Michaelmas, New Session, Work, and Play

Dear Families,

      Some of you may have received a number of announcements about Monday's all-school Michaelmas celebration, its joys, and the tight parking situation.  For parent & child families who have not, I wanted to again extend an invitation to the festival while duly noting that it is best to arrive early, carpool, or plan to park at Ken's Corner (525 and Cultus Bay) and fetch a ride from there.  It is my understanding that the school's Parent Council intends to create a sign or some other way for Whidbey Island Waldorf School families to gather in that parking lot if they seek a ride over to the school.  Please do call me 341-4124 or the school 341-5686 if you plan to attend and remain confused.  While the parking may present challenges and the dragon may be too intense or the play slightly too long for some of our very young children, I have heard that it is wonderful to have so many families gathering together to celebrate light and strength in face of the approaching darkness of winter.

There are brochures (enrollment forms) for next session, which begins October 30 & 31, outside the Butterfly Classroom in a red basket.  Thank you for coming to this session, and I look forward to seeing you next session.  It has been and continues to be a school policy that enrollment for Dewdrop and Rosebud classes is on a first-come, first-serve basis (that is, the school does not hold spaces in next session for families in the current session).  Although I am new to this school and community and it seems we have room to grow in our classes, my experience in Baltimore was that enrollment in classes could increase throughout the school year; I recommend putting in an application soon.  Contact me if you have questions. 

  The interaction of play and work in the Waldorf early childhood classroom is a rich one productive one.  For many young children, play and work are often the same--witness the focus many of our children show when washing dishes or how eager so many are to shake the butter jars in class.  This article by Joan Almon about the vital importance of play also shares insight into how our joyful and cooperative work as adults can inspire the independent and developing social play of our children.  Joan Almon was a founding teacher at the Waldorf School of Baltimore and then the Acorn Hill Children's Center (right outside Washington, DC).  She went on to become a teacher of teachers, a well-spoken lecturer, and to found the Alliance for Childhood, an organization that brings together educators, physicians, professors, researchers, and others interested in studying and preserving childhood.  The Alliance benefits from Almon's experience in Waldorf education but also tries to go beyond Waldorf education to promote and preserve childhood for all children.

With warmth and light,

William Dolde

Gerber, Pikler, Steiner, RIE, Loczy, Waldorf

Dear Families,

First, remember that you as parent & child families are invited to our Michaelmas celebration as guests (other grades and the nursery and kindergartens will be making food for all) next Monday, September 29 at the fields behind the school. Our school's newsletter, which I have forwarded on to families who do not already receive it, has a schedule for the evening and background information for the festival. Feel free to choose to come to, say, the first part of the celebration and leave before the play and the bonfire. Some young children (my 5 and half year old son, for example) may find the dragon portrayed by the 6th grade to be too intense during the play, and you may want to wander to the other side of the school and pick berries or the like if it seems best. I also realize that the bonfire and singing may push into bedtime routines. At the same time, if it works for your schedule and you are willing to be flexible if this or that part of the event doesn't quite seem just right for an infant or toddler, it is a well-attended and lively gathering--and in this manner provides a good chance to get a sense of the Whidbey Island Waldorf School community.
Last week's article on conflict had a few references to Magda Gerber and Emmi Pikler, and I think it would be helpful for me to provide more background information. This article about the lives and work of Emmi Pikler and Magda Gerber is by Susan Weber, founder of Sophia's Hearth in Keene, NH. Although Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Waldorf education, provided a wealth of information about a panoply of topics, when he helped start the first Waldorf School in Stuttgart in 1918, the school began with grade 1. It soon became clear to Steiner that it would support the movement to develop Waldorf kindergartens. Although he did give some insights to the founding kindergarten teachers, he died before the first kindergartens opened. The initial Waldorf impulse did not include nursery classes and parent & child classes or care situations for infant and toddlers. As the 20th century came to a close, and it was ever more apparent that there was a need for nourishing and nurturing care and community for very young children and their families in light of Waldorf education, master kindergarten teachers such as Susan Weber and Rena Osmer (now of Rudolf Steiner College in Fair Oaks, CA) travelled the country to see if there were existing models of infant and toddler education that had wisdom to share with Waldorf early childhood educators. The article by Weber describes her "discovery" of RIE. Weber has gone on to weave the wisdom of Magda Gerber and Emmi Pikler into her vision for the creation of a place--"Sophia's Hearth"--that would provide care for children with or without their parents from infancy to age three, along with midwifery services, as inspired by Waldorf education.
While it is hard to summarize the life's work of Pikler and Gerber in a few sentences, here are some of their insights that help us most.
1. Rather than treating times of care such as diapering, feeding, dressing, and bathing as time away from playing with or teaching or enjoying our infants and toddlers, we can use these together times as times of attentiveness, learning, and bonding--leaving both child and caregiver filled with joy and ready to play or work independently or in proximity.
2. We can as much as possible allow infants and toddlers the joy of achieving gross motor milestones such as rolling, crawling, sitting, walking, climbing, balancing, swinging, and jumping in their own way and in their own time. We provide them a loving atmosphere with lots of time to explore and play.
3. As Magda Gerber says, "Who knows better how to be a baby than a baby?" Allow the child to explore and show interest in this or that. We do not need to inundate young children with lots of toys or educational materials. We provide attention and love and a safe environment for children to discover the world.
4. Tell your child what you are going to do (e.g. "I am going to pick you up now.") from the very first.
Although Rudolf Steiner is much more overt about the spiritual elements of his picture of child development, careful reading of Gerber and Pikler shows that they, too, have a profoundly respectful and spiritual understanding of infants and toddlers. I am in the process of ordering books by or inspired by Gerber and Pikler for our parent's library at the school. These include Dear Parent: Treating Infants with Respect and Your Self-Confident Baby by Magda Gerber, 1, 2, 3, The Toddler Years from the Santa Cruz Toddler Center, and selections from Emmi Pikler's work translated into English in an academic bulletin. Emmi Pikler's research from Hungary had a powerful influence on child development research in Europe. Because Dr. Spock's book on childcare was perceived as so all-encompassing, American publishers were loathe to translate Pikler's works into English during her lifetime. You can learn more about Gerber and the parent & child classes she founded (Resources for Infant Educarers) at www.rie.org and of the ongoing work of the child develpment research of Emmi Pikler at www.pikler.org. You can learn more about Susan Weber's work bringing together Pikler, Gerber, and Waldorf at www.sophiashearth.org.

