Course: Early Childhood Education"Waldorf Education is not a pedagogical system but an art - the art of awakening what is actually there within the human being." ~ Rudolf Steiner
The Waldorf early childhood educator works with the young child by creating a warm, beautiful and loving home-like environment, which is protective and secure, and where things happen in a predictable, rhythmic manner. Here she responds to the developing child in two basic ways: First, she engages in domestic, practical, and artistic activities the children can readily imitate (for example, baking, painting, gardening, and handicrafts), adapting the work to the changing seasons and festivals of the year. Secondly, the Waldorf kindergarten teacher nurtures the children’s power of imagination by telling carefully selected stories and by encouraging free play. This free or fantasy play, in which children act out scenarios of their own creation, helps them to experience many aspects of life more deeply. When toys are used, they are made of natural materials. Wood, cotton, wool, silk, shells, stones, pine cones and objects from nature that the children themselves have collected are used in play and to beautify the room. Sensory integration, eye-hand coordination, appreciating the beauty of language, sequencing, and other basic skills necessary for the foundation of academic learning are fostered in the kindergarten. In this truly loving, natural and creative environment, children are provided with a range of activities to prepare them for later learning and for life itself. |
Course Outline
Early Childhood Education 1
Lesson 1: You Are Your Child's First Teacher Lesson 2: Home Life as the Basis for All Learning Lesson 3: Birth to Three: Growing Down and Waking Up Lesson 4: Helping Your Baby's Development Lesson 5: Helping Your Toddler's Development Lesson 6: Rhythm in Home Life Lesson 7: Discipline and Other Parenting Issues Lesson 8: Reflection and Final Paper/Early Childhood Education 1 Early Childhood Education 2
Lesson 1: Nourishing Your Child's Imagination and Creative Play Lesson 2: Developing Your Child's Artistic Ability Lesson 3: Encouraging your Child's Musical Ability Lesson 4: Cognitive Development and Early Childhood Education Lesson 5: Common Parenting Question: From Television to Immunizations Lesson 6: Help for the Journey Lesson 7: Reflection and Final Paper/Early Childhood Education 2 
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What Makes Waldorf Early Childhood Education “Waldorf”?
Is there a Waldorf early childhood curriculum? Are there specific activities—puppet plays, circle games, watercolor painting, for example—that are essential to a Waldorf program? Are there certain materials and furnishings—lazured, soft-colored walls, handmade dolls, beeswax crayons, silk and other natural materials—that are necessary ingredients in a Waldorf setting? What makes Waldorf early childhood education “Waldorf”?
Rudolf Steiner spoke on a number of occasions about the experiences that are essential for the healthy development of the young child. These include:
• love and warmth
• an environment that nourishes the senses
• creative and artistic experiences
• meaningful adult activity to be imitated
• free, imaginative play
• protection of the forces of childhood
• gratitude, reverence, and wonder
• joy, humor, and happiness
• adult caregivers pursuing a path of inner development
Love and Warmth
Children who live in an atmosphere of love and warmth, and who have around them truly good examples to imitate, are living in their proper element. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
Love and emotional warmth, rather than any particular early childhood program, create the basis for the child’s healthy development. These qualities should live between the adult caregiver and the child, in the children’s behavior toward one another, and among the adults in the early childhood center. When Rudolf Steiner visited the classes of the first Waldorf school, he often asked the children, “Do you love your teacher?” Children are also served if this love and warmth exist in the relationships between the teachers and the parents, between the early childhood teachers and the rest of the school, and in the surrounding community.
An Environment that Nourishes the Senses
The essential task of the kindergarten teacher is to create the proper physical environment around the children. “Physical environment” must be understood in the widest sense imaginable. It includes not just what happens around the children in the material sense, but everything that occurs in their environment, everything that can be perceived by their senses, that can work on the inner powers of the children from the surrounding physical space. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
Early learning is profoundly connected to the child’s own physical body and sensory experience. Everything the young child sees, hears, and touches has an effect. Thus a clean, orderly, beautiful, quiet setting is essential. The physical environment, both indoors and outdoors, should provide varied and nourishing opportunities for self-education—experiences in touch, balance, lively and joyful movement, and also inward listening. The children should experience large-group, small-group, and solitary activities. The teacher, in integrating diverse elements into a harmonious and meaningful environment, provides surroundings that are accessible to the child’s understanding, feeling, and active will. The care, love, and intention expressed through the outer materials and furnishings of the classes are experienced unconsciously by the child. The child experiences the immediate environment as ensouled and nurturing. The adult shapes the temporal environment as well as the spatial. Through a rhythmic schedule, in which the same thing happens at the same time on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis, the child gains a sense of security and confidence in the world. Also, the different activities of the day should take place in a comfortable flow with smooth transitions.
Creative, Artistic Experience
In order to become true educators, we must be able to see the truly aesthetic element in the work, to bring an artistic quality into our tasks. . . . [I]f we bring this aesthetic element, then we begin to come closer to what the child wills out of its own nature. —Rudolf Steiner, A Modern Art of Education
In the early childhood class, the art of education is the art of living. The teacher is an artist in how she perceives and relates to the children and to the activities of daily life. She orchestrates and choreographs the rhythms of each day, each week, and each season in such a way that the children can breathe freely in a living structure. In addition, the teacher offers the children opportunities for artistic experiences in singing and music, in movement and gesture—through eurythmy and rhythmic games—and in creative speech and language—through verses, poetry, and stories. The children model with beeswax, draw, and do watercolor painting. Puppet and marionette shows put on by the teacher are an important element in the life of the kindergarten.
Meaningful Adult Activity as Examples for the Child’s Imitation
The task of the kindergarten teacher is to adapt the practical activities of daily life so that they are suitable for the child’s imitation through play. . . . The activities of children in kindergarten must be derived directly from life itself rather than being “thought out” by the intellectualized culture of adults. In the kindergarten, the most important thing is to give children the opportunity to directly imitate life itself. —Rudolf Steiner, The Child’s Changing Consciousness
Children do not learn through instruction or admonition but though imitation. Good sight will develop if the environment has the proper conditions of light and color, while in the brain and blood circulation, the physical foundations will be laid for a healthy sense of morality if children witness moral actions in their surroundings. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
Real, meaningful work with a purpose, adjusted to the needs of the child, is in accordance with the child’s natural and inborn need for movement, and is an enormously significant educational activity. The teacher focuses on the meaningful activities that nurture life in the in the classroom “home,” such as cooking and baking, gardening, doing laundry and cleaning, creating and caring for the materials in the immediate environment, and taking care of the bodily needs of the children. This directed attention of the teacher creates an atmosphere of freedom in which the individuality of each child can be active. It is not intended just that the children copy the outer movements and actions of the adult, but that they experience also the inner attitude—the devotion, care, sense of purpose, focus, and creative spirit of the adult.
Free, Imaginative Play
In the child’s play activity, we can only provide the conditions for education. What is gained through play, through everything that cannot be determined by fixed rules, stems fundamentally from the self-activity of the child, The real educational value of play lives in the fact that we ignore our rules and regulations, our educational theory, and allow the child free rein. —Rudolf Steiner, Self Education in the Light of Anthroposophy
In a seemingly contradictory indication, Rudolf Steiner also said: Giving direction and guidance to play is one of the essential tasks of sensible education, which is to say an art of education that is right for humanity. . . . The early childhood educator must school her observation in order to develop an artistic eye, to detect the individual quality of each child’s play. —Rudolf Steiner, Lecture of February 24, 1921 in Utrecht, The Netherlands
Little children learn through play. They approach play in an entirely individual way, out of their entirely individual ways, out of their unique configuration of soul and spirit, and out of their unique experiences of the world in which they live. The manner in which a child plays may offer a picture of how he will take up his destiny as an adult. The task of the teacher is to create an environment that supports the possibility of healthy play. This environment includes the physical surroundings, furnishings, and play materials; the social environment of activities and social interactions; and the inner/spiritual environment of thoughts, intentions, and imaginations held by the adults.
Protection for the Forces of Childhood
Although it is highly necessary that each person should be fully awake in later life, the child must be allowed to remain as long as possible in the peaceful, dreamlike condition of pictorial imagination in which his early years of life are passed. For if we allow his organism to grow strong in this nonintellectual way, he will rightly develop in later life the intellectuality needed in the world today. —Rudolf Steiner, A Modern Art of Education
The lively, waking dream of the little child’s consciousness must be allowed to thrive in the early childhood group. This means that the teacher refrains as much as possible from verbal instruction. Instead, her gestures and actions provide a model for the child’s imitation. Familiar daily rhythms and activities provide a context where the need for verbal instruction is reduced. Simple, archetypal imagery in stories, songs, and games provides experiences that the children can internalize but that do not require intellectual or critical reflection or explanation.
An Atmosphere of Gratitude, Reverence, and Wonder
An atmosphere of gratitude should grow naturally in children through merely witnessing the gratitude the adults feel as they receive what is freely given by others, and in how they express this gratitude. If a child says “thank you” very naturally—not in response to the urging of others, but simply through imitating— something has been done that will greatly benefit the child’s whole life. Out of this an all-embracing gratitude will develop toward the whole world. This cultivation of gratitude is of paramount importance. —Rudolf Steiner, The Child’s Changing Consciousness
Out of these early, all-pervading experiences of gratitude, the first tender capacity for love, which is deeply embedded in each and every child, begins to sprout in earthly life.
If, during the first period of life, we create an atmosphere of gratitude around the children, then out of this gratitude toward the world, toward the entire universe, and also out of thankfulness for being able to be in this world, a profound and warm sense of devotion will arise . . . upright, honest, and true. —Rudolf Steiner, The Child’s Changing Consciousness
This is the basis for what will become a capacity for deep, intimate love and commitment in later life, for dedication and loyalty, for true admiration of others, for fervent spiritual or religious devotion, and for placing oneself wholeheartedly in the service of the world.
Joy, Humor, and Happiness
The joy of children in and with their environment must therefore be counted among the forces that build and shape the physical organs. They need teachers who look and act with happiness and, most of all, with honest, unaffected love. Such a love that streams, as it were, with warmth through the physical environment of the children may be said to literally “hatch out” the forms of the physical organs. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
If you make a surly face so that a child gets the impression you are a grumpy person, this harms the child for the rest of his life. What kind of school plan you make is neither here nor there; what matters is what sort of person you are. —Rudolf Steiner The Kingdom of Childhood
The teacher’s earnestness about her work and her serious striving must be balanced with humor and a demeanor that bespeaks happiness. There must be moments of humor and delight in the classroom every day.
