Maths main lesson... and Christmas!

Here's stuff that I've done.. but today when i go back to settle the classroom, i'll take photos of what the kids have done in the ML books. They are stunning!

Baba Yaga

The kids loved the Baba Yaga stories, which then led on to the Baba Yaga games. We used these to do multiplication, division, addition and subtraction. Basically they had to escape from Baba Yaga by doing chores for her. Like sorting the gifts collected along the road and counting in threes and eventually sevens. There was a lot of screaming and yelling... as usual. I think the kids actually prefer the maths main lessons to the English ones!!

Gingerbread house

 It was universally declared that the Christmas party we had in our classroom was the best Christmas party ever on account of the gingerbread house. It lived for less than 24 hours!

The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship

Getting ready for Advent!

Getting ready for Advent...stars start to emerge

More beeswax...

New nature table

12 dancing princesses underground world -
diresctly inspired by trip to Venice

New Advent song

Mary and Joseph make their way to Bethlehem

Spinning!!!

Drop spindles

Spinning wheel

Used to teach maths - can u spot the 12th princess and the soldier?

Diorama to teach multiples of 2, 3 and 4

It is now the Maths main lesson. Now that we have learnt the four operations etc, it is about having fun with numbers! So most recently we made twelve pairs of shoes per pair - like the Elves and the Shoemaker - a story i recently told - and then did division - but of course i didn't call it division. Next week we will do multiplication - but it is all about getting the ol mental maths working in their heads by getting the body to do the work.

In the unabridged Brothers' Grimm version of the Elves and Shoemaker the elves are two naked little men - and i left this detail in - usually they are clothed in rags, and of course the children found this incredibly funny. I thought it was a harmless funny, but i do apologise if the children keep talking about naked elves.

We also finished off our wildlife garden. We weeded, raked, put in a bird table, made birdfood and THEN we sowed some garden wildflower mix, some countryside wildflower mix (like redshank and quinoa), and then LOTS and LOTS of flax. I can't wait to harvest some of the flax to show where linen comes from!

Today is the Advent festival - our classroom has been turned into the Crystal Forest. Come along to experience some wonderful Advent spirit!

R is for Raven

Because i did a job which had to do with birds previously i have a partiality to birds. But the Raven is an bird which is so much of the imagination - it is probably the bird we have the closest relationship with as human beings. It is so much part of our mythology around the world - American Indians, Norse mythology, Egyptian mythology, and of course Celtic mythology as well. So when i saw that R was done as Raven in a previous book, i did not miss the opportunity.

It is always good fun when you tell children that the Raven is about the same size as i am with its wings outstretched. They are very impressed.

We did R in the ML books. Here are the results...

Shading

I am teaching the children how to shade. Rather than have everything done uniformly, being ever so slightly sanguine, i'm using the ML drawing practise sessions to teach various drawing teachniques with different media - colour pencils and wax (block and stick) crayons, and how to mix colour. This time round we used shading - i loved the results - each child coming up with something which is entirely theirs with some instructions. For children who don't want to do shading, that's alright. They can do what suits them ... and i do a straightforward colouring with them.

November song drawing

Finally, we did our November song and said goodbye to it.

Chalkboard practise

We spend lots of time drawing the letters and saying them before we put them in the ML book. In this case we did D and R. We walk it, draw it with bits of our body and then finally model it. And then we pracitse draw it and then finally put it in the ML book.

We have plastercine Rs

There is also a strang emphasis on making sure that they do the letters in the correct way - up to down and then a non mirror image. This will probably be something which happens gradually, as often children at this age still cannot tell left from right and will flip/reverse letters. It will take awhile but playing down good habits is essential now. Get it right from the start.

Beeswax, wet on wet and blacksmithing, oh and barracudas...just another day at the school

Nothing says Waldorf education like beeswax modelling. However it is a pain in this climate as it takes AGES to become soft and the kids tend to get a bit bored trying to warm it up. So as a result they barely take notice of this amazing medium. I decided to take matters in hand (boom boom ) and have a beeswax modelling class. The results were adorable.

A red fox

Snails and leaves were the theme

Then, one of them decided to do squirrel!!!
You could have just died of cuteness factor with this squirrel

Snail and leaf - and cuteness factor

Gift of tumblers and today's beeswax work

This week's wet on wet - gold, yellow and blue

Just goergeous

Class Ten does Blacksmithing - oh i LOVE blacksmithing
I was born to blacksmith, it was so hard not to join in

Charcoal burning - they made their own charcoal!!! Hoover provides the air

Going away like hammer and tongs -
that's where the expression comes from

Pokers and hooks

In another part of the workshop - clay work

Make dragons

Then a ten year old made this barracude in the workshop from wood

Today has got to be the best one honestly. It was so filled with grace. What more could anyone want? Oh yes, we also did "R". Tomorrow pictures from the ML book.

Prussian blue, gotta love it and Martinmas

Pinkel and the witch

 It was so fun telling this story. The boys in the class kept their eyes and ears shut with excitement as Pinkel went into the witches hut to steal her goat, lamp and cloak. They were, we can't listen to this we can't listen to this. I used to think there is little difference between telling a story from memory and reading one. I cannot tell you how satisfying it is to start the day telling a story for the children and seeing how excited they are. An ancient, ancient human experience which the kids get every single day!

Our November song

Golden light is turning grey
Mists begin to rule the day
Bare the trees their branches lift
Clouds of dead leaves earthwards drift...

Sometimes the magic of the painting is undeniable. Here we did the prussian blue for the first time and when you do the wet and wet you bring it to them in the picture. I got the idea from the Drawings for Class One to Eight book - the bible for drawing in Steiner schools. We say that this blue comes from the deepest part of space, far in the sky and it sees us here and it wants to come down to earth and it does this slowly at first... just a bit - and then to just paint it with water, then it comes closer and you take a tiny bit of blue and do a band, and then it comes even closer... and finally it enters the sea and it is dark and beautiful in the sea... and we got a lakeland lanscape, a rainforest storm, creatures living in the seas, a morning of mist in a forest... it was really, really amazing - one colour, six and seven year olds. When it was done i just wanted to cry...

Ready to go

The kids did their own lanterns... painted and tissue papered and oiled them... how gorgeous are they against the light.

Here they are in action... it was absolutely delightful listening to them sing as they walked
along the dark in the school

I love Martinmas - winter has begun and we now start getting ready for Christmas. Next posting will show the drawings of the kids from their Main Lesson books.