Nature Walk: Every Single Day

This should be written on a prescription pad from our doctor. It is the key to healthy children.

"Our woods aren't frozened up anymore!" - Wild Thing

Stone steps...

Inside the forest hut....

Getting reacquainted with an old tree friend.

APRIL Circle

Group forming (sing til everyone joins together and is in circle)

Round and round the earth is turning
Always turning round to morning
And from morning round to night

Speech - seasonally appropriate songs (all have movement involved too)

Drip drip drop
Little April showers
We're getting wet
And we don't care at all
Drip, drop, drip drip drop

Use fingers to tap drops on head and arms, whole body! - this develops tactile sense)

It rains on Sprout
It rains on Wild Thing
It rains and rains on Mummy!
But it didn't rain on Nature Girl
She has a HUGE UMBRELLA!

(repeat so everyone gets a chance to make the big umbrella - a big body X or Y stretch)

Its raining its pouring (hands drum on head)
The roots are getting wet (touch your toes)
The rain will help the flowers grow (grow back upright)
It quickly melts away the snow (sink back down)
Its raining, its pouring (stand up while fingers drum on head)
My boots are getting wet (touch your toes again!)

March in circle with the classic for silly kids:

It's raining, its pouring
The old man is snoring
He went to bed with a bump on his head
And didn't get up til morning.

ENKI action verse: Tall stand the Sailor Men

(ENKI materials are copyrighted, so I won't post the whole thing but this is a verse for Lateral midline crossing, and heavy on the Proprioceptive system work)

Looking glass EYE SPY - right now we're focussing on looking with the right eye for Nature Girl - she's the only one who gets that instruction. For now it's just looking - as we go on we'll combine this with out phoneme work.

ENKI action verse: Waters

(Crossing the midline repeatedly in different ways - right/left, horizontally, and forward and back)


Rolly polly rolly polly up up up!
Rolly polly rolly polly down down down!
Rolly polly rolly polly out out out!
Rolly polly rolly polly in in in!

Rolling the hands round in a spiral following instructions - Proprioceptive system - naval radiation)

12345
Once I caught a fish alive
678910
But I let him go again
Why did you let him go?
Because he bit my finger so!
Which finger did he bite?
My little finger on the (?)

Act it out grasping up with 12345 and down with 678910 - helps with body awareness (lateral midline crossing and quickly identifying left or right)

EXTRA LESSON Body Geography Simon Says

In this exercise you give instructions to the child without acting anything out yourself. At 8 I have Nature Girl using the terms right and left, with a younger child you start with right, and then move on to left after a few months. Nature Girl is nearly 9 so we are crossing the midline and having her touch her left side with her right side and vice versa. You build up to a verbal sequence of three (Nature Girl can't handle more than one at a time right now) "take your right hand and touch your left ear, then touch your right knee, and your left big toe"

Nature Girl does not have a firmly developed right dominance yet. This usually happens between ages 6 and 7. Why is this important? Firmly developed dominance happens at the same time that there is a growth spurt in the left hemisphere of the brain and both hemispheres have developed localized and holistic functions. - as a result concentration span increases, language development is in sync with the imagination, and the individual has more control over visual perception - able to perceive the switch between 2 and 3 dimensions instantaneously. This is necessary for learning to be done at a subconscious - comfortable level.

Dance thumbkin dance
Dance ye merrymen everyone
Thumbkin can dance alone, thumbkin can dance alone
Dance merrymen dance
Dance ye merrymen everyone

Dance foreman dance
Dance longman dance
Dance ringman dance (ringman cannot dance alone)
Dance little man dance

hand and finger coordination fingerplay (necessary for handwriting)

ENKI Action Verse: RAIN

Tactile and auditory - this one involves running the fingers over the entire body tapping, pounding, dancing lightly and in big washing rubdown movements head to toe.

Clap, Snap, Stomp sequence game

This is another sequencing game and Nature Girl has a hard time with following right now. It's an Extra Lesson game from Take Time. Make a rhythm sequence to follow clap clap snap stamp stamp (for instance) Nature Girl is more likely to engage if she gets to lead to. So go back and forth leading the sequence.

Verse for formdrawing forms

Little drops of water (vertical lines)
Little grains of sand (scoop a curved line)
Make the mighty ocean (curving running wave form)
And the pleasant land (smooth hillock running form)

Great A little a (body makes a large A quickly crouch to make little a)
Today is pancake day (clap with beat)
Toss the ball high (catch ball tossed)
Throw the ball low (throw the ball back)
Those that come after (salute)
Can sing heigh ho! (canter round circle while next child gets turn)

This is my right hand I'll raise it up high
This is my left hand I'll touch the sky
Right hand left hand
Roll them around
Left hand, right hand
Pound, pound, pound!

Bean bags or balls tossing games according to frustration level

The rainbow toss:

Bean bag in right hand toss in arc over head to catch in left - feet planted
Pass bag back to right across midline in front
Practice doing it without losing balance or looking up.
Switch sides (start with bag in left hand)

Crawling toss

Throw balls into basket
Crawl to retrieve

Relaxation exercises

Yoga - salute the sun
shaking out hands left hand then right hand
shoulder roll
Head drop
Deep relaxed belly breathing - remind child to pause!
Low sounding - MMMMMMMM
Sing vowels (short vowel sounds)

Listening game: listen intently to natural sounds and list (its nice to lie down for this, heads together making a spoked wheel - in our case a peace symbol)

Focusing verse

I am a star
From heaven I came - point above
To earth below - point down
My friends to meet - hands to sides
To be truthful in deed - right hand over heart
To love all I know - left hand crosses right
To walk with my angel - hands behind shoulders
To shine like a
STAR! - jump into star form

Closing verse (sing)

Birds in the air (hands link and fly through air)
Fish in the water (hands swim through ocean)
Stones on the land (fist on flattened hand)
I'm in God's hand (both hands cupped gently then together upright as to pray)

Namaste!

