W and C

This week it was back to the letters. Grant learned about W and C. We started with W on Monday. First we learned that Katie and her family started making a canoe to use on the nearby stream. In the story, Katie learned about the letter W and her father told her the story of The Fisherman and his Wife. I told Grant the same story and then we drew a picture from the story. Grant is starting to get better drawing with the block crayons, but they are a little challenging for him to use. We will have to add in some extra practice with those in the afternoons. I also introduced Grant to our form drawing and he practiced tracing that, and the letter W, in flour with his finger before moving onto practice on his chalkboard. This week's form is a hard one for him!

Chalkboard drawing for The Fisherman and His Wife including the letter W and this week's form

Grant's form drawing in his lesson book

Grant's "W is for Wave" drawing

Mom's "W is for wave" drawing

On Tuesday, we started our morning with a canoe ride around our lake since we were talking about Katie's family making a canoe. It was a beautiful fall morning and a perfect day for a canoe ride. We all enjoyed it. I did manage to drop Julia's hat and one of her shoes into the water, but both were recovered quickly.

During our music lesson on Tuesday, Julia came over for a visit and made it very difficult for Grant to play his penny whistle! Of course Grant did not mind the interruption and found it to be very funny. This week, his music lesson includes a ball-bouncing game to the verse of "1-2 buckle my shoe, 3-4 shut the door, etc... He is really enjoying that! It's like having P.E. right in the school room. I'm a little nervous about having a ball in the room, but so far there have not been any major disasters.

Johanna getting in on the ball bouncing game

We also wrote a summary of The Fisherman and his Wife in Grant's lesson book, talked more about W and words that start with W and he finished his picture from Monday. Grant has a little birch bark canoe he got in Minnesota, so during bath time he took it into the tub to see if it would float. It didn't float, so we talked about why and how it was different from our big canoe.

On Wednesday, Grant learned the letter C as I told him the story of The Poor Miller's Boy and his Cat. He had an interesting time trying to figure out my chalkboard drawing before he heard the story. He thought the man was trying to hit the cat (it took him awhile to figure out it was a cat) with the axe. I intended for the cat to be laying on a red rug, or Carpet, but Grant thought it was a pool of blood he was laying in from being hit by the ax. This has to be a boy's way of thinking, because surely Johanna would not have come up with such a gruesome story to go along with my drawing! Okay, so maybe this wasn't my best drawing! It all made sense to him after I read him the story. Below, I have included our summary from this story, so my picture will make sense to you, too. We also enjoyed another canoe ride that evening before dinner.

Chalkboard drawing for The Poor Miller's Boy and His Cat and the letter C

Our summary from The Poor Miller's Boy and His Cat:

There once was a miller who had three men working for him. He said whoever could bring back the most beautiful horse would earn the mill. The three set out and camped in a cave. The first two left the third behind as he was the drudge and they thought he was stupid. He woke and said, "Where am I?" He started walking in the forest and met an enchanted cat. She said she would give him the most beautiful horse if he worked as her servant for seven years. He worked for her faithfully. At the end of the seven years, she had him mow the grass and dry the hay in a meadow with a silver scythe. Then she had him build a house out of silver timber using a silver axe. She showed him the way back to the mill and said the horse would follow him in three days. When he returned, he found the other two men had brought one horse that was blind and one that was lame. In three days a beautiful princess brought the horse to the mill and left it there for the miller. The third miller's boy, who was her servant, left with the princess. They were married and he was rich for the rest of his life.

Thursday started out cloudy and rainy, so instead of our morning walk Grant and Johanna did a kid's yoga video, or as Johanna likes to call it, yoda video. Once in the school room we reviewed the letter C and this week's form. Grant had gotten much better at drawing it by today. He was very excited because now he knows "how to draw waves and put boats on them." He also finished finger knitting his jump rope so we will be moving on to a new handwork project.

