earthschooling Archives

Homeschooling :: Playing Teacher

October 27, 2016 | Leave a Comment

I once read that the best way to learn something is to teach it.

As Chilli is getting a little bit older, it’s wonderful to be able to encourage her to take the lead with some gentle Early Childhood activities and lead the lesson for Marlin. She really enjoys to be the ‘teacher’ or the ‘teacher’s helper’ and of course it helps me to be able to leave them together at the lounge room table doing a simple activity together, led by Chilli, while I tend to a home task close by. Often I include this rhythm first thing in the morning if I’m still organising the day either in school or the home.

A good friend also speaks highly of allowing her Grade 6 son to lead the younger aged 4 and 6 children in their family, for some nature studies each week.

I think this is not only really empowering for the older child, but a great balance for the younger child as well and allows a wonderful time of connection between siblings in a different and beneficial dynamic.

Earlier this week, Chilli and Marlin had been out for a morning nature walk and outdoor run. Tending to a few morning farm chores, I then asked Chilli to lead Marlin in looking at some new springtime leaves that were growing on our orchard trees. They collected 2 grape vine leaves each and came inside to settle into an early morning activity while I continued to ready for the day.

I was giving the children some free time of a morning for larger outdoor movement time – running, jumping, hopping, skipping, bike riding and the like. Years ago I remember in a conference call, hearing Beth Sutton of Enki Education talk about how this first thing morning activity of something that gets the heart rate up – primes the brain for learning in morning lesson. I love the idea of this, however it’s been really hard for Marlin to transition from this freer morning time into ‘school’ time. It started to really be quite unkind to him as he’d start every day unhappy, crying and resisting school time for Chilli. I really find I need to ‘hold that space’ quite tightly of a morning and bring the children very mindfully – before they ‘expand out’ for the day – into our rhythm of school.

Therefore I’ve been ‘reining in’ that space with some morning prayer work. After breakfast and getting ready, we tend to a few simple chores amongst ourselves (at which time I have to really mindfully make sure they don’t ‘break off’ in any free play type way!) and then come to our lounge room table to start our day in an informal way. From here I spend some time with Marlin for his nursery school morning circle while Chilli either continues on with her prayer work independently or another small task that I have set her up with. I use this time for things like her writing out times tables, drawing monthly calendar pages or working on bookwork that we need to finalise. We’ve just started our cursive journey, so it will also be a good time for her to practise some of her writing.

Following on from Chilli and Marlin’s early morning Spring walk this week, I had set up the lounge room table with pads, white crayons and green watercolour paint. Chilli led Marlin in some ‘invisible’ leaf rubbings and then some ‘magic’ painting. It’s lovely for Chilli to be able to share these early childhood activities she enjoyed, with her brother. When I ask her to be the ‘teacher’s helper’ she’ll help the ‘younger student’ to either take off or put on shoes/slippers, get his outdoor gear on or off or hung back up, make a small snack for them or help him to lay out his lesson supplies. She really relishes in this sense of purpose and responsibility and takes great enjoyment from saying “Come on Ma, let me help you with that”.

The ‘magic painting’ idea this week was inspired by a member on the Earthschooling forum who was working with the Autumn Earthschooling | pre-school program. These ‘magic leaf paintings’ are an activity to accompany the ‘Anxious Leaf‘ story in Week 4 of the November monthly plan. We’d done this activity in a slightly different way back in April which is our Autumn, but I thought this was a great activity to accompany our budding spring as well.

Do you encourage your older child to take the lead with directing some of your younger children’s lessons through their Early Childhood program?

Welcoming :: 2016

January 14, 2016 | Leave a Comment

We celebrated a lovely quiet Christmas in 2015, sharing our Christmas Eve with dear friends and relaxing on Christmas Day in the heat that gripped our little island home. New Year’s Eve was shared with the same lovely friends, enjoying some botanical infusions I’d made from that long awaited book ‘Wild Cocktails‘ which is a collection of recipes from Lottie Muir and her rooftop bar in London – Midnight Apothecary. It was so much fun to spend the days between Christmas and New Year’s infusing various spirits with produce from our gardens and making all kinds of fruit and herbal syrups in preparation for New Year’s Eve Cocktails and Mocktails.

Our family then enjoyed a few weeks of taking in all the deliciousness of our Southern Summer. I immersed into planning land for a week to put together the first block for our 2016 school year. I am so inspired by the Oak Meadow program for Grade 2. We loved both the Kindergarten and Grade 1 program so I was looking forward to seeing what the Grade 2 program had in store for Chilli this year.

I always like to start our year on Plough Monday. It’s a nice time for Papa to resume his work for the year and symbolically I think it’s a lovely time to return to our school work as well. Summer is still in it’s height here at the moment, but I try to balance some enjoyment of the outdoor delights amongst the resuming of our school year. This year, inspired by a friend on the Facebook Oak Meadow Southern Hemisphere Community Group, I have decided to work a 3 week on – 1 week off rhythm for our schooling. Before I can relax into Advent and the Festive season, I always need to have what I call our ‘skeleton plan’ worked out for the year ahead. I use the Waldorf Essentials Ultimate Planner and with the monthly sheets, I go through and map out our year. Starting with Festivals, birthdays and times I know we will need to take holidays from school – I can then mark out our year with school blocks. I also wanted to finish up at the beginning of Advent this year. Last year we were still schooling through the beginning of Advent and I found it all too much for myself and the children. There were some important culmination and rounding out lessons for Grade 1 that I felt were important to finish with Chilli and subsequently it meant Advent activities got missed and the time was rather busy.

Starting at this time of year, we are able to work our new 3 on – 1 off rhythm and still finish up at the beginning of Advent. We will have the odd 4 week block in amongst the year but I really think the shorter ‘bursts’ of school will be nourishing for us all. When new Mums ask after a rhythm for early childhood in the home, I often suggest to sit back and just look at the rhythm that you see naturally emerging in the home through your days. After I heard of this idea mid last year, it was interesting, because as I watched the cycle that was in our home in regards to school, I really saw that this 3 on – 1 off was really what was naturally happening, or needing to happen, anyway. To keep myself fresh and inspired in the lessons and at my best to present the material as well as keeping both the children fresh for their school time as well as allowing Marlin and Chilli to have a nice balance of free time, I see that this 3 on – 1 off rhythm is what was ultimately happening if we didn’t try to ‘push through’ on a 10 or 12 week term program – which was exhausting everyone. By the end of these longer stints I really found that we were often just ‘going through the motions’ with little enthusiasm or enjoyment. Everyone was tired and unmotivated and just needed some ‘breathing out’ time. When we would do a few weeks of school and take just a short break, we would return to our work refreshed and inspired again. Even with the benefit and convenience of doing school at home, lessons can be exhausting mentally and physically – time to breath out and let lessons as well as school in general, ‘sleep’ is so important. It also gives a nice balance in the home for Chilli and I as time when I am ‘just Mum’ and time when I am also her teacher. This I have seen over the past year since we have started more formal lessons, is really important to both be mindful of and to keep in balance, so as to keep our relationship healthy.

