Weekly Rhythm at Stone Soup
In the Waldorf early childhood program we do relate to the natural rhythms of the cosmos. Because our body responds to the rhythms it is easy to follow this with the children.
Monday is Painting:
The children will join the teacher in preparing for this unique color experience. The technique is “wet on wet” watercolor on wet paper. We introduce the color with the rhythm of the season. Autumn in the beginning of the season is a bit of yellow; later comes red to meet yellow transforming right before the children’s eyes into beautiful orange; then red stays alone to meet blue. Winter is cold and blue until one day at the end it meets yellow; yellow brings green at the beginning of spring; red joins again creating the rainbow towards the end of school and close to the summer.
Tuesday is Baking:
Many skills are involved while we make our bread, a lot of sensory work to meet the children for integration of their senses. The child is able to cross the middle line while stirring the ingredients with the proper motion, and kneading. At the end, after singing and baking we have delicious bread to take home or eat with our lunch.
Wednesday is Handwork:
We sew, weave, felt and other related projects of arts and crafts that brings more hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills.
Thursday is Drawing and Cooking
In this activity we have the pre-writing skills from our drawing evolving and maturing as their sense perception of the world around them is identified with more clarity. Together we gather vegetables from our school garden or from individual contributions- and will make a delicious soup for lunch. Beyond fine motor skills or peeling vegetables and admiring the beauty of their color and form, we have a social skills exercise where community experience is alive. Blessing on our meal.
Friday is Farm Day
We will be spending our Friday’s visiting local farms and nature based environments in the area. It is our intent that the children develop strong relationships with their natural environment, including a deep respect for the land, gardening, farming and the food they eat.
As you can imagine, the repetition and rhythm creates a sense of trust in the child’s life, the trust that everything continues, evolves and that there is always an adult guide into the physical world, that they are not on their own, that they belong. Home/school, school/home are the rhythms that will help shape the forces of these children’s life.