Adult Caregivers on a Path of Inner Development
For the small child before the change of teeth, the most important thing in education is the teacher’s own being. —Rudolf Steiner, Essentials of Education
Just think what feelings arise in the soul of the early childhood educator who realizes: What I accomplish with this child, I accomplish for the grown-up person in his twenties. What matters is not so much a knowledge of abstract educational principles or pedagogical rules. . . . [W]hat does matter is that a deep sense of responsibility develops in [the teacher’s heart and mind] and that this affects her or his worldview and the way she or he stands in life. —Rudolf Steiner, Education in the Face of the Present-Day World Situation, Lecture of June 10, 1920
Here we come to the spiritual environment of the early childhood setting: the thoughts, attitudes, and imaginations living in the adult who cares for the children. This invisible realm that lies behind the outer actions of the teacher has a profound influence on the child’s development. The spiritual environment includes recognition of the child as a threefold being—of body, soul, and spirit—on a path of evolutionary development through repeated Earth lives. This recognition provides a foundation for the daily activities in the kindergarten, and for the relationship between adult and child. Such an understanding of the nature and destiny of the human comes out of the inner life of the adult, the life of the individual Ego. This is a realm that is largely hidden, and hence is difficult to observe directly and to evaluate objectively. Yet ultimately this realm may affect the development of the children most profoundly. It is not merely our outer activity that influence the growing child. What lies behind and is expressed through this outer activity also is crucial. Ultimately, the most profound influence on the child is who we are as human beings—and who we are becoming and how.
Conclusion
The “essentials” described here are qualitative in nature. For the most part, they are not part of a body of concrete “best practices.” Instead, they concern inner qualities and attributes of the teacher that foster healthy development in young children. These qualities can come to expression in a wide variety of ways, according to
• the age range of the children in the group and their individual characteristics;
• the nature of the particular program—a kindergarten, playgroup, or extended care program; and
• the environment and surroundings—urban or rural, home or school or child care center.
Many practices that have come to be associated with Waldorf/Steiner early childhood education—certain daily rhythms and rituals, play materials, songs, stories, even the colors of the walls, the dress of the adults, and the menu for snack—may be mistakenly taken as essentials. The results of such assumptions can be surprising, even disturbing—a “King Winter” nature table appearing in a tropical climate in “wintertime,” or dolls with pink skin and yellow hair in a kindergarten where all the children are brown-skinned and black-haired. Such practices may express a tendency toward a doctrinal or dogmatic approach that is out of touch with the realities of the immediate situation and instead imposes something from “outside.” There is a parallel concern at the other end of the spectrum from the doctrinal or dogmatic. The freedom that Waldorf Education offers each individual teacher to determine the practices of her early childhood program can be misinterpreted to mean that “anything goes,” according to personal preference and style. Here too, there is the danger that the developmental realities and needs of the children are not sufficiently taken into consideration. Each of these one-sided approaches may be injurious to the development of the children. As Waldorf early childhood educators, we are constantly seeking a middle, universally human path between polarities. Rudolf Steiner’s advice to the first Waldorf kindergarten teacher, Elizabeth Grunelius, in the early 1920s, can be paraphrased as follows: "Observe the children. Actively meditate. Follow your intuitions. Work so that all your actions are worthy of imitation." Today, those of us who work with young children in a Waldorf environment are challenged to engage in a constant process of renewal. We must actively observe the children in our care, carry them in our meditations, and seek to work consciously and artistically to create the experiences that will serve their development. Our devotion to this task awakens us to the importance of self-education and transformation in the context of community. Our ongoing study of child and human development, our own artistic and meditative practices, and our work with Anthroposophy, independently and together with others, become essential elements for the practice of Waldorf early childhood education. Here we can come to experience that we are not alone on this journey. We are supported through our encounters with one another other and with our sharing of insights, experience, and knowledge. We are helped also by those beings spiritual beings who are committed to our continued development and to the renewal of culture that Waldorf Education seeks to serve.
Rudolf Steiner spoke on a number of occasions about the experiences that are essential for the healthy development of the young child. These include:
• love and warmth
• an environment that nourishes the senses
• creative and artistic experiences
• meaningful adult activity to be imitated
• free, imaginative play
• protection of the forces of childhood
• gratitude, reverence, and wonder
• joy, humor, and happiness
• adult caregivers pursuing a path of inner development
Love and Warmth
Children who live in an atmosphere of love and warmth, and who have around them truly good examples to imitate, are living in their proper element. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
Love and emotional warmth, rather than any particular early childhood program, create the basis for the child’s healthy development. These qualities should live between the adult caregiver and the child, in the children’s behavior toward one another, and among the adults in the early childhood center. When Rudolf Steiner visited the classes of the first Waldorf school, he often asked the children, “Do you love your teacher?” Children are also served if this love and warmth exist in the relationships between the teachers and the parents, between the early childhood teachers and the rest of the school, and in the surrounding community.
An Environment that Nourishes the Senses
The essential task of the kindergarten teacher is to create the proper physical environment around the children. “Physical environment” must be understood in the widest sense imaginable. It includes not just what happens around the children in the material sense, but everything that occurs in their environment, everything that can be perceived by their senses, that can work on the inner powers of the children from the surrounding physical space. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
Early learning is profoundly connected to the child’s own physical body and sensory experience. Everything the young child sees, hears, and touches has an effect. Thus a clean, orderly, beautiful, quiet setting is essential. The physical environment, both indoors and outdoors, should provide varied and nourishing opportunities for self-education—experiences in touch, balance, lively and joyful movement, and also inward listening. The children should experience large-group, small-group, and solitary activities. The teacher, in integrating diverse elements into a harmonious and meaningful environment, provides surroundings that are accessible to the child’s understanding, feeling, and active will. The care, love, and intention expressed through the outer materials and furnishings of the classes are experienced unconsciously by the child. The child experiences the immediate environment as ensouled and nurturing. The adult shapes the temporal environment as well as the spatial. Through a rhythmic schedule, in which the same thing happens at the same time on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis, the child gains a sense of security and confidence in the world. Also, the different activities of the day should take place in a comfortable flow with smooth transitions.
Creative, Artistic Experience
In order to become true educators, we must be able to see the truly aesthetic element in the work, to bring an artistic quality into our tasks. . . . [I]f we bring this aesthetic element, then we begin to come closer to what the child wills out of its own nature. —Rudolf Steiner, A Modern Art of Education
In the early childhood class, the art of education is the art of living. The teacher is an artist in how she perceives and relates to the children and to the activities of daily life. She orchestrates and choreographs the rhythms of each day, each week, and each season in such a way that the children can breathe freely in a living structure. In addition, the teacher offers the children opportunities for artistic experiences in singing and music, in movement and gesture—through eurythmy and rhythmic games—and in creative speech and language—through verses, poetry, and stories. The children model with beeswax, draw, and do watercolor painting. Puppet and marionette shows put on by the teacher are an important element in the life of the kindergarten.
Meaningful Adult Activity as Examples for the Child’s Imitation
The task of the kindergarten teacher is to adapt the practical activities of daily life so that they are suitable for the child’s imitation through play. . . . The activities of children in kindergarten must be derived directly from life itself rather than being “thought out” by the intellectualized culture of adults. In the kindergarten, the most important thing is to give children the opportunity to directly imitate life itself. —Rudolf Steiner, The Child’s Changing Consciousness
Children do not learn through instruction or admonition but though imitation. Good sight will develop if the environment has the proper conditions of light and color, while in the brain and blood circulation, the physical foundations will be laid for a healthy sense of morality if children witness moral actions in their surroundings. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
Real, meaningful work with a purpose, adjusted to the needs of the child, is in accordance with the child’s natural and inborn need for movement, and is an enormously significant educational activity. The teacher focuses on the meaningful activities that nurture life in the in the classroom “home,” such as cooking and baking, gardening, doing laundry and cleaning, creating and caring for the materials in the immediate environment, and taking care of the bodily needs of the children. This directed attention of the teacher creates an atmosphere of freedom in which the individuality of each child can be active. It is not intended just that the children copy the outer movements and actions of the adult, but that they experience also the inner attitude—the devotion, care, sense of purpose, focus, and creative spirit of the adult.
Free, Imaginative Play
In the child’s play activity, we can only provide the conditions for education. What is gained through play, through everything that cannot be determined by fixed rules, stems fundamentally from the self-activity of the child, The real educational value of play lives in the fact that we ignore our rules and regulations, our educational theory, and allow the child free rein. —Rudolf Steiner, Self Education in the Light of Anthroposophy
In a seemingly contradictory indication, Rudolf Steiner also said: Giving direction and guidance to play is one of the essential tasks of sensible education, which is to say an art of education that is right for humanity. . . . The early childhood educator must school her observation in order to develop an artistic eye, to detect the individual quality of each child’s play. —Rudolf Steiner, Lecture of February 24, 1921 in Utrecht, The Netherlands
Little children learn through play. They approach play in an entirely individual way, out of their entirely individual ways, out of their unique configuration of soul and spirit, and out of their unique experiences of the world in which they live. The manner in which a child plays may offer a picture of how he will take up his destiny as an adult. The task of the teacher is to create an environment that supports the possibility of healthy play. This environment includes the physical surroundings, furnishings, and play materials; the social environment of activities and social interactions; and the inner/spiritual environment of thoughts, intentions, and imaginations held by the adults.
Protection for the Forces of Childhood
Although it is highly necessary that each person should be fully awake in later life, the child must be allowed to remain as long as possible in the peaceful, dreamlike condition of pictorial imagination in which his early years of life are passed. For if we allow his organism to grow strong in this nonintellectual way, he will rightly develop in later life the intellectuality needed in the world today. —Rudolf Steiner, A Modern Art of Education
The lively, waking dream of the little child’s consciousness must be allowed to thrive in the early childhood group. This means that the teacher refrains as much as possible from verbal instruction. Instead, her gestures and actions provide a model for the child’s imitation. Familiar daily rhythms and activities provide a context where the need for verbal instruction is reduced. Simple, archetypal imagery in stories, songs, and games provides experiences that the children can internalize but that do not require intellectual or critical reflection or explanation.
An Atmosphere of Gratitude, Reverence, and Wonder
An atmosphere of gratitude should grow naturally in children through merely witnessing the gratitude the adults feel as they receive what is freely given by others, and in how they express this gratitude. If a child says “thank you” very naturally—not in response to the urging of others, but simply through imitating— something has been done that will greatly benefit the child’s whole life. Out of this an all-embracing gratitude will develop toward the whole world. This cultivation of gratitude is of paramount importance. —Rudolf Steiner, The Child’s Changing Consciousness
Out of these early, all-pervading experiences of gratitude, the first tender capacity for love, which is deeply embedded in each and every child, begins to sprout in earthly life.
If, during the first period of life, we create an atmosphere of gratitude around the children, then out of this gratitude toward the world, toward the entire universe, and also out of thankfulness for being able to be in this world, a profound and warm sense of devotion will arise . . . upright, honest, and true. —Rudolf Steiner, The Child’s Changing Consciousness
This is the basis for what will become a capacity for deep, intimate love and commitment in later life, for dedication and loyalty, for true admiration of others, for fervent spiritual or religious devotion, and for placing oneself wholeheartedly in the service of the world.
Joy, Humor, and Happiness
The joy of children in and with their environment must therefore be counted among the forces that build and shape the physical organs. They need teachers who look and act with happiness and, most of all, with honest, unaffected love. Such a love that streams, as it were, with warmth through the physical environment of the children may be said to literally “hatch out” the forms of the physical organs. —Rudolf Steiner, The Education of the Child
If you make a surly face so that a child gets the impression you are a grumpy person, this harms the child for the rest of his life. What kind of school plan you make is neither here nor there; what matters is what sort of person you are. —Rudolf Steiner The Kingdom of Childhood
The teacher’s earnestness about her work and her serious striving must be balanced with humor and a demeanor that bespeaks happiness. There must be moments of humor and delight in the classroom every day.
