Rose and Thorns

As I work on re-formatting the Celebrate the Rhythm of Life Living Curriculum Program, I'll be sharing with you some of the material from the program. That way, when you hear about the new format and special offer, I am hoping you'll say, "Yes please!" and join the Celebrate the Rhythm of Life community. 

My children were young when their dad and I separated sixteen years ago. One was seven years old and the other was a newborn. It's hard to go through separation and divorce with young children. With divorce come new relationships, some are long lasting and some are not. The sense of who is family and who is not can be fleeting.  For several years after the divorce, my children were fortunate to have a "bonus mom" who served as a consistent, warm and loving person to guide them and care for them when they spent time with their dad. Among the many ways she warmed their hearts and inspired them was one that migrated over to my house and has stayed with us, to be shared with guests at our table. That is the gift of rose and thorns.

Rose and Thorns: We can't have one without the other.

At dinner, after the food is served, the candle is lit and the blessing has been said, we settle in a bit, taste the food, and then I announce that it is time for Rose and Thorns. If we have guests at our table I explain to them what it is, that we take turns sharing a little something from our day that was beautiful, sweet or beloved like a rose, and we also share something that was prickly, hard or challenging. Each person shares both a rose and thorn.

If there is a singular event that we're all wanting to claim as our Rose, we might place that aside, and dig a little deeper into the less obvious. Same with the Thorn.

Some days a person may not have a Thorn to share, that's just fine. Sometimes a person doesn't want to share, there's no pressure to join in.

What I do notice as my children have grown older is that Rose and Thorns can spark conversation into topics that might not have come up. They help us see each other a little better, and they help us to feel compassionate towards each other, as we are reminded with the Thorns that each of us has challenging moments in our days.

We began sharing our Rose and Thorns when my oldest was seven, school age, and that felt right age wise developmentally.

We recently had a friend over for dinner, who upon coming over the next time for dinner asked if we were going to play that game again, about the Rose and Thorns. And so we did.

My warmest thanks to the "bonus mom," for opening her heart and home to us, and for all the sweet rose goodness she has shared, as well as for providing a model of grace in meeting the prickly bits of life. The dinnertime Rose and Thorn tradition has nourished us and gone on to inspire many others.

Colors and Days of the Week with Waldorf Education

Then

The world of Waldorf education first came online in the late 1990's with a chat group that included parents, teachers and administrators of Waldorf schools. A few of us had an inclination towards homeschooling, which was controversial within the world of Waldorf schools at the time, and out of that group was born another group dedicated to Waldorf homeschooling which gave birth to more groups.

Now
Today, in 2017, we have many websites as well as social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and even online programs and courses devoted to Waldorf homeschooling and homemaking, including my own program and eCourses. The point being that the world of Waldorf education has opened its doors to the world.

With this expansion of Waldorf into the world, some notions about Waldorf education seem to have taken on a life of their own, outside of the pedagogical grounding Waldorf education ideally experiences in a school environment. I've noticed some online versions of things attributed to Waldorf education that I'd like to explore with you, within the context of myth busting.

Myth Busting
Steve Sagarin and Sarah Baldwin have delved into some of these myths with an exploration of the pedagogy associated with the use of gnomes to introduce the four processes in first grade and the notion that the teaching of literacy is delayed in Waldorf schools.

(The nourishment of a deep love of literacy and language begins at birth in the Waldorf realm. This is a topic I feel passionate about yet will save for another post.)

What I'd like to talk about is the use of colors and the names of the days of the week with children in the realm of Waldorf homemaking and homeschooling. It seems that once the cat came out of the bag, with the sharing of the meditative practice for the adult to reflect on the qualities of the days of the week, a whole new world unfolded online to share this with children by naming the days of the week by a color in order to create a rhythm of the week.

This practice of reflecting on the qualities of the days of the week with a particular meditation, is for adults. It is something a teacher might do.

I'm not sure how it hit the online world of Waldorf homemaking and homeschooling, but it did.

Why We Do What We Do
I've had some wonderfully wise and helpful Waldorf mentors in my life. One in particular inspires me to constantly ask myself why I we do what I do, to inform the action with an understanding of what it means for the child.

We can ask ourselves why would we tell children about a color of the day? Why would we make a chart with the colors, how would it serve the child? What is the child's experience of this?

Out of this emerges for me, a deeper question, how can we help bring children into healthy rhythm, into a healthy rhythm of life?

What's Happening Developmentally?
The young child, from birth to age 7 or so, even age 9 for some aspects, lives in the realm of the will, that is in the realm of activity.

