Festival of Lights

At this time of year in the Northern Hemisphere, when the days are getting shorter and the nights longer, cultures around the world are celebrating light in their own different ways. In ancient times, people greatly appreciated the little candlelight that could illuminate even the darkest path!

Waldorf schools also celebrate this holiday. Walking with lanterns is an autumn tradition in Waldorf education that is designed to teach children to celebrate the light within themselves and to share it. As children grow, we inspire them to help others, to give.

You may find inspiration in the story of St. Martin who was a young Roman soldier. When he found himself in front of the city walls of Amiens during a cold night, he saw a beggar. He was barely dressed and was shivering from the cold. Martin, without hesitation, took off his thick, warm military cloak, cut it in half with a sword and covered the beggar to keep him warm. The next night, Martin had a dream in which he saw an angel wearing this same piece of his cloak. That experience changed his life and Martin left the military. Martin later became the protector of beggars and the forgotten, and was known for his gentleness and humble nature. Martin has selflessly, all his life, brought warmth and light to all those who need it.

As we enter the darkest time of the year (Winter Solstice), it is an opportunity for each of us to be reminded of the light we carry within us, that can shine brighter than any darkness and cold.

Bring this celebration into your home and enjoy it with the kids. That morning, bake simple cookies, light lanterns, sing seasonal songs and hang out! When night falls, in the early hours, walk with your family and friends, carrying the lanterns around the place where you live, sing and share that joy with others. Break and share each cookie. In this way we nurture giving, understanding, caring.

The meaning of this holiday is something wonderful that we can pass on to children, and you can modify it to yourself and your tradition. In this increasingly long night, we want to realize how each of us has our own light and inner strength. It is this inner strength and light that will guide us through the long, dark nights.

Martinmas is a celebration of light, humility and goodness. It is celebrated on November 11th. You adapt the Festival of Light to your lifestyle, culture and tradition. This is a wonderful period when you can celebrate a holiday full of goodness, warmth, joy and the spreading of this light.

Each of us is one little light, but together we shine great and radiant!

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1. ten days before the feast, start telling stories about the life of St. Martin or stories from your tradition, tell one part every day

2. the day before the festival, make lanterns for the celebration (in the next two posts you can find instructions for making two types of lanterns), choose the technique that suits you, prepare the space and supplies and enjoy the creative process; the making of the lanterns is more important than them being perfect, it is perfect if it is made in a cheerful and warm atmosphere

3. On the day of the celebration, bake the simplest cookies, prepare them with the whole family, nurture working together

4. when the first darkness falls, gather your family and friends, light your lanterns and go for a walk and sing seasonal songs

5. finally, stand in a circle, break the cookies in half and share them with each other

6. in silence, with the lights of lanterns, go to sleep

Danijela Žura

23 October 2021

#amazing #art #adventure

#danijelazura

#magic #moments

#waldorfteacherartist

#fairytales

#story

#light

#shine

#ancient

#onceuponatime

#martinmas

#waldorfpedagogy

#waldorfeducation 

Even in those ancient, ancient times when people talked around the fire, fairytales enchanted both listeners and storytellers .

It was enough to hear “Once upon a time, behind seven hills, behind seven valleys, she lived…” and we would step into a magical place full of fairies, princesses, knights, witches, giants, enchanted forests.

In those distant times, fairy tales traveled the world thanks to storytellers. They were handed down with original, primordial images and profound meaning, and then someone started collecting and writing them down. It is a fantastic fact that similar fairy tales have sprung up in different parts of the world, which proves that humanity has always been connected by an invisible thread. These beautiful images sprouted up all over the globe at the same time!

Over time, fairy tales have inevitably transformed, primarily plot and language, but still those same fairy tales still raise many questions today.

Female characters in fairy tales can cause a feeling of inequality nowadays.

We must try again to step much further than the modern way of thinking.

We cannot equate ancient stories with today’s female-male relationships, with today’s status of women in society. Strength and virtue were evoked through accentuated female beauty, and through the ugliness of her weakness.

The main female character (Snow White, Cinderella,…) is often tempted in fairy tales, so with her strength and virtues she overcomes obstacles and experiences liberation, ie she wins in a hopeless situation. The female characters are embellished with quiet strength, courage, empathy and wisdom in solving seemingly unsolvable situations.

