Did you all see these amazing main lesson book creations over here at Loveyland? For those of you with small children, check it out and be amazed at where your child will go with the Waldorf curriculum as they mature and grow!
http://lovey-land.blogspot.com/2009/02/main-lesson-books.html
Carrie
“Children relate to the world around them primarily through what is seen and done. It is only later that they easily grasp abstract ideas. So in preparing festivals for children we give priority to the visual presentation and to the accompanying activity. We have found it best to avoid completely the temptation to explain in words anything to do with the meaning or background to a festival. It could be many years later that illuminating connections in thought are discovered by the child- but this will be a personal discovery and therefore all the more precious and inspiring.”
-All Year Round, page 42.
Here are some ideas for celebrating Spring within your Waldorf Home! (I did not include Passover and hope to find you a blog to link to with Passover ideas – Loveyland, where are you??)
Karneval/Mardi Gras: Probably not a true Waldorf tradition celebrated within the Waldorf school, but Karneval is a season of fun in many regions of Germany ! You could consider celebrating at home with cutting out chains of colorful paper dolls and hanging them up, celebrating with a Karneval party where the children dress up (not in scary costume, but colorful costume!) and there is dancing and singing and food. Some regions of Germany celebrate with a special kind of jelly-filled donut for Karneval.
The season of Karneval typically culminates in Shrove Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday. Wikipedia has a lovely entry on all the different foods people in different countries eat on this day before Lent. See this link for further details: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrove_Tuesday In my region of the United states, this night is known to many in the US as “pancake dinner” night for “Fat Tuesday.”
There are many pancake rhymes out there, here is one I remember that I believe is Mother Goose:
Mix a pancake
Stir a pancake
Pop it in a pan
Fry a pancake
Toss a pancake
Catch it if you can
You could have a pancake tossing race as I am told they do in England!
In some Protestant traditions, families make pretzels on Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. Here is a recipe I found: http://www.rca.org/Page.aspx?pid=2601. I also found this link regarding pretzels and their role in Lent from a Catholic perspective: http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0535.html
Lent:
According to the book, “Celebrating Irish Festivals” regarding Lent: “In older times people were expected to abstain from all animal fats during Lent. This meant no eggs, butter, milk or meat, so the people ate simple meals like porridge, with black tea for breakfast; and potatoes, herring and seaweed for dinner………..In the 19th century the custom changed so that only Ash Wednesday and Good Friday were strictly observed fasts. There was a prohibition on dancing and singing during Lent. Visiting friends was frowned upon, as were card games; and still today many people decide not to visit the pub during this period……Nowadays, many people choose to give something up for Lent. This can be a habit, or something like chocolate or sweets. You could also choose to take up some spiritual discipline during this time.”
I personally like to do more intensive inner work during the 12 days of Christmas and during Lent. One thing that I have been using for my own adult inner work during this season of Lent is the contemplation of my role in Social Justice. I have been using these devotions as found here: http://images.rca.org/docs/discipleship/LentenDevotional.pdf Food for thought.
Maybe you would like to join the Anthroposophical Society during this time to further your foundation for Waldorf homeschooling. Maybe you will intensify your yoga practice or prayer or meditation life. I am sure you will find the thing that speaks the most strongly to you.
Other thoughts for during Lent include Spring Cleaning, and also cleansing your body with such herbs as dandelion and nettle. There are many wonderful recipes for this in many of the festival books.
The book “All Year Round” has this to add regarding the celebration of Lent with small children:
“In what ways can we develop an appropriate Lenten mood for a younger child? We could sit together for a few minutes each morning, listening in silence as the birdsong gains strength from the ebb of night. We could take time to watch for the moon as it unfolds its rhythmic process between darkness and light. There are many small, quiet ways in which the adult can offer certain pictures. We do not mean art reproductions of the Crucifixion, which children can find disturbing, but pictures taken “out of the book of Nature”, or presentations of a symbolic quality. For example, if an unlit candle stands on the dining room table each day instead of flowers, this can make a very deep impression…….”
St. Patrick’s Day:
The book “Celebrating Irish Festivals” discusses the life of St. Patrick and provides a story about Finn MacCool and St. Patrick, which would probably be suitable for eight-year-olds and up.
Some children wake up to find a St. Patrick on their Nature Table. Many families celebrate this day by having green food (yes, the dye, the horror!), making shamrock rolls, hunting for shamrocks outside, sewing little green felt shamrocks to pin to a shirt. Celtic music is great fun as well. Some mothers sew a small little green shirt and pants and leave them somewhere for the children to find in the morning, or have a scavenger-type hunt for gold. I have known parents who even went so far to use green food coloring in the toilets even, LOL!
I don’t know how “Waldorf-y” any of this is, but it sure is fun!
Spring Equinox: A great time to change the scene on your Nature Table!
Some families set up an egg tree especially for the Equinox and some families do one tree for the Equinox and one for Easter. Some families wet felt flowers and when they are dry, tack them to their shirts with a safety pin. Some families use the Equinox to leave out special gifts for the birds to build nests with or make birdhouses or Mason bee houses. Wet-on-wet watercolor painting on paper cut out in the shapes of chicks or rabbits also comes to mind, as does those simple pipe cleaner and coffee filter butterflies.
Easter:
Palm Sunday: All Year Round recommends making a cockerel to hang over the breakfast table for the children to wake up to and includes directions.
There is also a thought that if you have been using an unlit candle on your table, then you start lighting it on Palm Sunday.
This can also be a day to sow grass seed or wheat grass or start a Lenten Garden in a dish.
For the time between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday, you could make an Easter Pole as a family. The pole usually is made from a branch that you can bend into a hoop at the top, decorate with streamers and a bread rooster. Some families also do an Easter tree and decorate it with blown and dyed Easter eggs. Even a small child of age 4 or 5 may be able to take a large-eyed needle to sew some yellow felt together to make Easter chicks for the Easter Tree.
Maundy Thursday may be a day of a simple meal. In much of Europe, this is a day to eat green food such as herbs and salad.
Good Friday is ideally the day to make Hot Cross Buns and also to dye Easter eggs if you have not done that before this day. There is a lovely book regarding Easter Crafts, titled simply “The Easter Craft Book” by Thomas and Petra Berger that may give you other ideas.
Some families also plant things on Good Friday, and seeds are nice gifts in the Easter baskets.
Holy Saturday/Easter Sunday: A day of waiting, stillness, anticipation. Some families make a bread ring for Easter morning that has “pockets’ in it, and on Easter morning the children wake up to dyed eggs being in the pockets.
“All Year Round” has a simple explanation about the Easter bunny versus the Easter Hare and remarks, “May we make a plea for the reinstatement of the Easter Hare? He is fast becoming an endangered species, owing to the increasing popularity of the “Easter Bunny.” The rabbit, with its established communal life and reputation for timidity, presents a very different picture from that of the hare. The hare is a loner, creating the most transient of abodes. He is said to be a bold and courageous creature, and his upright stance is characteristic. His long ears suggest a wide and intelligent interest in the world, and in legend and folklore he is invested with the virtue of self-sacrifice.”
If you are searching for Easter stories, Suzanne Down’s “Spring Tales” has a story about the Hare, the book “Festivals, Families and Food” has two separate tales about the Easter Hare .
As far as Easter baskets go, I know many Waldorf families who put small trinkets in the basket as opposed to candy. Homemade items and toys are always especially wonderful.
Earth Day: I don’t know if this is celebrated in Waldorf schools, but it may be fun to celebrate our love for the Earth and the home we share by marking the day in some way. I have looked at a number of links on the Internet about Earth Day and small children and have not found any of them to be especially appropriate for the under-nine child from a Waldorf perspective.
Waldorf approaches the challenges we are facing in the environment from a perspective and realization that the young child is ONE with the environment; with all the trees, the animals, the birds, and the plants. As Waldorf educators, we work hard to foster reverence and wonder for the great outdoors.
So, my suggestion would be to take part in hiking that day, planting a tree, or if you have seven, eight and nine year-olds, possibly participate in helping to clean up a trail, park or river –IF you can keep the “gloom and doom” out of it and just simply say, “We are helping to keep Mother Earth neat and clean.” No guilt about what the human race is doing wrong yet!
Remember, holidays and festivals the Waldorf way are about DOING, not the words or the explanations. DOING.
Yours till next time,
Carrie
My friend Jodie is working feverishly on a Waldorf Music Curriculum for the early grades specifically tailored for the homeschooling parent with little to no music background. Please see the details on her blog here:
http://homemusicmaking.blogspot.com/2009/03/music-curriculum.html
Happy Music Making,
Carrie
Okay, I have to start this post by admitting I love science – I love biology, I love comparative anatomy, I love chemistry, ( I took college-level physics one and two but I was not a physics whiz!). I have done a whole semester of cadaver dissection for physical therapy school, and enjoyed biochemistry and two or three college-level geology courses. All of it fascinates me. My husband is a tech guy, and also fascinated with astronomy, and anything and everything to do with space.
So, as you can imagine, science was an important consideration when choosing a method of homeschool education for our children. I think Waldorf does a wonderful job in creating bright science graduates.
For those of you unfamiliar with the Waldorf approach to Science, it is very much based upon a Gothean approach. You can read further about this approach by following this link: http://www.natureinstitute.org/scied/index.htm
This talks a great deal about how science today often requires students to take theories at face value, rather than examining the theories close up and personal and in a hands-on way. In this day and age, where many educators count “science” as worksheets or reading a book about nature, Waldorf counts science education as DOING. This is an extremely important point, and an essential foundation for a future scientist.