Adult Caregivers on a Path of Inner Development
For the small child before the change of teeth, the most important thing in education is the teacher’s own being. —Rudolf Steiner, Essentials of Education
Just think what feelings arise in the soul of the early childhood educator who realizes: What I accomplish with this child, I accomplish for the grown-up person in his twenties. What matters is not so much a knowledge of abstract educational principles or pedagogical rules. . . . [W]hat does matter is that a deep sense of responsibility develops in [the teacher’s heart and mind] and that this affects her or his worldview and the way she or he stands in life. —Rudolf Steiner, Education in the Face of the Present-Day World Situation, Lecture of June 10, 1920
Here we come to the spiritual environment of the early childhood setting: the thoughts, attitudes, and imaginations living in the adult who cares for the children. This invisible realm that lies behind the outer actions of the teacher has a profound influence on the child’s development. The spiritual environment includes recognition of the child as a threefold being—of body, soul, and spirit—on a path of evolutionary development through repeated Earth lives. This recognition provides a foundation for the daily activities in the kindergarten, and for the relationship between adult and child. Such an understanding of the nature and destiny of the human comes out of the inner life of the adult, the life of the individual Ego. This is a realm that is largely hidden, and hence is difficult to observe directly and to evaluate objectively. Yet ultimately this realm may affect the development of the children most profoundly. It is not merely our outer activity that influence the growing child. What lies behind and is expressed through this outer activity also is crucial. Ultimately, the most profound influence on the child is who we are as human beings—and who we are becoming and how.
Conclusion
The “essentials” described here are qualitative in nature. For the most part, they are not part of a body of concrete “best practices.” Instead, they concern inner qualities and attributes of the teacher that foster healthy development in young children. These qualities can come to expression in a wide variety of ways, according to
• the age range of the children in the group and their individual characteristics;
• the nature of the particular program—a kindergarten, playgroup, or extended care program; and
• the environment and surroundings—urban or rural, home or school or child care center.
Many practices that have come to be associated with Waldorf/Steiner early childhood education—certain daily rhythms and rituals, play materials, songs, stories, even the colors of the walls, the dress of the adults, and the menu for snack—may be mistakenly taken as essentials. The results of such assumptions can be surprising, even disturbing—a “King Winter” nature table appearing in a tropical climate in “wintertime,” or dolls with pink skin and yellow hair in a kindergarten where all the children are brown-skinned and black-haired. Such practices may express a tendency toward a doctrinal or dogmatic approach that is out of touch with the realities of the immediate situation and instead imposes something from “outside.” There is a parallel concern at the other end of the spectrum from the doctrinal or dogmatic. The freedom that Waldorf Education offers each individual teacher to determine the practices of her early childhood program can be misinterpreted to mean that “anything goes,” according to personal preference and style. Here too, there is the danger that the developmental realities and needs of the children are not sufficiently taken into consideration. Each of these one-sided approaches may be injurious to the development of the children. As Waldorf early childhood educators, we are constantly seeking a middle, universally human path between polarities. Rudolf Steiner’s advice to the first Waldorf kindergarten teacher, Elizabeth Grunelius, in the early 1920s, can be paraphrased as follows: "Observe the children. Actively meditate. Follow your intuitions. Work so that all your actions are worthy of imitation." Today, those of us who work with young children in a Waldorf environment are challenged to engage in a constant process of renewal. We must actively observe the children in our care, carry them in our meditations, and seek to work consciously and artistically to create the experiences that will serve their development. Our devotion to this task awakens us to the importance of self-education and transformation in the context of community. Our ongoing study of child and human development, our own artistic and meditative practices, and our work with Anthroposophy, independently and together with others, become essential elements for the practice of Waldorf early childhood education. Here we can come to experience that we are not alone on this journey. We are supported through our encounters with one another other and with our sharing of insights, experience, and knowledge. We are helped also by those beings spiritual beings who are committed to our continued development and to the renewal of culture that Waldorf Education seeks to serve.
Early Childhood Education 1 - Lesson 6
Tasks and Assignments for Early Childhood Education 1 - Lesson 6
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Please study the study material/chapters indicated below. Feel free to use additional resources as wanted and needed. Once you feel you are sufficiently acquainted with the subject please complete the following:
1. Please comment on the ideal of living a life that has a daily rhythm. 2. Describe activities that can be done to celebrate the festivals both in the home environment and the preschool/kindergarten setting. 3. Describe activities that can be done to celebrate birthdays both in the home environment and the preschool/kindergarten setting. 3. Describe and discuss the rhythm of the week. Submit the completed assignment via the submission form or via email. 
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Study Material for Early Childhood Education 1 - Lesson 6
You Are Your Child's First TeacherCΗΑΡΤΕR 6 - Rhythm in Home Life
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Creating a rhythmical home life will nourish both you and your child. It will also eliminate 80 percent of your discipline problems—I can practically guarantee it! Because the young child is so centered in the body and in imitation, rhythm is one of the most important keys to discipline. It both guides the child's life by creating good habits and helps avoid arguments and problems. So much of discipline for young children involves self-discipline on the part of the adults: keeping regular rhythms in home life, working on your own patience and emotional responses, being there when your child needs interaction. As an example, playing with your child first can free up an entire twenty minutes to read the paper, whereas telling him you'll play in ten minutes can result in all kinds of emotional disasters. Elizabeth Grunelius states:
Much of a child's happiness depends on our success in conducting the daily life with and around him with a minimum amount of friction. Every time we may feel like stepping in with advice or an order or a correction, we might well pause for a moment to do two things: firstly, to ask ourselves whether our interference at this particular instant is really necessary; and secondly, to find out what the child is actually trying to do. (1)
In this chapter, first we will consider why rhythm is so supportive to every member of the family, and then we will look at the activities of daily life and some practical suggestions you will be able to apply immediately. Finally, we'll consider the rhythm of the week and then the rhythm of the year as it connects us to both nature and spirit.
CREATING RHYTHM IN DAILY LIFE
We are surrounded by rhythm in nature: the alternation of day and night, the phases of the moon, the cycle of the seasons, the ebb and flow of the tides. Our bodies are permeated by rhythm, in the beating of our hearts, the breathing of our lungs, women's cycles of fertility, and the circadian rhythms of our metabolism. But as modern human beings we have also established a life that is removed from the rhythms of nature. Through electric lighting we can work well into the night; we can shop at twenty-four-hour supermarkets; we can fly strawberries to Minnesota in January. Through technology we can live outside most of the rhythms of nature. As a result, we have often become unaware of the messages and rhythms of our bodies and have forgotten the importance of rhythm in daily life. Steiner describes it as follows:
Rhythm holds sway in the whole of nature, up to the level of man. Then, and only then is there a change. The rhythm which through the course of the year holds sway in the forces of growth, of propagation and so forth, ceases when we come to man. For man is to have his roots in freedom; and the more civilized he is, the more does this rhythm decline. As the light disappears at Christmas time, so has rhythm apparently departed from the life of man. Chaos prevails. But man must give birth again to rhythm out of his innermost being, his own initiative. (2)
A baby, who has been surrounded by the mother's heartbeat and rocked by her breathing in the womb, emerges into earthly life and must find new rhythms, gradually developing from the fast and irregular heartbeat and breathing of the newborn to the rhythm of one breath to each four heartbeats of the adult.
A regular lifestyle, like the pattern of life in the womb, offers a stable environment during the rapid growth and changes in rhythm of the body during childhood. Children provided with this regular life feel confident about their world and are not concerned by uncertainty about when the next thing will happen. Rhythm in home life can also help calm a nervous or difficult child by turning the child's life into a series of events in which he participates, and from which he gains a new sense of security and competency. Regular mealtimes and regular nap- and bedtimes start orienting the child to a natural feeling for the passing of time. They go a long way toward preventing discipline problems, because bedtimes become something that happen as regularly as the sky turning dark— there is no one to argue with or complain to each night.
Grunelius summarizes, "The rhythm then becomes a habit, is accepted as self-evident and will eliminate many difficulties, struggles and arguments about eating and going to bed. . . . Regularity should prevail in as many of the child's daily activities as possible. It is the key to establishing good habits for life." (3)
She gives an example of how supportive rhythm is for young children and how much they learn through it by telling about taking care of a two-year-old child whom she bathed each day in the same way— first soaping her hands, then her arms, then her neck, and so on. When she took care of the child again after several weeks, the child spontaneously asked, "May I wash myself?" and proceeded carefully and happily through the whole sequence exactly as it had been done so many times before. The child was extremely satisfied with herself! (4) This example amazed me, because it never occurred to me to wash a child in a regular fashion, thus providing the child with something it would then be possible to learn.
Andrea Gambardella, a Waldorf teacher, explains, "With the young child and the elementary school student this requirement for an outer structure continues to be vital to growth and emotional well-being. Learning that there is a 'time for all things' is a life's lesson. Now is the time for you to play and do as you will, now for a meal, now for homework, now to prepare for bed." (5)
Rhythm is also a blessing for parents, because it enables the daily activity of life to flow more smoothly, requires less energy, and becomes a platform that supports the family, its activities, and interactions. Many parents don't discover the secrets of rhythm until they have two or more children and suddenly there isn't enough time not to be organized! Regular meals prevent constant feeding and cleaning up or over-hungry and whiny children; regular bedtimes suddenly free the evening for adult conversation and life again as a couple. The benefits are many, and yet it is often difficult to create rhythm in family life. It requires an inner discipline of its own!
Creating rhythm in one's life doesn't mean being rigid and dogmatic. There is still plenty of room for special activities and surprises (and sometimes the piper to pay the next day when the child has missed a needed nap or had a late, exciting evening—but it's worth it!). But freedom is not without form, and one is truly free when not hampered by a disorganized life. The rhythmic structure imposed on a young child and permeated with the parents' love is a discipline in the most positive sense of the word. And as your children become older, they will transform this outer structure into an inner self-discipline that will be invaluable for homework and getting other jobs done. Putting attention into these areas can help the quality of life for both you and your children from the time they are toddlers until they leave home.
A Word of Caution
Before reading the following practical suggestions, remind yourself that I'm not suggesting you have to do all these things to be a good parent! Rather, by mentioning so many different ideas, I hope that you will be drawn to adding one rhythmical element to even one area of your child's life. Most people are too busy to have every part of the day be a wonderful time for their children. In my house, breakfasts were efficient, without frills; there was no way, during the school year, that I was going to put special place settings on the table! So I focused my attention on bedtimes. For someone else, however, early mornings might be a great time for the family to be together, especially if evenings are shortened by a parent working late.
There are many blogs and e-zines today portraying a picture-perfect "organic" home life that may make you feel like giving up before you get started. Real life, like the tides, ebbs and flows. There may be chaotic times when all you can focus on is the two most basic activities: eating and sleeping. Because they always occur, they are an excellent place to start and are more than enough during challenging times! There is no point to feeling guilty on top of feeling overwhelmed—life happens!