As is our tradition, we started our year with a Rose Ceremony for the children. This was Marlin’s first Rose Ceremony and he planted a yellow ‘Banksia Rose’ which is a climbing thornless rose that is often planted in Waldorf Kindergarten gardens. Chilli chooses a rose to plant for the year to come during the previous Winter. We purchase her rose for the year ahead as ‘bare root’ during that dormant time and it sits there patiently waiting for the year to come. This idea came from the traditional Waldorf ‘Rose Ceremony’ where the Kindergarten children are ‘handed over’ to their class teacher at the end of their Kindergarten years and presented with a rose.

The year Chilli was 5 years old and had to be officially registered to homeschool in Tasmania, many of her early childhood friends from our hometown were heading off to Steiner schools. I wanted to do something special for Chilli to acknowledge that she was now ‘officially’ homeschooling and the idea of the Rose Ceremony grew from both this traditional Waldorf school ceremony and the starting school ceremony in Shea Darian’s book Living Passages for the Whole Family. The first year when Chilli was 5 years old and still in early childhood years, we just presented her with a rose from the gorgeous rose gardens on the property we lived at, in that time. The year she was 6 and started Kindergarten we were here at our little cottage home, so we created a Children’s Garden area and began the tradition of planting a rose for each school year.

It is so lovely to watch the rose after it is planted. I find it so symbolic of the journey the child takes in the year through that grade. At first it struggles a little while it finds it’s feet and plants down roots. Then as the year goes on, it grows and matures and then in the latter part of the school year as spring rolls around, the little green shoots appear and spring forth ‘jumping up to live again’. And then of course as the school year and that grade concludes – the rose blossoms and sends forth her very first bloom. We collect these petals after the flower has finished her spectacular show and we dry them to be used in very special crafts, teas and herbal preparations. In our ceremony to mark the beginning of each school year, we come together in a space at the top of our orchard. We light each of the children’s life candles, sing a song, talk about where the child has come from and what they have ahead of them, we bless them for the year ahead and they receive a small keepsake gift. Chilli always receives a small turtle trinket as this represents the Native American story we tell of how the world that was dreamt into being by the Creator was placed upon the Turtle’s back. This was Marlin’s first year of receiving a gift as our program this year includes a very gentle ‘nursery school’ rhythm for him; a few verses, songs, stories, finger plays, early childhood movement and gesture games as well as some various activities like baking and painting, sprinkled amongst our week. He received a little owl as we just marvel constantly at how wise he is! After receiving their gifts, the children walk over to a ring of stones that stands in front of the archway into the Children’s Garden and they wait to pass through the threshold into their new class, where they are welcomed by their ‘teachers’. We listen to our story, plant their roses and then head into our school room where there is a welcoming chalkboard for the year and some school supplies that each child will need in their grade for the coming lessons.

We started our Grade 2 year with an opening lesson from ‘The Journey of Analise‘ from Earthschooling. I have long been waiting to bring this story and these lessons to Chilli and I felt that Grade 2 was going to be the perfect time. The Grade 2 Oak Meadow program which still in my opinion draws strong parallels at this stage to a Waldorf program, has a strong theme this year of giving thought to what is happening underneath the surface of what we see on first impression. With the fables and with the art we do with the Grade 2 child, we are encouraged to explore how we ‘see’ certain characters when we close our eyes. Things no longer have to be painted true to real life colourings as an example – when we close our eyes, what colour do we ‘see’ that wolf, lion, mouse or person in the story being. All of this tied in perfectly I felt, with starting to take a little venture into the study of temperaments and what is ‘under the surface’ of people. I think these lessons will be really therapeutic for both Chilli and myself and I could tell Chilli was at a nice age and stage to start to explore the topic of temperaments, in this wonderfully age appropriate way through the story Kristie has written of Analise. Our welcoming chalkboard for the year was kindly drawn by Papa and is the opening chalkboard image for The Journey of Analise story. We modified it a little to represent Chilli and Marlin in our own home.

I’d also long been wanting to come up with a name for our homeschool – something that gave us an identity in terms of what we strive to do with our education of the children. Whilst we do use a program for our schooling and we do have ‘lessons’ through our day, so much of what we do is natural learning that happens through the course of our everyday. Having the children by my side, immersed in our daily home rhythm there is so much learning that happens naturally through experience and through the flow of the regular happenings in our day; cooking, cleaning, washing, folding, homemaking, growing food, tending animals, collecting eggs, making compost, preserving the harvest and everything else in the way we live our lives which educates our children with the skills they need for their lives. The program we create for our children draws on several curriculum resources, to provide an enriching ‘lifeschooling’ experience that won’t just merely fill their heads with facts. Instead with the program we create, we hope to place them steadfastly into existence with the most valuable life skills that we can possibly provide them to live the best and most enriching lives they can as they walk their path and live their purpose here in this life. This year we are using a yoga program by Kira Willey and amongst this she mentions Fireflies at some point. When I heard this I thought – “That’s it!” Fireflies and Dragonflies have long fascinated me – not only with their beauty but with their spiritual message they carry as well. The Firefly brings messages of remembering that the light that is within us is what will shine brightest, illuminating us from the inside out. The firefly is symbolic of spreading your wings and flying, holding hope, cultivating patience, living with aspiration, inspiration and illumination, seeking new ideas, being creative, having passion for what you do and living with the heart of a child – holding the magic of believing. Therefore, rather magically and serendipitously – ‘Fireflies Lifeschool’ was born. Chilli and Marlin love being little fireflies through our day and enjoy spreading their wings to fly through our program, being illuminated by our life schooling lessons.