For those of you reading to get an idea about circle time - this is NOT your average circle! In a kindergarten you'd have a circle calling song (same all year) , a group forming action verse, one verse for balance and rhythm, 1 for midline crossing, 1 for music prep, one for spinning (proprioceptive) and one for closing (same all year) 7 verses - 2 you use all the time, 5 new ones to learn each season, and you'd work up to that!

Because Nature Girl is doing Extra Lesson therapy I have incorporated as much of that therapy as possible into circle so it stays playful and fun. She has anxiety issues and I need to keep this moving quickly so she doesn't get caught up in something she perceives as difficult - our circle has 22 parts! AND I've been doing these verses for a long time - I had 5 to learn new in this whole big thing. Learning 5 verses is a lot of work! It really is. I practice in the shower!

Sensory Integration - Weeding through the Lingo and Finding Good Resources

There's so many BRANDS of programs that deal with the importance of sensory integration in addressing learning disabilities.

Brain Gym
The Extra Lesson
Enki Education's Sensory Integration Program
Ayres
Therapeutic Movement
The SAVE Program (Sensory-motor Auditory Visual Education)

What they all have in common is a belief in the need to look at the whole child and address them as individuals first and then to look at what we all need to have hardwired in to make learning...a comfortable experience.

I have always been drawn to the holistic vision that Waldorf Education is based on. They have almost a hundred years of experience in addressing the needs of children, all children, and their goal is a WHOLE person. Their approach and attitudes towards learning difficulties and differently abled people is amazing.

Over the past 15 years that I've been researching Waldorf Education I've watched the movement become more and more approachable. However when people start digging in to the underlying anthroposophy they're often confounded by the "spiritual science" that is tightly woven into the fabric of their belief in human and planetary potential. I'm finally at a point where I can read Steiner without rolling my eyes in frustration or having an inner voice mocking things as I read along. I understand those that do hear that mocking voice though.

So I was really happy when I found the book Take Time, which is an approachable "accepted" mainstream look at Extra Lesson work. The book was written for parents as well as therapists and there isn't any spiritual science to wade through while you absorb all the practical advise. It's too bad it's so hard to find! It started out as a book by a non-waldorf speech and language pathologist. A few years after it was published she did a revised edition with a curative eurythmist (Waldorf Movement Therapy). Educational books don't often cross international borders and this is a British book. I had to get my copy from the United States! Bob and Nancy's is a great bookstore to deal with though.

Enki Education is, well, simply amazing and if they had packaged curricula for third grade I'd buy it in a heartbeat. They address sensory integration throughout the day. I'm utilizing what I have - their kindergarten materials - and I'll be purchasing their grade 1&2 materials when I can afford to. I find it difficult to take all the technical stuff I've learned regarding movement and turn it into activities we actually want to do without being self conscious about it being "therapy". It is one thing for the curative teacher to get Nature Girl to do exercises for her in an evaluation, it's another thing to seamlessly integrate those movements into our daily life. Enki's materials are just chock full of those exact activities - and they write above every finger rhyme. verse, or game what kind of sensory integration activity it is so you can look at the things you are grouping together and check off that you're hitting all your pointers - tactile, vestibular, balance system, and proprioceptive.

If you find other resources make sure to pass them along!

Using Movement and Music to Address Learning Difficulties

For the first while in our homeschool we're going to lay off the academics and focus on finding our feet. Well, not just our feet, our whole body and all 12 (yes 12!) senses.

Touch
Life
Self-Movement
Balance
Smell
Taste
Sight
Temperature/Warmth
Hearing
Language
Concept
Ego

We're going to do an intensive two week long "Extra Lesson" with lots of movement exercises, relaxation techniques, making sounds (which handily enough happens when you sing!) and curative drawing, painting, and modelling.

I'm working on a circle time that can address all of Nature Girl's needs while being unselfconscious enough to involve Wild Thing and Sprout if they want to be involved.

Circle was a disaster with Darkmirror. As a preschooler he was so disruptive in playgroup circle time that we were often asked to leave. His kindergarten teachers pulled out their hair and started going grey dealing with his outbursts. When it came to homeschooling there was no way he was going to be subjected to more circle time work! So I had to sneak in these things in different ways. It was a constantly evolving process, sometimes successful, sometimes not.

Nature Girl is so very different, and the dynamic in our house is different. She loves group activities and gentle cooperative games. She loves helping Wild Thing and Sprout learn to do things, and her unselfconscious patient teaching personality will bve a great help in what we need to do.

We need to go back and give her the experiences she missed in kindergarten and grade one. Things she missed in an academic program that kept a pace she couldn't follow.

There are 5 books living on my bedside table right now

The Extra Lesson: Movement, Drawing and Painting Exercises to Help Children with Difficulties in Writing, Reading and Arithmetic by Audrey McAllen

Take Time: Movement Exercises for Parents, Teachers and Therapists of Children with Difficulties in Speaking, Reading, Writing and Spelling by Mary Nash Wortham & Jean Hunt

Putting the Heart back into Teaching by Stanford Maher & Yvonne Bleach

Enki Education's Kindergarten Circle Materials (sensory integration in game form)

and my childhood tome of Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes