This post is an excerpt from my newly revised Waldorf Homeschooling – Simplified: Your Toolkit for Grades 1 – 4 . This 72-page guidebook can help you work with the Waldorf approach and bring it to life in your home. Here’s what one homeschooling Mom says, “I am loving your planning guidebook! It has given me the freedom to simplify, to make lessons easy and doable.”
Read on to hear more about how to get your homeschooling mindset in order.
Your Homeschooling Mindset
Mindset refers to your frame of mind as you go about this whole homeschooling journey. So really, this is a bit of a pep talk here. I find that Waldorf homeschoolers (me included!) tend to over complicate things while feeling inadequate and perpetually behind! There, I said it.
First, know that you are not alone.
Next, figure out what you need to do to:
1. Simplify your homeschooling and life.
2. Gain the confidence you need to keep going.
My planning guide can help you with both of those things!
If you need a little more of a boost, choose one of the blog posts below to read.
Fear Is the Cheapest Room in the House
Inspiration Overwhelm
Make Your New Mantra: You Are Enough
7 Mantras for Waldorf Homeschooling Moms
The Essence of Waldorf Education
Here are the basic tenets of Waldorf-Inspired learning to begin to paint a picture for yourself of what your homeschooling will look like. I like to keep this list where I can see it, to review it and to remind myself of what it’s really all about.
- Reverence for nature – nature walks, nature table, natural materials
- Rhythm – breathing in and out in daily activities; yearly rhythm of festivals,
seasonal rhythm of holidays, monthly & weekly rhythms; sleeping on it - The lively arts – drama, drawing, movement, music, modeling, painting, and
speech, along with storytelling (Steiner recognized the healing power of the
arts, both for individuals and for society) - Respect and ritual – emphasis on moral qualities and reverential gestures
- Creative play and artistic expression
- Honoring the spirit
- Activity precedes “head work”: the experience before the explanation
- “The way to the head is through the heart and hands”
- Curriculum matches stages of child development
- Block learning – subjects are scheduled in blocks in order to go deep and
then we rest - No textbooks (instead, children often make their own main lesson books)
We can set ourselves up for homeschooling success when we first get our mindset in order. And then when we wrap our minds around the foundations of the Waldorf approach.
My guidebook can help you with both!
Check out Waldorf Homeschooling – Simplified right here. To help you get your homeschooling mindset in order.
