Self-Activity & Following the child: First day of Homeschool, our 3rd year

Our first day of school began with the requisite first-day-of-school photos in front of the house. It was a beautiful rainy day, so after photos, we took a family walk around the neighborhood. And we jumped in puddles, too. After that, we went into our school room for circle time.

Frederich Froebel (German pedagogue, inventor of Kindergarten, 1782-1852) was the first known person to develop an early childhood education method and philosophy. He was also the pioneer of the now ubiquitous "morning circle time," when kids and teachers begin their day together with a song, and some kind of play with movement. A cornerstone of Froebel's philosophy is starting with the whole, transitioning into separate parts, then going back to the whole. One of the ways he manifested this in Kindergarten was by starting the day together in circle time and ending the day by coming back together as a whole, and the teachers spread kindergartens worldwide honored this concept, as seen here in a kindergarten in 1956.

For some reason, my kids are resistant to this idea even though they both went to a Montessori preschool where each day always started with "circle time." Maybe that's why they aren't into it, I don't know, but it was really important to Froebel, so I am trying to figure out what that will look like for us. We have circular green rugs where I've attempted circle time in the past, so I tried something new in the same area. We started out by chatting together about our upcoming day, and then we played leapfrog, hopping from lilypad to lilypad. Froebel loved incorporating drama and song and dance, so I think maybe he would have approved!

The Froebelian Kindergarten was the first early childhood education program. It was designed for children between the ages of three and seven and a half. I will write another post about the history of Kindergarten because it is fascinating, but for now, I will get on talking about our day.  

The original kindergarten was child-led and truly child-centered. Froebel's motto was that we must allow the children to learn rather than teach them. I had a few ideas of things we could do for the day, but true to their nature, the kids had their own ideas on what they wanted to do in school. They each had gotten a Wise Elk mini-brick construction set for Christmas, and they were suddenly inspired to work on them, becoming our first homeschool project. The basis of Froebel's philosophy on education is that children needn't be "taught" they should simply be allowed to learn through doing. The most important aspect of their educational experience is what he calls "spontaneous self-activity." Just like it sounds, these are activities that children choose for themselves in which they become completely immersed.

Our 7-year-old, Art, began working on his Wise Elk Chinese House set and stayed super engaged for over an hour until he realized it needed to dry before he could continue. Then it was the very first thing he wanted to do the next morning as soon as he woke up! This is exactly the "self-activity" that Froebel talked about, and it is really amazing to watch kids become so entirely engrossed in an activity of their choosing.

As for Fred, our 5-year-old, he was excited to start his Wise Elk Windmill set and was fully engaged for about fifteen minutes or so, then decided to let it dry while he moved on to something else. He came back to it the next day, but it didn't quite hold his focus and interest as it does for Art. The gypsum bricks don't fit together perfectly so there is some inherent wobbliness that can be frustrating for younger kids, but it is a good lesson in patience and not being perfect!

Fred found his "self-activity" after lunch when he spontaneously started making flags out of construction paper. We'd learned about flags a bit last year after getting out our Montessori world flags set. At that time, after doing the Montessori flag-matching activity, he chose to make the Canadian flag (so we worked on that together). Art made the Greek flag – and both flags are still up on the wall in our school room. This time, after playing with the world flag set, Fred took out some construction paper and got to work all on his own - he'd decided that he wanted to make the Chinese flag. He asked for some help making yellow stars, so we worked on that part together, and he cut them out. Then Fred made the Norwegian flag, and when he realized that it was smaller than the other flags, he made a larger one and kept the small one, too (he said it was a baby flag). Then he made the French flag. Art joined in and made flags for Japan, Italy, Germany, and Switzerland. We followed up by reading about some of the flag designs in The Lonely Planet's Flag book and finding the countries on the globe. It was a fun and impromptu lesson and was definitely child-led!

I don't see the Chinese House available on Amazon at the moment, but the Wise Elk Windmill set is, and there are several other sets available too. Kids can follow the construction notes to build the intended structure -- then soak their creation in water to dissolve the glue, and they can build with the bricks again! Wise Elk is made in Ukraine of natural materials and we've loved them. I'm part of the Amazon affiliate program, so I may earn a small commission if you make a purchase after following the links. I will only post links to activities and books that we have used and loved and want to share. If this blog becomes successful, I hope to be able to take on fewer coach clients and focus more on reading old education philosophy books from the 1800s for ideas to share with you! Cheers!!

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