Michaelmas

We are taking a break from letters this week to celebrate the Festival of Michaelmas. It is the "festival of courage". Michael, the archangel who inspires courage, is associated with this festival time. Michael is the brave dragon conqueror who wields a sword of cosmic iron, and brings strength to mankind, strength we can draw upon as the days become darker and we find our light within. Through the inspiration of this angelic being, the lowly peasant, George, was inspired to persevere. Though the odds were stacked against him, he completed a daunting task, conquering the "dragon".

Brave St. Michael is my guide

As free and fearless forth I ride

With courage of St. George of old

I dare to fight fierce dragons bold

It is pretty common in Waldorf Schools for the Kindergarten or First Grade classes to make wooden swords during Michaelmas. Since Grant already has a wooden sword, we designed a shield and him and Grandpa Paul made it. They also made Grant's knitting needles.

On Monday, I read a story about St. George conquering the dragon and then we decorated a dragon candle to use during our meals for the rest of the week. We made dragon bread for dinner, and Dad read a verse from Luke before we ate.

On Tuesday, I read a Michaelmas story from South Africa and we used our block crayons to draw a picture of a dragon.





On Wednesday, we made a dragon and angel mobile. We started by dyeing a white silk green, and let it dry while we took our walk. Once inside, I read the first part of the Michaelmas story involving our favorite fairy, Tiptoes Lightly, and her friends (remember her from Kindergarten?). After the story, we finished our mobile. We collected a twig from our red bud tree, and used our green silk to make a "dragon" and a white silk to make our "angel". Grandpa Paul came to visit us today and joined us for dinner, so we made another dragon bread for him, and read Revelations 12 about Michael and the angels conquering the dragon and throwing him out of heaven.

The Angel and Dragon Mobile

The Great Knight Grant

On Thursday, I finished reading the Tiptoes Lightly Michaelmas story and then we did a wet-on-wet watercolor painting with red and yellow to make "dragon flames".

Grant's "Dragon Flames" Painting

S is for The Six Swans

This week Grant is learning about the letters S and T. We started off Monday with our usual walk, circle and penny whistle lesson. The penny whistle lesson was different today. We basically stay with the same lesson for 2 weeks (which would be 8 lessons) and then we move on to something new. Grant was pleasantly surprised with the new change.

Next, we moved on to the main lesson. First, I told Grant the next part of our container story about Katie and her family and how they were setting up a temporary home by a nearby stream where Katie would hear many stories from her father. After that I told him the Grimm's fairytale, The Six Swans. I introduced this week's form and the letter S. He easily found the two S's and this week's form in my chalkboard drawing. We practiced drawing the form on his chalkboard and he also traced it with his finger in some flour. We talked about the sound that S makes and made a list of "S" words as Grant was practicing writing the letter S. After that we drew a picture (with our 3 block crayons) in our main lesson books from the story.

Mom's Swan Drawing

Grant's Swan Drawing

Before starting our walk on Tuesday, we walked out the form and the letter S on the driveway. Once inside, he practiced writing the letter S on his chalkboard (this is a hard one for him) and we used dragon tears to make an S and this week's form. Next, Grant re-told me the story of the six swans and we wrote a summary of it in his book. Dad interrupted our lesson at one point so he could show us a turtle he found in the backyard. We all enjoyed watching it, and while we were out there we picked two small red tomatoes off one of our tomato plants. This will be good conversation for tomorrow when we learn about the letter T.

On Wednesday, we learned that Katie's father also set up their camp near a grove of coconut trees and they enjoyed a treat of fresh coconut and coconut milk. After their meal, Katie's father told her about the letter T and the story of The Three Little Men in The Forest. Grant practiced writing the letter T, but he was feeling a little under the weather so we called it a day.

Julia and I left on Thursday morning to take a trip to Toronto, Canada to visit a friend of mine. As luck would have it, Thursday is Dad's day off, so he finished up with Grant's lessons for the week. They talked about the story and wrote a summary of it in his book. Grant also drew this week's form and the letter T in his book. They had fun reviewing all the letters that he has learned so far with a bean bag toss game. I was also able to find a whole coconut at the grocery store, so they had to figure out how to open it and then talked about it and ate the coconut out of the inside. The decided to use a sharp rock to open it, just as those who first discovered them probably did. They said it worked really well. While Grant didn't care much for the coconut, Dad and Johanna liked it.

My Belly Button Hurts

We started off the week with a bang. Literally an explosion from Johanna's mouth. On Sunday night, I heard a noise coming from our staircase and I turned on the light and peeked around the corner to find Johanna standing there after she had already been put to bed. She told me her "belly button hurt" and the next thing I know....yuk! You can just imagine. Being that she was on the stairs it also had a nice showering affect down through the railing and onto the carpet below in the living room, along with covering many stairs. I rushed her up to the bathroom at the top of the stairs. We still did not have time to get the seat up and get her properly positioned before it happened again, but finally before she did it a third time, we managed to get her over the toilet. Needless to say, she was a little shaken up and had left quite a mess of herself and the house. I was also thinking this was really the first time in three years this has happened to her, and I'm sure she was wondering what the heck was going on! I took her and put her in the tub and washed her off. As I was drying her off, she asked me, with a tear in her eye, what we were going to do about the stairs. I told her not to worry that Dad was cleaning it up. I dried her hair, put on warm pj's and tucked her back into bed. Then I joined Dad for the rest of the clean-up. Ah, the joys of parenthood.

Rainy Day

M and V

This week we learned the letters M and V. We started each day with our walk, circle time and penny whistle lessons. I introduce each letter with a chalkboard drawing, a Grimm's fairytale, and then different activities using the letter. My brain will be full of fairytales! I suppose when I learn a new one, an old one will be pushed out. Then I will have to re-learn them all again for Johanna, and maybe I will still know some of them by the time it's Julia's turn!


On Monday, we continued the story of Katie's quest for knowledge as she learned about the letter M through the Grimm's fairy tale, Simeli Mountain. We also learned the form drawing for this week. After Grant found the letter M in my drawing, he practiced drawing the form and the letter M on his chalkboard. Then we drew a picture of mountains and he wrote the letter M in his lesson book. When we were outside enjoying some play time before lunch, I drew the form on the driveway in chalk and Grant and Johanna enjoyed walking it forward and back. Grandpa Russ even helped Julia get in on the action.

On Tuesday, we reviewed the story of Simeli Mountain, came up with a short summary and I wrote it in his lesson book. Then we looked at some geographical maps of the different continents and found that all of them have mountains. We talked about the fact that we don't have mountains around us, but we have hills (which are a lot like mountains, according to Grant). Then Grant reviewed the letter M by tracing with his finger in flour. We also made bread today, and as the kids were kneading and shaping the dough, Grant made this week's form using the dough. When we went outside I collected a handful of sticks and then asked Grant to make the letter M and this week's form out of them.


On Wednesday, we checked back in with Katie and her family as they set up camp near a valley so she could continue with her lessons. Today we learned the letter V as I told the Grimm's tale The Vagabonds. Grant easily found the V in my drawing, and then he practiced writing it on his chalkboard before writing it in his lesson book. Julia is certainly making school interesting as she is always trying to get up on the benches at the table and be part of what is going on. She is not very happy when she doesn't get her way!



Once we were outside, the kids collected buckets of broken hickory nuts as we talked about how the squirrels cracked them all open. (Wouldn't you know that we were able to relate it back to our story for the day as the first line of the story was, "The cock said to the hen, "It is nutting time; let us go together into the mountains and have a good feast for once, before the squirrels come and carry all away.") We also admired the myriad of mushrooms all around our house including one that was as shiny and smooth as bronze when the sun was shining on it. In the afternoon we did some wet-on-wet watercolor painting. Grant and I used red, blue and yellow paint to make a blue sky, with purple mountains, and a green valley down at the bottom. Johanna used red and just had fun exploring the color.

On Thursday, we reviewed the sounds that M and V make while tossing bean bags as part of our circle time. I tossed him a bean bag while saying either M or V, and then Grant tossed it back to me while saying a word that started with the letter. He tried to make up some words, but I told him they had to be real words! Grant re-told me the story of The Vagabonds and we wrote a summary of it in his lesson book. After that, he copied some "V" words I had written on the chalkboard into his book. Then we continued our geography lesson by looking a Map of Missouri. No Mountains, but plenty of rivers, forests and roads. We found where we lived, where his Grandmas and Grandpas live, and where his friend in Illinois lives. After we looked at the map, Grant drew his own "Indiana Jones" map and we all went outside to follow the map to the treasure.