In this stage of development, children are developing the WILL forces, the forces for doing, for being active. They are in the realm of DOING and can relate to what they will DO week after week by their physical experience of it, by DOING it, not by talking about it. 

What does this mean for sharing about colors of the day and creating charts for the activities of the week? 

Talking to children about colors of the day and showing them charts are all abstractions to a young child. To talk to them this way brings the child into the intellectual realm, while taking them out of the dreamy, wonder and awe filled realm of childhood. 

To keep track of time in such an abstract way belongs to the realm of the adult. Slowly the grade school child is brought into the realm of a schedule, initially through a strong weekly rhythm based on doing, on activities, with the same activities repeated on the same day of the week, consistently, week after week.

Name the Doing

In a Waldorf early childhood program, the days of the week are named for the ACTIVITY that is done on that day, such as "painting day," bread making day," "soup making day." These activities are done consistently week after week, as part of the weekly rhythm for children.

At home, a few examples of weekly rhythm we might have and use as names for the week:

Soup Day (we make soup)
Bread Day (we make bread)
Painting Day (we paint)
Crayoning Day (we color with crayons)
Woods Walk Day (we walk in the woods)
Playgroup Day (we meet with our playgroup and play)

So please, let's ditch the conversation about colors and keep the charts for ourselves. For the child under nine, just do it -  do the activity for the day consistently that is! 

Children thrive on having a predictable and consistent life, with days such as soup making day, a baking day, a painting day. These activities deeply nourish the four foundational senses of childhood while the strong weekly rhythm provides deep nourishment to the child, and to the whole family.

Basic Elements of Daily Living with Children ~ Circle Time

"When we choose one story and carry it in a rich nourishing way through speech, movement, gesture, song and drama over three weeks, we are bringing rich imaginations to the child that the child can drink in deeply and digest over time."

 The topic of Circle  comes up regularly among homeschoolers and is one that is also being taken up by early childhood teachers and care givers who are working with younger and younger children each year. It is a really good and really important question.

I will try to address this topic from my experience as a homeschooling parent, kindergarten teacher, Parent Child group leader and Morning Garden Mistress:

The very young child, 3 and under, does not need circle but can benefit from rhythmic elements of the circle brought one on one in play through the day.

The four year old needs a bit more and is in a transition and so much depends on the environment: if other children are present, and the child, who is this child?

Do we need to do circle at home?  It sure does seem odd to stand up and lead a child, one child around the room in song and gesture. What does it bring to the child? Are there benefits? Is it part of the pedagogy?

First let's look at the difference between circle for the grade school child and circle for the kindergarten and nursery child:

Circle time in the grades is a part of Main Lesson,  an opportunity to come face to face with each other, check in, experience the self within the group and do all sorts of rhythmic movement and games and verse and song. This is the age (6 +,7, 8 and 9 year olds) and time (older kinders,1st , 2nd, 3rd grade) that is really suited to playing the archetypal rhythmic circle games of childhood and ideal for math movements and math learning in a group. We can bring elements of that circle one on one at home. Unfortunately, some of the finer elements we cannot bring without a group at home for the grades.

Circle time for early childhood, for the child under seven for the Nursery and the Kindergarten is a completely different animal altogether. Well, two different animals: one for the Nursery Child (2, 3, 4 year old) and one for the Kinder Child (4, 5, 6 year old)

Children in the stage of early childhood from birth to seven (also referred to as the first stage of child development given to us by Rudolf Steiner) benefit greatly from the activities that take place within a circle. The circle invites children into the social realm. Children under three are not quite ready to enter that realm for they are still very much at one with the world, enveloped in the "mother bubble."

Yes they can take place outside of the "circle" too. The "circle" brings form and focus to the artistic activities that are so nourishing for the young child and rhythm as well for the child of three and older.

If we consider circle in the context of the pillars of Waldorf education, something Carrie Dendtler and I have recently blogged about, over "Virtual Tea, "

https://celebratetherhythmoflife.blogspot.com/2011/12/as-person-who-has-straddled-worlds-of.html

We see many artistic elements of Waldorf education come into "play" with circle time:

• Speech
• Singing and music
• Drama
• Movement

These elements are can be connected to the Four Foundational Senses or four physical senses, the senses that involve being in a physical body: touch, life, self movement and balance through circle movement and play that Connie Helms has been writing on in her series over on The Wonder of Childhood. (They can be satisfied outside of circle as well) Remember that the young child is all about movement, doing and action, being engaged with the body, all physical.