With warmth and light,

William Geoffrey Dolde

As Our Children Grow -- Conflicts into Conversation

Dear Families,

Thank you for bringing yourself, your children, and your vegetables to our classes last week. The soup was delicious both days, and children found areas or social situations in the room to explore alone or with parents or with each other.

Our children grow and change. In the generally harmonious and sometimes lively rhythm of our first classes, I had a few parents ask me questions about how to support their children when they were struggling over a toy, taking a toy away, or having a toy taken away. It is my understanding that Vanessa Kohlhauss gave a well-attended and helpful talk about infant and toddler conflict last spring. I also find that I as a parent and teacher have to keep updating and refreshing and renewing my attitude toward conflict as my own children and children in my class change, and as I as a parent and teacher fall into old habits. As Trice Atchinson writes in this article from Sophia's Hearth about conflict, many of us as adults (me, at least, when I do not remind myself) wish the conflict would go away. It is often most helpful for our children, however, when we welcome conflict as a chance for children to grow and learn. When Kim Payne--who gave a talk about discipline last month in Langley--helps schools develop plans to promote social inclusion and decrease bullying, he makes it very clear that the end goal is not a school or a world free from all discord and conflict. Even as he coaches elementary and middle school teachers to deal from a therapist's perspective with some very tricky and potentially abusive situations, he still reminds teachers that for many conflicts, the teacher should, "Not just do something but stand there." Our presence and support are sometimes enough to help children move through and grow from conflict.

Among the many things I like about Atchinson's article is the manner in which she weaves together books from Waldorf education (some of which are in our parent's library in the lobby; Beyond the Rainbow Bridge is an excellent and concise introduction to many of the principles of Waldorf education, for example) with wisdom from Emmi Pikler, Magda Gerber, Loczy in Hungary, and RIE in California. Atchinson suggests that there will be times to redirect the children. Wise Waldorf kindergarten teachers from decades past show us how effective imaginative pictures ("The barge is carrying the wood to the harbor" instead of "You need to put those blocks away now!") can be in guiding our children through the day. There will also be times when--especially if parents find it supportive--the struggle is productive for the children, and we can resist the urge to redirect the children's attention elsewhere. Sophia's Hearth itself, in Keene, New Hampshire, explicitly works with the wisdom of Waldorf Education and Rudolf Steiner and the wisdom of Pikler and Gerber and RIE. Susan Weber, one its directors, finds this weaving an excellent and respectful way to meet the needs of very young children and their parents.