I suggest you start by focusing on the area of your life that is going the least smoothly. It might be nap time, or it might be dinner, or it might be getting the children out the door in the morning. Whatever the area, think about what happens now, and how you could make things go more smoothly by applying some of the suggestions given here or by inventing some of your own. Having a regular rhythm, adding a bit of ritual like a song or verse, and avoiding too many choices can transform a hectic part of family life into an activity or transition that flows smoothly. Discuss your ideas with your partner, if you have one, agree on a new series of actions for an activity, and then start doing them with the children. You'll be amazed and supported by the results!
Mealtimes
Eating together is a major part of family life and can be an important force in bringing people together. However, attention needs to be focused on mealtimes so they don't become tense or chaotic or simply disappear because everyone is eating on the run.
When do meals occur at your house? Who is present? There are no right or wrong answers when it comes to rhythms and family life. You need to consider the needs of your family members and decide what works for you. The important thing is to bring your consciousness to your situation and work toward what feels best. We know a family where the father and three-year-old would have breakfast together on weekdays before he went to work while the mother got some extra sleep. It was a special time for the two of them that they really cherished. Similarly, work schedules will probably determine what time dinner happens and whether your children will need to eat before you do. Whatever you work out for your family, having meals at a regular time (and regular snacks for the children as needed) can provide an important anchor for rhythm in family life.
Now look at the setting. Do you have a table around which the family can gather? Any little touches you add, like a candle or fresh flowers, can help make meals a special time for the family. I found that, in the summertime, if I set the breakfast table the night before, even I felt nourished and cared for by waking up to a table that was inviting. And all the members of my family, who tended to get up and eat at different times during the summer, felt "held" by the family, even though no one else might be at the table with them.
Next consider the atmosphere. Are mealtimes relaxed and conducive to digestion? Small children in particular need to eat in calm surroundings, without the television or radio on. (The six o'clock news is enough to give anyone indigestion with their graphic reports of murders and other atrocities.) Similarly, the adults should be careful not to be negative about people or to dwell on disappointments of the day. Children take everything in and are unable to disconnect emotions from the functioning of their bodies.
Conversation at meals changes with the arrival of children. It becomes impossible to conduct adult conversation in the same way, and children need to be accepted as conversationalists at the table. Mealtimes then become a time for listening, sharing, and balancing conversations so that each child can bring something of himself or herself to the family's time together. The essay "Family Meals" in Lifeways shares many ideas for harmonious meals with growing children, (6) as does Shea Darian's book Seven Times the Sun. (7)
Beginning the meal with a spoken or sung blessing encourages feelings of thankfulness and ensures that everyone starts the meal together. Young children are especially nourished by whatever ritual you develop around your family's mealtimes. But you need to bring feelings of gratitude, not empty words said in haste! If you don't have any graces from your religious background, here are two that express an awareness of the connectedness of life and gratitude for our sustenance.
Before the flour, the mill,
Before the mill, the grain,
Before the grain, the sun and rain,
The beauty of God's will.
—UNKNOWN
Earth, who gives to us this food,
Sun, who makes it ripe and good,
Dear Sun, dear Earth, by you we live,
Our loving thanks to you we give.
—CHRISTIAN MORGENSTERN
It is important for children to learn to be grateful for their food and for the efforts of the cook in preparing it. Such an attitude will be fostered by the care we take in preparing and serving the food. This is another area in which cultivating our own gratitude and appreciation for the gift of life will resonate with our children. Handling a child's dislike of certain foods requires some creative thinking. You will need to set your own rules about what can be said about food and what needs to be eaten before a child can leave the table or have dessert. At our house we had a rule that no one could say food was "icky" and that they had to try one (or maybe three) bites of something. What about picky eaters? If you don't offer extra snacks or alternative meals, children are pretty survival oriented. It's sometimes helpful to realize that your job is to put wholesome, nutritious food in front of your child; it is his or her job and responsibility to eat and grow—something that you can't force. Usually the less said, the better.
So that meals can become a calm and harmonious experience for everyone, certain behaviors must be maintained. Sitting in the chair unless one leaves the room can be a minimal expectation, followed by learning how to ask for things politely. If a young child who is whiny or who throws a fit is immediately taken out of the room by a serious adult until he's ready to return, he will probably change his behavior within three minutes. No one wants to be away from the action!
Do your dinners have a formal ending, just drift off, or degenerate rapidly? Having children ask to be excused at the end of a meal is not an old-fashioned formality but a useful way to keep track of who's finished and can help a child clearly distinguish whether he should be sitting at the table or off playing (no coming and going, crawling under the table, chasing the dog, and so forth!). Although some families prefer that everyone stay at the table until a song or short verse is said to end the meal, we preferred that our children ask to be excused when they were finished. This gave them a short time to run around (outside of the dining room) and provided us with a chance to sit back and talk as a couple for a few minutes before we called everyone back to do their jobs of clearing the table, loading the dishwasher, washing the pots and pans, and so forth.
Mealtimes provide one of the earliest opportunities for each child to participate in family chores. While each child can take his or her plate to the kitchen, jobs that benefit the whole family, such as setting the table, clearing the dishes, and wiping the counters, can be rotated among the children. Even the youngest child can have his or her special task in contributing to the family meal, such as putting the napkins at each place.
Mealtimes will change as your children grow older. Meals are different with toddlers, teenagers, or children spanning a range of ages, but gathering around the table to eat and participating in the family's evolving rituals can become an irreplaceable part of your family's life together.
Nutrition
Although it is important for parents to be aware of nutrition, it is just as well to leave young children unaware of the intricacies of daily nutritional requirements. When a child is truly allergic to a food such as milk or peanuts, he needs to be able to tell people so he won't inadvertently eat it. However, your analysis of ingredients or searching for refined sugars will make preschoolers pick apart everything on the table rather than feeling that what they are being served is good. Allergic becomes a synonym for "I don't like," and any kind of shared snack becomes impossible because Liam doesn't eat dairy and Jennifer doesn't eat wheat and Michael is allergic to peanuts and Addie can't have anything with sugar in it.
Your child's trust that what you have given him to eat is good for him is equally or more important than the item itself; if three- and four-year-olds are excessively conscious about nutrition, it will only be divisive. I once saw at the lunch table two kindergarten boys who noticed that one had a huge lunchbox with a big thermos of milk, two white-bread sandwiches, potato chips, and a fruit roll-up, while the other had carob soy milk, a whole-wheat sandwich with tofu and sprouts, a piece of fruit, and a granola bar. These children, who were starting to become self-aware and more aware of the world around them, noticed the discrepancy. One said to the teacher, "My mother says that milk is good for you and helps your bones and teeth."
The other said, "My mom says that milk gives you mucus!"
"Who's right?" they asked together.
My eyebrows went up as I waited to see what my assistant would answer, and I was delighted when she wisely replied, "Your mother is right," which satisfied both boys.
We found that the preschool-aged children in our program had become so picky about food that serving any kind of common snack was almost impossible. The social experience of eating together was difficult to achieve at best!
Children instinctively feel that the world is whole and good and that whatever their parents give them is good for them. It isn't necessary to tell your child more than is minimally necessary for their health or is required to make distinctions about matters like vegetarianism. What you do will be more important than long explanations. "Our family doesn't eat meat" is usually enough for a child to know, and your telling friends and teachers will help keep the child from having to make choices. With something like trying to avoid sugar, if you feed your child wisely at home and tell grandma that you wish she would put away the candy jar before visits, then you may decide that the little bit your child eats at a birthday party or a friend's house may not be worth all of the intellectual and emotional investment required to tell the child he can't have it. These are issues you will have to discuss with your partner and decisions you will have to make based on your medical and philosophical convictions. I can only tell you as a preschool teacher that the awareness and misinformation children have about nutrition these days reflects an increased consciousness of the metabolic sphere that wreaks havoc with the unitive worldview of the young child.
Nap or Quiet Times
Young children need restful or quiet times during the day in order to be restored for play. Like the rhythm of breathing, the child's activities alternate between active play, during which the entire body is in motion, and quiet times, where he might enjoy a snack or a story. When a child focuses his attention on something close at hand, such as when he is making something, coloring, or modeling with beeswax, the activity brings the child into himself and balances his active play.
Many children today sleep very little and seem ready to give up afternoon naps at an early age. However, the afternoon nap is of great benefit to help a child digest the impressions of the day, and it provides welcome downtime for parents as well. The time can be spent sleeping or it can just be a quiet time during which the child has to stay on his bed or in his room. If the rhythm of a daily rest is maintained, the child will learn that this is a time to be by himself and not to call on mother or father. In our LifeWays program, all the full-day children sleep, and when I taught kindergarten, many of the five-year-olds would in fact fall asleep, even though they wouldn't ordinarily nap at home. The others would rest while playing silently on their mat with a favorite doll. Again, the same song is used each time to start and end nap time—and the ending is especially welcome because "Red Bird" (a felt bird on a stick) comes and wakes the children or lets them get up to play.
Recognizing the value of a quiet time for preschool and kindergarten children is the first step in instituting one. An hour in the afternoon without the children can also be a valuable time for parents to center and refresh their energies by resting or doing something they want to do. If your child is not used to a quiet time and you want to institute one, think it through first. What time will work for you? What are the parameters of acceptable behavior? For example, does the child need to sleep or can he just stay quietly on his bed? What kind of doll or toy, if any, will you make accessible to him? Will the room be darkened? What needs to be done in preparation? Going to the bathroom, washing hands, or putting shoes neatly under the chair? Will you sing or tell a story? A kinderharp is wonderful for calming a child and helping him go off to sleep. If you want to sit with your child until he falls asleep, look and act very sleepy yourself—eyelids drooping, not talking or answering questions, yawning, and letting sleep ooze from your pores. Putting your hand on a child's head or back can also be very calming. If you don't have such a nap time, you will probably find that your child comes home from a morning program and just wants to sit or play alone for a while after lunch anyway. The children have been so active in a group during the morning that a more inward time provides needed balance.
Bedtime
What is bedtime like at your house? Does the evening have a rhythm to it, ending in going to bed at a regular time and accompanied by a regular set of activities? A regular bedtime preceded by a set ritual can help calm your child and prevent arguments. It can also help him learn to do more and more of the activities involved in getting ready for bed by himself as he becomes older. This will also help him feel more secure when you have a babysitter if the sitter is taught to do things in the same order.
How a child enters sleep is important for refreshing the spirit as well as the body. Falling asleep and waking are portals to the spiritual world, the world of dreams and inspirations. How we and our children enter sleep and wake up can affect the quality of both sleeping and waking life. With a young child, the entire time after dinner is often focused on leading toward bedtime. Quiet play can be followed by straightening up the room, then by a bath when needed or washing up, brushing teeth, and putting on pajamas. Talking slowly or singing softly can help set a quiet mood for bedtime. Lighting a candle in the room and then whispering can help create a mood of calmness and sharing. A song, a story, a verse, or a prayer that unites the child's soul with the divine can all help a child drift peacefully into sleep. You might play some music on the kinderharp if you have one. If you have used a candle, you'll want to blow it out before leaving the room, but its warm, soft light can be very calming during the song and story. If your child has difficulty going to sleep, many more suggestions can be found in the essay "Sleeping and Waking" in Lifeways (8) and in Seven Times the Sun. (9)
Children love consciousness and cling to it, and thus they will stay up to the point of becoming overtired. They really can't be depended on to go to bed when they need to! When I first enrolled in the teacher training program at the Waldorf Institute, my children were in kindergarten and second grade and were going to bed at 8:30. One of the instructors talked about sleep and suggested that my children could easily be going to bed at 7:30. I thought, "Not my kids! Eight-thirty is hard enough!" But I decided to try this suggestion to see if it would work. To my utter surprise, the children went to bed an hour earlier without a fuss and slept an hour longer at night, even though they hadn't seemed tired on the old schedule. I was dumbfounded! I have had similar experiences, suggesting that preschool parents start their child for bed at 7 p.m. instead of putting him to bed at 11 p.m. To their surprise, it took less than three days for the child to get into the new rhythm, so that one boy even told his babysitter that it was time for bed in the early evening.