The feeling of wholeness of the one: the circle, no beginning, no end, is mood we want to uphold for the child under seven and to a slighter degree until age nine and the fall. Circle brings that imagination, that picture.

Circle time offers benefits to the child in the areas of:

•  singing 
• drama 
• movement 
• speech

Let's consider the adult and the relationship to circle time. Circle offers the adult a moment to stand tall and clearly be the leader, the basis for being The Loving Authority. It also offers us, the parent, a chance to push ourselves a bit and begin learning verses and songs by heart, we can take up musical instruments for us the adults to use in circle, for this is what we will ask of our children in the grades and guess what? they need us as the model. It is so important for our children to see our striving. The young child is, as Rudolf Steiner wrote, all about learning through "Example and Imitation."

My humble opinion, is that it all depends on the adult's willingness and desire to take up circle for the child, as a flowing story with movement and song as an artistic endeavor.

In a training with Joan Almon many years ago, she taught us, the teachers and care givers, to make a circle that tells a story. She spoke of the smorgasbord too but emphasized the value of the story in the circle. She had particular advice for the smorgasbord too.

Story is one way to bring circle that can work at home. You might make it a movement journey, telling bits of the story in song and verse as you go and building as each day goes over three weeks.

Themes and particularly weekly themes break the world into bits for the young child, they fragment reality. A theme has no life, no breathe, no rhythm. The young child needs to be held and cared for with rhythm that flows through the year. No themes, no bits, the season, flowing one into the next through the years of early childhood. It is not until third grade that we begin to look at the parts to the whole.

The picture we need to carry for the child in the early years of childhood, up to age nine and the "fall"  is one of wholeness, of oneness. Weekly themes make for busy work rather than living into the rhythms of nature. This is really important to understand. We live in a busy world that is so fragmented with this and that and focus here and there, quick, quick, quick, easy come and easy go,  it is so important, so healthy, even therapeutic to stay with the flow, the rhythm that is inherent with nature through the year and reflect that back to the child over the course of the whole season.

The gesture we want to carry is one of the whole world, of oneness of the child at one with the world, connected to natures rhythms everyday through the season. This is why early childhood educators make a seasonal focus with story, song , circle and activities specific to the season.

The material can be brought over many weeks with a gradual building on the basic elements. Think of it as a flow, a rhythmic flow through the year reflecting Mother Nature's inherent rhythms. When it snows, we go out and play in the snow and then we make hot cocoa or tea to warm ourselves when we come in. The material reflects what is happening in the household and in nature, it reflects the child's world.

Young children do not need crafts in Waldorf early childhood. Crafts are for the adult. The teacher makes the puppet figures and the silks and the blocks. The children play with self initiated free play and movement. The Handcraft work for the young child (seven and under) is the daily living, being involved in the housework, the cooking, the baking, the washing of dishes, sweeping the floor along with the artistic activities of coloring and painting (for the over 3's). When we are doing that, who has time for crafts?

The crafts come in with the Handwork in first grade. The older kindergarten child may begin with some handwork to make useful objects. Let the decorative objects come from nature as much as possible.

When we choose one story and carry it in a rich nourishing way through speech, movement, gesture, song and drama over three weeks, we are bringing rich imaginations to the child that the child can drink in deeply and digest over time. Remember the child is like one whole sensory organ, a sieve, talking it all in, in imitation. (See Anthroposophy in Light of the Child for more)

 Painting can reflect the mood of the season and yes do use just one color. No need for story with the child under seven. Stories with painting, stories that describe the mood of the color, that elicit feeling in the child are for the middle stage of childhood (7-14) See my last post on painting to links where you can see it in action and learn more.

Changing it up each week does not give the child time for digestion nor does it allow us to deeply penetrate the mood of the season or the story.

It can be so simple. One story for three weeks. (and yes read or tell other stories at bedtime or nap time) but give yourself and your child the gift of one story (maybe a fairy tale for the 5,6,7,8, year old)  to carry through three weeks. The circle and the story can build together over the weeks with gestures, song and movement then either start anew with a circle and story or let elements drop off and introduce new ones. This is a great gift for the child.

Rudolf Steiner spoke of working in six week blocks. Today it seems that grade school teachers work in three and four week blocks. Kindergarten teachers work with the rhythm inherent in the season with a circle for early season, mid season, late season.

For me the whole circle experience really asks a bit of the adult to present it as storytelling, singer, poet and it takes quite a bit of understanding and experience to really get. Foundation Studies help grasp a picture of the developing human being.

My suggestion is for those who have never experienced a really well put together circle in a Waldorf environment is to take it up quite seriously as a study in speech, song, music, drama and movement. Consider it part of the adult training and the inner work of being the parent/teacher.