I have been quite amazed at Chilli in the way her Grade 1 lessons seem to have just blossomed in her through our short Summer holiday. Concepts and work that she was still not 100% with at the end of the year, she deeply understands now as we work through some Grade 1 revision, heading into our Grade 2 year. I’ve also been amazed at this seemingly more mature student in front of me in our lessons. Something has really just blossomed inside her and within her own self during our Summer holiday – it is so beautiful to see. As I mentioned, our first lesson for Grade 2 was The Journey of Analise. The following day we then worked on the Waldorf Essentials Grade 1 ‘closing story’ of A New Land. We hadn’t gotten to finishing our Grade 1 year with this story last year, so I wanted to make sure we still used it as I thought the revision it provided was fantastic. I decided then that it would be a nice way to open our Grade 2 year, by gently reviewing some Grade 1 maths concepts. Chilli amazed me in this project and worked wonderfully well with the equations and situations that were presented in the story. This year we are also moving onto Volume 2 of the Living Music from the Heart program and Chilli is really growing beautifully in her music playing from this program. The lessons in this also provide creative elements that allow Marlin to live into the music lessons in his own early childhood way.

Inner Work is something that like so many of us, I have often not prioritised under the notion of just being too busy and not having the time. As I grow a little older and a little wiser, I realise that really Inner Work is something that you never do not have the time for. When we make the time to nurture the nurturer then everything else seems that little bit more effortless, time just magically opens up. I have compiled an Inner Work book to carry me through the year. It contains Kristie’s 2 weekly rhythm focus for each day that comes amongst the Earthschooling material, Steiner’s daily exercises from Melisa Nielson’s planner and the weekly caregiver meditations from the Little Acorn Enrichment Guides. Rising before the children each day and having time to centre myself, practise a little yoga and bring attention to my inner focus for the day, I have found to be so nourishing to myself, our family and our days. The front of my Inner Work book has a beautiful hand lettered piece by Amber Hellewell who illustrates for Waldorf Essentials. The piece is in the Ultimate Planner and it carries my favourite inspiring Steiner quote regarding Inner Work; “You will not be good teachers if you focus only on what you do and not upon who you are!”

Has your 2016 school year started as yet? What grade are you launching into and how do you plan to start the year with purpose and meaning?

Homeschooling :: Vowels

July 20, 2015 | Leave a Comment

There are many different ways to ‘bring the alphabet’ to the child, and even amongst the Waldorf modality – it is done in numerous and varied ways. There is also many differing views on the stories and creative ways behind how the vowels are brought to the child.

Here is how we experienced the vowels in our alphabet journey. We journeyed through the letters in alphabetical order, omitting the vowels. As we progressed through our Alphabet main lesson book (MLB) we would leave the vowel pages blank and as we modelled each letter of the alphabet to stick to our ‘alphabet window’ we would leave the spaces where special ‘Angel Letters’ were to later come. The anticipation within Chilli of these ‘special letters’ was beautiful. As we completed all our consonants – we journeyed through the vowels. I blended many different programs into our ‘experience’ of these letters.

The ‘foundation’ for our vowel journey was taken from the Waldorf Essentials Grade 1 curriculum. The first time I read the way the vowels were brought to the child in this program I just loved it and knew it was perfect for Chilli. I know there is much written by many a Waldorf teacher about why they believe the Angels are not the best way to bring the vowels to children, however for us, this just felt like the perfect and right way to experience the vowels. We are using a ‘container story’ of a family journeying through the year and the Grade 1 lessons. The little girl in our story is called ‘Anna’. Great King Equals met Anna in the Gnomes cave and each of the Math Gnomes had a key for Anna. Great King Equals presented his key first as he explained to Anna what would happen. There were 5 golden keys and a door on the wall of the cave just behind where Great King Equals’ throne sat. Anna couldn’t believe that she had never seen this door before, she’d been working so often in this cave with the math gnomes – but never before had she noticed this door in the wall of the cave.

The Waldorf Essentials program brings together the revision of the Roman Numerals 1-5 in association with the keys and which lock they fit into. In turn each gnome came forward over the duration of our vowel journey and presented Anna with a key which fit one of the locks. The ‘door’ to reading was slowly unlocked.

With the turning of each lock, an Arch Angel appears. Each angel presents to Anna the letter they are the ‘keeper’ of and the sounds associated with that letter – the long and short vowel sounds as well as the name of the letter. As the angel almost ‘sings’ the sounds of each vowel – the angel was doing the Eurythmy gesture for each vowel. We would be standing and also did this gesture as we made the various sounds associated with each letter. We brought attention to how the letter felt as we made the various sounds and where in our body the sound was coming from. We also looked at each others mouths as we made the various sounds, noticing the shape of the mouth and the position of the tongue. We would also try to make the sound with an opposite mouth and tongue position. As an example, if the shape of the mouth is quite a tight contracted gesture, we would try to make the sound with our mouth open wide like another letter. It was a lot of fun and a really nice way to bring mindfulness to how the sounds are formed in the mouth. Each angel has a story for Anna which was the story from each vowel given in the Waldorf Essentials Grade 1 program.

We re-jigged our rhythm a little on these ‘vowel days’. Normally we do our letter verses associated with the letter we are studying in Morning Circle at the beginning of the day. When we were doing the vowels, we left doing these letter verses until after the letter had been presented. The verses we used were a blend of the letter verses from Earth Schooling’s ‘Sixth Sense Language’ program and Oak Meadow’s Kindergarten and Grade 1 letter work. Earth Schooling has some lovely verses that emphasise the various sounds associated with each vowel and Oak Meadow has some great tongue twisters for the letters. Each day we would also do the associated letter activity from Oak Meadow Kindergarten curriculum such as making A’s out of tied bundles of twigs. We also modelled all the vowels out of white medium for our alphabet window.

Our Chalkboard drawing would be ready each day for the letter that was going to be presented. The Chalkboard drawing as a base remained the same and was inspired by a Pinterest picture I had seen. I loved the gesture of giving that the angel was in and the hands ‘presenting’ the letter. I adapted the colourings of the angel each day to correspond with the Arch Angel that was presenting that letter. When Chilli copied the drawing and letter into her book, we wrote a sentence that emphasised the vowel from that angel and ideally both the long and short vowel sounds.

