Every Wednesday our members get to ask Waldorf teacher Diane Power questions about their homeschooling experience, Waldorf education and more. These Q & A sessions are posted on the member blog every week so you have access to all the past Q & A sessions. Become a member of Earthschooling to get your questions answered personally every week.
Question from Member: I have the hardest time organizing the daily lesson with head, heart, etc. We will be starting 6th grade. Can you make this easy for me? – Kristina P.
Reply from Waldorf Teacher Diane Power: Can you explain a little more… Is it getting the right mix? Having a better grasp of what that means for a 6th grader? Examples for a ML? What did you do last year?
Kristina: I know I am probably over complicating things. There is the 3 day rhythm and the rhythm throughout the day and then the same with the lesson. I guess how do you do the lesson? What get’s presented first, second, etc. I hope that is more clear. You asked what we did last year. Honestly I just tried to keep up with a weekly rhythm. My adorable son often has his own ideas.
Diane Power: Kristina, for a daily lesson, I would start with the upper grades verse, play the recorder to get warmed up and/or sing and then move! Upper grades we would jog, jump rope, yoga, quick basketball HORSE game, or dance. Next, review the previous lesson. Find ways to work with the info. Practice. Book work. Move into new material. Verse/poem/song to close the ML. This is a very broad brushstroke of the morning. Is this what you were referring to regarding what gets presented first, second, etc?
Kristina P: How do you present a new lesson?
Diane Power: With history (the Romans), you would tell the new part of the story at the end of a lesson, review it the next day and work with it, create an artistic rendering of the material, telling the new part to end that day’s lesson. With the sciences, you would set up the experience, observe, discuss, write down observations in day one. Day two new experience, observe, discuss, write down observations, convert day one written work into final copy: experiment number, materials, procedure, conclusion/observation. Day three continue pattern. In the upper grades it becomes more of a two day rhythm for the subjects, continually adding new material, building on what’s been brought previously, creatively placing it in a ML book (or other projects) and moving forward.
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