Butternut squash climbing to the sky!
Banana peppers pickling for the fridge!
Tomatoes refusing to give up despite squirrels!
Sweet potatoes working their underground magic!
Cucumbers producing despite the bugs!
Lemon verbena begging to be used!
Bell peppers being lazy!
Watermelons biding their time!
Rudbeckia cheering them all on!
The Sun is actually showing his face.
Our garden is overflowing with all the rain,
And if the squirrels weren't taking tomatoes,
I'd have much more than just three in my windowsill here in front of me.
Two of three children splash in the little pool.
I can hear them laughing together.
This week we attended an excellent puppetry performance at our local library entitled Migration, by Hobey Ford.
We were excited to learn that he was the inventor of the Peepers Puppet, an ingeniously simple set of eyeballs that fit onto your finger, turning your hand into a puppet instantly. He said he came up with the idea when his wife ask him to create a puppet that could help with toddlers who didn't want their hair washed. Clever!
Peepers Puppet Performing in Packing Peanuts!
Packing peanuts courtesy of their Uncle, who kindly sent them water squirters, buckets and shovels for our upcoming beach trip.
So, we have been strawberry picking twice within the last few days.
So we're overflowing with berries - 9 gallons picked!
Though one and a half have already been consumed.
This simple dressing came together quickly, using an immersion blender.
I sliced a bunch of handfuls of strawberries, the ripest ones I could find.
It was about 2 - 2 1/2 cups sliced.
Then I added a tablespoon of mustard, a splash of cider vinegar (balsamic would have been nice, but I was out!) and a crank of salt.
I blended this up well, then drizzled in about 1/4c olive oil until it was creamy and frothy.....yum.....
I had added a bit too much vinegar this time, so a tablespoon of local, raw honey was added. Otherwise, this is paleo-friendly!
The girls approved! We'll have this over fresh lettuce from our garden, leftover pork, and more sliced strawberries.
(Pictured: dressing, berries with freshly whipped cream and one very dirty berry-picking girl! It rained on us, and then the kids played in the resulting mud. Blissful!)
This week, we're reviewing our four processes, reciting the verses I wrote for each one and practicing word and written math problems. This is getting us in the 'mood of math', because next week I'll introduce place value! Enki has a nice story and explanation for this, which I'll be sure to share.
Today, we read the verses for Gnome Plus and Gnome Minus, and looked back on our first grade math books. (Enki uses other characters for the four processes, but I wasn't as pleased with those, so I made up my own, based on the usual Waldorf math gnomes with a twist from Donsy of Gnomes. Maybe I'll write it up.....)
I told a a few Gnome Plus stories: one was about Plus having 3 star seeds in his pouch, and then finding 2 more on a hill. (I added lots of detail, on the fly, so it was about a 5 minute story.) Lela, who is newly 8 years old, had to figure out the equation and solve it. Rather, she likes to solve it and then figure out the equation! We wrote it on the chalk board in the horizontal "first grade way" and then in the vertical, then "second grade way".
Next I told a little story about Gnome Plus going for an adventure, and leaving his house with a banana muffin in his pack. He stopped to pick two mushrooms (he's an expert mycologist!) and then crossed a creek and picked three fern fiddldheads. At the top of the mountain, he took in the view, but heard a noise that sounded like a frog (I made a tummy-rumbling noises), then a louder noise that sounded like a bear (louder tummy rumbling noises) and then one big long growling noise that finally made him realize it was his stomach asking for a snack! (I made the noises very loud and quite embarrassing and silly, and Lela found it hilarious!) Gnome Plus opened his pack and pulled out his snacks (we recounted them - 1 banana muffin, 2 mushrooms, 3 fiddleheads) and he gobbled them down. She had to figure out how much he ate in all, and once again write the equation and practice on the vertical and horizontal.
To wrap up with Gnome Plus and transition to Gnome Minus, told a story of him gathering a bouquet of flowers for Gnome Minus' birthday: 1 daffodil, 3 violets, 4 clovers and 2 tulips. Again, she solved the problem (how many flowers in the bouquet?) and we wrote the equation/number sentence in the horizontal and vertical, practicing putting the numbers back into words as we went along.
Then we moved on to Gnome Minus, and I told a story about he and Gnome Plus preparing for the birthday party at Minus' home. They put up banners and baked the cake and cleaned the house. Then Gnome Plus was hungry. Gnome Minus happened to have a little clay crock with some dried mushrooms, and so Minus shared with Plus. Minus took the crock off the high shelf and opened the lid, revealing 7 dried mushrooms. Gnome Plus, not wanted to seem greedy and remembering the party was soon, took only one and gobbled it right down. Then they went back to party preparations. Lela had to identify the equation (7-1=?) and figure out how many mushrooms were left, and again, write it on the board.