As an overview – here is how we presented the vowels;

At the end of our alphabet journey
Using the Arch Angel stories and concept from Waldorf Essentials Grade 1 program which also ties in the Maths Gnomes and revision of the Roman Numerals 1-5
In association with the Eurythmy Gestures for each vowel
Exploring the sounds of each vowel with Earth Schooling’s Sixth Sense Language verses as well as Oak Meadow’s Kindergarten and Grade 1 verses and tongue twisters
Creative projects from Oak Meadow Kindergarten program
Chalkboard drawings inspired by a Pinterest pin

In my opinion, leaving the vowels until last, presenting them in a reverent way and exploring them in ways that differ slightly to how the consonants were brought – all help to bring that necessary ‘specialness’ to these 5 letters.

After leaving the vowels to ‘sleep’ for a little while now – we have started to spend a little more in-depth time with the various sounds each vowel makes. We have explored these through the ‘long and short vowel sounds’ lessons that are in the Oak Meadow Grade 1 program. I told Chilli a short, simple story along these lines; Because there is always a child somewhere in the world learning their letters (I spoke about friends who had learnt letters before her, then when she was learning her letters and now friends that were still learning their letters and would soon learn the angel letters) … Well, the Arch Angels are so busy going around taking their letters and stories to all these children, that they need to have helpers that look after the sounds of the letters. Sure, the angels when they first present the vowels, give the children the Heavenly sounds that come with the letters, but of course the children need to practice the different ‘long’ and ‘short’ sounds that each angel letter makes, so the angels have helpers…

Long Lance looks after the long vowel sounds and Short Seth (who we thought later probably should have been called Shawn for a better rhyme!) looks after the short vowel sounds. We drew a picture of each helper – everything about Lance was long, his; hair, body, legs, arms, feet, shirt, sleeves, pants even his finger nails (I had a bit of a Struwwelpeter image in my mind!) But Seth, well everything about him was short; he is short, his feet are short, he has short arms, short hair, even his shirt is short! We explored the short a.a.a. and the long a—— a—– sound and then I read some words (a mix up of the suggested long/short ‘A’ sound words in the Oak Meadow curriculum) and Chilli told me whether it was a long or short ‘A’ sound. I made sure to focus in the beginning on really pronouncing the ‘A’ sounds well as long or short to emphasise that aspect for her, but by the end she just knew these sounds so well amongst the words I didn’t have to emphasise much if at all. After that she thought up 5 words that either had the long/short ‘A’ sound at the beginning or within the word. I was really surprised at how well she did with this and her understanding of these sounds. We’re still currently working through each vowel in this way with these lessons from Long Lance and Short Seth.

How have you made these 5 vowel letters ‘special’ in your homeschooling journey?

Festivals :: Saint Patrick’s Day

March 18, 2015 | 2 Comments

:: Can you believe I accidentally deleted this photo off our camera? It captures so perfectly the character of both our children. Lucky my IT savvy husband was able to retrieve it from the jaws of IT nothingness ::

In her book ‘Traditions :: Reviving Victorian Family Celebrations of Comfort and Joy’, when speaking about Saint Patrick’s Day, Mrs Sharp reminds us of the Irish Proverb “There is no fireside like your own fireside”. How true that is. As much as our family loves our camping and adventuring holidays we take through the year at various times, it’s also lovely to arrive home to the warmth of our own fireside. After a lovely long weekend spent camping in the gorgeous Mount Field National Park with a few very close friends and relatives – to celebrate Marlin turning 2 – it was also lovely to arrive home and re-settle into our everyday rhythm. You can imagine how topsy-turvy our recent weeks had been as we busied ourselves with party preparations and camping organisation. Of course, every single moment of time spent dreaming, planning, creating and organising is beyond worth it when one sees the children’s joy as they enjoy the Teddy Bears’ Picnic we held to celebrate Marlin’s birthday, it was also nice to ‘get back to rhythm’ yesterday and what better way to ease back into school than with a Festival!

Despite our celebrations of this Irish Saint being a far cry from the days of pub crawls through The Rocks with the boys drinking copious amounts of Guinness – the festivities we enjoy now-a-days are still surrounded by shenanigans that I am sure have the scent of Leprechauns at work! Mrs Sharp tells us that 40 million Americans claim Irish Heritage, but on March 17 – that number increases dramatically! How true that is! I have to say, this Festival has to be amongst one of my favourites, it is such fun to plan and celebrate. I think many people dig deep into their Ancestral roots on March 17 to find any reason to celebrate the calamity of this mischievous day honouring a wonderful Saint. The children delight in the mischief of the Leprechauns and just quietly, I think it’s a day that they subconsciously channel their inner Leprechaun; running amok, laughing heartily, playing pranks, being cheeky and having a jolly old goof of a time. It’s a real ‘let-your-hair-down’ day and I think that’s lovely for not only the children, but ourselves as well.

:: Chilli picked this delightful end of Summer flower bunch from amidst our food gardens and arranged it so perfectly in this very appropriate green vase that she chose from the cupboard on her own ::

We always scour our wardrobe for any items that are green and we pull together, sometimes some of the most uncoordinated – but fun all the same, outfits. Marlin did indeed look like a little Leprechaun yesterday in his green outfit, and to be honest – it’s probably a very fitting character for him – he’s quite the cheeky little one, our very own Leprechaun indeed!

Green food is always a must for the day; For breakfast we juiced new season apples with carrot tops from our food garden – bright green ‘Leprechaun juice’. We foraged in the garden for greens and of course the mix included clover from our food garden paths. Boiled eggs from our ladies were sliced in rounds and arranged to look like shamrocks a-top our fresh Leprechaun salad. Lunch was ‘Green Soup’ – lots of onion and garlic fried around with a few zuc’s from our abundant supply in the food garden at the moment, a splash of stock (but not too much as I like this soup quite thick), salt and pepper, then whizz it up once the zuc is cooked through. As far as quick and easy meals go, this one is top of the list. I love the way the zuc’s take on the onion flavour so beautifully, it’s a little like a French Onion Soup – just green! With dinner we served fresh steamed beans and mustard from our food garden and mixed some of our flourishing chives through the butter. I love that our cooling Autumnal days make the weather so conducive to a real hearty Irish meal. Irish stew was our meal of the night, prepared by Chilli and I earlier in the day and left to slow bake through the afternoon. Normally we make Dublin Coddle which is another of my favourite Irish and Winter meals, but we’d just had that the week past when we were camping (makes an easy camp meal!). Of course no Irish stew is complete without a good Irish Soda Bread to accompany it, this year we made ours in the shape of a Shamrock and used our favourite bread baking book recipe (although I sub in our natural baking powder instead of bicarb soda, the bicarb gives quite a sharp, zesty flavour otherwise. So maybe our Irish Bread isn’t so ‘soda’ after all!)