Male and female characters in fairy tales symbolize dualities: water and fire, earthly and heavenly, active and passive, mental and spiritual. This male-female encounter in fairy tales, which often ends in marriage, symbolizes a free human soul that unites with spiritual nature. Two people in their polarity become united and point out that differences can go hand in hand together, if we have enough love, reason, perseverance, morality, understanding ...

Cruelty in fairy tales

Children do not have the same perspective as parents nor do they have the consciousness of their parents.

And most importantly - children do not have the life experience of adults, so they do not experience cruelty as adults.

Children triumphantly celebrate the victory of good over evil, celebrate the victory of the right and expect punishment for evil.

It is certainly true that fairy tales should be told appropriately for the age. We tell stories from everyday life to children up to the age of three and four.

We will then tell simple stories with simple conflicts and simple solutions to a situation or entanglement. Kids love repetition and that’s where they need to be satisfied. Talk to them without adding or subtracting from the original version. Sometimes you could also prepare a story for them with a puppet show.

As children get older, the stories become more complex. From the age of seven, children are ready for a clearer cause and effect in fairy tales, thus developing the ability to continue learning.

When you tell a story, do not express your views and thoughts, do not show your judgments, give the child the freedom to live and experience the purity that comes to us in fairy tales from ancient times.

Talk to the child, try not to read. Meet his gaze, be authentic. Have the child build their own pictures. They will be most easily created if you are authentic in your performance, in your storytelling. When narrating, one should not over-dramatize because in this way we impose ‘ourselves’ on the child, but the school-age narrator should certainly enter all four temperaments (sanguine, choleric, melancholic and phlegmatic) during the narration. Fairy tales for children under the age of seven should be told evenly and clearly, with an emphasis on consonants rather than vowels. Vowels carry the emotional coloring of words, while consonants create images.

By our storytelling, we must leave the child's imagination free.

Dorothea Viehmann was a German storyteller. Her stories were an important source of fairy tales collected by the Brothers Grimm.

She impressed them because she narrated over and over again without changing a single word. The Brothers Grimm stick to original versions, ancient wisdom and customs in their fairy tales. That is why they are healing for children, they are food for the soul because they strengthen the moral life of children, and the preserved images of fairy tales will emerge as a guide through the challenges that life brings them. The story goes that the Brothers Grimm wrote the same fairy tale from several narrators in order to preserve the most original version.

Rudolf Steiner said that a teacher should use a fairy tale as a pedagogical tool because fairy tales were created in the period of humanity when people lived in a dreamy state of mind, before the unfolding of intellectual capacities.

A fairy tale can be told in a puppet show in kindergarten, while in school the narrator is a Waldorf teacher, and in homeschooling it is usually a parent.

When choosing a fairy tale, rely on your feelings.

No matter what the literature says, if a fairy tale does not suit you and you cannot connect with it, simply do not give it to your child.

Through fairy tales, children live in images that feed them, in fairy tales they learn about human characters, traits, emotionally connect with characters, develop emotional intelligence, learn to solve situations, act morally, develop vocabulary, learn to respect differences and release their imagination.

Traveling through fairy tales we learn how to find the strength to change, to wake up, to be different in key life situations.

Fairy tales show us how there is a way out of every labyrinth, if we are persistent enough, if we are ready to find new strength in ourselves and if we are ready to act differently.

Don’t turn primordial fairy tales into ordinary stories. Then you steal their most precious traits. Fairy tales prepare children to meet the world. Fairy tales tell a child that the power of virtue brings true happiness.

Children love fairy tales because they understand them and receive their messages correctly.

Each country has its own folk tales and fairy tales, but expand your horizons and find fairy tales from other cultures. Tell them to children, explore this magical world of fairies, dwarves, giants, enchanted forests, magic and wonders, diversity, similarities, nobility…

And most importantly, the story you enjoy will be enjoyed by your child as well.

With fairy tales, regardless of age, we live happily ever after!

Danijela Žura

3 May 2021

#amazing #art #adventure

#danijelazura

#magic #moments

#waldorfteacherartist

#fairytales

#story

#storyteller

#brothergrimm

#ancient

#onceuponatime

#happilyeverafter

#waldorfpedagogy

#waldorfeducation 

Projects I am proud of

Michelangelo, my students and me

"He was not afraid of people, or power, or death, he was only afraid of mediocrity."

