For me, the weaving of the natural and the liturgical year is common to our family. So, to plan, the first thing I literally do is get out My Book of Common Prayer and find out when things such as Lent, Easter and Ascension are, Feast Days of Saints, and things that I just know from tradition within my Parish that happen each year.  I also try to think in terms of attending the Divine Liturgy itself, but  also what speaks to that particular season through nature because that is where  I can more show my children in our home what ties this whole season back to the Holy Trinity.

For example, the days between Easter and Pentecost, (when we celebrate when the church was born), is a time I like to think about family.  We are part of the family of humanity, we are part of the family of the Church, if we make a birthday cake for the church on Pentecost, what could we be doing to talk about the Church and family and us as the broader picture of Anglicans around the globe to lead up to this?  (Please remember that I have older children as well, so things are more direct for them than just the indirectness that goes on for a tiny child under the age of nine!)   The idea of family, of living in communion,  is a huge concept, but there are indirect ways to do this.  Or, for another example,  how about the days after Pentecost as a time of growth?  There are many sweet picture books about nature and growth to have in a book basket, many ways to experience a beautiful garden and how we grow as Christians.  These are just a few examples.

The second thing I do is just start making free form lists with what I associate with each month – bonfire?  certain foods?  certain events in our community? certain craft  or handwork projects?  certain songs?  I get out my memories, my notes from previous years, my Early Years books and make lists.

Then I can take these ideas and plug them into a monthly rhythm and a weekly rhythm.

So, here is an example for you, but you really need to sit down and do this for yourself.  I don’t mean this harshly, but if creating a family culture is important to you, if Waldorf homeschooling is important to you, then you will try to do your own lists after you see this example.  You must be a person of initiative in order to have this be true to your own family.

So, here is my list, for example, for September:

Labor Day, an American Holiday  –>

8th  The Feast of the Nativity of the Theotokos

14th  Holy Cross Day  (find books about St. Helena for book basket)

21st  Feast of St. Matthew

29th Saint Michael and All Angels  (dragon, red cover for nature table, icon of St. Michael, dyeing red cloaks of courage, baking dragon bread, feats of courage and strength, bonfire, roasting smores)

harvest vegetable soup

bread

grated carrot and apple salads

fall greens kale, mustard, collards

leaf banners

pinecone people

picking apples

applesauce

baking whole apples

apple cake  remember apple cake book

stories  — Grandpa’s Farm and Carrot for two weeks (movement with story), Little Boy Knight  (Suzanne Down)  for two weeks

songs  working, harvesting fruits and vegetables, apples,

Circle – Opening verse, movement verses, songs, ring games, closing verse

Props needed for stories and verses:  see prop list (and then I have a summer schedule where I sit down and make things I need for the school year!)

This is just a small example of the beginning stages of planning a mood of celebration for the whole family.

Love,
Carrie

Ideally, once you have gone through cycles of celebration with the small child, with its wonder, anticipation and joy, these cycles will continue throughout the life of the people in the family and become an embedded part of that family;s particular culture.

In a family interested in Waldorf Education, one often hears things about Michaelmas, Christmas, Easter and St. John’s Tide.  Many families pick the festivals and holidays that speak to them,  from within their own country and  also from their own religious or spiritual practices.

As a Christian, I often look to our liturgical year, the feasts of the Saints, and also nature within the course of a year.  Celtic Saints provide a commonality for Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Anglican families and what Celtic Christianity in particular calls us to look at is  celebration and thanksgiving in autumn, stillness and reflectiveness in winter, preparation in the spring, and a calling of expansiveness and growth in the summer.

The celebration mood extends to how we live: do we live life as a celebration in front of our children or drudgery?  Do we complain, dislike, and show restlessness within our life or our own hearty love for where we are right now?

The other day I started trying to plan a few things out for our third child, who will be four years old in the fall.  The plan for him is a solid Waldorf kindergarten experience, and in accordance with our family culture, a solid Christian experience.