:: Sometimes it seems like overnight, the children just ‘grow up’ with certain abilities. Chilli has always loved to help me cook and has from a young age been very able with kitchen tasks, but yesterday I marvelled at her attention to, ability with and neatness of peeling/chopping the garlic ::

Irish Music is always played throughout the day and my favourite album is ‘Celtic Woman :: Songs from the Heart’. Amongst the songs in this collection are some of my all time favourites and the women’s voices in this group are phenomenal – goosebump and tear evoking!

:: Yes, that band-aid is from a felting injury! ::

:: Despite her look captured here, Chilli was quite chuffed with her felted clover fashioning it into a ring to wear around for the rest of the day ::

For school on Festival Day, Chilli needle felted a Shamrock using a cookie cutter and then we made a Triquetra design on the front, adding a fleece wrapped pipe cleaner to the back as the stalk. (There’s something I love about the Triquetra form and design – it’s actually on my engagement/wedding ring!) Marlin had lots of fun with potato stamping and then the children both headed outdoors to collect supplies for, and build their Leprechaun Gardens.

With our evening meal we said an Irish Blessing (there is so many beautiful Irish Blessings to choose from) and played a fun ‘Leprechaun’s Family Game‘. I wrote out the activities as well as our blessing onto cards created from one of Marlin’s stamping artworks from the day. Following our meal, we each took a stone the children had painted green and I’d painted little shamrocks onto. We held the stone, made a wish and put our breath onto the stone and wish before placing the little wishing stones into the children’s Leprechaun gardens.

To cap off our evening, we enjoyed fresh apple pie with new season apples, while listening to a great Saint Patrick’s Day story from our favourite storyteller Sparkle Stories. The story we listened to was a Martin and Sylvia story, titled ‘Saint Patricks Day’ which is week 36 (or week 10 on a Southern Hemisphere feed) in the ‘Martin and Sylvia’ subscription series. Marlin is coming to an age where he really enjoys the stories now – he spent most of the story doing this funny little belly laugh that he’s recently started doing, it was quite amusing indeed!

:: Saint Patrick is a simple peg doll, the sheep is made from roving wrapped around a basic pipe cleaner frame, the snake is a roving covered pipe cleaner twisted around to look like a snake and the pig is an Ostheimer one the children had amongst their play things. Saint Patrick’s hood lifts up and down to change him from the young boy in Ireland to the shepherd and then the Bishop. The wooden driftwood stick ties into the side of his cloak with a strand sewn there for that purpose and changes the young Irish boy into the shepherd and then becomes his staff as he becomes Bishop ::

When the children close the curtains over for the evening on their gardens outside, they say a prayer to the Leprechauns and hope for a little bit of gold to be left when the Leprechauns pass through to enjoy the gardens they leave out for them. Sure enough, Leprechaun dust was to be seen this morning all over the gardens, and as usual, they did leave the children a piece of gold. However because those cheeky little, mischief loving Leprechauns can’t ever just do anything straight forward, they always leave the gold in a little pile of honey! Sticky Honey Money! This year, I helped the Leprechauns with a little Saint Patrick’s Day gift I’ve had my eye on making for a few years now. I finally got around to making a ‘Saint Patrick’s Day Story Bag‘. It was quite simple, easy and fun to put together in the low light of a quite home once the children had settled last night. I think it came together quite lovely and would like to explore the idea of using this for the Saints we study in Grade 2 next year. I also think we’ll make a Leprechaun trap next year. I think Grade 2 is a nice age for this activity and Chilli is excited to think about this through the coming year and create some great trap ideas!

There were smiles all around this morning as these parting Leprechaun gifts were discovered. Chilli always delights in the Honey Money, Marlin seemed a little concerned why the money was sticky – but enjoyed immensely the story bag, while Chilli flicked through a simple book with lovely illustrations and short stories about the life and legends surrounding Saint Patrick.

What is your favourite part of Saint Patrick’s Day celebrations?

“May your Troubles be less
And your Blessings be more

And nothing but Happiness
Come through your door”

:: Irish Blessing ::

Field Trip :: Foraging

February 21, 2015 | Leave a Comment

At the end of an old, dusty, country road that Chilli often rides along is a beauty of a mulberry tree. Gnarled and heavy with twisted branches that reach down to the grassy meadow below, it’s the kind of tree you only have to stand under for a moment to hear the echo of the many years of laughter that have rung through the ears of this masterpiece of nature. As children have climbed her limbs, reached for her fruits and no doubt shed tears as they fell from her leafy bower trying to reach that plump looking mulberry that was just*over*there, you know you are sharing in the bounty of a harvest and wild foraging legend that spans many, many years.

Our day of foraging started out with mulberries from this little beauty. I must say that mulberries in Tasmania are definitely not as plump, elongated or sweet as the ones I grew up on and stained many a school uniform with, in summer on the mainland. These are more like a mulberry crossed with a blackberry. Even the leaf structure and tree shape is different to mainland mulberries, but mulberries they definitely are.

Following our mulberry picking, we journeyed to one of our favourite local beaches to pick blackberries. We’ve been a bit behind in our blackberrying this season and so we thought we’d better get a start on it, even if only for a small basket full that was nibbled for snacks over the following few days.

As we were leaving our blackberrying, we were delighted to find a whole bank of samphire! We’ve been wanting to try samphire for a while now ever since we saw it on a local blog and then read about it in our wild foods book. We had searched a few times for it, but to no avail. Needless to say we were elated to find such a supply of it and immediately set about harvesting. I think we’ll cook our samphire with lemon and olive oil alongside some smoked fish. Although the way it is done on Hugo & Elsa looks good as well.

Onto another stop and we collected driftwood in tiny, thin lengths so as we can create a fish skeleton on a watercolour painting we recently did. We’ve been reading about the legend of Mousehole in England and immersing in all things seaside, fish and summer at the moment. Chilli and Papa are planning a fishing expedition to catch our dinner one evening when they can figure out where they’d like to put the canoe in. Papa is very particular about these things! Amazingly, Chilli found some fish bones still intact on the beach as we fossicked for driftwood ‘bones’ so she decided to use the bones to match up the sizes of driftwood she’d need.

Our last item on the foraging list for our Field Trip was some ochre rocks. We’ll be doing some Aboriginal style paintings in a few weeks and I thought we’d do a background wash with ochre paint. Chilli and Marlin had fun testing the colours of the rocks on a flat, light coloured boulder where we were gathering and Chilli was interested that the colour of the rock didn’t always reflect so identically in the colour it drew out with.

