This weeks lessons: more apples

We are going to a music festival tomorrow , so this weeks lessons were very short & sweet. Last week we learned how to preserve apples by drying. This week we sauced 1/2 bushel, and learned that canning was another way to preserve the harvest.   I made up an apple running form & we used this for a form drawing lesson.  After she had practiced the form my daughter copied her version into her farming book along with the 3 ways of preserving we learned about.

She really liked the apple running form, and asked me if she could have some time to make up some on her own. This was her idea.

She put the poem we were learning into her poems book. This is what happened to my Eden drawing. I transformed it into a background for the poem.

 

2 stories I told during these lessons were

Why Apples Have Stars Within &

Johnny Appleseed- I really loved this version

Today we prepared for our trip. We like to take most of our food. Being vegetarian can be difficult when traveling, and you can end up “junking out”. My daughter and I made the most delicious energy balls from a recipe we found on Dr. Ben Kim’s blog. I have found his blog wonderful for healthy recipes & articles. These have only 3 ingredients, pecans, dates, & cocoa. I added some spirulina powder to ours. So yummy, healthy, and easy to make.

Picking apples, and Mini German Caramel Apple Pancakes

We went on a field trip  a few hours north to a u-pick apple grove to see how apples were grown and pick a bushel for preserving. The whole picking process was fast. I wish it had been a longer experience, but at least my daughter did get the experience of pulling the apples from the tree with her own hands, apples she will process this week into dried apples, apple sauce, and fruit leather during next week’s lessons. At the orchard a mother pig had just had 5 babies a few days before. Baby pigs are pretty close to the cutest things on earth. You really have to see them in action. CUTE OVERLOAD!!! 

This morning I made everyone mini german apple pancakes from a few of the apples we picked. The recipe is below.

 

 

 

 

Baking bread: cheesy snails, and some books

cheesy snails

I recently bought “Baking Bread With Children” by Warren Lee Cohen. I can’t say enough good things about it. It’s full of songs, stories, verses, recipes, and ideas. It has sections on why bread baking is important, how to integrate bread baking into a curriculum, and even how to make an earth oven.  This is a must have book for ny one who is integrating Waldorf ideas into their homeschool. This is not just for early childhood. We will be using it a lot, and my daughter will be starting 3rd grade in the fall.

The first thing we made were the cheesy snails. They are made pretty much like sticky buns, so that they have a spiral shape. I can’t give the recipe since it is in the book, but It is basically a basic dough with tomato sauce used in place of the water. The tomato sauce gives the dough a bright orange color. The dough is rolled into a rectangle, sprinkled with cheddar,rolled into a tube, then cut into 1 inch slices, and then baked. These were delicious, and we had so much fun kneading the orange dough.  

                                                                                                                               

 

 I have also been reading “Encountering Self: Transformation & destiny in the ninth year“. It deals with the nine year change. In the book the author relates the act of baking bread to process which the grain goes through in the earth. In both all 4 elements come together to create the whole. It was in idea I had not ever read before, and I was struck by the truth of it. In the grain we have the sun-fire, soil-earth, wind-air, & rain-water. In the bread we have the same. The oven-fire, the grain comes from the earth, the yeast makes gas (air) which make the loaf rise, and have those delicious bubbles, and nooks inside, and of course water. I had always baked bread with my daughter. It was always fun, and something we looked forward to. I had not really had a full understanding of how truly sacred it is. I do recommend both of the books I mentioned in this post. You won’t be sorry you bought them.  I have a couple of snail stories, and verses posted on this blog. You can find them in the snail category on the right.

It hasn’t any windows
It hasn’t any doors
Although it has a ceiling
It hasn’t any floors
‘Twas built without a builder
A hammer or a nail
Because you see this funny house
Belongs to ___________.

