Forming the Will

I paid special attention to all the stuff about developing the will in children (since this is my biggest concern about Natalie) and came home with one over-riding impression. My daughter will never have self-discipline if I don't. It is a strictly imitation-based kind of a thing. No dice with the "do as I say, not as I do" approach, not that that works for anything but it especially does not work when it comes to teaching responsibility and a work ethic. This means that I will be working harder than ever to do my housework on a regular basis (ie. daily) AND be with my kids when it is their time and save "work" for the 7 pm - 10 pm slot. Today I put this plan into action and didn't turn on my computer at all until they were tucked in. I also wrote down all my ideas on paper instead of actually doing them in the moment (like when I thought of something I wanted to do for the website I wrote it down instead of diving into darkness to get it done while they putter around, bored). We succeeded in planting the remainder of the autumn bulbs before they rot into oblivion, organizing the front yard into three gardens (one for each child) and rolling round stumps from the decaying log pile across the yard to form a climbing wall around the garden beds. This climbing wall idea is from Spring: Nature Activities to do with Children but I think it's great for any time of year! Plus it will keep the dog out of the garden, always a plus.

I was lucky enough to find the Winter book from this series at the conference, although waldorfbooks.com does not carry it yet (they are being slowly translated into English). In my opinion, these seasonal books are the perfect foundation of a Kindergarten curriculum and I plan to use them as such with Leah next year. I skipped developing Kindy, really, for Natalie since we popped her into a school but I am really looking forward to doing it with Leah.