Look into the development of the young child, what serves the child?

 Ask the questions:

• What movement is healthy for young children? Why? How do they serve the child?
• What speech do we bring? Why? 
• What songs?
• How do I bring this dramatically yet without rousing feelings and awakening the feeling realm of the middle years of childhood?
• Did I play circle games as a child?
• What experience do I have of circle?
• Where can I start building a wee little circle time for my child?

How is it with you to do circle? Are you doing it at home? What works? At school? With wee littles? Feel free to link your posts on circle below in the comment section.

::

If you'd like to gain confidence with circle time and movement games, have a deeper understanding of circle time, explore the myriad of developmental benefits for children and the opportunity for artistic expression through circle work for the adult,  join Celebrate the Rhythm of Life through the Year in Caring for Children, my program that supports homemakers and homeschooler on this path, and take up an exploration of this topic with specific examples and interaction.

Click here for more information on Celebrate the Rhythm of Life through the Year in Caring for Children

Celebrate the Rhythm of Life 

Harmonious Rhythms ::  Parenting with Soul :: Waldorf Homeschooling

~living curriculum program to support parenting and homeschooling

Basic Elements of Daily Living with Children ~ the Morning

We all get up in the morning. How to you awaken in the morning? Begin with some reflection about your day, how does it begin?

• Is it peaceful and slow without an alarm clock? This is the moment, between sleep and awakening when the spiritual world brings us the answers to questions we bring at bedtime. To hear the response, we must be quiet and still to listen. Do you have time to really listen?

• Do you jolt out of bed? 

• Do you need an alarm clock to wake up? 

• Is your child your alarm clock? 

• How do you like the way you wake up? 

• How does it color you day?

Let these questions live within you this week, notice how you rise. Don't try to make answers or big changes, just notice, be gentle with yourself. It is an enormous task to care for children and a doubly enormous one to be solely responsible for the homemaking too.

Some of us work and help support our families materially too. (Whew! ~ hug yourself now and send hugs to all  moms striving and working so hard, everywhere on the planet. It is a huge big deal. We know we hold up half the sky.)

The question of daily living with children comes up frequently over on my discussion group.

The question of how to talk to young children comes up too.

This is one I wrestled with for many years when I went from working with children over three to working with children under three in the nursery program. Many conversations and questions on this topic still resonate with me from conversations at Sophia's Hearth wondering... what stories to tell? do we use puppets? when to use marionettes? sing? when to talk? when to sing? when to start painting? what about coloring? What about nursery rhymes and finger puppets? what about work? chores?

So many questions of how to go through the day with children.

So I've decided to do a little series here on some of the basic elements of daily living with children or the Basic Elements of Daily Living with Children. So often I respond in discussion groups and those posts get lost or buried in the archives. This way they can be found or returned to as a reference point if they help you.

My kindergarten curriculum program with monthly guides and eCourses called Celebrate the Rhythm of Life in Caring for Children though the Year penetrates these questions much more deeply and focuses on the practical aspects of being with children as well as the deeper pedagogy grounded in development of the child supporting it. I offer guides, videos, stories, recipes and materials for specific support in implementing nourishing rhythms and activities through the day, the week, the week, the month, the season and the year in living with children, in finding joy and wonder in celebrating in the rhythm of life.

In this series on the blog, I will explore some of the basics. My experience comes from spending sixteen years in early childhood with my own children as well as twenty three years of working with families and children of other parents, in the Morning Garden, Kindergarten, After Care and Parent Child groups. I've worked at Waldorf schools with other teachers in a faculty environment and in my own home based  nursery program. I've started a playgroup and taught childbirth education classes, a full spectrum of early childhood work that fuels my passion for this endeavor.

Over the years, in working with the children and carrying these questions, I began to find the answers. The children showed the way along with ongoing exploration of the pedagogy for greater understanding of the development of the human being. That part is ongoing.

The subject of rhythm of bringing rhythm to our lives with young children, is one all parents and early childhood teachers and care givers wrestle with, in finding one that will carry everyone through the day with a gentle flow, and tweaking it as it needs tweaking, ever so slightly to serve all through the year.

Rhythm is life. We breathe rhythmically, our heart beats rhythmically; we are rhythmic creatures. Until very recently in the history of humankind, we lived with nature’s rhythms, to rise with the sun, work in its warmth and light and turn in with its setting each day.

Through the year our ancestors followed the earth’s rhythms with sowing, planting, harvesting and preserving, all done to the beat of the earth’s rhythms.