It was so lovely to visit both these beaches together again. One was right by the house we lived in when Marlin was born and the other by the house we lived in for a short time when Marlin was a baby. In the Winter when we lived by the second beach, I would walk most days with Chilli along the beach, Marlin snuggled up in the sling as he drifted off to sleep and slumbered as we explored that shoreline. Other days I would sit in a camp chair on the sand, rugged up in layers and bundled under the ‘Nanna Blanket’ my Mum had knitted Marlin when he was born. Chilli would spend the hours lost in her own imaginative world playing amongst the treasure filled shoreline of that beautiful beach. I wonder if he’ll always feel a connection to this area where he spent so many of his babyhood days nestled into a cosy nest while the breezes of the bay whispered in his ears and caressed his newborn cheek. I know I’ll always hold this place special in my heart for that very reason, it sounds like such an idyllic way to spend those precious newborn days, and I have to say it honestly was – I always feel extremely blessed for that gorgeous opportunity of immersing so deeply in baby land.

Late Summer is a time that I identify so strongly with foraging. The wild holds so many treasures for us, but particularly at this time of year there seems to be such an abundance. Papa gifted me a book for Christmas by one of my favourite authors – The Thrifty Forager. It’s a very inspiring read indeed. What are your favourite things to forage for?

Field Trip :: Japanese Culture

February 7, 2015 | 3 Comments

One of my favourite aspects of Waldorf Education and something I think can be so deeply and wholly honoured in homeschooling, is the immersion in a particular topic. As homeschoolers, we have the benefit to permeate our ‘immersion’ topics into so many aspects of not only our schooling, but our everyday and family life.

The last story of our first Grade 1 block (which was of course Form Drawing) was from the Earthschooling curriculum – ‘Moon Flower’. We used this story for bringing the form of a circle to life and the opportunity presented amongst the theme of not only this story, but also the continual story of a family’s journey that carries us through our year – to immerse in the Japanese culture. The story of Moonbeam is a traditional Japanese Tale. It is a gentle, sweet and inspiring story.

I am using a ‘base’ or ‘foundational’ story through the year of a family that is on a journey together. Through this journey, many opportunities and experiences arise that ‘meet’ the little girl ‘Anna’ in our ‘family’ with her lessons for the year. This ‘base’ story idea comes from the Waldorf Essentials curriculum and I also think it is mentioned in Eric Fairman’s Grade guide. As we approached the tale of Moonbeam, our ‘family’ met a Japanese Lady. The children enjoyed talking to her about the culture, what foods she liked and used to cook with her mother as a child, as well as the lady’s name and the meaning/origin of her name. ‘Sakura’, the lady our ‘family’ ‘met’, told the ‘family’ the story of Moonbeam, as it was one of her favourite stories when she was younger.

Following on from this part of our Form Drawing for circles, we concluded this first Grade 1 block with what I like to call an ‘immersion’ – really diving deeply into a topic or theme and having it permeate as much of our daily/family life as is possible. On Saturday morning, Chilli and I went shopping together – just a Mumma and Daughter shopping adventure. We purchased the ingredients we needed to cook a special ‘Japanese Feast’. That afternoon we set about preparing the foods we needed to bring together the Japanese Fare that Sakura had mentioned were her favourite meals when she was younger. It was nice that Sakura had reminisced about cooking these dishes with her mother when she was younger – as Chilli and I were now cooking them together! During our cooking and dining time, we listened to a beautiful collection of Traditional Japanese Music. Amidst our cooking and preparing, Chilli also relished in the opportunity to get out her cuisenaire rods to work out certain measurements along the way.

The dishes we made were; Yudofu, Tempura with sweet rice, Anko to put into Dorayaki for dessert and then of course Green Tea. We found a really wonderful Japanese Cooking site with handy videos and clear instructions. The green tea was actually a gift from a Japanese friend who visited and stayed with us last year. It was in a really sweet little metal tin with the gorgeous Japanese paper labels and fancy Japanese writing that many special Japanese products have. I often think that certain Japanese products look so pretty the way they are presented. Whenever we receive a gift from our Japanese friend, it comes wrapped in the most gorgeous natural packaging and then gift wrapped by the store it was purchased in. Everything is mindful and beautiful.

Chilli delighted in going about setting up her very own ‘Japanese Restaurant’ to serve Daddy and Marlin in for dinner that evening. We set the table together, made a menu board and then Chilli put on her ballet ‘Character Shoes’ as her ‘high heels’ because “All waitress’ in restaurants always have high heels on Mummy!” We chose our Japanese names for the evening (we actually just used the two lady’s names from the Japanese Cooking 101 videos!), lit the candle, and invited our guests to dine. Our guests came dressed very well to the restaurant as well!

The next day we ventured out to our favourite Tea House! (Any excuse – I know!) This time there was guidelines around what we could order – we were there for tea, and this in my opinion is the best place in Hobart to go for tea. The tea menu is extensive without being exhausting. Mathew and Shae know their tea – that’s for sure and they’ve recently put together a retail range of teas, so we were eager to try some of these. Between us we selected 4 of their different teas, and conveniently Shae had made a Matcha Cashew Cream Cake for the sweets that day – so of course we had to try a piece of that! It was all delicious.

Following on from our tea adventure, we went on to another of our favourite Hobart destinations – The Japanese Gardens in the Royal Hobart Botanical Gardens. At any time of year this space within the Botanical Gardens is breathtaking, and this Summertime trip was no exception.

Experiencing :: Number Three

November 22, 2014 | Leave a Comment

Since Chilli turned 7 recently, we’ve been doing a very gentle introduction to numbers in this final Kindergarten term. We’ve had so much fun with the Earthschooling ‘Sixth Sense Maths’ program – exploring the numbers in different ways through their Physical, Mental and Spiritual dimensions. Once we’ve finished the numbers 1 – 10, I’ll try and find the time to photograph Chilli’s number book and do a post about how we explored each number. In the meantime, I wanted to put together this brief post to share our experiences with Learning the number Three this week.

This year, Chilli just learnt the letters of her name, however since turning 7, she has been copying some very basic sentences from my writing, relating to her lessons. She is very excited about learning all her letters next year.

