Arts, Environment and the Child: Walking the Wheel of the Seasons

I got to know some of my class mates while we tore tissue paper and made a jolly mess with glue. I also got to jump off the hay bales with the children. I am glad I didn’t have any glue on me at the time. I also put extra hay down where everyone was jumping with Ben.

Called up a friend who just became a Waldorf teacher and asked him questions about the school, would they be interested in having volunteers. Did he think that Amy (the other kinder teacher), would like to work with me ect....

Met with Amy...How delightful! She introduced me to some of the children. Then she storied me on some of the curriculum. We coordinated schedules, I will be volunteering at the Waldorf School on alternating Tuesdays and Wednesdays every week.

Cindy nannies a 3 year old boy, who is adopted by two wealthy men in Seattle. She is the main woman in this boy’s life. She talked about her experience working with an adopted child and recommended some reading for me.

My first day volunteering at the Waldorf School I entered the most home like class room of my life. Amy, the main teacher, suggested that I volunteer for the whole day, partially because it is a busy day for and partially because it would be more enriching for me to see the whole routine and theme of the day. Art day is on Tuesdays and all the kids know it. There is an emphasis on certain kinds of routines at the Waldorf School. Every Tuesday there is a nature walk, a circle time, a painting activity, free play time, a snack of vegetables and a lunch of cooked oats, (the best oats I have ever eaten) outside play, and closing circle. There is one girl who does not like free play time. Amy says that this five year old likes quiet activities best, during free play it gets real loud. This day it was so loud that the little girl huddled close to Amy, about to cry. I was sitting in the rocking chair and Amy was in high demand by the other 22 children so she put this small curled up child in my lap where I hummed and rocked her to sleep. It was beautiful.

Visit number two…. Campfire day….Wow! I sure would have loved going to this school when I was a kid. At least I get to go now. When I got there a little girl called me over to the fire place where they where making pancakes. She was pretending to be a puppy and I pretended with her as we ate pancakes. Rraor-roor-yum. Then we all got in a circle, it was a special day. Isza’s birthday. A birthday is a big deal in Waldorf school. There is a special ceremony for every child’s birthday. The child’s parents come in and tell a story about when the child was first born. It was super precious. Later the kids all played in freezing rain… I love how the Waldorf kids play in all kinds of weather. These kids were not afraid of some really cold rain… they were laying down in hypothermic puddles… literally swimming with their raincoats on, they had so much fun and got very cold but then they were bundled up and it was time to go home.

I got to witness Rebecca’s incredible workshop presented to nine teens at GRuB. I took a lot of notes but will have to post them tomorrow.

I went over to Marja and Meena's home, with the plan to get better acquainted with the pair and to open up a coconut. I thought Meena would probably be familiar with coconuts and maybe after we ate the coconut we could make coconut bowls and put flowers from the garden in them. I learned that Meena loves coconuts. I learned some Hindi words. Marja lent me a book called The Primal Wound about adopted children that discusses some of the anger and anxiety that adopted children go through. I had a great time singing, laughing, and drinking coconut juice with Meena.

Today I was again struck by the incredible intelligence of little people, how quickly they learn, the life in their observations, their memory… One girl who I had not seen in two weeks remembered my name immediately, while I floundered and gaffed to remember hers. They are just so bright, the way they look at the people and things around them, how their eyes light up. In playing jump rope with these children they seem to know an endless amount of rhymes, some common teddy bear, bubble gum songs but some that I have never heard before. One girl, age five, is very interesting to watch. She spends much of her time alone. She doesn’t like it when it gets loud. At story time she is by far the stillest and most attentive child I have ever seen. Her hands where in her lap, her eyes wide, and her mouth was pierced in such a way that she might be holding a marble on her tongue. She looks like a European picture. At play time I saw her climbing a tree with a dandelion in her hand… humming… every time I walked by her she was humming something. When she was on the swing she was singing softly “row, row, row your boat” when I chimed in with her she looked at me saucer eyed. Later when I was drawing by the steps she approached me looking at my drawings, dangling from the banister and occasionally humming.

Sometimes when I look at adults I can imagine very easily what they would look like as children. Even people like David Letterman and Jay Leno. Today, I was looking at some girls on the jungle gym and I could imagine their faces as adults. The humming girl I can also imagine pretty easily.

Interesting book, I am reading about the separation anxiety that adopted children have, even if they were adopted at birth. The author states that the connection between mother and child in the uterus is not forgotten. The result it a fear of abandonment that creates the primal wound in adopted children, and attempts to explain the difficult ways that many adopted children act.

When I drove to the Waldorf School this morning the sky was pure white fog. I thought of doing a Waldorf-style painting to it. Waldorf painting in the Kindergarten year entails thick water color paper soaking wet and a two primary colors with which the paint spreads and blends with great ease. This turns out to be very colorful and the painted images get a soft velvety look. I have heard that young children shouldn’t paint because they find it frustrating to control the brush and paint. I don’t remember being frustrated as a child when finger painting… I think at that age painting is mostly about color. That is how the children take it at the Waldorf School.

I went on a nature walk with the children and told them that they could collect different things that they liked off the ground. This came very naturally to them.

What else….the youngest girl in the class put her head a few inches from my and very intently asked me “who are you” a number of times. That shocked me, for she knew my name. Sometimes children just seem like little Buddha’s.

I watch a DVD that showed Meena's orphanage, it predominately showcased the children up for adoption, Girls and boys from ages 2-11.

It was a fun and special day. Rebecca came to the school with me to observe my activity. I got to go collecting with a few of the children before the activity. We were looking for moss and they knew to look behind all the rotting logs. I did the activity right before lunch. I passed around different containers of natural objects we had found the nature walk the previous Tuesday. Every one got a turn to hold the canister and to guess what was inside. In the first canister was pine needles and in the second was pine cones and in the third was a surprise one that I had collected on my own. Inside of a hollow coconut shell with a hole in it I put wintergreen berries. Everyone shook the coconut shell and smelled and guessed... root beer... no candy... were the kind of things they said with eager smiles. When it came time for lunch the children wanted to continue with the game so the teacher told them we would continue when I returned next week.

We also got to sing around the campfire!!!

Created a slide show from the pictures taken at the Waldorf School, mostly pictures that Rebecca so graciously took during the nature activity and throughout the day.