May 2023
And Now It's Spring
The grass is green across the hill,
But yellow blooms the daffodil.
It's sunshine on a little stalk,
A friendly flower, I bet they talk...
Of little kids, too long inside
They burst outdoors to play and hide.
Tracking mud and bringing bugs.
Look, there's footprints on the rug!
Tiny whirlwinds, these little tykes,
They skin their knees while riding bikes.
They rip and roar, they're running wild!
What fun it is to be a child.
It grows warmer every day.
Shoo the children out to play!
Pick the flowers, play in mud.
Too much rain, here comes a flood!
My snowy, winter days are gone.
I mourn them, but I hear a song
Of birds in trees; wind chimes ring.
I guess it might as well be spring!
By Lhtheaker
Class Updates
The look on the kids faces when they walked into Root Wood to find it transformed into a magical tea party was priceless! How filled their young minds are with imagination and how accepting they were of the magic of the experience. Taking time to draw out their creative nature in these early years by reading them fictional books, scattering open ended play things or art offerings and telling wildly impossible stories are how we grow those parts in their brain that help them think creatively. Cheers to magical tea parties!
The Air Class has been having a wonderful time the last few weeks. The weather has been both the sunniest and the rainiest we’ve had all year! May Day was a huge hit with kids wow’ed by the parent effort with flower crowns and a magical tea party. The memories they made with these experiences are priceless. They also helped out almost all day by leading the other classes in learning how to weave and dance around a May Pole. They finished up their projects last month with an exhibit of their learning - all about how things are made - and have moved on to studying humans. ALL things human! Students will be writing essays and giving a verbal presentation to the rest of the class as a final project. In math, we’ve been working on fractions, multiplication and multi-digit addition and subtraction!
Fire Class is enjoying spring for sure. We are well into our Water Unit and exploring all the magical components that are water. Students are crushing it at the social/emotional piece of friendship and problem solving with peers at this point in the year. I hope you are proud of your Fire student because they have mad skills at checking in with themselves, what they need and working to express it. We have our Elephant and Piggie play coming up at the end of May!
The Earth Kids have spent the last month studying the human body! Each student made a life-sized illustration of their insides, following their own interests to discover more about how their bodies work - a child-led project! These kids are also finishing up a many-month project carving with Ms. Victoria, as we prepare for our goodbyes to her. Ms. Victoria has been an Earth Class staple since the beginning, and we will miss her dearly! Also this past month, we explored rocks with the Fire Class, practiced skip counting, introduced multiplication, and everyone in the Earth Class is reading like mad. These kids are blossoming like springtime in our forest!
We will miss you Ms. Victoria
Our school has been so lucky to have this treasured human for over a year. She came on board mid year last year to take on a wild pack of 3rd and 4th graders-mostly boys. As a brand new program Victoria joined us with an open heart, an open mind and so much flexibility. We are so grateful to have had Victoria during DTE’s growth and change, her true nature was exactly what we needed. You can always find Victoria laughing at a child’s silly jokes, listening intently to someone sharing or gracefully holding space for a child to learn a new skill. I know that all the children she has yet to meet in her new home in Peru will soon understand why we treasure her so!
We bid you farewell and send you with prayers of abundance, adventure, opportunity and a prolific new community to encircle you in your journey ahead. Thank you for all the ways you’ve shared a heart connection and translated skills to the children and adults in our community.
A river day with Air and Water class.
These two go together like peas and carrots!
Air class frying up some Maple Blossoms.
A rare moment for these two wild ones.
Thank you to our parent volunteers! May Day was a day to remember.
On the Horizon
We are looking for volunteers to help with our very last Forest Families adventure! We are going to play a GIANT game of hide and seek, we call it Predator and Prey. Fire, Earth and Air classes will be working on their map making skills and heightening their sense of space and place in the next few weeks. We are looking for 9-10 parents to help all the classes “seek” out the Air class kids hidden in their favorite forest hide out.
Our end of the year potluck and Contra dance gathering is quickly approaching. You won’t want to miss this one! Our Contra dance caller will be coming a few times before our gathering to give our kids some Contra lesson.