It also provides the experiences around festivals, feasts, the liturgical year and nature that sets the tone for the whole family.  This could be easy to lose in planning if one has only older children, but is actually the most important part of homeschooling, for it teaches gratitude, service, love, anticipation, wonder and joy.

I took a piece of paper and divided it into sections with each section labeled by month and just started making lists.  My lists included feasts and festivals for each month, songs, things in nature that I want to remember to look for or craft with, ideas for cooking, ideas for family life.  This then becomes the blueprint for each month and the basis for what is TRULY important within the heart of the family.

I hope to share more with you as we go along each month!

Blessings,

Carrie

Life, and the rhythm of life, moves in seasons.  And summer is a perfect time to slow down, re-charge, re-evaluate and take time for the moments that matter.

This year has been so difficult for me, and I hope that summer proves to be a time of hope and healing.  I hope it is for you and your family as well.  Many I know also went through a difficult time this year, a year of complete loss.  So, in honor of this time of rest and rejuvenation…..

May you have nothing on your calendar to do except for what you want.

May you have whole days of nothing to do.

May you have time with the people who are most important.

May you take time to take care of yourself.

May you find joy in the great creation and nature outside your door.

May you re-discover what is most important.

May you grow in a healthy way.

Much love for whole days of nothing,

Carrie

We used these resources, including:

• All of the nature right outside our door and in the fields and lakes around us
• Our garden in our old house before we moved and planting things in pots in our new house
• Botany by Charles Kovacs
• Botany by Donna Simmons of Christopherus Homeschool Resources
• This post, by guest poster and veteran Waldorf homeschooler Lauri Bolland:  http://theparentingpassageway.com/2012/08/19/guest-post-botany-in-the-waldorf-inspired-homeschool/
• This Pinterest board:  http://pinterest.com/queenslace/5th-waldorf-botany-block/
• Drawing From the Book of Nature
• Botany by Live Education!
• Eric Fairman’s A Path of Discovery Fifth Grade
• A really old copy of Botany:  A Golden Science Guide by Golden Press (pictures to draw; also the biome map in there I am planning on using in sixth grade as an introduction and weaving that into mineralogy).
• Jakob Streit’s books about bees – one is for free on the Waldorf Library website
• Oddly, a whole section about plants and botany in an unexpected and unrelated resource:  Complete Healing by Michael Evans, MD and Iain Rodger.  This is a book about anthroposophic medicine but was helpful for my own understanding and will relate plants to nutrition in future grades
• “Girls Who Looked Under Rocks” , the story of six pioneering female naturalists, was a mainstay for biographies during this block.  Recommended by Meredith over at A Waldorf Journey in her Botany block: http://www.awaldorfjourney.com/   Readily available through Amazon.
• The Herbal Roots ezine was also helpful.
• We studied the biographies of Julia Hill and Luna the Redwood, George Washington Carver, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson and the contributions these founding fathers made to agriculture in the United States.  Try the picture book “Farmer George Plants  A Nation” for a good one about George Washington and Mount Vernon.

Here is what I think the broad theme of botany is for  a fifth grader:

• How the six (seven if you include bacteria and note scientists now consider this a separate kingdom and not part of the plant kingdom anymore) broad plant families relate to the development of the child and the human being…Remember that in Waldorf Education, we always seek to bring a subject back to the human being and the child him or herself.
• How  the plants relate as intermediaries between the earth and the sun and the stars
• How the life cycle of the butterfly is intertwined with that of the plant

There are wonderful activities and observations to do with plants, and many other blogs list these types of activities, but here are a few of the artistic things we did:

• We did a lot of observation out in the fields and woods just drawing and sketching and being outside.  In our artistic drawings we especially practiced hatching, a type of drawing often used in Waldorf Schools starting in the fourth grade or so.  We also practiced using negative space in our drawings.
• We made clay models of a fern unfolding and beeswax models of flowers
• We memorized and recited poetry with movement
• We did wet on wet paintings of flowers in particular
• We made paper flowers
• We worked with copper rods to a poem by Goethe I found in Eric Fairman’s Path of Discovery

This is a wonderful block.

