Adjective Webs

In Waldorf 1st grade, wet on wet watercolor painting revolves around "color stories," winningly explained and demonstrated by Kelly Morrow on her watercolor painting DVD workshop:
informedfamilylife.org
Double Workshop DVD - $27.00

Great for those new to Wet on Wet watercolor painting. I also was glad to see her tell stories in a "Waldorf way" -- sooo helpful for a newbie homeschooler!

If you are teaching in a trad school and want to do these stories, I have a suggestion to help you work it in to the traditional curriculum. Adjective webs! A Waldorf classroom would never bring the relationship between or personality of the colors up to the head so early on by concrete discussion, but I think it would help you sneak painting into your Language Curriculum. Paint happy Little Yellow dancing in the center of the paper and shy Little Blue standing in the corner. Next day, blue comes right up to yellow but doesn't quite touch him. The next day, he approaches and they play together. (These are the first 3 in the series she demonstrates). Do a whole group lesson/brainstorm on the board creating an adjective web describing the personality of yellow. Do another adjective web describing the personality of blue. Then ask the children, what kind of personality do you think Little Red will have? Then do the painting where she shows red boldly barging right in to the play. Ask the children to do an adjective web of their own with words or phrases describing Little Red.

I think any way to get watercolor painting into the classroom is a valuable experience for the children, even if it's been adapted and isn't traditional Waldorf. No doubt plenty of people out there would disagree with me! I know so many traditional teachers who hunger to get more storytelling, painting, knitting, and so on into their schools. Let's find a way to make it happen...