In the traditional Waldorf way, we’ve been exploring each number through;

Laying out ‘twistys’ on the floor and walking – forwards, backwards and eyes closed along the form
Drawing the form with our ‘finger pencil’ both in the air and on each other’s backs
I lay out the twisty somewhere hidden for Chilli and Marlin to go on a ‘number hunt’ with their homemade toilet paper roll binoculars
Shaping the form with either bread or play dough
Drawing the form with sticks on unsealed ground when we’re out on nature walk
Finding the form in nature
Discovering that number through our daily lives – in writing, signs and clusters of items both in the home and in nature

When I feel Chilli is ready to try writing the number, we first take our chalk boards to write the form a few times in a ‘semi-permanent’ way. I think this step is really important as it’s a gentle ‘easing into’ the written form for the child. I actually remember as a younger child, feeling a lot of pressure as I went to take pencil to paper learning to write. It’s a very permanent ‘no mistakes’ kind of medium. That’s definitely not to say I expect no mistakes of Chilli when she does take crayon to paper, but I think there’s a nice gentle ‘easing into it’ when the first written form is in a casual space. Whenever we come to the chalkboard or the paper, we always ‘practice’ first – in the air with our finger pencil and then on the board or paper with our finger pencil, before we put the chalk to the board or crayon to the paper. I think this step is also really important. The air practice re-inforces the form and the finger pencil practice on the platform before the medium meets it, helps to bring a spacial relationship between the form and the page. I’ve watched Chilli many times with her finger pencil get to the bottom of the platform only halfway through the letter or number and say “Oh, hang on”, starting again. I find 3-5 times of finding the form on the platform with the finger pencil really brings that spacial relationship nicely before actually writing the number or letter. When we are drawing the form on the chalkboard, we often will turn the number or letter form into a picture for fun.

This week with the Number Three we have been discussing objects around us that have the word ‘tri’ in them – meaning ‘three’. The triangle we ring each day for start of school, the tripod Daddy uses for the camera occasionally and the trinity on Mummy’s wedding ring. It’s so empowering when children remember, realise and make connections with things mentally on their own. Chilli was excited to think about how the clover has three petals and remember the story about Saint Patrick plucking a clover from the grass to speak about the Holy Trinity. It’s said many times through Waldorf literature how important this early childhood foundation of story and verse is that we lay in those first seven years. Watching this all blossom, unfold and live so deeply in Chilli is really magical. I have a friend who often says to me how blessed we are to be the ones bringing this curriculum to our children – to not only share the experience with them, tailor a program that meets our child exactly where they are, but also to see the magic that lives in them and the connection, realisation and neural pathway spark just ‘light up’. What an immense blessing and phenomenal privilege homeschooling truly is. We also spoke about the three horned dinosaur – ‘triceratops’ and the name for three babies born at once – ‘triplets’. We haven’t done a lot of reading on dinosaurs as yet so Chilli found this concept of a three horned dinosaur really bizarre and surreal.

The main reason I wanted to post here however was to share a really wonderful resource for Learning Three. The Spiritual discussion on Three in our Earthschooling Curriculum mentions Goldilocks and The Three Bears. Today I asked Chilli if she could think of a Fairytale or Story she remembered that had something about the Number Three in it. After a few moments of thinking, she said “Goldilocks and The Three Bears!” Again, that connection of story in the early years that makes concepts ‘Jump up and Live’ in the child. We sat together and read this book – I really love Gerda Muller’s works. Her stories are beautiful and her pictures just gorgeous – classic illustration at its best. Now most often in Waldorf Lessons, we will tell a story through either puppet scenes or in a Grades Lesson, by bringing the story to life via illustration on the chalkboard. However what I LOVE about using this book for the Number Three is the thoughtfulness of Three throughout the book’s illustrations. Each page, after we read the story, we would count the things we could see in threes. And there is a bounty of items grouped in three through this book – it’s brilliant! Three tree trunks together, three branches coming out of a cluster together on the tree, three squirrels running up the trunk, three snails together on the ground, three butterflies flying around – and of course then once you’re inside the bear’s cottage there is a whole new world of three: bowls on the table, brooms in the kitchen, umbrellas by the door, chairs, beds, money boxes and dressing gowns. We had such fun counting all the threes in this book.

In essence, this is what Waldorf Education is all about for me – especially in these early years and elementary grades. Making the lesson really Live in the child and not having a concept that stands separate to them as a foreign ‘thing’ to be ‘learnt’. In bringing the lesson as an ‘experience’ so that the information lives within them, we make this knowledge a part of their being. Education should not be something that is separate to a child, it should be something that is integrated into every aspect of their being, something that has a life of it’s own that the child experiences rather than has to ‘learn’ as a foreign concept.

:: We giggled to realise that even what Goldilocks did once she saw the Bears was in three – jumping out of bed, grabbing her shoes and running outside! ::

This introduction to numbers 1 – 10 is very gentle and basic. We will of course be revising the numbers next year through a formal Grade 1 block and bringing together the number forms with a very gentle introduction to the matching Roman Numeral form as well as the written word for each number. We’re all wonderfully excited about the program we’ll be doing next year. Marlin is at a really beautiful age that harmonises wonderfully well with being able to bring deeper, more focussed lessons to Chilli. I’ve said many times that even if we’d sat down and mapped out ahead of time exactly when we’d have our children, considering their correlating ages along the way, we couldn’t have planned more perfectly the age Marlin would be as Chilli was starting the Grades. Today while we immersed ourselves in Three, he immersed himself (by our side) in his latest obsession. A little bowl of water in the sink of ‘Pumpkin House’ to tend to the daily washing up. I can’t even begin to count and tell you how many changes of clothes we’re going through on a daily basis at the moment. A hand wash bowl, a small cup of water, a sink if someone stands with him and allows him to indulge in that privilege or the hose if he is close by when the gardens are watered or a can is being filled. He’s definitely our water boy little Marlin!

How is your planning for the coming school year going? I’ve just laid the foundation of blocks, rotation and concepts on how each lesson subject will be brought to Chilli. There’s still lots of work to be done, but it feels exciting to have that foundational direction laid. Hopefully I’ll have the time at some point to put together a little post about the planning I’ve been working on and the concepts we’ll be using for Grade 1 lessons.