Barbara Dewey writes this in her introduction to “Science As A Phenomena”:
Western culture has created a powerful wealth of scientific knowledge, based on total objectivity. The objectivity means that the observer must be isolated from the observation. It also means that we must ignore, as scientists, a humanly meaningful occurrence such as “a warm smile.” To measure it instrumentally would be ludicrous, because all meaning would be drained from it……
In the earlier part of this century, it was truly believed that science would be able to solve all of the world’s problems. Anyone who criticized this belief was considered a crank, and yet, as the dawn of the twenty-first century approaches, it becomes very clear that science has created as many problems as it has solved, largely because science, and the legislation based on it, have failed to take into account the human aspect of life on earth. Our materialistic philosophy causes us to believe that “having” is more important than “being.”
Science in Waldorf education is phenomenon-based; it is experiential; it is seeing things whole to part and within the original context of environment. It shows the relationship of the Earth and all of its glorious inhabitants in relation to man. True environmental education at its finest. It is also a very observant and artistic way to sort through natural phenomenon; we would expect nothing less with a Waldorf education.
Waldorf Science throughout the grades looks somewhat like this: (this was taken from the above-mentioned Barbara Dewey booklet and also Donna Simmons’ “From Nature Stories to Natural Science”):
Kindergarten, ages 3 through age 6: No memorizing of science facts! Remember, we are still protecting the child up to age seven in order that he or she uses his or her body! Nature stories, being outside every day, using natural materials, building things, observing the seasons and the physical changes that come with the seasons and the festivals are essential. Cooking is an activity that brings in much foundation for later chemistry. The Nature Table is another highlight of seasonal change. Fingerplays and gardening are also of great importance.
The important thing at this age is to NOT make these experiences a series of factoids. The facts will come later when the child can understand and make those connections.
Remember, while this approach goes against much of the way we are currently teaching young children in this country, we are NOT doing well at the middle school and high school levels compared to other nations in high school science scores. We are not doing well when we look at the number of American graduates, particularly at the PhD levels in science, compared to other nations. It is time to stop explaining the nitty gritty of photosynthesis to a small child and let them wonder and explore in a hands-on way. It sets a much better foundation for science education as they mature!
A very important part of Waldorf is training the child’s senses, and that looking at phenomenon from whole to parts; forget the microscopes, telescopes and magnifying glasses for the under seven crowd and help them develop their senses! The classic text for this is “Sharing Nature with Children” by Joseph Cornell. Check it out; it deserves a place on your bookshelf!
First Grade, for the seven-year-old: Much of before, nature stories. many times Form Drawing is drawn from stories about nature; I started my first grade year with my eldest with an entire month of Form Drawing from River life (otter, beavers, turtles). Some families choose to devote a block to the four seasons by telling stories and doing activities regarding the seasons. Some families do a block study of backyard nature. Some families also work with a weather tree with symbols for each day. Gardening and cooking are still very important.
Second Grade: Much like First Grade, although now we may see more direct stories about the animals as tied into the fables. The fables present human qualities in animal form. Some families will introduce the fables within a three-day rhythm by talking about the animals in a story form, tying in poetry about the animal or a hands-on experience about the animal the second day, and then the third day telling the fable. This was a suggestion from Marsha Johnson, and she has a wonderful free file about this in her second grade FILES section on her Yahoo!group.
Other nature resources for second grade include all the wonderful Thornton Burgess stories. There is also the book “Animal Stories” by Jakob Streit, available through the Rudolf Steiner College Bookstore that some families draw from.
Some families and teachers have also done a block on the Four Elements. There is a wonderful book entitled, “Earth, Water, Fire, and Air” by Walter Kraul that involves toy-making that would enable the child to feel and experience the Four Elements.
Donna Simmons suggests you could do a Weather Block either in the Second or Third Grade that would include poetry and simple definitions of meteorological terms. However, don’t forget that much of this would include going outside and feeling the different types of weather, observing the clouds and then drawing and painting.
Other ways children work with nature in second grade includes gardening, cooking, care of pets, outdoor play, festival celebrations, toy-making, observation of the sky and weather with the naked eye.
Third Grade: Continued Gardening, a Farming block, Cooking, a Homes/Building block, Clothing and (in the US a block) on Native Americans.
Donna Simmons writes in her book regarding the Farming block:
It is a central theme of Waldorf education that one always starts with the Human Being, and relates what one is studying to the human. With the Farming block this is obvious – What does the Farmer do? How does he affect his surroundings? Waldorf teachers carefully present a picture of the Farmer as the mediator between Heaven and Earth, as one who molds his surroundings but is also subject to them.
Many projects abound with farming – going to work at a real farm or real CSA; tracing the path of fleece to yarn, making butter, picking berries, raising small livestock. Many Waldorf students read Laura Ingalls Wilder’s “Farmer Boy” during the Third Grade year.
Fourth Grade: Man and Animal block, where the student looks at relationships of Man to the animals. Barbara Dewey mentions Steiner’s “Study of Man” and Roy Wilkinson’s “Man and Animal” as essential reading for this block.
