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Learning & Development: Steiner Waldorf - Winning laurels

Laurel Farm Kindergarten makes the most of its rural setting for
children to learn life skills and enrich their learning through play
that engages with animals and nature. Nereida Olives explains.

At Laurel Farm Kindergarten, we provide Steiner Waldorf education and care for a mixed-age group of children from the age of three to seven. The setting is based on a small holding surrounded by three acres of land, streams, woodland, ponds and with animals, ducks, sheep, hens, pigs and bees. On our recent Ofsted inspection, we achieved an 'outstanding' rating in all areas, and according to the early years team in Bath and North East Somerset, we are the first local setting to accomplish this since Ofsted raised the bar.

WHAT DO WE OFFER?

As a Steiner Waldorf farm kindergarten we are truly blessed to be able to enjoy such a rich, natural indoor and outdoor environment, enriching children's learning and development, and nurturing their sensory experiences through play and activity, as we describe.

Our approach at Laurel Farm is based on Steiner Waldorf principles. We, therefore, acknowledge the children's strong need to be active learners, giving them the necessary time and space for free child-initiated play so that they can engage their imagination and develop their social and physical skills and innate creativity throughout their first seven years.

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Children imitate (model) the active adults around them who are involved in repetitive daily tasks such as preparing food, cleaning, repairing and making toys and playthings, as well as general activities that support the life of the kindergarten.

The constant repetition that goes on throughout our daily, weekly and seasonal rhythm allows children to integrate these learning experiences at their own pace and to develop in a wholesome way, as they are not being rushed by adult targets. Rather, they are seen and respected as individuals, able to follow their interests through their own creativity and play, and enjoy their childhood. We are witness to that development.

HOW DO WE OFFER IT?

Each beautiful day is filled with exciting opportunities for us to experience life, to grow, learn and develop, and to be at one with everything.

The children become involved with the activities out of their own initiative, planting, caring for and harvesting our vegetables, which are washed, peeled and chopped with proper implements to make soup and bread for lunch. They feed the leftovers to the pigs and hens, or use for compost, and collect eggs that are used in our meals and birthday cakes.

We climb trees to collect apples that are pressed into juice to celebrate our harvest. The children are involved in the process and nourished by its delicate sweetness ... each experience is rewarding and satisfying.

As was noted by our Ofsted inspector, this way of 'teaching promotes children's independence and they thrive and are empowered with the trust given to them. They have a real sense of purpose and ownership at the setting. Using real tools and taking risks promotes their physical skills and gives them pride when they complete a task'.

These learning experiences throughout the seasons are planned carefully to support, mirror and to be reflected on during our adult-led 'ring-times' where the seasonal story comprises songs, poems, movement, rhymes and more, and builds memory and concentration, as well as exercising bodies.

It is repeated for a week or more so that children build up a rich repertoire. Storytime, consisting of repeated fairy tales, nature or seasonal stories, nurtures our souls with the morality and pearls of wisdom that each story contains. This helps to expand the children's knowledge and understanding of the world in which they are growing, echoing within the child for years to come. It is wonderful to see children spontaneously burst into song while they play or work, or re-enact the stories through their puppet shows.

So much is learned, without the need for adult interference or formal teaching. The adults gently support and offer a naturally resourced enabling environment where the children play, as Peter Gray describes in his article 'Give childhood back to children', responding to the move by government to increase school hours. He writes: 'The most important skills that children everywhere must learn in order to live happy, productive, moral lives are skills that cannot be taught in school. Such skills cannot be taught at all. They are learned and practised by children in play. These include the abilities to think creatively, to get along with other people and cooperate effectively, and to control their own impulses and emotions.'

In Steiner Waldorf settings, the role-modelling adults are engaged in real work, inspiring children in their play and gently introducing new skills. For example, during harvest time, the children gather wheat, thresh it and store the kernels for later use.

On baking day, which happens weekly as part of our rhythm, the children help to grind the wheat into flour, using a stone grinder. This allows children to be active and to direct their energy into purposeful work, as well as actively learning the bread-making process.

Bread-making also offers a wonderful opportunity for the children to use their mathematical skills to count, weigh and measure, to strengthen and develop the muscles in their fingers, hands and wrists, while they poke, stretch and knead the bread, and turn it into anything they wish. Such activities also build the small motor skills essential for writing and maths - in a Steiner school at around the age of seven.

Being part of a process, they are able to connect with what we eat and to be thankful for what we have, learning social skills and empathy at the same time. Most importantly, it offers a motivation and an example to follow, as often the children role-play what they have seen adults doing.

HOW ARE WE DIFFERENT?

One of the things that make us different to most settings is the farm environment, and the enthusiastic team that makes good use of what is around us.

Sheep are part of our daily scenery and immediate environment. We see them being born, growing up and being sheared, while throughout the year, we wash the wool, tease it and card it, and it may be some weeks before we begin to dye it, using what's around our environment.

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Blackberries in the autumn, marigolds in the summer, sorrel in spring, all the onion peels that we have saved throughout the year ... then our snowcoloured wool becomes a wonderful selection of rainbow colours, all found in nature. The children experience the change in texture, smell, feel and colour. It's like a magical process of transformation, mirroring the inward transformation that they undergo though this experience.

The journey does not end there, as we use that wool for all our felting projects and to make our handmade play resources, as well as for spinning, transforming the wool into thread to their amusement. The spun wool is then used by the older children to weave in their looms and to finger knit.

During our inspection, it was noted by the Ofsted inspection: 'The children talk about what they have learned enthusiastically with each other, showing their learning experience, and this gives them a sense of pride and achievement, because they have been involved throughout the whole process, while subconsciously developing rich language.' At the same time, the children bring to life a lost art, instead of being carried away by the consumerism that's around us.

 

WHAT MAKES US OUTSTANDING?

During the Ofsted inspection, the inspector described the quality of the teaching as exceptional and inspirational', and noted how the Steiner approach 'linked with the Early Years Foundation Stage and allows children to thrive in this calm and nurturing environment, where they grow to be good communicators, compassionate and empathetic'.

Despite our exemptions in areas such as literacy and modifications in numeracy, the inspector was able to witness the excellent progress that children make in their learning and development, and was impressed by the abundance of carefully planned activities for counting or using mathematical language.

'For example, as children collect tools, they talk about how big, small and how many tools there are. At lunchtime, they talk about how much soup they want and what size bowl they will choose. Much of this knowledge is complemented by the children of different ages, without the teacher's interference'.

laurel4I truly believe that it is thanks to the rich learning environment we provide that we are able to call ourselves an 'outstanding' setting, one that allows children to thrive and blossom. It is also because of the support that we have received from our wonderful parents, our well-trained staff and the Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship.

It shows how Steiner Education is an inspirational system, protecting the children's right to play, grow and be nurtured throughout their rich and joyful childhood years. Our commitment is to protect and support them, not by wrapping them in cotton wool, but by allowing them to experience life in its full motion, and to weave a tapestry of learning experiences.

Nereida Olives is a teacher at Laurel Farm Kindergarten, Peasedown St John, Bath

MORE INFORMATION

- Email: laurelfarmenquiries@gmail.com

- www.laurelfarmkindergarten.co.uk

- Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship: www.steinerwaldorf.org

- 'Give childhood back to children', by Peter Gray, The Independent, 12 January 2014.

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