Many blessings,
Carrie

I believe it was in Kim John Payne’s book “Simplicity Parenting” that I read about reducing the amount of toys a child has by about one-third and perhaps one would then be on track to simplifying within the home.

I was thinking about this one-third estimate and have thought about how this might apply to those of us with commitments outside the home.

Whether you work a part-time job, or your children are in sports, or you spend time volunteering, or you spend a lot of time with all the neighborhood children at your home – what would it look like to have one third of that time back in your own home and with your own family?

A simple thought to ponder,

Carrie

Manufactured, ready-to-use toys are more present in our lives and in the lives of our children than at any time before in history. This is the result of aggressive product development, advertising, and marketing by large toy companies. These companies are primarily interested in toys that will sell and make a profit, not in toys that will foster the healthy development of children.

Research has shown the benefits of less toys, less structured toys, and a childhood based in play and song.  Having less toys increases the chances that children will engage in social play.  Simpler toys provides the child a chance to construct their own world of play.

If a small child under the age of 7 is truly a being of the senses, then attention should be given to the details of toys:  are they natural materials or plastic?  Are we sending the message as parents to our children that more is better because of the quantity of toys we have endowed our children with?  Are we trying to buy time apart or away from our children with specific toys because our own family culture is too fast-paced?

These are difficult questions to ask ourselves, but ones that deserve an honest look and an honest answer.

There are many suggestions in this chapter to help parents work toward reducing the load of toys and materialism in the home. Some suggestions include remembering that simple toys are best (remember the jokes about children enjoying the box that a toy came in more than the toy itself is true!), to feel free to limit media and catalogue and shopping exposure, to not be afraid to set limits on things like birthday gifts by asking only for art supplies or seeds for the garden, teaching our children to be creative doers and not seek passive entertainment, asking for gifts that involve doing as a family rather than just another toy to sit in a closet somewhere.

Another interesting chapter!

Blessings,
Carrie

What is it about Waldorf homeschooling that brings out this guilt?

I think it is because no one other form of homeschooling is so tied into the universal picture of child development and how the development of the human being impacts parenting and education.  I don’t know as any other form of education has such a strong idea about what leads to good adult health in the future.  It is also more teacher led, than say opening a textbook or workbook and reading that.  It involves a certain initiative.

So, because of that it is natural to wonder if one’s efforts measure up.

“One’s efforts.”  I think that is the first thing we need to ask ourselves when we are wondering if we “measure up” is:

Am I making an effort?  What is my effort toward?    I think almost more than any physical  piece, like do I have a rhythm to my home,  or do I teach Greek mythology to my 11 year old,  the answer to this question lies in what initiation am I taking in adult education and learning about this subject?  What are the why’s beneath the “Rhythm would be good” or “Greek mythology would be good around fifth grade”?  Am I interested in learning more about how a subject that I am teaching would be approached by Steiner himself or by a teacher who really has studied Steiner?  Do I care about the developing human being and do my thoughts on this leave open some room for what Steiner or other secondary Waldorf education literature/pedagogy have to say according to what age my child is?  Does that resonate with me?

There is no “check-off” list for what is “Waldorf enough”.  It is a subjective experience.  So, when you ask yourself about “Waldorf enough”, I think all you can do is look at where you are, and where you want to go.  How do you get there?  Where are you on this walk, and is this actually the path you want to walk on to an extent?

Sometimes we hear in Waldorf Education that we have to digest things and then bring them to our children.  I think that is why so many teachers are reluctant to endorse or write a homeschool “curriculum”, because the usual method in Waldorf Education is to know oneself, to know the subject, to meditate on it and the children and digest it and then see what a-ha moments flow from that as this reverent whole.

That sounds awfully daunting, doesn’t it?  For many of us as homeschoolers, short on time and sleep, it sure does.

But here is the thing.  I think if you have a handful of those “a-ha” moments scattered throughout the year, then you are doing well.  I think the longer I teach and go through the curriculum itself (which has I outlined in previous posts may be broader for a homeschooling family than at a school), I learn and approach things differently, even if I start from a more rote perspective.

I went through botany this year.  Some of it was rote.  It was a book or books I had read, it was ideas for projects, it was ideas for paintings and drawings and experiences.  But some of it was “a-ha” and when I stepped out to look at the world, my view of the plant kingdom had changed.  My view of the cycle of the life of a butterfly had changed.  It touched me and resonated with me.  That is an “a-ha” moment.  It was “a-ha” for my child and for me as well.

I think if you have initiative to learn, if you are fairly clear at least about the basics of Waldorf education and what that means with the seven year cycles, then you are striving.  But no one can spoon feed you this path.

You have to actually want to do this and be open to it.

If it is stressful for you, then perhaps it is not the right time for you or you are focusing on the wrong things on this path.  It is not the wooden toys, it is not just about play and being outside (although that is huge!), but to me it is slowing down enough and finding time to do your own inner work (whether that is your religion, yoga and meditation or using some of Steiner’s ideas, etc) and then using some of your time for hearing the ideas of Waldorf Education and yes, thinking about how that resonates with you and where you would bring that to your child in a loving way.  It implies a certain amount of trust that this would be beneficial for my child. 

It is about seeing broad pictures and themes.

It is about regarding this work as holy and sacred.  It is a privilege to be able to do this, not a bother and not a stress.

It is about being positive about where you are, but also to keep striving forward with your own efforts and not waiting for it to fall into your lap.

Observe your child, and keep striving.  Those are the two rules.

To this I would add a third:  understand child development and the seven year cycles.  Then you know the “why’s” of the curriculum and how to adapt to what works for you.

Blessings,

Carrie

What Waldorf homeschooling can bring you, if you let it, is healing but also BALANCE.  If you are interested in Waldorf homeschooling but lean more toward structure and skills and knowing what your child “can do”, Waldorf homeschooling can help you slow down and realize, for example, that an oral report in fifth grade could lay the basis for a discussion of literature in sixth grade.  Waldorf education can put the academic skills children need for life on a timetable that is realistic for development and can place them at a point where these skills will not be like pulling teeth, but will be vigorous and full of vitality.

If you are more unschooling led, Waldorf Education can provide a beauty in form and also help with healthy development as to what nourishes each broad developmental phase through these broad themes.  You have more leeway, I think than just “X story in X grade.”  Waldorf Education leaves time and space for what the child brings, leaves time and space for “a-ha” moments, but this comes after careful preparation by the teacher within these broad themes and meditating on the child in question.  If you are more unschooling led and you don’t feel comfortable taking the lead in teaching your child anything that the child might enjoy and find nourishing but didn’t think of it themselves first, then Waldorf Education might not be a good fit for your family.  And that is okay!

Kindergarten through Grade 2 (grades one through two is ages almost seven through eight or so):  A general theme of celebration of life, especially through the festivals,  a strong sense of protection and unhurriedness, and  a feeling of unconditional love from the family branching out during the grades into love felt by the child from the “best buddy” and the trusted community.  In homeschooling families, the love of a peer or “best buddy” may come later, but the longing is still there and can be seen in children who reside in a stable community each year in the grades.

This comes best from the folk tales, fairy tales, saint stories, and stories of animals that YOU are comfortable with within your family tradition.  All of these stories point toward the  unconditional love for the child by not only the family but the community and by nature and yes, a general sense of a higher being itself.

In a Christian Waldorf home, the Old Testament stories are very rich and nourishing for all ages, but of course speak very directly to those children in the nine year change if you can work deeper with the stories the children have already encountered as part of family culture.

The seasonal festivals and the doing are most important.

The challenge for the more form led parent will be to remember to teach through art, to provide balance, to not get so caught up with “where their child is academically.”  The shift at the six/seven year change toward the parent assuming a more direct role in teaching is also part of this time.  This can be a challenge for some truly dedicated unschoolers, but the role of the homeschooling parent as a more direct and loving leader cannot be understated nor overlooked.

