ARTS
That is arts and crafts activities for children and also all forms of arts and history. Influenced by a classical curriculum and looking at lives of people we can learn from, in subjects that engage simple learning tasks. Looking at how numbers are manifest in architecture and art.
NATURE
As in Richard Louv’s book “Last child in the Woods – saving our children from nature deficit disorder” reinstating an attachment to nature and the outdoors. Through experiments, crafts, scavenger hunts, play.
Get out there. Get involved and sometimes get a bit dirty. The Steiner Waldorf philosophy holds significance in the passing of the seasons and the awareness of nature around you. To stay in touch with nature and understand its importance and relevance to everyday.
That’s the ‘Happy’ bit.
NATURAL GEOMETRY
My children so often ask me “why are the shadows longer at the end of the day?” “why does the sun move with us in the car?” I struggle with some of these questions. This is the geometry of the world found in the planets and oceans and forests all the way down to butterfly wings, seed formations and cell production.
It’s a popular homeschooling subject and takes reference from a classical curriculum. In the renaissance times the quadrivium subjects formed part of the classical education of that time. The 4 subjects of the quadrivium being
- number
- geometry – number in space
- music – number in time
- heavens – number in space and time
To notice its forms both in maths and in nature, to build, create, draw, stick, shape and paint. To see numbers as characters as well as quantities, they can be so much more than values.
That’s the ‘Smart’ bit