Donna Simmons talks about also looking at amphibians, reptiles, and fish as part of the Man and Animal block with such projects as ant farms, beekeeping, collecting frog or toad spawn, setting up a fish tank or pond.
She has many more wonderful tips for this year, do check out her book!
Donna Simmons mentions another possible block for this age could be an Ocean Block, and gives suggestions for how this could span multiple ages and grades.
Fifth Grade: Botany block (there may be one botany block or two blocks). Barbara Dewey summarizes the study of botany during the fifth grade in this way: “The study of Botany at this level is really the study of four journeys: 1) the plant from seed through the seasons, 2) the vegetations of earth from the poles to the equator, 3) the vegetation of various altitudes from the tropics up to the mountain top, and 4) through the ladder of the plant kingdom, from simple to complex.”
Remember, much of this is done outside. The students draw in their Main Lesson Books from plants they are squatting down and observing in the plants’ natural environment. The plant is not ripped out and brought inside a schoolroom for the children to see how a plant grows!
Drawing and painting are essential components within the artistic observation of botany. This is also a time where exact drawing for form and accuracy is important.
Fifth Grade may also contain a Zoology block.
Sixth Grade: Physics, including the study of color and acoustics (building on those experiences from the early years that the children are so familiar with!); Earth Science including mineralogy and geology are studied, including minerals from a social and historic perspective; astronomy.
Donna Simmons also suggests several blocks that are not typically done within Waldorf schools but may work well at home, including habitats/ecology; biographies of naturalists; and inventors and inventions. Inventors and inventions could also be taught in earlier grades as well.
Seventh Grade: Physics, possibly focusing on mechanics; Health and nutrition as it relates to human physiology; chemistry of combustion with a possible second block on the chemistry of foodstuffs: fats, oils, proteins and carbohydrates. Barbara Dewey also mentions a block on the heliocentric theory of the solar system.
Eighth Grade: Physics again; Human anatomy; Meteorology; Chemistry including the study of the photosynthesis of plants and the study of sugars, including the history of sugar. Computer technology is also typically taught in this year.
Donna Simmons also suggests a block on Alternative Energy not normally taught in Waldorf schools but which may work well at home.
High School: Donna Simmons mentions possible studies for high school include not only continuation of geology, physics, botany, and astronomy, but also topics such as metallurgy, meteorology, genetics, archaeology, zoology, and embryology.
In future posts I hope to outline and share some of the approaches I took in creating science blocks for first grade and into second grade so you can see the flow and will therefore be comfortable creating your own wonderful Waldorf science blocks.
I would love to hear comments from Waldorf homeschooling mothers who have children in the higher grades! Please leave your comments in the comment section below; I value your readership and your thoughts.
Peace,
Carrie
The six-year-old year seems to be a make or break point for many parents as they sort through their homeschooling options, and it is an age where many parents give up on Waldorf, doubt they can do Waldorf in First Grade, or just decide Waldorf is not right for their six-year-old and forge ahead with academics (usually in a Classical style).
Some parents I have talked to fear their child is “getting behind” because in the United States, most six-year-olds are in the first grade. If the parent keeps the child in “Waldorf Kindergarten” another year, not only will they behind in homeschooling, but suppose they ever have to transfer to public school? Then they will be behind and everyone will know it!
If you go back and read the series of four posts on the six-year-old, I think you will clearly see by BOTH traditional developmental views and anthroposophical views, six year olds are DOERS, not deep thinkers. They may be ready for “more” but that can easily be satisfied with real projects, real work, longer stories, more physical activity. It does not mean that the early six-year-old year is a time for stringent academic work.
I remember a time in our six-year-old year where my eldest, who was just over six-and-a-half at the time, really did seem to want to do academics. It was near the end of our school year, (our last year of Waldorf Kindergarten), so we started to look at math in preparation for the fall. Her urge to do “real math” lasted about a week. I didn’t push it, and let the issue fade away. Some six-and-a-half year olds may be ready for Waldorf first grade, but mine was not. Someone asked me what I would do if she did that in the fall ; what would happen if she would quickly loose interest at that point, when it was time for real work. I guessed that she would not lose interest, that she would be seven then and would be ready. And she was.
Some parents feel their first grader will be bored in Waldorf first grade because the child can read and write already, and he or she already knows the numbers or even beginning mathematics. This has been addressed again and again in the section of “Waldorf First Grade” in the tag section. My eldest was reading at a fourth grade level when we started first grade this year. The stories of the first grade are designed to speak and live in the hearts of the first grader, the almost seven-year-old, to come out in their play. It is not all about the academics, and while the academics are important, there certainly are many ways to adjust Waldorf first grade for children who are “ahead” or “behind”. (Oh, how I hate those terms in our homeschooling vocabulary!). In our case, we did do all the things anyone else would do in first grade, we did many hands -on things for our main lessons, lived into our bodies and into art and music. My daughter read books for pleasure at her reading level, and did not feel it beneath her to not have to write volumes of words about the fairy tales. She enjoyed learning about the qualities of numbers. This is because this is where the child is developmentally. The American method of pushing early learning has not speeded up the process of learning, and has in fact put our children further and further behind at the middle school and high school levels when compared to children of other countries who start their formal learning later.
