The Root Children Circle, Week 2

This was our second week working with this Circle inspired by the 1906 book The Story of the Root Children by Sibylle von Olfers.

Here are my notes from The Root Children Circle, Week 1.

We continued with our Songs, Verses & Movement for classroom routines.

Circle Time Introduction

#1 - "Good Morning, Dear Earth" verse

#2 - "Morning Verse"
from A Child's Seasonal Treasury, page 13

#3 - "We Stretch Right Up to the Star of Our Birth" verse
from The Breathing Circle, page 56

#4 - NEW - "Beautiful Bird" pose
from Fly Like a Butterfly: Yoga for Children, page 18

#5 - NEW - "Windmills" pose
from Fly Like a Butterfly: Yoga for Children, page 67

Monday

• new Spring flowers in the classroom: tulips
• "The Root Children Circle," pages 79-82
  from Movement Journeys and Circle Adventures: Therapeutic Support for Early Childhood, Volume 2 by Nancy Blanning and Laurie Clark

Getting the Pikler back out for some fun indoor climbing... continued interest in scissors and construction paper in morning play time, lot of cutting elaborate designs along the folded edge of a piece of paper and then opening up the paper to see the exciting results... adding yoga to our morning Circle.

Tuesday

• new Spring flowers in the classroom: hyacinths
• "The Root Children Circle," pages 79-82
  from Movement Journeys and Circle Adventures: Therapeutic Support for Early Childhood, Volume 2 by Nancy Blanning and Laurie Clark
• "Flower Necklace or Lei" from Earthways, page 140

It was a joy to have the strong scent of hyacinth blossoms in the classroom today, and to help each child take a turn making a necklace or crown. They worked so so carefully to line up the end of the needle with the end of the blossom! We used a wonderful vintage pure linen thread through the hyacinth blossoms, so that the project is all natural and fully compostable.

Thursday

• mixing greens and painting outside
• "The Old Woman and the Tulips" from Tell Me a Story, page 109

Today the paper cutting work which has been so popular for the past few weeks transitioned into an interest in folding. The children were folding the paper in many different ways and then opening it up to see what designs the crease marks made on their paper. "My folding is really good. I'm an artist."

There was also a renewed interest in weaving and all of the potholder looms and loops were out all over the floor, while older children tried to explain the pattern of over, under, over, under to the younger children.

We took this beautiful day as an opportunity to also do some paint mixing and explored the different greens that we could make by combining yellows and blues. Then the children went outside with their paint palettes (old ice cube trays) and stirring sticks and brushes and stretched paper and painting boards and tried to find a Spring green which they would like to paint. Two children decided to paint the color of the brand-new grass and two children chose the evergreen leaves of the magnolia tree.

The children sat in the warm sunshine by their nature inspiration and mixed greens until they were satisfied with the color they had achieved, then painted their "grass" or "magnolia leaf" green onto their paper.

We enjoyed the familiarity of the Root Children Circle story and movement this week, but I chose to end the two week session with a very sweet story about tulips. I had deliberately purchased tightly closed tulips earlier in the week so that the children could watch them slowly open. After our story, I placed the pots of flowers on the floor and let them gently peek inside.

Today, of course, was also a Fruit Salad day. Here was our list of group contributions this week:

cantaloupe
apple
banana
strawberry
frozen peaches macerated with a bit of sugar

spontaneous drawing during indoor play time

practicing folding and cutting along an axis

the big kids take advantage of the mats out on the floor

they want to do yoga too!

carefully threading the needle through the base of the flower

demonstrating how to mix a green

carefully propping his painting board up against the tree trunk

like an easel

mixing different colors

a grass green

a magnolia leaf green

looking up at the color of the leaves

here are all four of the greens they mixed

doing a Gallery Walk to look at friends' work

our delicious fruit salad

outdoor play in the garden

our Dish Gardens are beginning to sprout!

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