Finally, it was time for the party! All the gnomes arrived (Plus, Minus, Times, Divide and Equals) plus four river ducks (the girls decided there needed to be more party-guests!) and after celebrating, Gnome Minus brought out the cake. (Here I lined up 10 glass stones in 2 rows of 5, all touching each other.) Minus made a wish and blew out the candles, then cut the cake (I dragged my finger between the two rows, then across each row, effectively cutting the cake into 10.) Each of the 5 gnomes and 4 ducks had a piece. Lela had to figure out how many pieces were leftover, and then again, create, solve and write the equation.
I helped out here and there, so she didn't get tired. Five mini-stories, each with a several step process for solving and practicing, could get a bit much for any child, but with selective help and intervention, she could do it. (She didn't need help solving any problems, just with the "process" of creating the equation and writing it out. And she could do that, but would have gotten tired without my help.) Between the verse reading, stories and chalkboard equations, we spent an hour, and then she took another 20 minutes to make a drawing based on the last story.
It was a lot of fun for both of us. I enjoyed creating impromptu stories and filling them with detail, and she enjoyed the stories and playing with her gnomes, and writing on the chalk board.
Tomorrow, we play with multiplication and division, and all week we'll be practicing 'counting-bys' with singing.
We enjoyed a hike at Latta Plantation Nature Preserve,
browsing the fairy houses and making a few of our own.
(See the second picture!)
The difference between our math and language arts blocks was striking. Here we sat, in first grade, laughing and relaxed, as gnomes cartwheeled and crystals were sorted into even piles. Numbers were savored in individual lessons, and she felt proud of herself for noticing that not only was "8" for a spider, but that it also looked like a spider! As we refreshed our minds in second grade, and dusted off our computational skills, math was play.
But the language arts blocks. Oh.
She loved the fairy tales of first grade, and the sages and trickster stories of second grade. She recalled them in vivid physical and emotional details, sometimes down to the exact phrasing. She so obviously had a clear picture in her head.
And then we move to the academic portion. Oh.
In first grade, writing a few words could take an hour. Handwriting, something I pride myself on, was careless. I would fret and pressure more writing. At the beginning of second grade, I was surprised at how much progress she'd made from a summer of doing "nothing." She could write and copy several sentences, with much improved penmanship, and sometimes even construct the sentences from her own head. She no longer was paralyzed by spelling mistakes. Her writing was complex and creative and spontaneous.
Her ability to read, something I hadn't yet taught overtly, had jumped over the summer, too. But I certainly couldn't credit my incessant quizzing. She was reading in spite of me. And she was reading fine - comprehending, processing - but she didn't LOVE reading.
Somehow, the fact that my 7 1/2 year old wasn't reading more than reader books and Dr. Seuss, and was certainly not reading for pleasure and relaxation like I do, I translated as "my child isn't a reader". And it worried me that she hadn't shown an interest in picking up The Hobbit or Harry Potter from my nightstand.
My child, who sings, harmonizes, and naturally finds chords on the piano.
My child, who knows birds by song, sight and flight pattern.
My child, who rides a skateboard and has been on two-wheels since age 4.
My child, who climbs trees like a squirrel.
My child, who sews independently on the machine, and creates her own patterns and templates.
My child, who just this morning was walking through the grocery store with me and knitting.
My child, who helps her sisters.
My child, who cooks scrambled eggs by herself.
My child, who feels concerned that she cannot invite all her friends to her birthday party, because their feelings may be hurt.
My child, who has been crafting and knitting and drawing pictures for her yet-unborn twin cousins.
My child, who I can trust to not cross the street without permission.
My child, who dances around the kitchen to Tchaikovsky or Grateful Dead.
So this is the child I'm concerned about?
Because she's not reading long chapter books?
Even though she loves looking at books and listening to me read?
And even though I've heard her read to her sisters?
(I won't even go into how I feel when I hear about friends' younger children reading.)
Today I'm gently laughing at myself, at my insecurities.
Today I'm enjoying my completely normal, average child.
During my blogging hiatus,
we've taken a dip in the waters of Second Grade.
I worry a lot, *a lot* about our decisions to use the Waldorf approach,
especially since I consider myself somewhat of an academic.
But to be fair, I'd worry about anything.
In comparison to her schooled peers, my second grader is not spouting off times tables or reading Harry Potter.
But, as my friend put it, she knows the song of the nuthatch.
Still, I fret and peruse the websites for different workbook-type curricula for language and grammar, especially after my husband expressed his concerns that she might not be learning all she should.
But her end-of-year testing showed her to be right where she should be.
Upon reviewing her test, before sending it off for official grading,
my husband was dumbfounded.
"Did she really do this by herself?" he asked incredulously.
He stared at the little booklet, flipping between the sections and pointing.
"With no help from you?"
And then -
"Really? No help at all?"
"Well," he said after a long pause, "I have to say that I had no idea that she was capable of this. Obviously, what you've been doing is working."
If he's convinced, I guess I should give myself a little breathing room before I break out the flash cards and perhaps a little credit as well.
(Trying this blogging thing from my phone! I just found the idea of [putting pictures on my camera, choosing and lite-editing if necessary, then waiting for them to upload and then crafting text] to be daunting from a time perspective and consequently was not doing it. Perhaps this will be a solution?)