Today we have light switches, heaters and grocery stores that make light, warmth and food possible anytime of the day or the year. We lost our dependence on that connection with the earth for survival. Now we must consciously become aware of the rhythm inherent in the natural world and implement it into our lives with full awareness of the need for that connection.

So how do we bring rhythm to our daily lives and particularly to the children? We do it artistically with verse and song to signal transition and to accompany our movement, to carry us along with our work such as chopping or kneading or washing or sweeping as well as playing and tidying up.

Remember those Pillars of Waldorf Education?

Our daily rhythm includes playing: inside and out of doors, preparing food, tidying, washing, eating, and listening to stories. Carrying these activities of our day in a rhythmic context helps bring a sense of containment to children, a feeling of security that helps them feel free to participate in the activities of daily living.

Weekly rhythm brings predictability to the child’s life; the child anticipates “ soup day”, “coloring day,” “bread day” and painting day.” Each week these activities remain on the same day of the week. With the seasons, we implement elements to reflect the rhythm inherent in the natural world, such as colors in painting and drawing and ingredients in the food we prepare, slight changes within the natural rhythms.

We have carried these activities into our grade school homeschooling with the new lesson on Monday, a writing exercise from it on Tuesday, a drawing on Wednesday, deepening on Thursday and painting on Friday. We also begin that three day within five day rhythm with a second part to the lesson on Wednesday, writing (and deepening from Monday) on Thursday) and painting on Friday.

Our mornings tend to go from 9:00 until noon with lunch around 12:30 and a rest to follow with handwork, French, movement games in the afternoon.

My teacher, Joan Almon, recommended a four hour morning for the under sevens to allow plenty of time for the children to engage deeply in free play and to allow plenty of breathing time, a flow through the activities of the morning, transitions and all.

With the under sevens, here is a sample of the morning in the Winter:

 It's hard to sketch out one fixed time rhythm to our toddler days, this is the sequence and the times are approximate not exact on the dot. This is our weekday rhythm. On weekends, we tend to go out of whack - rhythm wise.

5:00 ~ 6:00 Rise (me) quiet mom time, read/study, visualize day, toss one load of laundry into machine

7:00 ~ 8:00 Children wake up, morning routine, breakfast

Home "blessing" (inspired by FlyLady) cleaning, housework

Take laundry outside to hang on line

Outside play ~ I'll fill the bird feeders, shovel rake, work in the garden while the children play, they are free to join me and help if they wish

10:10 ~ 10: 15 Wash hands (leave time to play in water)

10:15 ~ 10:30 Morning Tea

Transition into playroom with nursery rhymes, fingerplay, songs

Tell a story ~ it's the same simple story everyday for 3-4 weeks for 3 year olds

10:30 ~ 12:30 Daily activity and indoor playtime, laundry to fold is waiting in baskets, I may iron, knit, mend things, clean the fridge, bay bills

12:30 ~ 1:00 Lunch and lavender foot bath

1:00 ~ 3: 00 Story and quiet, rest time

3:00 ~ 3:15 Use toilet, change diaper, wash face and hands, brush hair, experience a slow gentle wake up

3: 15 ~ 3:30 Afternoon tea

3:30 ~ 4:30 Free play out of doors

4:30 Prepare dinner and set the table ~ children are helping me or next to me at the table coloring or using homemade playdough

5:30 ~ 6:00 Eat dinner and clean up, pick up stray toys and put them away

Say goodnight to house

Layout clothes for next day

Bath

Bedtime routine ~ story, prayer, lullaby, lights out by seven o'clock for under sevens, transitioning to by eight for eight year olds

Our Daily Activity is whatever we do each week on that day, our weekly rhythm: soup broth making, soup making, coloring, painting, bread making, decorating the house, nature crafts.

Next time, I'll share how that became the foundation for our grade school homeschooling days.

My friend Carrie, over on The Parenting Passageway, is blogging about Rhythm in her series on Eight Facets of Healthy Family Culture.

Celebrate the Rhythm of Life 

Harmonious Rhythms ::  Parenting with Soul :: Waldorf Homeschooling

~living curriculum program to support parenting and homeschooling

Rhythm ~ Waldorf Style

I wrote this article for my monthly subscription program Celebrate the Rhythm of Life ~ a living curriculum, when I did a test run. Because it has been viewed more than any other page on that site, and because rhythm is such a important and fundamental element of early childhood, I am sharing it with you here.

Rhythm is life! Rhythm is strength! Rhythm can carry you.

