we started our school year this week and are going all-out waldorf, a huge switch from classical. my reasons for doing so are:
1. i love the waldorf philosophy and really believe in the ideas behind it
2. i'm exhausted from trying to keep up with the classical education work
3. classical felt too pushy, trying to cram too much intellectual info into my kids at such an early age
4. jaden has a very artistic/creative side that i want to nurture as much as possible
5. i want to establish routines in our household for all our sakes
6. i want to cut out all the tv viewing we've been doing....well, not tv but movies and videos and such
so, i have at my disposal, the first grade info for live education!, oak meadow and christopherus. oak meadow is not waldorf, only uses waldorf concepts. at first i thought i'd like it better because it's a more 'ready made' curriculum of sorts but after reviewing it and the other two, i like the other two better. out of the other two, christopherus is my favorite. i'm lucky to have a friend who had the christopherus and live education! curriculum so i could review and try them out before i actually commit and buy.
jaden is starting first grade this year so we'll follow the concepts and ideas of first grade. i don't have the luxury of schooling all day long since we have a homestead and i have my herbal business so we use 2-3 hours 4 days a week as our 'formal' schooling though the unschooler in me smugly knows my kids are learning whether we're sitting down and saying we doing schoolwork or not.
our schedule will go something like this:
~i get up, milk the goats, check emails if kids aren't up
~make breakfast, eat and clean up
~get sage occupied so we can have some alone time
~start by lighting our candle, reciting our poem and doing some yoga stretches/poses
~review foreign language flash cards (currently reviewing colors in spanish and french)
~main lesson
~recorder
~nature stories
~watercolor
~take a walk
our afternoons will be free to have playdates, work on special projects or just play. around 4 in the afternoon the kids watch the sheep for an hour then it's time to pick up the playroom area while i get dinner ready.
after dinner, i milk while they take baths or finish up anything then it's a story and bedtime. our goal is to have the kids in bed by 8:30pm with the high schoolers in bed by 9 and lights out at 9:30.