On Friday, we had our first day of homeschool co-op. Julia is in the nursery, Johanna is in the preschool class, and Grant is in a class that teaches about the rainforest and another one called community helpers. I asked Grant what the special guest talked about in that class, and he said, "Ah, she was talking about health. All the stuff that you guys know about. I was thinking my Mom and Dad already know all this stuff." They do pay attention sometime!

First Week of School

We have finished our first week back in school. We start each day off with a walk to get the wiggles out, though I don't think you can get all the wiggles out of Grant! Then we go into the school room and come together for "circle time". In circle time we enjoy seasonal songs and verses complete with movement and props. There is also a lot of counting in the verses and songs to start introducing it to Johanna in a fun way, and re-enforcing what Grant already knows. I made some beanbag "apples" and hobby horses. When Grant saw me making the bean bags, he wanted to make one too. He wanted his to be blue. It is his special "apple" during circle time. Our circle theme is a trip to the orchard. We end our circle time with a blessing on our day and then we move into Penny Whistle lessons. I have had fun learning to play this, so I can teach Grant.

After the lesson, I sit down and read a book, mostly for Johanna, Grant likes to listen too, and Julia tries to wreck the whole thing by crawling all over us and grabbing for the book. After the book, I move into telling the story that starts off Grant's lesson for the day. We are starting first grade with Language Arts lessons, the Waldorf way. Grant will learn to read and write as the letters come alive for him through stories, drawing, and painting.


We started our first week off with form drawing and the introduction to the story which will take us through the whole year. Form drawing is a precursor to writing and will help Grant learn how to control the crayon (and eventually his pencil) when writing/drawing, and is the beginning of nice penmanship down the road. I introduce the form by drawing it in the air, drawing it on his back with my finger, having him do the same, and then moving on to the chalkboard where he can practice drawing it before he draws it in his main lesson book. Grant will be making this main lesson book which will serve as a first reader for him, as well as a record of his school work. On Wednesday, we broke out the play dough we made in Kindergarten (infused with the nice, calming scent of lavender, aah..) and used it to make the 3 forms. The wavy line made a good snake!

Form Drawing 1

Form Drawing 2

From Drawing 3

Our story started with the introduction of Dad Joseph, son Ben (10 years old) and almost 7 year old daughter Katie who start out on a quest to find the Wise Old Sophia who is a magical enchantress who lives in the mountains and will give the "gift of knowledge" to Katie. On their journey, Katie will learn many things to prepare her for her meeting with Sophia, including the letters through Grimm's fairy tales (this will make more sense as we go along). I am also going to use some Hans Christian Anderson tales to honor our Scandinavian heritage.



I drew a drawing on the chalkboard that represented the first part of our story for the week, and I also included the forms in the drawing. Can you find them?





The first three days of the week he learned a new form and heard another part of Katie's story. On Thursday, we summarized the story so far and I wrote it in his main lesson book, and then we drew a picture of the family with block crayons. Yes, as you may be wondering, these are rectangular shaped crayons that we will use to draw pictures throughout the year. We will only use red, yellow and blue, and Grant (and me too) will learn to blend those 3 colors to make all the rest.

Mom's Block Crayon Drawing

Grant's Block Crayon Drawing

Julia was very insistent all week on getting up on the benches at the table and doing what we were doing. She liked the coloring, and the taste of the crayons, too.


When we are done with lesson time, the kids have some free indoor play time, and then we head outside to play before heading in for lunch. While we were outside on Thursday, I drew the 3 forms in chalk on the driveway and Grant and Johanna walked them frontwards and backwards, shoes on and shoes off. Then I challenged Grant by having him do the straight line with his eyes closed. He did a pretty good job!

We all enjoyed the first week, and look forward to next week when we start having fun with letters!