Two Weeks, Two More Schools

Well, I’ve been here two months! It’s so hard to believe! And I am still so much in love with Cape Town! I have spent the last two weeks visiting two more Waldorf schools. It was so great to observe all of the different classrooms! I was in 6 different classes, so I got to observe how differently the classrooms can be run.  The two coolest things that I got to witness and take part in were birthday celebrations and the Michaelmas festival.

I got to observe three birthday celebrations, which were all such special treats. In Waldorf education, for the younger ones, birthdays are celebrated warmly. Like in a traditional birthday, cake is eaten, candles are blown, and songs are sung. However, in Waldorf, there is more tender and spiritual celebration. The daily rhythm of the class changes to celebrate the birthday. The atmosphere of the classroom changes during the birthday. Some teachers changed the class the night before and some during the day. Regardless, a space in the room is dedicated to the celebration. In the craft, children all make a birthday card for the birthday child. Inside each card, the child gives a birthday wish to the birthday child. I had the fortune of writing the darling wishes and they ranged from two fighter jets to a golden rainbow. During ringtime, the birthday child gets to pick songs and games for the class to play. There are also special ringtime songs that only happen on birthdays. The birthday child wears a special birthday cloak and birthday crown. He/she chooses one or two children to be guardian angels, who also have crowns and cloaks. During the day, the birthday child and the angels get to wear their costume. Each teacher does the birthday celebration differently, however, they are similar in structure. The birthday child sits with the guardian angels at the birthday table, where they sit with the candles. The child’s parents are also present and involved in the ceremony. The teacher begins by telling the story of the birthday child, starting with when he/she was a star child. The star child desires to come to Earth, however, before the journey can begin, each star gives the child a wish. After the child receives a wish from each star (which are represented in rainbow colors), the child comes to Earth. The teacher then tells a short story of the child’s life, lighting a candle for each year. The children in the class participate in the ceremony by acting as stars and giving wishes. The child’s parents also attend. The ceremony, although it may sound cheesy, is completely adorable and beautiful. It is such a special way to celebrate a birthday, to celebrate the child’s life in terms of accomplishments, funny stories, and family history. I was so blessed to be able to see three of them.

The third term just ended for both schools that I visited, meaning that it was time for a festival. Woohoo! In the Waldorf calendar, the beginning of spring (at least in the southern hemisphere) marks Michaelmas, which is when St. Michael comes to tame the dragon. The story goes that Lady Spring is ready to come and begin spring, however, there is a grumpy dragon that does not like spring, and he would like it to continue to be dark and winter. So, he traps Lady Spring in a tower. St. Michael comes to free Lady Spring and tame, not kill, the dragon. Since it was leading up to this celebration, the classroom activities circled around the theme of spring and telling the story of St. Michael. In crafts, the children worked on sanding swords. And goodness, if you give a child a piece of sandpaper, that child will go on all morning sanding! The swords were eventually painted gold and the children glued on jewels so that they were ready to tame the dragon for festival. The children also made crowns that they wore. In story time, the stories were about the awakening of spring, Lady Spring, her gnomes, fire fairies, water pixies, and flowers, and the dragon who tried to stop it all. In ringtime, the songs also went around the story. And when the festival came, they were SO exited! It was so fantastic watching them run around the school with their swords (and yes, there were strict rules in place about using them to fight) and crowns that they had worked so hard on for weeks. The pieces came together and they were ready to tame the dragon and celebrate spring! It was such a great time to be in the schools, to get to see all of this happening.

When was not geeking out about schools the last few weeks, I got to be outside, which has just been amazing! I went camping with two friends in Bains Klof, which is a two hour drive outside of Cape Town. We left on a Friday afternoon and headed up towards the mountains. After navigating there, we reached a super twisty mountain road and that is when we knew that we picked the right spot to camp in. The mountains here are so beautiful! They are rocky at appearance, but covered in bushes and wild flowers. These mountains were no exception. We got to the campground at dusk and got everything set up. Good lord the stars here! I can never get over them and they continue to amaze me. The next morning we woke up and headed for the trail. Well, what we thought was a trail. This set the pace for the rest of the day as we guessed if we were heading in the right direction and were constantly on the look-out for trail markers. We found a small waterfall that had some pools around it so we stayed there for a while, jumping into the water, although it was FREEZING, and lying in the sun to get warm again. Afterwards, we headed for the larger waterfall, and once again, had consistent trouble finding the trail. And gheeze was it worth it! We stayed there for a while and then headed back to camp where we ate lunch and packed up. It was so great to get out of the city and explore a little bit more of the area around Cape Town! I have also been doing some hiking around the neighborhood. I am convinced that I live in the most beautiful part of Cape Town, although many people who are actually from here will probably disagree. Recently, we hiked to the top of Chapman’s Peak, which is a famous scenic drive. We started out just wanting a walk around that area, and then ended up hiking to the top. Haha, which we were not really prepared for, but the good news was that it was a stunnnnning day and not too warm for a hike that was straight uphill. The scenery was absolutely beautiful, and well worth the climb. On multiple occasions we thought that we had already reached the top because the real top was out of view. The hike overlooked the ocean and gave us amazing views of the mountain ranges of Cape Town. I really could not get over the beauty of it all! It was truly remarkable. And Sewanee kids, this joke is for you. Hiking with Germans is faster than trying to hike with Dr. Potter! No lie.

I have been reading a book about play that has given me a lot to think about. One thing that it talked about were the emotional benefits of play. The author said that when people look at play, they tend to only see the intellectual benefits to it, myself included. I never even considered what play can do for a child’s emotional well being. Play can help a child recover from a troubling situation, prepare for one, or create an empathetic feeling in the child. I witnessed this in one class the last week. A child was working with playdough with his mother. They were creating their family, down to the last detail. Well, the last detail also included constructing a grave for the cat that died many years ago and the rabbit that ran away. According to the mother, the child always requested to create the grave. Creating this situation with his mother, the child was working through a memory that was particularly challenging.

And a funny story to leave you with. If you know me, you know that I get these hiccup type things, referred to as “meeps” by some friends. I have had them since I was 16 and I get a couple each day. I have no idea what causes them, neither does my doctor, or WebMd. While I was sitting with a little girl at school I had a hiccup. She looked at me with a curious look on her face and said, “what was that?” I told her that it was a hiccup. She looked me straight in the eyes and said, “no it wasn’t.” She then went onto telling me that hiccups involve more than one sound and I just had one sound, so it couldn’t be a hiccup. This girl was 6 years old and I tried to explain my meeps to her. I can’t even explain my meeps to people my age!

I love spending my day with children! They are so intuitive, it continues to amaze me. The intuition even stretches across the cultural barrier, when I have had the fortune of seeing in my children. This was something that I learned in my psychology and education courses, something that I heard from my Professors, but it was never something that I experienced firsthand.  And goodness, it is awesome! J 

On a different note, I am now really into vegetables. Brussels, beet roots, turnips, leeks, butternuts, all kinds of yummy things! I'm sure those of you who are familiar with my eating habits find this hilarious!