Ripe

It's a glorious time of year.  The garden is waxing lush just as the children have grown in leaps and bounds before my eyes....creating bonds of friendship, trying on resolution to conflicts, developing logical thinking skills.  Oh how they have grown.  Today was gardening day and Lars and Gioia spent nearly an hour in the sweetpea covered cold-frame, chatting gaily...in German, non-stop.  Teacher had no idea what they were saying.  (Yikes?)

Out in the big garden several children were using amazing critical thinking skills as they built a very balanced "fort" made from log ends, wheelbarrows, chairs, lattices and stumps.  Perhaps it may look like a jumbled mess to you, but I get so excited as an educator when I witness this clever creating.  A little mind that thinks creatively creates such fertile soil for future academia.  These will be enthusiastic, eager learners.  And everytime they solve a question posed by the building process, more synapses reach one another in their brain.  Every time.  Miracles happen.  THAT is why I am such a proponent of play-based learning.

Once their fort was complete it became a zoo, and they made animal food from chalk dust, grasses, gravel and water.  The cooperation with which they worked made me smile from deep within.

The "food" was served from the wheel of my handtruck.  (Oh well.)

Then, sweet porridge and raisins with rice milk together with joy. 

Yes.  We are ripe for the moving on.  I am so complete with the knowing of these little ones I am sending on to kindergarten.  And I treasure the next year I will have with those who have one more year...to ripen on the vine.

Comments

[tracey k. in Ohio]

What a sweet post! How fortunate those children are to attend a place that allows them to learn while exploring & using their brains - that type of system should be used EVERYWHERE, dontcha think? Oh well... they look so happy and glad to be there.