If your child goes to bed early, will he wake up at the crack of dawn? You will have to try it and see. A preschool child who wakes up bright and smiling with the sun can't understand why adults want her to go back to sleep! But most children will not wake up so early, and they can be taught to put on a robe and slippers, if it is cold, and to play in their room (often with something that has been set out after they have gone to sleep) if you need to sleep a little longer.
Mornings
The transition out of sleep is also an important time, and focusing attention on this time of day can help both adults and children. How do you wake up? Many parents have found that getting up a half hour before the rest of the family gives them a quiet, centered time in the morning that affects their whole day. Or, if they don't get up early, they arrange as many things as possible the night before: what clothes each child will wear, jackets or snowsuits and mittens if needed, bags for school, lunches, the breakfast table, and whatever else is needed. The biggest problem with mornings is that they are often rushed, which makes children move even more slowly and puts everyone in a bad mood.
Assuming you wake your child, how do you do it? Margret Meyerkort reminds us:
It is important for both children and adults that the experience of the night-consciousness be allowed to stay more or less actively for a while just below the level of the dayconsciousness. For here rest the hints, understandings, reassurances and sense of the spiritual world. Therefore the alarm-clock needs to be kept well away from the young child, for it is such a cold, stern and literally shocking awakener. After such an awakening, the child could be disgruntled for hours afterwards. Instead the parent can hum a melody or sing a seasonal or morning song. (10)
Holding a young child up to the window to see the light of the new day is also a nice way to start the morning.
Because a child is still in a kind of night-consciousness after awakening, he often can't cope with any kind of questions for the first ten or fifteen minutes. He simply doesn't have the day-consciousness to come up with the answer, so try to avoid questions and choices. Make your choices together the night before, about what to wear and so forth, so that morning doesn't have to become a battleground of the wills.
Once your child is fully awake, do the events of getting ready for the day have a particular order? Remember that doing things in an orderly way gives a child something to learn and makes it much more likely that your child will remember to brush her teeth and hair when she is school-aged, or won't forget even though it is Saturday. Think about your mornings: getting dressed, eating breakfast, brushing teeth, brushing hair; what about making the bed (together at first)?
Greeting the day is something that children love to do with a verse or a song. If you don't know any, here are two suggestions:
Morning has come.
Night is away.
Rise with the sun
And welcome the day!
—ELISABETH LEBRET
Good morning, dear earth; Good morning, dear sun!
Good morning dear stones and flowers every one!
Good morning dear busy bees and birds in the trees!
Good morning to you and good morning to me!
—UNKNOWN
Here is a verse by Rudolf Steiner that can easily have hand gestures added as you point to your eyes, your heart, make a circle like the sun, and put your head on your hands in a resting gesture.
With my own eyes
I see the world,
The lovely world of God.
My heart must give thanks
That I may live
In this, God's world,
That I may wake
In the brightness of the day,
And may rest at night
In the blessing of God. (11)
THE RHYTHM OF THE WEEK
Helping your young child achieve a sense for the rhythm of the week is more easily accomplished if special activities regularly occur on a specific day. If you tend to go to the park once a week, going every Tuesday will give your child a sense of this activity as a punctuation mark for the week; it will also help you organize your other activities. If you often bake with your child, could you do it every Monday, adding another rhythmically recurring event to your child's life?
In former times work was done according to the days of the week as expressed in this traditional verse:
Wash on Monday
Iron on Tuesday
Mend on Wednesday
Churn on Thursday
Clean on Friday
Bake on Saturday
Rest on Sunday
This kind of rhythm is still observed in the Amish communities and, rather than being boring, it creates for them a pattern in the chaos of having so much to do in daily life. While most of us no longer live according to such rhythms of work, if we appreciate their value for the young child we can do certain activities on set days, or shop together on a certain day, so the child starts to feel at home in the week and its recurring rhythm.
Within the pattern of the week, something needs to be said about the Sabbath, which used to be a very special day in which no work or play occurred during the observance of religious practices. If your family doesn't go to church, temple, or mosque, this special day (Sunday, Saturday, or Friday) may have lost its sense of a day for inwardness, for communion with God, oneself, nature, or the family. Think about what your family does on this day. Whether or not you go to church, would it be nourishing to do something regularly, like having a special breakfast, getting out into nature, or having spiritual study for adults with Bible stories told to the children? What would be meaningful for your family?
The days of the week all have specific qualities, colors, grains, activities, and planets associated with them. For example, Tuesday is associated with Mars (which is reflected in the words mardi in French and martes in Spanish). Since Mars is the god of war in Roman mythology, the theme could be considered strength and energy, and activities could involve heavy chores, sports, and so forth. The Waldorf-inspired Living Home Kindergarten curriculum discusses the various qualities in greater detail for anyone who is interested in learning more (see the resources listed at the end of this chapter).
CELEBRATING FESTIVALS AND THE RHYTHM OF THE YEAR
The rhythm of the year is marked by the changing relationship of the earth to the sun, producing the seasonal changes we can often take for granted. Many of the major religions acknowledge and incorporate our experience of the year into the celebrations of their festivals, for example using festivals of light around the time of the winter solstice.
Many people today feel a renewed need for festivals and meaningful celebrations or rituals in their lives. Even if they have turned away from the religious upbringing of their childhood, they are still seeking new ways of creating community and celebrating meaningful events in their lives (such as marriages), or finding new ways to approach the meaning of Christmas despite the commercialism surrounding it today. The celebration of festivals is not only important in individuals' lives, but it is also important socially and for the possibility it provides to step out of "ordinary time" and be connected with something more abiding. Steiner felt that renewed awareness of the celebration of festivals could form a valuable link between the earthly and divine worlds.
I encourage you to explore the deeper meanings of the festivals of the year within your religion or heritage and find ways to celebrate them that are meaningful to you and that can nourish your children. Because I
came from a Christian background, my greatest familiarity was with the Christian festivals, but I have also learned a great deal from the Jewish, Buddhist, and Moslem parents of my students, who celebrate their festivals with their children in a living way and shared their efforts with our classes. Celebrating the Festivals with Children and several other books listed at the end of this chapter can provide helpful backgrounds on the inner meaning of festivals and ways to celebrate them. (12)
Festivals, Family and Food relates numerous stories, recipes, and craft ideas for celebrating the major and lesser-known festivals of the Christian year with children. (13) Remember that, with young children, the preparation for the festival—the baking, making special presents, decorating, and singing special songs year after year—is as important as the celebration itself. Be sure to include your children in all of the preparation activities! In trying to convey the inner spiritual realities of a festival to a young child, remember that what you do speaks more loudly than what you say. The care you put into making a present teaches more about giving than a lecture on divine love. In bringing festivals to young children, tell the story in simple images they can follow. Then the story, like the one of King Haman and Mordecai accompanied by noisemakers and the Hamantaschen cookies, will be a wonderful celebration for the young child. An example related to Easter comes through a story from the Waldorf kindergartens in Britain about a caterpillar who wanted to be like a flower and worship the sun. (14) Mother Earth told him that there was a way of transformation, but it was almost like dying and being born again in a new form. The brave caterpillar becoming a flower that can fly is an image of the resurrection in which nature mirrors the Easter miracle as well as our own potential for inner transformation.
Christmas is a festival that young children relate to naturally because Jesus as a baby is very near to them. The celebration of Advent with children makes a time of inner preparation more visible both to them and to us. The Advent calendar, with its magic windows, and the Advent wreath that can be lighted each night as a story is told, can help keep the inner aspects of Christmas from getting lost in the flurry of activity.
In addition to whatever religious festivals you celebrate with your children, you can enrich your own and your children's lives by observing the passing of the seasons. Seasonal songs, foods prepared in special ways, and seasonal activities all help raise our awareness of the changes in nature that surround us. Both Festivals, Family and Food and The Children's Year suggest a wealth of things to do with your children, and The Living Home Kindergarten program comes in four volumes corresponding to the four seasons.
You can bring a bit of nature into your home through a seasonal table, a place where you can keep special things, like the shells collected at the beach during the summer or a special birthday card from grandma. The colors of the cloth on this little table can be changed with the seasons, just as the objects on it change to reflect the changes in nature.
CELEBRATING BIRTHDAYS
Children's birthdays are special festivals that parents can find either delightful or a real strain. In planning celebrations for children, remember, the simpler, the better. Try to avoid sensory overload. If you don't actively enjoy a place, chances are your child shouldn't be there either. It is unfortunate that so many parties for young children now occur in pizza or ice-cream parlors with blaring music, nauseating clowns, or "singing" mechanical characters and video games.
Many suggestions for delightful birthday celebrations at home can be found in Festivals, Family and Food. With a group of children you can do some movement games, or try decorating "treasure bags" and taking a walk in the woods, or making "fairy gardens" out of moss on a paper plate and decorated with acorns and a pretty stone that the children find.
A birthday celebration, even just within the family, is a way of saying, "We're glad you were born!" Ways of letting the child be special that day can include having a special drawing or crown at her place at breakfast, letting her choose what will be cooked for dinner, or whatever traditions you develop. Think of traditions you might want to start, such as making a card for your child each year that includes several photos of that year— riding a tricycle, getting a new kitty, going on a trip. Such cards can be saved and become things that will be treasured when the child is older.
For the young child, a birthday story about his or her coming down to earth over the "rainbow bridge" is often told in Waldorf early childhood programs and is beautifully recounted in the children's book Little Angel's Journey, listed at the end of this chapter. The story involves a little angel or "star child" who wants to come down to earth after having dreamed of or seen its parents on the earth. The big angel says it would be possible to become an earthly child by traveling over the rainbow bridge, which reaches from heaven down to earth. The little angel finally agrees to leave its wings behind when reassured that they will be safely kept until his or her return. Then the little angel crosses through the many colors of the rainbow, while on the earth the seasons change three times. Then it becomes very dark, almost like going to sleep, and when the little angel opens its eyes, there is the loving woman and the man with the kind heart who were in the dream. And the little angel knows it has found its earthly home as the parents welcome him or her and say, "And your name will be . . . Such an image nourishes a young child by affirming that we know there is more to him or her than just the body.
Birthdays provide us with an opportunity to note the passage of time, which seems to go by so quickly when we see how our children grow and change in the course of a year. Birthdays, holidays, and the changing seasons all provide a familiarity and rhythm that can nourish us as well as our children. Through the turning of the days, weeks, and years, a rhythmical lifestyle is one of the greatest gifts we can provide the young child.