Grades 3 through 5 (ages almost 9 through age 11 or so):  The broader themes here are still one of love from not just the immediate family, but from the best buddy, from the community and  from connection to the community.   Philios, the love of brotherhood and the community, is found in these ages.   The beauty found in the world through biographies of great people such as George Washington Carver in fifth grade botany or in legends or in the Old Testament stories shows the important strivings of man and of humanity.  Academic skills typically increase slowly to include more significant writing, reading and through organization in fourth and fifth grade.  The challenge for the homeschooling teacher is to show a calm, steady emotional state whilst the child goes through the nine year change, and to balance the needs of the child to be in community with the need to be home with family.

The challenge for those more structured and formed will be to not rush into academic skills that are normally the realm of those children ages close to 12 and up, and the challenge of the unschooling led parent will be to step up and provide consistency and find the beauty in the stories of the Old Testament, the Norse myths, geometry and math, and finally through Ancient Civilizations and to know to bring these stories to a child after we have digested them and believe in them is nourishing even if the child doesn’t bring up directly that they want to hear about “X” subject.

Grades 6 through 8: The child is dealing with Eros, not just with the awakening provided by the more popular connotation of this term, but with the awakening to perhaps even a larger sense of community and what lies beyond and a larger awakening to themselves.  Causal thinking is developing, and this is fostered through accurate observation in the sciences, for example.   Even subjects such as math provide a pondering for the meaning of love, accepting and belonging… Things are brought in to balance a typically very black and white view of the world at this age – charcoal drawing, for example, in sixth grade and perspective drawing in seventh grade.

For those form and structured led, it may prove a challenge not to push into a high school level thinking and academic expectations.  For those unschooling led, it may be more tempting to abandon any of the broad themes found in history, literature, art and math found during these grades, but then I truly believe the child will miss a picture of beauty in the world and in humanity that is not often  found in mainstream co-op classes or computer and on-line classes.  It can be difficult to find beauty in the harshness of the Romans, or in some of the things in American history or the explorers, but yet that is the task of the teacher to see and guide the child towards.

High School:  The child is moving into discovering truth in the world, and who they are in the world.  What is truth, who are they in the world, how do they deal with the unconditional love of family, the love of the best buddy and the love for wanting to be accepted and belong to those outside the family.  Idealistic causes are well-served in this time, to warm often cool intellectual thoughts.  Art continues to provide the balance between the nervous system of thinking and the system of will and doing.  Art is a portal to feeling itself.

Hope that helps provide a broader picture today,

Carrie

Thank you to my dearest friend, Andrea Hartman!  These are her fine words:

I remember back to when we were homeschooling, on those really hard days when the house was a mess, and I was a mess, and the kids were a mess, and I would be having the passing thought  that I should send them to school.  School would be better for them than this.

We had to do public school this year.  We might have to again.  You might have to one day.  It’s not the end of the world, but now I see the public school experience not from my own experience, but from the experience of my children.  I feel like I am really blessed with the knowledge of ‘both sides of the coin’ here.  We are planning to go back to homeschooling this coming fall, so I have written a Homeschooling Manifesto. I didn’t write my little manifesto to discuss the negatives of school, but to reconnect myself with the essence of homeschool.  I’d love for you to read it, file it away, and on those crazy days, you can pull it out and remind yourself of what you are really doing.  I promise you, I will be reading it next year, many times.    I hope you enjoy it!

Today, in New England, it was a beautiful day. Sunny, breezy, low 60’s. Perhaps to my Florida family, this is a chilly day, made for long sleeves and snuggles. But to my northeastern friends, this was a day for opening windows, climbing trees, and running through the grass barefooted.

As I gratefully cracked open my own window over the kitchen sink this afternoon and felt the cool breeze on my face, I realized that these three aforementioned activities are so very symbolic of the choice our family has returned to- homeschooling.

For a variety of reasons, our family tried public school this year. I must say, that of all the public schools out there, this is one of the best. Not because of test scores or academic standards, but because it is old and has character, it is small and cozy, and the principal is there every day, accessible and available to chat with a smile on her face. One cannot say this of many public schools.