Our lessons: Honey bees

We did a very fun lesson block about bees. This was an interdisciplinary lesson. Included was math, language, nature study, art, form drawing, painting, cooking,and others. The lessons were based around The Story Of Hildy Honeybee, an original story I wrote for the lessons. It is a 4 part story which tells of the life stages of a honey bee from a tiny egg to adult. I did a huge amount of reading on the subject so that I would have a thorough understanding of the facts, and it was good that I did because the questions were many. I have included links to many of the pages I gleaned the information from. This block took almost 3 weeks for us. I used the standard Waldorf 3 day rhythm: Day 1 Story, day 2 artistic realm, then on the 3rd day academic realm. We learned a few new bee verses, and a couple of funny bee riddles ( youcan find them in the info links). We had a honey tasting. You can really taste the difference between the different flowers. We  made a no bake cookie called Honey Crispies, a type of rice crispy snack. Both of these activities were met with great enthusiasm. We worked on the number 6 all throughout this unit since the comb is hexagonal, and the bee has six legs. We skip counted, and tossed the ball to the 6 times table. In form drawing we drew freehand hexagons, six sided stars, and a form that mimics the bee’s waggle dance that we learned about in part 4 (see pic below).  Our spelling words came from our lessons. We do a spelling list each week. Our words were

Honey crispies recipe

 

Honey Crispies Recipe

Ingredients: 1/2 cup powdered sugar 1/2 cup honey 1/2 cup peanut butter 1-1/2 cups crispy rice cereal 1/2 raisins 1/2 cup chocolate or candy sprinkles

Instructions:
Place a sheet of waxed paper on a cookie sheet. Combine powdered sugar, honey and peanut butter in a medium bowl. Mix well. Stir in cereal and raisins. Shape mixture with your hands into 1-inch balls. Roll balls in sprinkles and place on a
cookie sheet. Refrigerate 1 hour. Cookies should be firm. Store in refrigerator.

Honey boo boo salve

This recipe comes courtesy of the Magnificent Marsha Johnson of the Shining Star School in Portland. Marsha has an incredible yahoo group Waldorf Home Educators, and also has some hard to find resources for waldorf home schoolers.

 

Honey Salve:

Heat 1 cup oil, preferably good oil, we used Trader
Joe Canola Oil. Heat it carefully to avoid fires. Grate 2-3 ounces
of pure beeswax with a cheese grater big holes side.

Stir into the hot oil, beeswax and a few drops of essential oil. We
add 3-4 gel-caps of Vitamin E as well. Stir well until starting to
cool and thicken. Spoon into a small jar and use for an all purpose
salve for any injuries, bumps, rashes, etc. Be sure to use an oil
your skin can tolerate, we used lavender.

Fairytail Tea & Luncheon

It has been dreary & rainy here for days & days. We really needed something fun & whimsical. I had just bought a set of lovely tea cups with strainers & lids at world market intending to just use them as our regular tea time/story time cups. They have the prettiest little berry patterns on them. They were the inspiration for our fridayday afternoon Fairytail Tea Party & Luncheon.

 

We came up with a fun menu that was easy enough to prepare for a lunch. My daughter drew a fancy menu while I began to prepare the lunch.

 

 Our menu:

• the 7 dwarf’s 7 fruit salad
• mama billy goat’s goat cheese toasts w/ your choice of cucumber or pepper relish
• stone soup
• Fox’s sour grape jelly doughnut cupcakes
• sparkling grape juice
• tea

Everything was very tasty. We both loved the jelly doughnut cupcakes

here are links to the recipes for those. One is vegan & one has eggs, milk, ect.I made the vegan ones, but I used rice milk instead of soy. When possible I do bake vegan things. They are lower in fat & have no cholesterol than comparable egg/milk/butter recipes. It also reduces exposure to hormones & toxins that occur in animal foods.  When these were done cooling I noticed mine had holes where the jelly was. I just spooned a little extra jelly into them & then dusted them with sugar. My daughter told me that we should have called them Mother Holle’s Snow Capped Jelly Doughnut Cupcakes”. I have to agree.  I wish I  had thought about that before we made the menu. Children are brilliant, all of them. We made our own sparkling grape juice with organic grape juice, and club soda. She helped make the soup while I told her the story of  “Stone Soup”. You can find that in the link above, or in many places on the web.  My daughter doesn’t usually like soup much, but she had 2 bowls of it. It’s rare for her to want seconds. It was so much fun.

 

 She made us both paper crowns to wear. My daugter told me no proper tea time is complete without a hat or crown.

 When luch was over we had a strawberry & honey facial. She told me that was ” a dream come true”.