Your six-year-old child is still little, just crossing over the bridge into the land of authority mixed with imitation as they approach first grade. Waldorf first grade for the almost seven-year-old should be this, should be a three-day rhythm, a wonder of art and main lesson book drawing, of music. Is your six-year-old truly ready for that? And should your little six-year-old be doing this? It is our job to protect the six-year-old, their senses until they are ready for first grade. Waldorf is about unfolding, and protection in these early years, not pushing.
And I know this view will probably irritate my eclectic Waldorf homeschoolers, but here goes: as far as parents forging ahead during the six-year-old year with Classical studies, I do feel there is a crossroads there. Doing arts and crafts and wet –on -wet watercolor painting does not a Waldorf homeschooler make. Doing arts and crafts to “balance out academics”, as I have heard some parents say, does not a Waldorf homeschooler make.
In many ways, either one agrees with the seven-year-cycles as a viable theory of childhood development and adjusts the schooling to meet the child’s developmental needs, or one decides that the seven-year-cycles, the Waldorf way of teaching whole to parts and all the ways Waldorf introduces math, letters, and science in the first grade is a bunch of crock. Choose and decide. You are the parent, and you do the best for your own family and your own child, but sometimes you do actually have to make a choice.
I think there are ways to mix topics of interest to your child and Waldorf, but it is much harder to mix Classical and Waldorf. Donna Simmons has a post about this on her blog, perhaps it will provide food for thought for you if you are at this crossroads of deciding what is best for your child. This is a decided pro-Waldorf view of comparing Classical and Waldorf methodology:
http://christopherushomeschool.typepad.com/blog/2006/10/the_well_traine.html
Another blog post that can help one sort out how other methods can be integrated into Waldorf can be found on Donna Simmons’ blog here:
http://christopherushomeschool.typepad.com/blog/2006/01/the_waldorf_vie.html
If you need some inspiration, I humbly refer you to my blog post about why we chose Waldorf as a method to homeschool:
https://theparentingpassageway.com/2008/11/06/wonderful-waldorf/
Many parents feel Waldorf homeschooling requires so much of the teacher, and feel Classical homeschooling is much simpler, much easier to look at definable progress with their children. The goal of Waldorf education is to encompass the whole child, the whole being, to lay a solid foundation for the future health of the child in the adult years. I honestly think once one reads Steiner, sees examples of blocks and starts to think, it is not any more difficult to create teaching plans in the Waldorf style than it is to open up a bunch of workbooks for your child. It is just that this creative way of looking at bringing academics and morality to our children is often not the way we were taught, and seems so foreign to all of us.
If you make a commitment to try Waldorf First Grade, in the true Waldorf way, for six months, and then open up and look at the dryness of the workbooks and textbooks your child would be using in the First Grade with other methods, I think you will see there is no comparison. Waldorf is alive and bringing all that humanity in a developmentally appropriate way. Waldorf does cover the Greeks, the Romans, all the history that the Classical method covers but at a later time where Waldorf feels the child is developmentally ready. Waldorf is extremely academically rigorous, and the quality of work, understanding and knowledge is outstanding.
If you feel as if you are drowning in the six-year-old year, my thought is you are probably putting too much pressure on yourself and your child for this year. Enjoy the gift of the six-year-old year as you use it as the transition it is for First Grade. Make sure your child can handle the longer stories, memorizing longer verses and songs, can handle projects that span several days. Your child will need these skills in the First Grade.
If you are concerned that your workload will be too great (and do see my post about Waldorf Homeschooling planning – if you start now for only 10 or 15 minutes a day you could have your own open and go Waldorf Syllabus by fall, created by you, for your own child!), then do check into Melisa Nielsen’s open and go first grade curriculum at http://www.alittlegardenflower.com/store/ or Donna Simmons’ First Grade Syllabus at www.christopherushomeschool.org . Look at the free blocks available in the FILES section of Marsha Johnson’s Yahoo!Group. It may give you a jumping off point and give you the confidence to do Waldorf at all!
You have to consider what is best for your family, but please do not discount Waldorf education at home before you have even tried.
Think carefully, act mindfully, and best of love and luck in planning the best educational experience for your precious child.
Peacefully yours,
Carrie
Now that we have peeked at the traditional childhood development of the six-year-old and the anthroposophical view of the six-year-old, it is time to get down to the nitty gritty of peaceful living with the six-year-old.