With the infants and toddlers in our classes, we have to make judgment calls. Even after reading the article from Sophia's Hearth, even if you feel inspired to have patience if your child is in a conflict, if you find it is 10:45am and you know your child is exhausted, that may not be the best time to allow your child to struggle over a toy with another child. As the article mentions, sometimes the teacher or parent realizes that this particular moment is not the right one for the conflict to bring learning (hunger, fatigue, new situation, possible illness coming on). When the children are of different ages or at different stages of development when the same age, we may have to intervene more often. If I am available (not leading a circle, song, or with hands full of bread dough), I will help when I can. Like Atchinson in her classes, I find it helpful to be available, nearby, and ready to put a gentle arm to block a blow as children struggle. It is amazing how often it happens that when teacher or parent describes the situation without judgment ("Jane and Jenny are both grabbing for the same shovel"), children, once acknowledged, will find a solution. Elsewhere in Beyond the Rainbow Bridge, Barbara Patterson writes of listening to a dispute between two kindergarten children. Both were heated; both were blaming the others. For Patterson, there seemed to be no way to move the situation without seeming to favor one child over the other. A 6 year old who had heard the whole conversation intervened and said, "Just go try again." The two other children, quite satisfied, returned to their play and worked everything out. Just as Gerber and Pikler encourage us as parents to allow our children to achieve their movement milestones in their own way and in their own time, sometimes our children secretly wish we would trust them to resolve their conflicts in their own way. Because we also want to keep our children safe physically and emotionally, this is difficult work, with lots of room for confusion and not knowing.

Sometimes our attitude toward conflict can be very helpful to young children. When we approach a heated situation with confidence that matters can work out, our children will pick up on our confidence. As Sharifa Oppenheimer suggests (as quoted by Atchinson), if we can use the same tone in possibly tense situations that we use when we say "Here's the towel," we convey this confidence and clarity. I find it helpful for myself to think "Here's the towel" as I prepare to intervene in a possibly explosive situation. Magda Gerber was extremely effective in using "I-statements" when she communicated with infants and toddlers and their parents. Indeed, I-statements can often remove the tone of judgment that "you-statements" can carry. Sometimes, however, even I-statements can trip us up, take us out of the moment, or invite conflict in a different way. Especially in my teaching of nursery and kindergarten children, I find that ontological statements about what is ("The coat is on the floor" rather than "You need to pick up that coat" or "I worry I might trip on this coat") can be most helpful. Two paragraphs from Whole Child/Whole Parent by Polly Berrien Berends help me to frame my thinking about this. Here is a piece I composed about this beyond personal way of speaking to children. Berends' book is available in the parent's library and is well worth a read. It is not a fast read, and I would differ with some of Berends' recommendations about motor development, toys, and cleaning, but her book helps us as parents transform the challenges of parenting and being into something that will help child and parent grow and learn.

With warmth and light,

William Dolde

music and recipes

Dear Dewdrop and Rosebud families,

      It was wonderful to experience our first Rosebud class on Friday.  As the returning parents have noticed, I have moved furniture around in the classroom and am bringing different elements to the morning.  My hope is with time that you and your child find the classroom and its rhythm nourishing.  I have procured a comfy chair for nursing moms and playful children that seems just right for the way I teach.  Thank you to everyone who had begun a search for a rocking chair.

There have been requests for songs I sing throughout the morning.  Here are lyrics to many of them.   Do not feel you need sing any of these songs at home.  My hope is to inspire you to sing with your child, whether these songs, the Beatles, or Johnny Cash.  Although no studies have shown that the Mozart Effect actually has any benefit for children (it does help the sellers of cds and other products), I would posit that the "Mom or Dad singing as best she or he can" effect will have wonderful benefits for you and your child.   I sometimes think that once I become a better singer, I will be able to sing less.  For now, I find singing throughout the morning helps keep my voice ready for our puppet show and circle time.  I also find that it helps many of our toddlers flow into the room without feeling overly exposed as they might if all the adults were silent.  Balance is always needed, and sometimes silence or quiet seem very healthy for a group of young children.  

Some of the finger games, songs, and verses I use come from Wilma Ellersiek.  Ellersiek was a teacher of drama, rhythm, and music in Germany.  When she became concerned with the trend toward early academics in the 50s (most German schools went back toward play as the center of early childhood curriculum after this, but now I hear that many European schools feel the push to follow the American model of more academics early even though research shows the value of play and movement in the early years), Ellersiek began creating a series of songs and games to provide balance for children and parents.  Some of these games and songs are tender; some are silly and full of nonsense.  All are overflowing with joy and love.  Over the years, I use more and more of these games and songs in my teaching because they have always seemed to be the favorites of the infants, toddlers, and nursery children I interact with.  The collection of traditional rhymes and songs we might know from a childhood in America or elsewhere are also wonderful.  If you want to learn more about Wilma Ellersiek, here is a review of her first book of songs and games.

With warmth and light,

William Dolde

p.s.  Thank you for bringing vegetables to add to our soup.