RECOMMENDED RESOURCES
Rhythm and Family Life
Festivals, Birthdays, and Seasons of the Year
Homeschooling: Waldorf Preschool and Kindergarten
NOTES
Bibliography - You Are Your Child's First Teacher
Much of a child's happiness depends on our success in conducting the daily life with and around him with a minimum amount of friction. Every time we may feel like stepping in with advice or an order or a correction, we might well pause for a moment to do two things: firstly, to ask ourselves whether our interference at this particular instant is really necessary; and secondly, to find out what the child is actually trying to do. (1)
In this chapter, first we will consider why rhythm is so supportive to every member of the family, and then we will look at the activities of daily life and some practical suggestions you will be able to apply immediately. Finally, we'll consider the rhythm of the week and then the rhythm of the year as it connects us to both nature and spirit.
CREATING RHYTHM IN DAILY LIFE
We are surrounded by rhythm in nature: the alternation of day and night, the phases of the moon, the cycle of the seasons, the ebb and flow of the tides. Our bodies are permeated by rhythm, in the beating of our hearts, the breathing of our lungs, women's cycles of fertility, and the circadian rhythms of our metabolism. But as modern human beings we have also established a life that is removed from the rhythms of nature. Through electric lighting we can work well into the night; we can shop at twenty-four-hour supermarkets; we can fly strawberries to Minnesota in January. Through technology we can live outside most of the rhythms of nature. As a result, we have often become unaware of the messages and rhythms of our bodies and have forgotten the importance of rhythm in daily life. Steiner describes it as follows:
Rhythm holds sway in the whole of nature, up to the level of man. Then, and only then is there a change. The rhythm which through the course of the year holds sway in the forces of growth, of propagation and so forth, ceases when we come to man. For man is to have his roots in freedom; and the more civilized he is, the more does this rhythm decline. As the light disappears at Christmas time, so has rhythm apparently departed from the life of man. Chaos prevails. But man must give birth again to rhythm out of his innermost being, his own initiative. (2)
A baby, who has been surrounded by the mother's heartbeat and rocked by her breathing in the womb, emerges into earthly life and must find new rhythms, gradually developing from the fast and irregular heartbeat and breathing of the newborn to the rhythm of one breath to each four heartbeats of the adult.
A regular lifestyle, like the pattern of life in the womb, offers a stable environment during the rapid growth and changes in rhythm of the body during childhood. Children provided with this regular life feel confident about their world and are not concerned by uncertainty about when the next thing will happen. Rhythm in home life can also help calm a nervous or difficult child by turning the child's life into a series of events in which he participates, and from which he gains a new sense of security and competency. Regular mealtimes and regular nap- and bedtimes start orienting the child to a natural feeling for the passing of time. They go a long way toward preventing discipline problems, because bedtimes become something that happen as regularly as the sky turning dark— there is no one to argue with or complain to each night.
Grunelius summarizes, "The rhythm then becomes a habit, is accepted as self-evident and will eliminate many difficulties, struggles and arguments about eating and going to bed. . . . Regularity should prevail in as many of the child's daily activities as possible. It is the key to establishing good habits for life." (3)
She gives an example of how supportive rhythm is for young children and how much they learn through it by telling about taking care of a two-year-old child whom she bathed each day in the same way— first soaping her hands, then her arms, then her neck, and so on. When she took care of the child again after several weeks, the child spontaneously asked, "May I wash myself?" and proceeded carefully and happily through the whole sequence exactly as it had been done so many times before. The child was extremely satisfied with herself! (4) This example amazed me, because it never occurred to me to wash a child in a regular fashion, thus providing the child with something it would then be possible to learn.
Andrea Gambardella, a Waldorf teacher, explains, "With the young child and the elementary school student this requirement for an outer structure continues to be vital to growth and emotional well-being. Learning that there is a 'time for all things' is a life's lesson. Now is the time for you to play and do as you will, now for a meal, now for homework, now to prepare for bed." (5)
Rhythm is also a blessing for parents, because it enables the daily activity of life to flow more smoothly, requires less energy, and becomes a platform that supports the family, its activities, and interactions. Many parents don't discover the secrets of rhythm until they have two or more children and suddenly there isn't enough time not to be organized! Regular meals prevent constant feeding and cleaning up or over-hungry and whiny children; regular bedtimes suddenly free the evening for adult conversation and life again as a couple. The benefits are many, and yet it is often difficult to create rhythm in family life. It requires an inner discipline of its own!
Creating rhythm in one's life doesn't mean being rigid and dogmatic. There is still plenty of room for special activities and surprises (and sometimes the piper to pay the next day when the child has missed a needed nap or had a late, exciting evening—but it's worth it!). But freedom is not without form, and one is truly free when not hampered by a disorganized life. The rhythmic structure imposed on a young child and permeated with the parents' love is a discipline in the most positive sense of the word. And as your children become older, they will transform this outer structure into an inner self-discipline that will be invaluable for homework and getting other jobs done. Putting attention into these areas can help the quality of life for both you and your children from the time they are toddlers until they leave home.
A Word of Caution
Before reading the following practical suggestions, remind yourself that I'm not suggesting you have to do all these things to be a good parent! Rather, by mentioning so many different ideas, I hope that you will be drawn to adding one rhythmical element to even one area of your child's life. Most people are too busy to have every part of the day be a wonderful time for their children. In my house, breakfasts were efficient, without frills; there was no way, during the school year, that I was going to put special place settings on the table! So I focused my attention on bedtimes. For someone else, however, early mornings might be a great time for the family to be together, especially if evenings are shortened by a parent working late.
There are many blogs and e-zines today portraying a picture-perfect "organic" home life that may make you feel like giving up before you get started. Real life, like the tides, ebbs and flows. There may be chaotic times when all you can focus on is the two most basic activities: eating and sleeping. Because they always occur, they are an excellent place to start and are more than enough during challenging times! There is no point to feeling guilty on top of feeling overwhelmed—life happens!
I suggest you start by focusing on the area of your life that is going the least smoothly. It might be nap time, or it might be dinner, or it might be getting the children out the door in the morning. Whatever the area, think about what happens now, and how you could make things go more smoothly by applying some of the suggestions given here or by inventing some of your own. Having a regular rhythm, adding a bit of ritual like a song or verse, and avoiding too many choices can transform a hectic part of family life into an activity or transition that flows smoothly. Discuss your ideas with your partner, if you have one, agree on a new series of actions for an activity, and then start doing them with the children. You'll be amazed and supported by the results!
Mealtimes
Eating together is a major part of family life and can be an important force in bringing people together. However, attention needs to be focused on mealtimes so they don't become tense or chaotic or simply disappear because everyone is eating on the run.
When do meals occur at your house? Who is present? There are no right or wrong answers when it comes to rhythms and family life. You need to consider the needs of your family members and decide what works for you. The important thing is to bring your consciousness to your situation and work toward what feels best. We know a family where the father and three-year-old would have breakfast together on weekdays before he went to work while the mother got some extra sleep. It was a special time for the two of them that they really cherished. Similarly, work schedules will probably determine what time dinner happens and whether your children will need to eat before you do. Whatever you work out for your family, having meals at a regular time (and regular snacks for the children as needed) can provide an important anchor for rhythm in family life.
Now look at the setting. Do you have a table around which the family can gather? Any little touches you add, like a candle or fresh flowers, can help make meals a special time for the family. I found that, in the summertime, if I set the breakfast table the night before, even I felt nourished and cared for by waking up to a table that was inviting. And all the members of my family, who tended to get up and eat at different times during the summer, felt "held" by the family, even though no one else might be at the table with them.
Next consider the atmosphere. Are mealtimes relaxed and conducive to digestion? Small children in particular need to eat in calm surroundings, without the television or radio on. (The six o'clock news is enough to give anyone indigestion with their graphic reports of murders and other atrocities.) Similarly, the adults should be careful not to be negative about people or to dwell on disappointments of the day. Children take everything in and are unable to disconnect emotions from the functioning of their bodies.
Conversation at meals changes with the arrival of children. It becomes impossible to conduct adult conversation in the same way, and children need to be accepted as conversationalists at the table. Mealtimes then become a time for listening, sharing, and balancing conversations so that each child can bring something of himself or herself to the family's time together. The essay "Family Meals" in Lifeways shares many ideas for harmonious meals with growing children, (6) as does Shea Darian's book Seven Times the Sun. (7)
Beginning the meal with a spoken or sung blessing encourages feelings of thankfulness and ensures that everyone starts the meal together. Young children are especially nourished by whatever ritual you develop around your family's mealtimes. But you need to bring feelings of gratitude, not empty words said in haste! If you don't have any graces from your religious background, here are two that express an awareness of the connectedness of life and gratitude for our sustenance.
Before the flour, the mill,
Before the mill, the grain,
Before the grain, the sun and rain,
The beauty of God's will.
—UNKNOWN
Earth, who gives to us this food,
Sun, who makes it ripe and good,
Dear Sun, dear Earth, by you we live,
Our loving thanks to you we give.
—CHRISTIAN MORGENSTERN
It is important for children to learn to be grateful for their food and for the efforts of the cook in preparing it. Such an attitude will be fostered by the care we take in preparing and serving the food. This is another area in which cultivating our own gratitude and appreciation for the gift of life will resonate with our children. Handling a child's dislike of certain foods requires some creative thinking. You will need to set your own rules about what can be said about food and what needs to be eaten before a child can leave the table or have dessert. At our house we had a rule that no one could say food was "icky" and that they had to try one (or maybe three) bites of something. What about picky eaters? If you don't offer extra snacks or alternative meals, children are pretty survival oriented. It's sometimes helpful to realize that your job is to put wholesome, nutritious food in front of your child; it is his or her job and responsibility to eat and grow—something that you can't force. Usually the less said, the better.
So that meals can become a calm and harmonious experience for everyone, certain behaviors must be maintained. Sitting in the chair unless one leaves the room can be a minimal expectation, followed by learning how to ask for things politely. If a young child who is whiny or who throws a fit is immediately taken out of the room by a serious adult until he's ready to return, he will probably change his behavior within three minutes. No one wants to be away from the action!
Do your dinners have a formal ending, just drift off, or degenerate rapidly? Having children ask to be excused at the end of a meal is not an old-fashioned formality but a useful way to keep track of who's finished and can help a child clearly distinguish whether he should be sitting at the table or off playing (no coming and going, crawling under the table, chasing the dog, and so forth!). Although some families prefer that everyone stay at the table until a song or short verse is said to end the meal, we preferred that our children ask to be excused when they were finished. This gave them a short time to run around (outside of the dining room) and provided us with a chance to sit back and talk as a couple for a few minutes before we called everyone back to do their jobs of clearing the table, loading the dishwasher, washing the pots and pans, and so forth.
Mealtimes provide one of the earliest opportunities for each child to participate in family chores. While each child can take his or her plate to the kitchen, jobs that benefit the whole family, such as setting the table, clearing the dishes, and wiping the counters, can be rotated among the children. Even the youngest child can have his or her special task in contributing to the family meal, such as putting the napkins at each place.
Mealtimes will change as your children grow older. Meals are different with toddlers, teenagers, or children spanning a range of ages, but gathering around the table to eat and participating in the family's evolving rituals can become an irreplaceable part of your family's life together.