We often hear these words but what matters most.... is our relationship to rhythm. 

If we tend toward the precise and exact and well... maybe even rigid,  we might need to loosen up and have more fun, be more fluid, go with the flow, laugh more and get the children to laugh too.

If we tend toward the loose with little structure to our day or week, we might find that the day has slipped by and we have not had lunch or fed the dog or thought about dinner and we're out of milk and no time for breathing into the fun. We might need to tighten up our self discipline, set tiny goals for the day and meet them.

Balance

Rhythm is really about balance, finding our own, finding our way to breathe through the day, to be calm and present and bring attentive awareness to our lives with children. Rhythm is flow, a feeling that we are moving in and out energetically with the needs of the day. Rhythm is finding rest and a time for pulling back in after having been out in stimulating activity.

Baby Steps
We begin to find our rhythm by taking baby steps, one at a time. What is the structure of our life right now? Do we go to bed around the same time? Do our children? Do we rise around the same time every day? Do we have regular meal times? Do we set a pretty table?

It's helpful to let go of trying to make many changes at once, we might try for one small change, maybe rising first or dinner by five or bedtime by seven.

In the Moment
When we are running from behind, always trying to catch up, we find ourselves breathless and not in the moment. When we are too focused on the schedule and on what is coming next, we are unable to relax and be in the moment.

Flow
Finding a rhythm that flows is key to life with children, for children thrive on a rhythmic and predictable life and a strong rhythm can carry us all through the years with breathing time and time for grace.

For those of us who work with young children in Waldorf nursery and kindergartens, and at home as our child's first Waldorf teacher, we have a rhythm of the day, a rhythm of the week, and, a rhythm of the year.

The Daily Rhythm
is the flow of the daily activities, a balance between quiet inner focused ones and more rambunctious outer focused ones, an in breathing and an out breathing, all anchored in four basic activities for health and well being. 

Every day, every child needs these elements to develop and thrive as a human being, along with a strong relationship with a warm, loving adult and protection from too much stimulation and the adult world. 

By warm loving, I do not mean sentimental and gushing, I mean present, one who sees, hears and feels the child and responds accordingly with warmth and support. 

Once we master the flow of these, we have a solid foundation for our children's early years. They are:

1. Eating

2. Sleeping  

3. Free play

4. Fresh air

Sample daily rhythm --> Rise ~ Mama time ~ Breakfast ~ Chores + Outside Play ~ Morning Tea ~ Guided Activity ~ Lunch ~ Nap/Rest ~ Afternoon Tea/Snack ~ Outside Play ~ Dinner Prep/Play at Kitchen Table ~ Dinner -~ Bath ~ Bed

Consider additional activities, such as circle, storytelling, cooking, baking, painting, craft making to be transitions between theses anchors with the basic four taking precedence over all other activity. Cooking and baking help satisfy the eating need, so you might start with those activities. 

Circle, painting and craft making can wait until children are five years old, it is in the kindergarten traditionally that children first had some of these experiences. 

We need to ask ourselves if we want these activities for ourselves or for our children. If the answer is for ourselves, then consider how and where they might fit and respect the child's need for time and space and play.

If your child is four or older and you have time and space in your life for crafts, circle and painting by all means do them, just not to the detriment of eating, sleeping, playing and being outdoors and most importantly, not if it gets in the way of your sanity.

If you are a child care provider and have parents clamoring for activities and projects to take home, think about what the child needs to grow into a healthy human being and find ways to convey what is needed for healthy development to the parents with articles, parent nights and laying it all out in your literature and your interview. 

Free child initiated play is fundamental for healthy growth. Eugene Schwartz has a great article on play, From Playing to Thinking, in the kindergarten as the basis for scientific learning later on. It is the child's ability to take time to do small tasks in the early years, like putting on their boots, tying their shoes, wrapping a gift, collecting an egg from the henhouse, so carefully reaching in, that lay the foundation for math later on.

The rhythm of the week is the pattern or flow of activities set for the days of the week.

The nursery rhyme reminds us of how our mothers and grandmothers lived with a task for each day of the week.

Wash on Monday

Iron on Tuesday

Mend on Wednesday

Churn on Thursday

Clean on Friday

Bake on Saturday

Rest on Sunday

Homemakers have had a homemaking task for each day of the week out of pure practicality, the oven was stoked with wood to run all day on Saturday to bake the beans and the bread. The clothing that was washed on Monday, got ironed on Tuesday and mended on Wednesday. Butter was churned on Thursday, ready for Saturday's baking. The wheel went round and round, week to week and the chores got done. Everyone knew what to expect. Life had form.