She LOVED it! All it consists of is a few strawberries mades with a tablespoon of honey. Edible, and good for your skin. Commercial facial products are really to harsh for a little girls skin, but strawberries are perfect. You just rub it on your skin & was off with a bit of warm water ( or a shower if you have a daughter like mine).

Stone Soup

We made stone soup as one of the menu items for our fairytale tea & luncheon. I told my daughter the story while we made the soup. It was so much fun, and she really enjoyed pretending to be each villager, adding the veggies to the pot. I decided to do this on the spur of the moment & just used things that were already in the fridge. I adjusted the story to go with the soup components that I had on hand. I prepared a large plate with all of the items ahead of time, so that the story could flow smoothly. Basically it was just a clean stone, veggie broth, thin noodles,  assorted veggies, and a bit of salt & pepper.

 

 

Stone Soup

A kindly, old stranger was walking through the land when he came upon a village.  As he entered, the villagers moved towards their homes locking doors and windows. The stranger smiled and asked, why are you all so frightened.  I am a simple traveler, looking for a soft place to stay for the night and a warm place for a meal. “There’s not a bite to eat in the whole province,” he was told. “We are weak and our children are starving.  Better keep moving on.” “Oh, I have everything I need,” he said. “In fact, I was thinking of making some stone soup to share with all of you.” He pulled an iron cauldron from his cloak, filled it with water, and began to build a fire under it. Then, with great ceremony, he drew an ordinary-looking stone from a silken bag and dropped it into the water. By now, hearing the rumor of food, most of the villagers had come out of their homes or watched from their windows. As the stranger sniffed the “broth” and licked his lips in anticipation, hunger began to overcome their fear. “Ahh,” the stranger said to himself rather loudly, “I do like a tasty stone soup. Of course, stone soup with carrots — that’s hard to beat.” Soon a villager approached hesitantly, holding a small carrots he’d retrieved from its hiding place, and added it to the pot. “Wonderful!!” cried the stranger. “You know, I once had stone soup with carrots and a bit of broth, and it was fit for a king.” The villager managed to find some broth. . . and so it went, through peas, onions, carrots, corn, and so on, until there was indeed a delicious meal for everyone in the village to share. The villager elder offered the stranger a great deal of money for the magical stone, but he refused to sell it and traveled on the next day.  As he left, the stranger came upon a group of village children standing near the road.  He gave the silken bag containing the stone to the youngest child, whispering to the group, it was not the stone, but the villagers that had performed the magic.”

 

This week in lessons: the sun, and rabbits

My daughter has been asking tons of questions about the universe. She asks about the sun, moon, & other planets almost constantly. I decided we would learn a little bit about them in a 3 week block, and satisfy her curiosity. I know astronomy is not usually taught until later grades, but I felt since she was so receptive to learning about it,then I could not let an opportunity to teach a fully engaged child. That’s the nice thing about homeschooling. You can make it fit just for you.In keeping with the Waldorf 2nd grade ideals I am using animal legends to open the door to teaching about the sun,moon & stars. Since it is so close to spring, and rabbits are the consummate spring icon, I used the story “How Rabbit Saves the Sun”. I changed it a bit so that I could use the story as a basis for a painting lesson, and form drawing lesson. I am going to start posting stories, verses, and recipes separately to make the blog flow a bit more smoothly.  You will just have to click on them to be directed towards them if you would like to view.

I love how Waldorf methods integrate almost all subjects together. To me this synthesis makes it so much easier to teach. Instead of “lets put this away, and start that”, our day just flows together organically. In our circle time this week we started a new movement verse. I originally found it in “Looking Forward”, a wonderful movement & music book. It is called “Sally go round the Sun”. It is an old folk tune. It sounds very similar to “Here We Go LoobyLoo”. I changed it to go along with our story/lesson this week. Instead of Sally go round the sun, I substituted “rabbit”. Then I encouraged my daughter to choose other animals & act out what the animal would do, or how they would move. We also said her name, and my name along with the animals.  We sang the song, and did the movements in a circle around a yellow playsilk which was puddled in the middle of the floor to represent the sun. We changed the day of the week in the song to whatever day it was. I think this really helps in learning the order of the days of the week.