The first we need to do is establish a framework in which to work. If you have not read these posts in the past, please do so now and then come back to this post:
https://theparentingpassageway.com/2008/10/29/top-10-must-have-tools-for-gentle-discipline/
https://theparentingpassageway.com/2008/10/16/gentle-discipline-as-authentic-leadership/
https://theparentingpassageway.com/2008/10/05/thoughts-on-challenging-developmental-stages/
There is also a post on “Anger in Parenting” if you have not read that one.
So now that you are being held within the framework of being an Authentic Leader within your own home, now you are ready to tackle some of the methods for peaceful living with your six-year-old.
Here is a great quote from the article “Meetings with Parents On the Topic of Discipline” from the book “You’re Not the Boss of Me! Understanding the Six/Seven-Year-Old Transformation” to start us off:
The young child instinctively expects guidance and when it is not forthcoming, the child tends to feel insecure and frightened. Growing up without guidance, without boundaries, often translates into being left alone to flounder in a world that the child is not experienced enough to understand. Constantly being consulted by adults about what the child wants is not only bewildering, but can create an egoist, unprepared for the world awaiting him or her. Many parents believe that choices strengthen their child, but, on the contrary, too many choices can undermine a child.
This list was not in any particular order, I hope some of the points were valuable to you and yours. If you have other techniques that have worked particularly well with your six-year-old, please do share in the comment boxes. Let’s all help each other!
Your until next time,
Carrie
As you may have guessed by reading through the previous three posts regarding the six-year-old, I am a big proponent of not starting academics during the six-year-old year while the children are in a time of developmental crisis. Within the Waldorf system, most six-year-olds should still be in their last year of Kindergarten.
However, with this age often comes problems for parents who perceive that their children are wanting “more” and needing more. Many parents equate this “wanting more” with needing more academic work.
I disagree and offer you some alternatives in this post for what to do with your child during their six-year-old year, their last year of kindergarten:
First and foremost, they need to be outside and connected to nature during all types of weather this year. They need to be outside every day possible to burn off that restless energy that often pervades the age of six. There is a rather popular post on this blog about connecting children to nature if you need ideas. (see https://theparentingpassageway.com/2008/11/24/connecting-your-children-to-nature/ for that post; it is one of the highest hit posts on here!). Some Waldorf teachers also feel that daily nature walks are important for children who are weak in their physical and etheric bodies.
Secondly, they need opportunity for real work that hopefully will involve physical energy expenditure. Do you need a pile of rocks moved? A great job for a six-year-old! Do you need the pile of firewood moved from one place to another? Think creatively about what could be done around your house, your land, your yard, that is REAL WORK. Many six-year-olds go through a crisis of play, so do think about work they could do. Woodworking, to make something real and functional, also comes to mind.
Thirdly, they need a strong rhythm, longer and more involved stories and more involved projects. Think about things that involve several days to complete – modeling something, then painting. Finger knitting and then attaching that finger knitting to something to complete a project. What could you and your six-year-old do with a very large box? Make a barn, a spaceship, a house – something that, again, involves multiple steps over multiple days.
Fourth, think about games that involve strategy. We played a lot of checkers, Battleship, card games, Junior Monopoly, Mancala and other games during my eldest’s six-year-old year.
Fifth, think about gross motor skills. At home, you can work with your child on riding a bike without training wheels if they cannot do that yet, jump roping, using stilts, using scissors to cut snowflakes and paper chains of figures to develop fine motor skills and threading needles and tying knots also comes to mind for fine motor skills.
Sixth, is there any way your six-year-old could help someone else? Some parents feel strongly their six-year-old should not be exposed, say, to residents in a nursing home or such because it is hard to explain in simple terms why we have such a thing in our society. I personally wonder what is wrong with us that we segregate our elders away from our young people, but perhaps my perspective comes from being raised by my grandparents and having my great-grandmother also live with us. Some Waldorf Kindergartners actually seek out having a relationship with a nursing facility of some sort.
Perhaps there is a way your six-year-old could serve within your own family, within your neighborhood (does your neighborhood plant bulbs or flowers or such with the changing seasons? Could you and your family help?) Could you bake cookies for elderly neighbors and deliver them? Make May Baskets on May Day for neighbors?
Seventh, work on social skills in a more direct way – it is okay now to do this! Not a guilt-trip laden, wordy way but a matter-of-fact way – “We wait to speak.” “You may have this when I am done.” Those sorts of things. For bossy, often drama-laden six, these are valuable skills indeed. You are working out of more than imitation now – the seven-year-old works out of a picture of authority and you are transitioning to that. For those of you who put the cart before the horse and have been using these direct words for a long time, please do not beat yourself up over it. Do remember, however, that the six-year-old may need direct words and authority at some times, but still need arms around them and re-direction with fantasy and movement at other times.
Eighth, work on festival experiences. Has your six-year-old ever made a sword and shield for Michaelmas? Gone on a Lantern Walk for Martinmas? Made Advent crafts in any capacity? Dipped candles for Candlemas? Made Easter or Spring crafts? May Day Baskets? There are many wonderful festival books out there with lots of ideas to try!