Nutrition
Although it is important for parents to be aware of nutrition, it is just as well to leave young children unaware of the intricacies of daily nutritional requirements. When a child is truly allergic to a food such as milk or peanuts, he needs to be able to tell people so he won't inadvertently eat it. However, your analysis of ingredients or searching for refined sugars will make preschoolers pick apart everything on the table rather than feeling that what they are being served is good. Allergic becomes a synonym for "I don't like," and any kind of shared snack becomes impossible because Liam doesn't eat dairy and Jennifer doesn't eat wheat and Michael is allergic to peanuts and Addie can't have anything with sugar in it.
Your child's trust that what you have given him to eat is good for him is equally or more important than the item itself; if three- and four-year-olds are excessively conscious about nutrition, it will only be divisive. I once saw at the lunch table two kindergarten boys who noticed that one had a huge lunchbox with a big thermos of milk, two white-bread sandwiches, potato chips, and a fruit roll-up, while the other had carob soy milk, a whole-wheat sandwich with tofu and sprouts, a piece of fruit, and a granola bar. These children, who were starting to become self-aware and more aware of the world around them, noticed the discrepancy. One said to the teacher, "My mother says that milk is good for you and helps your bones and teeth."
The other said, "My mom says that milk gives you mucus!"
"Who's right?" they asked together.
My eyebrows went up as I waited to see what my assistant would answer, and I was delighted when she wisely replied, "Your mother is right," which satisfied both boys.
We found that the preschool-aged children in our program had become so picky about food that serving any kind of common snack was almost impossible. The social experience of eating together was difficult to achieve at best!
Children instinctively feel that the world is whole and good and that whatever their parents give them is good for them. It isn't necessary to tell your child more than is minimally necessary for their health or is required to make distinctions about matters like vegetarianism. What you do will be more important than long explanations. "Our family doesn't eat meat" is usually enough for a child to know, and your telling friends and teachers will help keep the child from having to make choices. With something like trying to avoid sugar, if you feed your child wisely at home and tell grandma that you wish she would put away the candy jar before visits, then you may decide that the little bit your child eats at a birthday party or a friend's house may not be worth all of the intellectual and emotional investment required to tell the child he can't have it. These are issues you will have to discuss with your partner and decisions you will have to make based on your medical and philosophical convictions. I can only tell you as a preschool teacher that the awareness and misinformation children have about nutrition these days reflects an increased consciousness of the metabolic sphere that wreaks havoc with the unitive worldview of the young child.
Nap or Quiet Times
Young children need restful or quiet times during the day in order to be restored for play. Like the rhythm of breathing, the child's activities alternate between active play, during which the entire body is in motion, and quiet times, where he might enjoy a snack or a story. When a child focuses his attention on something close at hand, such as when he is making something, coloring, or modeling with beeswax, the activity brings the child into himself and balances his active play.
Many children today sleep very little and seem ready to give up afternoon naps at an early age. However, the afternoon nap is of great benefit to help a child digest the impressions of the day, and it provides welcome downtime for parents as well. The time can be spent sleeping or it can just be a quiet time during which the child has to stay on his bed or in his room. If the rhythm of a daily rest is maintained, the child will learn that this is a time to be by himself and not to call on mother or father. In our LifeWays program, all the full-day children sleep, and when I taught kindergarten, many of the five-year-olds would in fact fall asleep, even though they wouldn't ordinarily nap at home. The others would rest while playing silently on their mat with a favorite doll. Again, the same song is used each time to start and end nap time—and the ending is especially welcome because "Red Bird" (a felt bird on a stick) comes and wakes the children or lets them get up to play.
Recognizing the value of a quiet time for preschool and kindergarten children is the first step in instituting one. An hour in the afternoon without the children can also be a valuable time for parents to center and refresh their energies by resting or doing something they want to do. If your child is not used to a quiet time and you want to institute one, think it through first. What time will work for you? What are the parameters of acceptable behavior? For example, does the child need to sleep or can he just stay quietly on his bed? What kind of doll or toy, if any, will you make accessible to him? Will the room be darkened? What needs to be done in preparation? Going to the bathroom, washing hands, or putting shoes neatly under the chair? Will you sing or tell a story? A kinderharp is wonderful for calming a child and helping him go off to sleep. If you want to sit with your child until he falls asleep, look and act very sleepy yourself—eyelids drooping, not talking or answering questions, yawning, and letting sleep ooze from your pores. Putting your hand on a child's head or back can also be very calming. If you don't have such a nap time, you will probably find that your child comes home from a morning program and just wants to sit or play alone for a while after lunch anyway. The children have been so active in a group during the morning that a more inward time provides needed balance.
Bedtime
What is bedtime like at your house? Does the evening have a rhythm to it, ending in going to bed at a regular time and accompanied by a regular set of activities? A regular bedtime preceded by a set ritual can help calm your child and prevent arguments. It can also help him learn to do more and more of the activities involved in getting ready for bed by himself as he becomes older. This will also help him feel more secure when you have a babysitter if the sitter is taught to do things in the same order.
How a child enters sleep is important for refreshing the spirit as well as the body. Falling asleep and waking are portals to the spiritual world, the world of dreams and inspirations. How we and our children enter sleep and wake up can affect the quality of both sleeping and waking life. With a young child, the entire time after dinner is often focused on leading toward bedtime. Quiet play can be followed by straightening up the room, then by a bath when needed or washing up, brushing teeth, and putting on pajamas. Talking slowly or singing softly can help set a quiet mood for bedtime. Lighting a candle in the room and then whispering can help create a mood of calmness and sharing. A song, a story, a verse, or a prayer that unites the child's soul with the divine can all help a child drift peacefully into sleep. You might play some music on the kinderharp if you have one. If you have used a candle, you'll want to blow it out before leaving the room, but its warm, soft light can be very calming during the song and story. If your child has difficulty going to sleep, many more suggestions can be found in the essay "Sleeping and Waking" in Lifeways (8) and in Seven Times the Sun. (9)
Children love consciousness and cling to it, and thus they will stay up to the point of becoming overtired. They really can't be depended on to go to bed when they need to! When I first enrolled in the teacher training program at the Waldorf Institute, my children were in kindergarten and second grade and were going to bed at 8:30. One of the instructors talked about sleep and suggested that my children could easily be going to bed at 7:30. I thought, "Not my kids! Eight-thirty is hard enough!" But I decided to try this suggestion to see if it would work. To my utter surprise, the children went to bed an hour earlier without a fuss and slept an hour longer at night, even though they hadn't seemed tired on the old schedule. I was dumbfounded! I have had similar experiences, suggesting that preschool parents start their child for bed at 7 p.m. instead of putting him to bed at 11 p.m. To their surprise, it took less than three days for the child to get into the new rhythm, so that one boy even told his babysitter that it was time for bed in the early evening.
If your child goes to bed early, will he wake up at the crack of dawn? You will have to try it and see. A preschool child who wakes up bright and smiling with the sun can't understand why adults want her to go back to sleep! But most children will not wake up so early, and they can be taught to put on a robe and slippers, if it is cold, and to play in their room (often with something that has been set out after they have gone to sleep) if you need to sleep a little longer.
Mornings
The transition out of sleep is also an important time, and focusing attention on this time of day can help both adults and children. How do you wake up? Many parents have found that getting up a half hour before the rest of the family gives them a quiet, centered time in the morning that affects their whole day. Or, if they don't get up early, they arrange as many things as possible the night before: what clothes each child will wear, jackets or snowsuits and mittens if needed, bags for school, lunches, the breakfast table, and whatever else is needed. The biggest problem with mornings is that they are often rushed, which makes children move even more slowly and puts everyone in a bad mood.
Assuming you wake your child, how do you do it? Margret Meyerkort reminds us:
It is important for both children and adults that the experience of the night-consciousness be allowed to stay more or less actively for a while just below the level of the dayconsciousness. For here rest the hints, understandings, reassurances and sense of the spiritual world. Therefore the alarm-clock needs to be kept well away from the young child, for it is such a cold, stern and literally shocking awakener. After such an awakening, the child could be disgruntled for hours afterwards. Instead the parent can hum a melody or sing a seasonal or morning song. (10)
Holding a young child up to the window to see the light of the new day is also a nice way to start the morning.
Because a child is still in a kind of night-consciousness after awakening, he often can't cope with any kind of questions for the first ten or fifteen minutes. He simply doesn't have the day-consciousness to come up with the answer, so try to avoid questions and choices. Make your choices together the night before, about what to wear and so forth, so that morning doesn't have to become a battleground of the wills.
Once your child is fully awake, do the events of getting ready for the day have a particular order? Remember that doing things in an orderly way gives a child something to learn and makes it much more likely that your child will remember to brush her teeth and hair when she is school-aged, or won't forget even though it is Saturday. Think about your mornings: getting dressed, eating breakfast, brushing teeth, brushing hair; what about making the bed (together at first)?
Greeting the day is something that children love to do with a verse or a song. If you don't know any, here are two suggestions:
Morning has come.
Night is away.
Rise with the sun
And welcome the day!
—ELISABETH LEBRET
Good morning, dear earth; Good morning, dear sun!
Good morning dear stones and flowers every one!
Good morning dear busy bees and birds in the trees!
Good morning to you and good morning to me!
—UNKNOWN
Here is a verse by Rudolf Steiner that can easily have hand gestures added as you point to your eyes, your heart, make a circle like the sun, and put your head on your hands in a resting gesture.
With my own eyes
I see the world,
The lovely world of God.
My heart must give thanks
That I may live
In this, God's world,
That I may wake
In the brightness of the day,
And may rest at night
In the blessing of God. (11)
THE RHYTHM OF THE WEEK
Helping your young child achieve a sense for the rhythm of the week is more easily accomplished if special activities regularly occur on a specific day. If you tend to go to the park once a week, going every Tuesday will give your child a sense of this activity as a punctuation mark for the week; it will also help you organize your other activities. If you often bake with your child, could you do it every Monday, adding another rhythmically recurring event to your child's life?
In former times work was done according to the days of the week as expressed in this traditional verse:
Wash on Monday
Iron on Tuesday
Mend on Wednesday
Churn on Thursday
Clean on Friday
Bake on Saturday
Rest on Sunday
This kind of rhythm is still observed in the Amish communities and, rather than being boring, it creates for them a pattern in the chaos of having so much to do in daily life. While most of us no longer live according to such rhythms of work, if we appreciate their value for the young child we can do certain activities on set days, or shop together on a certain day, so the child starts to feel at home in the week and its recurring rhythm.
Within the pattern of the week, something needs to be said about the Sabbath, which used to be a very special day in which no work or play occurred during the observance of religious practices. If your family doesn't go to church, temple, or mosque, this special day (Sunday, Saturday, or Friday) may have lost its sense of a day for inwardness, for communion with God, oneself, nature, or the family. Think about what your family does on this day. Whether or not you go to church, would it be nourishing to do something regularly, like having a special breakfast, getting out into nature, or having spiritual study for adults with Bible stories told to the children? What would be meaningful for your family?
The days of the week all have specific qualities, colors, grains, activities, and planets associated with them. For example, Tuesday is associated with Mars (which is reflected in the words mardi in French and martes in Spanish). Since Mars is the god of war in Roman mythology, the theme could be considered strength and energy, and activities could involve heavy chores, sports, and so forth. The Waldorf-inspired Living Home Kindergarten curriculum discusses the various qualities in greater detail for anyone who is interested in learning more (see the resources listed at the end of this chapter).