Rabbit go round the sun
Rabbit go round the Moon
Rabbit go round the chimney pot
on a Monday afternoon.
Whoopie!!! (hands meet over pot, and then fly into the air on “whoopie”)

then…

Horse…
rooster…
cat…
mommy….
elephant…..

Until you’ve had enough.

For sculpting this week we cooked some home made air dry clay.
It is a bit like salt dough, but it does not use as much salt. I think the salt dough makes your hands feel too dry, and to me that is really unpleasant.  This recipe made enough for me & her to make a sun, and we has a fist sized bit left over. We let ours airy dry for a few days, and then painted them with acrylics. I am going to put a topcoat of varnish on them to make them shine & preserve the finish. My daughters sun is tired. She said he was tired of burning so brightly, and wanted to rest. That is why he is frowning.

 

 

  

Our painting lesson involved our “Rabbit Saves the Sun” story.
This is my daughters painting.  We started our lesson with the sunlight painting verse, and then began the painting with a fiery red dot in the middle of the page. We circled out and made it bigger, and bigger. Then yellow came in from all four corners, and tried to get  as close to the red as possible. I think this helps to learn how to control the brush as well as the paint. As soon as yellow was as close as it could get we circle the yellow around the red, and then allowed them to meet.Then we painted rays extending out from the center like a sun..
We took a bit more red & made the center of the sun just a bit more hot.

You could just start with covering the whole page with yellow, and go from there if your child is younger.

We made sure to leave a part just yellow so there would be a nice yellow spot to put our rabbit. After our brushed were good & clean we too a bit of blue & made an oval at the bottom corner (this was his body)and a smaller oval on top of it ( the head). Lastly 2 small blue wisps created the ears. This made a cute, fuzzy, green rabbit. Green for spring, and green is a bit sneaky just like rabbit when he snuck in a stole the sun from the imps.

 

 

I always like to give some free painting time too to let her express herself. She made a little story for me to follow along to also. She said this is all of the children on a playground circling round playing a game. In the end, blue was a bully, so red came and made him be nice, which turned him into that soft lavender you see on the outermost part of the circles.

Our form drawing came from the part of the story when Rabbit kicked the sun into the sky, and it grew bigger, and bigger, and bigger. The second for we did was a mirrored form of the first when the animal council saw the sun & it’s reflection in the lake. It is rally like drawing an ever increasing figure eight or lemniscate. Steady in one fluid motion, always coming back & touching that center point.

  I always have a batch of 10 to 15 spelling words that come out of a lesson. This week they were….

Sun

Solar

Moon

Lunar

Star

Stellar

Constellation

Revolve

Revolution

Rotate

Rotation

orbit

The science comes in the form of discussion, movement, and observation. We talked about how the sun is a star. The closest star to us, and it is 150 kilometers away. We talked about how hot it musty be to warm our earth so gently, and pefectly from so far away.  We talkedabout how seasons are made by the earth revolving around the sun, and the earth rotating on it’s axis. We did 2 experiments to show this. First she was the sun, and I revolved around her while spinning. Then we traded places, with me being the center of the  universe. Then we did a similar experiment with a globe & a shadeless lamp. With this experiment you can clearly see why we have seasons.

We also went outside & traced our shadow onto brown craft paper. We did this  in the same spot at 9am, 12pm, & 3pm. That was a fun experiment. I let her color the tracings. Sorry, no pics.

I made up a poem about the solar system to teach the simple facts we were learning.

We also read the book “Sun Bread”, and then made sun bread. This is a really beautiful & fun book. I highly recommend it. It even has a nice bread recipe on the back, but I tend to use my basic no fail recipe for bread.

We continued the sun as a theme for a week. The next week we will focus on the moon.

Homemade, air dry modeling clay recipe

2cups water

2 cups flour

4 tsp. cream of tartar

1/2 cup salt

2 Tbsp. vegetable oil

 

1.Mix together in a medium-sized pot.

2. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly.

3. The dough will eventually become hard, Stir the mixture till it starts to stick to the spoon.

4. At this point, dump the dough onto wax paper and allow it to cool (about fifteen minutes).

5. Knead the dough until it is smooth.

This will air dry. You can speed up the process by baking in a 200 degree oven for 30 minutes to an hour.