Try to enjoy this year. A year without being tied into main lesson time, main lesson blocks, main lesson books. A year of wonderful experiences with lots of time to enjoy each other. This last year of kindergarten is really the best!!
With love,
Carrie
We peeked at a traditional view of the six-year-old child in one of our last posts and now it is time to look at the Waldorf view of the six-year-old.
Six is obviously the end of one seven-year-cycle and at the cusp of beginning a new seven-year-cycle. It is also traditionally the time the child should be in the last year of Kindergarten within the Waldorf school system and getting ready to transfer over to the first grade by the age of six and a half or seven. I have heard lately of Waldorf schools transitioning early six-year-olds into first grade and feel this is incredibly wrong. Just wrong! From a traditional point of view it makes no sense at all; Gesell Institute is pretty firm about what a rocky age this can be, it is an age already full of tensional outlets and all kinds of misery, they are firm that it is a terrible age for teaching numbers and letters and writing, most six-year-olds can’t sit still to save their own lives – so yes, by all means, let’s throw academics into the picture! That make perfect sense from a developmental standpoint! And, from a Waldorf standpoint, it makes even LESS sense to have an early six-year-old in the first grade. I have two more posts to write in this series about the six-year-old – one about peaceful living with a six-year-old, and one is going to be about what to do that last year of Waldorf homeschooling kindergarten, so stay tuned! I feel very passionate about the little six-year-old! Okay, done with my rant now…….
Back to the anthroposophical viewpoint of the six-year-old.
In Waldorf Circles, this time is often called the “first puberty” or “first adolescence”. The book “You’re Not the Boss of Me! Understanding the Six/Seven-Year-Old Transformation”, edited by Ruth Ker, mentions some of the following characteristics:
Of course, with some of these children, these behavior do not show up until age seven (hence the title the six/SEVEN-year-old transformation) and some children may hit it early, but these are some general characteristics of this age from a Waldorf perspective.
In our next post we will look at what to do to guide these behavior and be an Authentic Leader. If you need inspiration until then, do hit the “No Spanking” tag in the tag box and that will bring up the series of posts I wrote about being an Authentic Leader.
Until next time,
Carrie
Well, now that we are more than half way through our first grade year, I thought I would re-cap a few things I have learned and discovered; maybe they will resonate with you as you either plan for first grade or finish first grade up this Spring.
1. There cannot be enough Form Drawing. I planned three form drawing blocks plus weekly form drawing most months; it is that important. I highly suggest that you start First Grade with an entire MONTH of Form Drawing. There is a post on this blog about Form Drawing; please refer to that for further details.
2. You simply must plan handwork a certain number of times a week or it will may not happen; your child may love to knit but mine did not. We worked essentially on a row a day every day in knitting and we are still behind completing the number of projects she probably would have completed by now in a Waldorf school. This fact does not really bother me, she does beautiful and careful work and I feel certain by next year she will enjoy knitting when she doesn’t have to think so hard about it, LOL.
3. Which brings me to my third point – sometimes your little one will balk and YOU have to know when to take the day off and go hiking, when to allow play with the siblings,and when to say, “No, really, this has to happen today. Back to work, please.”
4. You can imbue many opportunities for nature and ecological study throughout the curriculum. We kept a gardening day due to my kindergartner and I think next year I may expand this to twice a week in our rhythm instead of once; I also planned nature blocks in with Form Drawing and we also did Nature Blocks in January with the The Year/The Four Seasons and a Backyard Nature Block. I hope to write a post on the Waldorf way of teaching Science in the future; it is fascinating! As a science person, I totally appreciate it!
5. The story of the letters can be taught in many different ways through the use of a container story to hold the fairy tales together. This was helpful as I made up something that spoke to my daughter, a story with fairies and princesses that also involved some spiritual elements as well. Think of what truly speaks to your child and work that in.
6. Wet-on-wet watercolor painting is important, and it is great fun to alternate this with modeling. We painted twice a week and modeled two to three times a week.
7. Math is one of those subjects that people tend to put in a secondary position versus reading; but please do not be fooled. Math is of the utmost importance; Eugene Schwartz is convinced that there are periods of math windows for math literacy. I think it is important once you do your initial math block to practice every day you do school where that is not the main lesson focus (with a few breaks here and there for holiday crafting and such). Math is one of those subjects that works whole to parts, that needs to build in the child. Please keep working on it.
8. Please do not neglect the fun things- festival preparation, crafts, projects. Don’t forget that the “head” part of your main lesson can be totally hands-on. Today we did the Grimms’ fairy tale “The Pink” and drew a huge, as tall as my daughter mural of the castle/tower from the story. We also wet-on-wet watercolor painted ‘the pink” (a flower) from the story. Tomorrow we will use our third day of this story to draw giant P’s on the driveway with chalk, walk them, hop them, draw them on each other, and finally draw them in our Main Lesson Book.