Learning :: Odd and Even Numbers

May 7, 2014 | 2 Comments

There’s a sweet little verse in the May section of Earthschooling’s Kindergarten curriculum. If you have a Lifetime Membership, or have purchased the May curriculum, you’ll also have access to this verse in the wonderful new month-by-month lesson plans The Bearth Institute is currently releasing. These are making a world of difference to my planning. Even though I may not use the plan exactly as they have laid it out, to have this foundation provided as a springboard for my own planning, is wonderfully valuable. I’m finding it terrific the way they have given each week a seasonally related theme and developed their curriculum around that. In the planning I do, we always have a theme to our weeks. I work our homeschooling rotations, normally in a three week block – with the view of flowing harmoniously along with how each block is received and allowing flexibility if the need arises for a block to be more deeply explored. Having this willingness to bend and flow freely, I feel, is important to offer Chilli the opportunity to fully live into each block and theme as well as the offerings of projects, verses and stories I have put together as her curriculum. Recently I wrote some of my thoughts and views on the Earthschooling Facebook group page in reply to how often a story should change. These words below also relate to the block theme as well as topics, subjects and projects we bring to our children through homeschooling curriculum. Isn’t this the beauty of homeschooling? In a classroom setting, if one or two children were really living so deeply into say, a story – but as a whole the larger part of the classroom seemed ready to move on, then this is what the teacher needs to be directed by. However in the place of homeschooling, we can be guided wholly by the sole needs of our own child/ren.

Just starting this year (K) we are now doing one story a week. I could tell our daughter was ready for that, she would ask when there would be a new story toward the end of each week. In early years though, we would try to keep a story set up for around 3 weeks for a few reasons. Firstly – in early years, (nursery/pre-school ages) it’s most likely that you’re not ‘doing school’ every day, the children most likely only hear the story around 3 times a week. Secondly, I was once told that three weeks is a nice rhythm for story changing to nourish hands, heart and head. (1 week for the hands, 1 for the heart, 1 for the head). I always remember reading that we as parents will be ‘over’ telling a story before our children are ‘over’ hearing it! On that note, I would advise you to watch and be led by your child. Tell the 1 story in as many different ways (as a puppet show, sitting with eye’s closed, as hand gestures, by ‘building’ the story together with play pieces, by your child telling you the story, by drawing the story, by acting the story out together) and let your child eat up every last bit that he or she needs from that story before going onto another one. You will see the signs when your child is ready for a new story, you will get the sense when a story is ‘done’. If you do this for a while, you will, I am sure, notice a natural rhythm emerging of how long a story needs to be kept the same for your child. That being said – some stories have many layers that need to be peeled back, lived into and explored – while others are less complex and are finished in less time. Have your next story ready to go so you’re prepared when the current story is ready to put to sleep, but let them truly ‘live into’ each story fully, without worrying about moving on to a new story for the sake of a scheduled time ideal.

I have, here in this post, digressed from the main topic, so I will go back to topic – promising you that I will very soon, share a post on how I plan and the main considerations in my planning. The task of planning is one of those daunting aspects that can really engulf a homeschooling parent with panic and overwhelm. However, when broken down into manageable pieces, planning really becomes an enjoyable and welcomed experience.

Back to topic – learning odd and even numbers. If you are a homeschooler, you will relate to the fact that the very best homeschooling and learning moments often come from inspired whims rather than well planned out projects and days. There really is something to be said for the whole un-schooling movement! Yesterday during morning circle while we were working with the verse about odd and even numbers, I had an inspired thought that Chilli just so deeply absorbed, loved and ate up with great enthusiasm. I must mention here that Chilli is an older Kindergarten child – so bringing more awareness to the verse in this way is quite appropriate for her. I am this year, weaving in very basic and gentle first grade themes as well as projects and awareness’. This awareness to the verse would not be so appropriate with a nursery or younger K child, however you could also bring this awareness and flow on activity from a verse about odd and even numbers, into a first grade environment.

I could see Chilli was a little distant to the verse we were doing – it wasn’t actually ‘meaning’ anything for her but she wanted to understand it. I asked her – Do you know what odd and even numbers are? She shook her head. I looked to my right and there lay the basket of wooden interlocking blocks. I took out two of the 2-prong blocks and laid them out as ‘houses’. I then took out two bridge pieces, because they looked markedly different to the 2-prong pieces. I could have used 3-prong pieces but I wanted a noticeable difference in the two different items. The bridge pieces became our ‘people’. I explained very simply to Chilli that if a number is even, we will be able to put the same amount of ‘people’ into each ‘house’. Even means equal – the same. We went through the verse; 2-4-6-8-10. Each time I added 2 more ‘people’ and Chilli counted the blocks before seeing if they would fit ‘evenly’ into the two houses. Then we started over again and went through the odd numbers 1-3-5-7-9. Each time we tried to fit the ‘people’ evenly into the two ‘houses’. “No – they don’t fit” Chilli would say each time with such enthusiasm. We then did a bit of impromptu practice. I would take out a handful of ‘people’ without counting them. Chilli would line them up, count them and then try to divide them between the two ‘houses’. Each time announcing if the number she had started with was an odd or even number. The lesson really came ‘alive’ for her and she wanted to go on and on with it. At lunch time, she revelled in the opportunity to explain to Papa how odd and even numbers work and show him the process for figuring out if numbers are odd or even.

In her curriculum, Kristie talks about ‘Sixth Sense Maths’ – a process by which we really bring math ‘alive’ for children in multi-sense ways and let them live into the math rather than math being some abstract, separate experience from the child. There is an often quoted story about Rudolf Steiner walking into a classroom where children were learning the 2x tables by jumping up stairs in lots of 2’s. The story went on to tell of how Dr. Steiner then proceeded to throw the children roses in lots of 3’s and hence the 3x tables came to be for the children in an alive and relative manner.* I can definitely say that this little game honestly helped the math of odd and even numbers to live so wonderfully and in a ‘real’ way for Chilli.

As we packed up this activity, I thought this might also be nice with the multiplication and division numbers – just increasing the number of houses in a relevant manner. That’s definitely a game though for next year and a truer first grade curriculum. If you don’t have the wooden interlocking blocks, you could use any manner of objects for this game. Just choose 2 identical pieces for the ‘houses’ and use a different piece with multiple same’s for your ‘people’. Even two little rocks and a bundle of twigs would work perfectly fine for this process.

I hope you enjoy this little inspired game that came from our homeschooling journey, and that it might add some value to your working with odd and even numbers. Tell me – have you had something impromptu in your homeschooling this week that has had a wonderfully enlivening effect on your child’s learning?

* Full story can be found in ‘Child and Man’ Vol.2 No.1