed. do you intend to do it up to gcse or alevel? and is it generally practised by teachers? do you do any sort of training on national curriculum or is it more learning through life like having chickens?

I think cos of where we live i'm quite keen on school (liked it myself) and I love the social side of it, as does dd so far. but i consider aside from social stuff it totally failed me on an academic level (total is an exageration) but I think it's much more fun and useful to learn practically and as dd gets older i presume that all the time she spends iwth me will be educational in some way or another. sorry that sounds a bit wanky but we have an allotment and she's really into nature and holidays will be a mixture etc etc.

Anyway im fascinated - and quite nosey.

different people do it in different ways and for different reasons. We're heavily into unschooling-learning through doing-your "wanky" stuff! but my kids are not actually really HE as they are under 5.

One of my big motivations for keeping them out is actually that I don't like to think of them in the classroom all day, I think kids need to run about.

You don't need to be a teacher and IMO it doesn't help at all, in fact some HErs argue it can be detrimental because teachers have preconcieved notions about learning. i don't know. I do not, however, think learning and teaching are something best left in the hands of experts.

you have to be pretty on the ball with social stuff IME, though other HErs argue that the social system in schools is warped anyway. I don't know-I loved the social side of school too! But there's woodcraft folk, cubs, drama clasesses etc etc, plenty of chance to meet other kids.

Have you checked out MuddlePuddle and Education Otherwise? More info there.

And NannyMe I think is HEing in the way you describe but with at least one school age child.

We started out by supplmenting school, basically as school provided no challange for him.

Then I tok him out of school, and have since followed our own Curriculum of sorts, we do not follow the National Curriculum, though we do cover all aspects of it, most of our work is Geography, science or History based, as these are Henry's Interests, but through these we cover other areas.

Thank you this is really interesting. dd1 is only 3 so i am looking into the future for the mo but I definitely intend to supplement school (just didn't realise it had a name - sorry about hte 'wanky' btw wasn't meant badly as it was describing what i'm doing) with drama classes and doing stuff together. However if school does end up not working for her it's nice to know there are other options.

tensing how long do you intend to do it? will you go up to gcses and alevels? Thanks again for coming back even though i hijacked your thread. been workign on dh for some chickens! just need to suss out the neighbs.

At the moment we intend to educate him right through to GCSE's, though he is only 6 at the moment. I have 3 older ones that are all in school.

If in the future I find a school that would suit him then I may put him back in to school, I can't see it though.

As for Chickens and Nieghbours, shouldn't be a problem if you do not have a cockrel.