Michelangelo wanted to turn down the offer to paint the Sistine Chapel because he considered himself primarily a sculptor, not a painter, and had no experience with frescoes.

He reluctantly accepted the painting of the vault of the chapel and set out to create a fascinating piece of art.

With his strong will, talent and temperament, he creates a masterpiece of painting art.

The unique artist and his creations from the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel inspired me and my seventh graders who became Michelangelo himself!

2 May 2021

#amazing #art #adventure

#danijelazura

#magic #moments

#waldorfteacherartist

#renaissance

#Michelangelo

#sistinechapel

#renesansa

#David

#italy

#waldorfpedagogy

#waldorfeducation 

Projects I am proud of

Fruits and vegetables made out of wool production

Studying with children is like a sailing journey into the unknown - you can never prepare enough for their creativity, daring, resourcefulness and the results they will give you.

At the age of thirteen, a child should sail out to sea and show himself that he can! My students have shown me that they can!

For my seventh-graders, I designed a series of steps to teach handicrafts that led to the final project - slippers created by the wet felting technique.

A wonderful and challenging goal was ahead of us:

to make decorative and useful objects on an exceptional aesthetic level.

It was a long way to that goal.

It was sprinkled with soft, multicolored wool. Seventh-graders first adopted the technique of dry felting, and then wet.

Making the shape of fruits and vegetables from wool required precision, skillful movements, sense of material, application of knowledge of geometry, focus, power of perception, the strength of will in the realization ...

With less skilled hands, the more skillful ones always jumped in, so everything progressed nicely. The atmosphere has always been enriched by song, laughter, stories and jokes.

1 May 2021

#amazing #art #adventure

#danijelazura

#magic #moments

#wool #felt #handwork #skills #watermelon #strawberry #avocado #carrots #pumpkin #onion #cauliflower

#aubergine #apple #waldorf #waldorfteacher #waldorfpedagogy #waldorfeducation #happychild #project

✨TUTORIAL✨

🍄🍁🤎 ⚔️🐉 Celebrating Autumn Equinox & Michaelmas - A celebration of strength and courage, of facing dragons both internal and external.

Find your inner knight and light and fight the dragon!

I share with you a tutorial with the idea of one outdoor game for all ages!

Enjoy the celebration of light, courage and strength! ✨☺️✨

Enjoy the colors of autumn! 🍁🍄🌻🍁🌳

🤍🌿🤍🌿🤍🌿🤍🌿🤍

#amazing #art #adventure

#magic #moments

#wonderful #world

#danijelazura

#waldorfteacherartist

🌿🌱🌸🌿🌱🌿

#homeschool

🌿🌱🌿🎶🌏

#michael

#michaelmas

#courage

#light

#knight

#waldorfpedagogy #waldorf #learningforlife

#learnbydoing

#waldorfeducation

#waldorfschool

🌸🤍🌳

#waldorfhomeschool

#waldorfhomeschooling

#consulting

#consultant

#homeschoolparent

#homeschooling

#unschooling

#support

#journey 

🍄🍁🤎🐉 Dragon bread🥖🍞🥰

When we celebrate festivals, we connect with nature, we follow the rhythm of the year, we connect to each other. The Autumn Festival inspires us to bravely conquer our dragons, to awaken our light, to thank the fruits of autumn, and to prepare for the long winter.

Enjoy the Autumn, enjoy the colors of autumn! 🍁🍄🌻🍁🌳

Enjoy the celebration of light, courage and strength! ✨☺️✨

Celebrating Autumn Equinox & Michaelmas - A celebration of strength and courage, of facing dragons both internal and external.

Find your inner knight and light and fight the dragon!

🤍🌿🤍🌿🤍🌿🤍🌿🤍

#amazing #art #adventure

#magic #moments

#wonderful #world

#danijelazura

#waldorfteacherartist

🌿🌱🌸🌿🌱🌿

#homeschool

🌿🌱🌿🎶🌏

#autumn

#dragonbread

#bread

#light

#waldorffestivals

#waldorfpedagogy #waldorf #learningforlife

#learnbydoing

#waldorfeducation

#waldorfschool

🌸🤍🌳

#waldorfhomeschool

#waldorfhomeschooling

#consulting

#consultant

#homeschoolparent

#homeschooling

#unschooling

#support

#journey

Music: Celebration

Musician: Alexander Nakarada

Site: https://filmmusic.io/song/4759-celebration

License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license