My older two children started off the school year with much enthusiasm. They were quite excited to try it out. The idea of a whole room full of children was brimming with potential, thoughts of playgrounds and indoor gyms delighted them, and school buses were held in the utmost reverence.

So off they went, every day, with new backpacks, clean teeth, and nicer clothes than they had ever owned before. And all was well. For a while.

But slowly I noticed a change. The windows were closing. The breezy, graceful, happy freedom that had once blessed these little people was being replaced with something more rigid. As I said, it was slow, and we marched on through Winter Break without putting much thought into it.

Then came February break. We were not travelling nor were we hosting any visitors, so it was just me and the kids, doing whatever we do, for a week. And it was such an uneventful, beautiful week! That curious, magical, yet oh-so subtle bond that we once had was rekindled. Such a funny thing. I hadn’t noticed we’d lost it till we found it again. A part of my soul was awakened by this realization, I could now see this bond and feel it; a very tangible, very precious gift. The night before school started back again, I was consoling two crying children. They missed me, they missed home, they missed homeschooling.

At this point, my heart literally took over my entire being. My rational mind was reeling, but I grabbed it by the hand and plunged ahead. I began searching out new homeschooling groups, researching curriculums, and planning for next school year. At home.

Now, as the school year edges toward its close, I am looking at the entire school system with an unbiased eye. I do not wish to love it or hate it. (We are actually having the kids complete the school year, because in most cases I support finishing what is started.) And this is what I see:

There are rules and norms, cool things and uncool things. Age and sex become factors for friendship. Judgment comes often and harshly, from state tests, prep tests, report cards, teachers, and other students. It is everywhere. Fun is relegated to lunchtime, recess, and P.E. (though recess is a privilege quickly removed for make-up work or poor behavior). Learning is a despised activity, consisting of sitting at a hard desk under fluorescent lights listening to a lecture that seems designed to bore; little more than test prep conducted by an over-worked, over-regulated, over-stressed teacher, stripped of any power to decide what or how she teaches. The emphasis, in the minds of the children, is not on what they learn, but where they rank in relation to their fellow classmates. And where is the respite, where is the expansive, creative outlet for these boxed-up children? Even at recess, that sacred 15-minute privilege, one may not play with small sticks, or climb trees, or dig in the dirt, and certainly one cannot be barefoot. (All those activities are reserved for eccentric homeschoolers.)

I am not writing this to bash the school system. The people there are doing their best with what they’ve been given, students and teachers alike. I am writing this for the homeschooling mother, the one who is exhausted, whose house is a mess, who hasn’t brushed her hair or taken a shower in several days, whose children are playing with toys in the bathroom sink instead of practicing their handwriting.

You, momma, are doing a fantastic job. Your children are living. Real, authentic, amazing living. Listen. You can hear them squealing with delight as they squirt water all over the bathroom mirror right now. They discover. They probe. They laugh. They learn. They are alive.

Your house may be messy, but your precious windows are open.

Lots of love,

Carrie

Just for today, think in your head how your child feels and connect with that through a hug, a smile, or holding your child but instead of filling this space with words just be there to listen.

Just for today, keep your own adult inner life to yourself or with other adults instead of spilling it out on the children.

Just for today, especially if you have children under the age of 12, stop reasoning and going on and on about something. Stop talking, take a breath, and listen to your child.  Try other tools:  distraction, change the scenery by going outside, use your strong rhythm to hold things, breathe through a tiny child’s temper tantrum.  Keep calm and composed.  Repeat what needs to happen, help especially the small child physically do what needs to happen with a song, with gentle hands, with a smile.  Hold the space.  For a bigger child who is bouncing against a boundary, through the tears and struggle, hold the boundary for them so they can grow and learn.   You are their model and their teacher.

Just for today, realize that play is the best therapy for feelings for children under the age of 12.  Check the play, especially how your child plays with others.  Keep your eyes and ears on your children.

Many blessings,
Carrie