Now, with all our conveniences at the flick of a switch, we are forced to carve out our own rhythm in the home.

On mending day we can add a day for mending of toys. We can darn socks, mend holes in the toes, replace a button. A toy with a broken part can receive attention on mending day. This is one way to care for things that get broken.

In the Waldorf nursery and kindergarten, a weekly rhythm often involves a grain for each day's menu based on Rudolf Steiner's work on nutrition and an activity for the child for each day.

The example below is a rhythm that has worked for me, with my own children and with the nursery program group of mixed age children. I have shifted it over the years to accommodate morning naps, mid day naps and noontime pick up. I find it flows best when it is consistent with the fewest transitions and just enough time with each activity to be satisfying - yet not get in the way of play, which is the real work of childhood.

What really fosters play in young children is an adult nearby engaged in productive work with tangible results, results you can see, sweeping, shoveling, folding, ironing. The computer and telephone do not do it for children. A weekly rhythm of home making tasks can help make a time for everything that needs doing.

They need to see us engaged in work and when they see us grapple with something, with mending or sewing or repairing a door frame, it brings a gift to them, that humans sometimes have to grapple in life for that is what growing can be grappling for children. They need to see us do it and persevere and succeed in our endeavors, even when they are hard. This helps grow children who will strive and get through the hard parts of life.

The Weekly Rhythm
 in the kindergarten or the home is a set pattern of activities, one for each day of the week. The more they can be integrated into the home life the better.

An example of activities of a weekly rhythm:
Monday ~ Visit farm or go for a nature walk, make soup stock

Tuesday ~ Make Soup

Wednesday ~ Coloring/Seasonal nature craft day

Thursday~ Baking day

Friday ~ Painting day

The Key
 to the Rhythm of the Day is to wake up before the children and

1. Get Dressed
2. Start the laundry
3. Think about dinner/organize it
4. Have mother time before the children rise ~ whatever it is that helps you put the spin you need on the day. It might be a quiet cup of coffee or tea, to read a verse, or say it aloud. Maybe it's meditation, yoga, reading, a walk, whatever it is that helps you orient yourself for the day. 

Something to think About
What is your relationship to rhythm? Does it come naturally? Do you have to work at it? What helps it? What gets in the way? Did you have a rhythmic childhood?

What does your rhythm look like? Where are your challenges? How do you move through the transitions? How does it differ in Autumn?

I love to see your comments and feel free to link to your rhythm below in the comment box.

xoxo
Lisa

Coming in January 2025

Rhythm in the Home

eCourse

::

Celebrate the Rhythm of Life 

Harmonious Rhythms ::  Parenting with Soul :: Waldorf Homeschooling

~living curriculum program to support parenting and homeschooling

Daily Life is the Curriculum

Summer has drawn back its heat and light, the days are beginning to feel crisp and cool. We're feeling drawn back to some kind of order and fresh start in everyday life. It seems like a good time to talk about homeschooling also known as the education of our children at home. 

Since how to get started and what sort of curriculum to use is often a first question, I thought I’d address the curriculum for the young child in the world of  Waldorf education. By young child I mean children who are toddling up to until around age nine. These are the years when they are curious, open and enthusiastic to join us in these tasks, which in turn provide a strong foundation for life. 

It is already well known to us as daily life: eating, sleeping, play and household work to keep everything flowing. And with the daily work, it is our task to help our child learn how to be fully human.

This includes healthy rhythms of eating, sleeping, movement and play as well as the activities of daily life, art, time with others and most fundamental of all nurturing activities that build connection between the child and the parent. 

Daily Homemaking Activities: like cooking and baking and housework, setting the table, clearing the table, sweeping after the meal.

Playful, Artistic Activities: like singing, ring games, coloring and painting, beeswax modeling, simple storytelling, puppetry.

Being with Others: like meal times and playing with other children (for 3′s and older), being with mom at the grocery or post office and reaching out to others in our building, neighborhood, or community.

Nurturing Activities and this means physically nourishing like touch, whole food and good sleep as well as warm baths, and attentive hand washing, and drying, and dressing, and hair combing, and protection from too much stimulation of the media, adult world, colors and stuff. Soulful activities stories rich in imagination, time and space for free play are deeply nourishing on a soul level. We the adults need to nourish ourselves too for we are the source of the strength to keep the household momentum going. (You know the saying, "If Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy... well it is so, no?)

Stories are an artistic activity that are very important for children because they help create pictures of life and of what it means to be human. Stories connect us with humanity and bring powerful archetypal images that have lived within human consciousness for thousands of years. Adults love stories too.