CELEBRATING FESTIVALS AND THE RHYTHM OF THE YEAR
The rhythm of the year is marked by the changing relationship of the earth to the sun, producing the seasonal changes we can often take for granted. Many of the major religions acknowledge and incorporate our experience of the year into the celebrations of their festivals, for example using festivals of light around the time of the winter solstice.
Many people today feel a renewed need for festivals and meaningful celebrations or rituals in their lives. Even if they have turned away from the religious upbringing of their childhood, they are still seeking new ways of creating community and celebrating meaningful events in their lives (such as marriages), or finding new ways to approach the meaning of Christmas despite the commercialism surrounding it today. The celebration of festivals is not only important in individuals' lives, but it is also important socially and for the possibility it provides to step out of "ordinary time" and be connected with something more abiding. Steiner felt that renewed awareness of the celebration of festivals could form a valuable link between the earthly and divine worlds.
I encourage you to explore the deeper meanings of the festivals of the year within your religion or heritage and find ways to celebrate them that are meaningful to you and that can nourish your children. Because I
came from a Christian background, my greatest familiarity was with the Christian festivals, but I have also learned a great deal from the Jewish, Buddhist, and Moslem parents of my students, who celebrate their festivals with their children in a living way and shared their efforts with our classes. Celebrating the Festivals with Children and several other books listed at the end of this chapter can provide helpful backgrounds on the inner meaning of festivals and ways to celebrate them. (12)
Festivals, Family and Food relates numerous stories, recipes, and craft ideas for celebrating the major and lesser-known festivals of the Christian year with children. (13) Remember that, with young children, the preparation for the festival—the baking, making special presents, decorating, and singing special songs year after year—is as important as the celebration itself. Be sure to include your children in all of the preparation activities! In trying to convey the inner spiritual realities of a festival to a young child, remember that what you do speaks more loudly than what you say. The care you put into making a present teaches more about giving than a lecture on divine love. In bringing festivals to young children, tell the story in simple images they can follow. Then the story, like the one of King Haman and Mordecai accompanied by noisemakers and the Hamantaschen cookies, will be a wonderful celebration for the young child. An example related to Easter comes through a story from the Waldorf kindergartens in Britain about a caterpillar who wanted to be like a flower and worship the sun. (14) Mother Earth told him that there was a way of transformation, but it was almost like dying and being born again in a new form. The brave caterpillar becoming a flower that can fly is an image of the resurrection in which nature mirrors the Easter miracle as well as our own potential for inner transformation.
Christmas is a festival that young children relate to naturally because Jesus as a baby is very near to them. The celebration of Advent with children makes a time of inner preparation more visible both to them and to us. The Advent calendar, with its magic windows, and the Advent wreath that can be lighted each night as a story is told, can help keep the inner aspects of Christmas from getting lost in the flurry of activity.
In addition to whatever religious festivals you celebrate with your children, you can enrich your own and your children's lives by observing the passing of the seasons. Seasonal songs, foods prepared in special ways, and seasonal activities all help raise our awareness of the changes in nature that surround us. Both Festivals, Family and Food and The Children's Year suggest a wealth of things to do with your children, and The Living Home Kindergarten program comes in four volumes corresponding to the four seasons.
You can bring a bit of nature into your home through a seasonal table, a place where you can keep special things, like the shells collected at the beach during the summer or a special birthday card from grandma. The colors of the cloth on this little table can be changed with the seasons, just as the objects on it change to reflect the changes in nature.
CELEBRATING BIRTHDAYS
Children's birthdays are special festivals that parents can find either delightful or a real strain. In planning celebrations for children, remember, the simpler, the better. Try to avoid sensory overload. If you don't actively enjoy a place, chances are your child shouldn't be there either. It is unfortunate that so many parties for young children now occur in pizza or ice-cream parlors with blaring music, nauseating clowns, or "singing" mechanical characters and video games.
Many suggestions for delightful birthday celebrations at home can be found in Festivals, Family and Food. With a group of children you can do some movement games, or try decorating "treasure bags" and taking a walk in the woods, or making "fairy gardens" out of moss on a paper plate and decorated with acorns and a pretty stone that the children find.
A birthday celebration, even just within the family, is a way of saying, "We're glad you were born!" Ways of letting the child be special that day can include having a special drawing or crown at her place at breakfast, letting her choose what will be cooked for dinner, or whatever traditions you develop. Think of traditions you might want to start, such as making a card for your child each year that includes several photos of that year— riding a tricycle, getting a new kitty, going on a trip. Such cards can be saved and become things that will be treasured when the child is older.
For the young child, a birthday story about his or her coming down to earth over the "rainbow bridge" is often told in Waldorf early childhood programs and is beautifully recounted in the children's book Little Angel's Journey, listed at the end of this chapter. The story involves a little angel or "star child" who wants to come down to earth after having dreamed of or seen its parents on the earth. The big angel says it would be possible to become an earthly child by traveling over the rainbow bridge, which reaches from heaven down to earth. The little angel finally agrees to leave its wings behind when reassured that they will be safely kept until his or her return. Then the little angel crosses through the many colors of the rainbow, while on the earth the seasons change three times. Then it becomes very dark, almost like going to sleep, and when the little angel opens its eyes, there is the loving woman and the man with the kind heart who were in the dream. And the little angel knows it has found its earthly home as the parents welcome him or her and say, "And your name will be . . . Such an image nourishes a young child by affirming that we know there is more to him or her than just the body.
Birthdays provide us with an opportunity to note the passage of time, which seems to go by so quickly when we see how our children grow and change in the course of a year. Birthdays, holidays, and the changing seasons all provide a familiarity and rhythm that can nourish us as well as our children. Through the turning of the days, weeks, and years, a rhythmical lifestyle is one of the greatest gifts we can provide the young child.
RECOMMENDED RESOURCES
Rhythm and Family Life
- Beyond the Rainbow Bridge, by Barbara Patterson and Pamela Bradley (Michaelmas Press).
- Gateways, Spindrift, and other books in the series by Margret Meyerkort (Wynstones Press). Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter contain a wide variety of poems, songs, and stories of the seasons and many contributions for festivals. Spindrift contains material from many different cultures for use throughout the year. Gateways contains sections on morning, evening, birthdays, and fairy tales.
- Rhythm in Home Life 127
- Lifeways: Working with Family Questions, edited by Gudrun Davy and Bons Voors (Hawthorn Press).
- Making a Family Home, by Shannon Honeybloom (SteinerBooks).
- Prayers for Parents and Children, by Rudolf Steiner (SteinerBooks).
- Rhythm of the Home. A quarterly e-zine with many contributors. At www.rhythmofthehome.com.
- Sanctuaries of Childhood: Nurturing a Child's Spiritual Life, by Shea Darian (Gilead Press).
- Seven Times the Sun: Guiding Your Child Through the Rhythms of the Day, by Shea Darian (Gilead Press).
- Simplicity Parenting, by Kim John Payne (Ballantine Books).
- The Spiritual Tasks of the Homemaker, by Manfred Schmidt-Brabant (Temple Lodge).
- This Is the Way We Work-a-Day, by Mary Schunemann. Available from www.naturallyyoucansing.com.
- Waldorf in the Home. The website www.waldorfinthehome.com provides articles and nearly two hundred DVDs and CDs of keynote presentations and workshops by leading Waldorf educators, including: "Family Matters: Homemaking 101 for Busy Parents," by Rahima Baldwin Dancy
- "Life as the Curriculum for Young Children," by Cynthia Aldinger
- Work and Play in Early Childhood, by Freya Jaffke (Floris).
Festivals, Birthdays, and Seasons of the Year
- Birthday, by Heather Jarman (Wynstone's Press).
- The Birthday Book, by Ann Druitt et al. (Hawthorn Press).
- "Create Your Own Family Celebrations." DVD by Esther Leisher from www.waldorfinthehome.org.
- Festivals, Family and Food, by Diana Carey and Judy Large (Hawthorn Press).
- Festivals Together: A Guide to Multicultural Celebration, by Sue Fitzjohn et al. (Hawthorn Press).
- The First Jewish Catalog, by Richard Siegel et al. (Jewish Publication Society of America).
- The Islamic Year: Surahs, Stories and Celebrations, by Noorah Al-Gailani and Chris Smith (Hawthorn Press).
- Little Angel's Journey, by Dzvinka Hayda (Trillium Forest Press). Retells the Waldorf birthday story of the child coming to birth over the rainbow bridge.
- The Nature Corner: Celebrating the Year's Cycle with a Seasonal Tableau, by M. V. Leeuwen and J. Moeskops (Floris).
- Sing Through the Seasons, by the Society of Brothers (The Plough Publishing).
Homeschooling: Waldorf Preschool and Kindergarten
- A Journey through Waldorf Homeschooling Kindergarten Curriculum, by Melisa Nielsen. Available at www.waldorfjourney.typepad.com.
- Kindergarten at Home with Your Three- to Six-year-Old, by Donna Simmons. Available at www.christopherushomeschool.com.
- "Little Acorn Learning." Monthly Waldorf-oriented guides and e-books from Eileen Straiton, available at www.littleacornlearning.com.
- The Living Home Kindergarten. Waldorf-inspired homeschooling program in four seasonal volumes, plus monthly consultation with a Waldorf teacher. Valuable throughout the early childhood years. Contact Live Education! at www.live-education.com.
- Waldorf in the Home. The website www.waldorfinthehome.com provides articles and nearly two hundred DVDs and CDs of keynote presentations and workshops by leading Waldorf educators, including: "Homeschooling: Which Style Is Right for You?" by Regina Mason "Waldorf Preschool and Kindergarten: Preparation for Life," by Daena Ross
NOTES
- Grunelius, Early Childhood Education, p. 28.
- Rudolf Steiner, Signs and Symbols of the Christmas Festival (Spring Valley, NY: Anthroposophic Press, 1969).
- Grunelius, Early Childhood Education, p. 27.
- Ibid.
- Andrea Gambardella, "Rhythm in Home Life," Waldorf Kindergarten Newsletter, Fall 1984, p. 10.
- Bons Voors, "Family Meals," in Davy and Voors, eds., Lifeways, pp. 154—60.
- Darian, Seven Times the Sun, pp. 41—58.
- Margret Meyerkort, "Sleeping and Waking," in Davy and Voors, eds., Lifeways, pp. 142-53.
- Darian, Seven Times the Sun, pp. 133—48.
- Meyerkort, "Sleeping and Waking," p. 150.
- Rudolf Steiner, Prayers for Mothers and Children (London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1983), p. 50.
- Friedel Lenz, Celebrating the Festivals with Children (Spring Valley, NY: Anthroposophic Press, 1986).
- Diana Carey and Judy Large, Festivals, Family and Food (Gloucestershire, UK: Hawthorn Press, 1982).
- Margret Meyerkort, ed., Spring (West Midlands, UK: Wynstones Press, 1983). Available from Rudolf Steiner College, 9200 Fair Oaks Blvd., Fair Oaks, California 95628.
Bibliography - You Are Your Child's First Teacher