9. We waited to start our “blowing instrument” as Steiner called it (we have been using a pennywhistle this year) until after the New Year. You really don’t have to do it all at once; we did however bring in a lot of singing throughout the school year. We learn at least two new songs or more a month, and often make up repetitive songs to go with the fairy tales or the season. Think how you can bring music into your homeschool! Steiner talked about how the seven-to-fourteen-year old learns best through rhythm, so thinking about how to bring this to your child is so important.
Just a couple of things from along the way; if you are finishing First Grade please your nuggets of wisdom in the Comment Box to share and help other mothers just like you!
Carrie
I recommend this book time and time again to parents, so now you will know about this secret gem as well: “You’re Not the Boss of Me! Understanding the Six/Seven Year Transformation” with Ruth Ker as the Editor.
This book was borne out of a question Ruth Ker from the Sunrise School in Duncan, British Columbia had: were Waldorf Kindergartens truly meeting the needs of the older Kindergarten students? (Recall that five and six year olds are typically still in Kindergarten, with First Grade starting closer to seven years of age in accordance with Steiner’s views on the seven year cycles of life). This book contains a series of articles written by teachers, doctors and parents of Kindergarten children.
This is the Table of Contents:
Foreword, Susan Howard
Introduction, Ruth Ker
Section One Picture of the Six/Seven Year Old Change
Observations of the Six-Year-Old Change, Ruth Ker
The Birth of the Etheric, Nancy Blanning
Dentition: A Mirror of the Child’s Development, Helge Ruof and Jorg Ruof
Seeing the Wholeness of the Child, Nancy Blanning
Is Our Educational System Contributing to Attentional and Learning Difficulties in Our Children?, Susan R. Johnson
Section Two: Meeting the Challenge – The Role of the Teacher
Old Man Trouble, Tim Bennett
Our Role in Meeting the Children, Barbara Kloeck
Soul Milk, Ruth Ker
Essential Oil Baths, Louise deForest
Extract from Work and Play in Childhood, Freya Jaffke
Section Three: Building the Social Fabric of a Mixed-Age Kindergarten
You Can’t Play With Me, Barbara Kloeck
The Six-Year-Old in a Mixed-Age Kindergarten, Laurie Clark
The Raft, Louise deForest
The Little Ones in the Classroom, Barbara Kloeck
Girls and Boys- Feminine and Masculine, Louise deForest
Beer and Lollipops, Melissa Borden
Section Four: Meeting the Child’s Needs- Suggestions for Working in the Classroom
A Working Kindergarten, Louise deForest
Creating A Flow In Time, Barbara Klocek
Sailing Our Ship in Fair or Stormy Weather, Tim Bennett
The Daily Blessing of the Older Child in the Kindergarten, Ruth Ket
Movement Journeys: Enticing the Older Child to Intentional Movement, Nancy Blanning
The Role of Handwork, Barbara Klocek
Little Red-Cap: The Overcoming of Heredity and the Birth of the Individual, Louise deForest
Section Five: Activities and Resources for the Classroom
Mother Goose Movement Journey, Nancy Blanning
Through the Snow: A Winter Movement Journey, Nancy Blannning
Briar Rose Circle, Janet Kellman, after the Brothers Grimm
The Gnomes, Janet Kellman
Star Money, Elisabeth Moore-Haas, adapted by Ruth Ker
The Magic Lake at the End of the World, adapted by Barbara Klocek
The Pumpkin Child, submitted by Ruth Ker
The Legend of the Babouschka, adapted by Ruth Ker
Activity Ideas for Older Children in the Kindergarten, compiled by Nancy Blanning and Ruth Ker
Transitional Games, Verses, and Songs, compiled by Barbara Klocek and Ruth Ker
Jump Rope Rhymes, compiled by Barbara Klocek and Ruth Ker
Section Six: Parents As Partners
Waldorf Education for the Child and the Parent, Devon Brownsey
Working with Parents:Ideas for Parent Meetings, Ruth Ker and Nancy Blanning
A Bouquet of Wishes for the Rosemary Kindergarten, Tim Bennett
Meetings with Parents on the Topic of Discipline, Louise deForest
Working with the Will of the Young Child, Nancy Blanning
How to Get the Young Child to Do What You Want Without Talking Yourself to Death, Nancy Blanning
Handouts for Parents, Susan R. Johnson, MD including:
The Importance of Warmth
The Importance of Breakfast
The Importance of Sleep
The Meaning of Illness
Fever
The Earache
Parenting a Young Child-What My Formal Education Never Taught Me
Confronting Our Shadow
Product vs. Process
Notes on the Contributors
References
This is a great book and all the articles should be required reading for the parent of the five-to-seven-year old. This book definitely belongs on your bookshelf as a wonderful reference to be turned to again and again.
Happy Reading,
Carrie
The Parenting Passageway 