Children will play out what they see and hear in their environment and stories are a way to provide pictorial images that the child will play out. This is why Waldorf teachers are always encouraging parents to protect children from the stimulation of the media, to protect the inner world of childhood, so rich with imagination, imagination for the moment and the future.

What is important with daily life as the curriculum is that it be filled with meaningful and purposeful work that is tangibly productive for a child. Computers and books and typing are not, they are too abstract for the young child to grasp but chopping and kneading and washing are, they produce something the child can grasp, literally and physically. So that is why it is the picture of little house on the prairie with making bread and soup and tending the garden and the animals that is found in the Waldorf kindergarten, a space tended with care and love for all the beings who pass by.

Children need real tools to work with as well, an apron, a sturdy rake, a strong snow shovel and a small version but strong adult garden shovel.

This is where the craft making and handwork in Waldorf come from, in having a relationship to the articles we need for daily living, wash clothes, pot holders, caps, mittens scarves and anything made by mom is so dear to the child, even if they do not outwardly express it, it is.

The what of the curriculum is life, eating, sleeping, caring for the child, caring for the family caring for the home and caring for others in the community. The how to get there in tiny steps is a topic for next time.

Celebrate the Rhythm of Life 

Waldorf in the Home
Guides, eCourses, Mentoring
Mothering, Homemaking, Home education

Storytelling with Children ~ The Speech We Bring

How we tell or read a story can make a very big difference in the way the child experiences the story.

The vowels carry feeling. Vowels are called the singing letters. The Ah brings wonder and awe, the E carries fear eech!, the I with understanding one's place in the world, with self assertion, here I stand! Oh brings surprise, the o of protection as in love and the long U, brings concern and withdrawal.

When we tell a story or read to a child and bring it in an even, calm voice with stress on the consonants, rather than on the vowels, the child is free to bring his or her own feelings to the story. Try chosing one or two consonants and focus on them when they fall at the end of a word when telling or reading a story.

We can enunciate clearly the sound of the consonants which name and give form, the hiss of the s, the roll of the r, the closure of the bilabials sounds, b, p, the t, the rounding off of the m and the flow of the ll.

Try saying the phrase below with emphasis on the vowels:

The wicked wolf ate the small child.

This time say it with emphasis on the d, f, t, ll and d, at the end of the words.

The wicked wolf ate the small child.

Notice a difference?

But we love the drama you say. That is something for an older child and adults. For the child who has not yet expereinced the change of teeth, the calm, warm, even version leaves room for the child to find his or her own feelings within the story. With young children, before the change of teeth (birth to seven) the focus is in doing, in being in the will, in action, in deeds. What is done in the story, the action, is what is most important to describe for the young child.

A five or six year old can hear a complex fairy tale told in the even, calm way and take it in deeply without fear while the same story told with dramatization and emphasis on the feeling letters can make it frightening for the child. A three and four year old can hear simlper fairy tales.

With older children after the change of teeth, the feeling life and learning through feeling becomes the focus developmentally.

When we sing, chant nursery rhymes or tell stories to a small child, we bring the warmth of the our voice to meet the child on a deep level, soul to soul. We can envelop our words with warmth and evoke pictures for the child to live into, through their play, through their life. Children will play out the stories they hear with dress up, singing, self talk and the creation of scenarios and socio-dramaric play. This is the basis for imaginative thinking. This is the basis for a literacy that is infused with inspired feeling and creative action.

We can support this in many ways. (More to come on this topic)

Children under the age of seven are like a sieve, they absorb everything we say, do and feel. They learn through imitation. They know when our words are aligned with our feelings and when they are not. They will play out or act our our deepest feelings and concerns.

In bringing stories and rhymes to children here are a few questions to ponder about our speech:

Is it good?

• Am I speaking clearly and enunciating my words?
• Are the words and phrases appropriate for the developmental phase of the child?
• Does it convey, in the end, that the world is good?
• Is it imbued with warmth?

Is it beautiful?

• Are the words beautiful?
• Is the combination of words beautiful?
• Is it rhythmic?
• How does it feel for the ears to hear such soumds?

Is it true?

• Am I here and fully present with the child?
• Am I fully present with the words I am speaking?
• Does it convey the truth of life I wish for the child to experience?
• Is it worthy of imitation?

Next will be a little nature story of courage to tell.

Blessings!

Celebrate the Rhythm of Life 

Harmonious Rhythms ::  Parenting with Soul :: Waldorf Homeschooling

~living curriculum program to support parenting and homeschooling