Share your thoughts on two or more of the reflection questions: Questions In what ways do children manage transitions? In what ways can we support parents to communicate t

7 Rhythm and repetition Introduction

In this chapter, the security and coherence offered by rhythm and the learning opportunities given by repetition are discussed in the context of the Steiner early-childhood setting. The idea of the breathing rhythm is introduced, and we explain how the young child learns through repetition in a spiral of development. Examples are given of the rhythmical and repeated rou- tines for the day, the week and the year, through which young children can build trust in their environment and the adults caring for them there, including the value of the repeated story and of working with the seasons of the year, in songs, stories and activities. The celebration of festivals brings special highlights to the year, and we consider how this benefits the child and involves parents too.

Rhythm and repetition as key concepts

Rhythm and repetition stand alongside imitation and example as key concepts of Steiner Waldorf early-childhood education, and they will be reflected in the practice of any setting. Rhythm always brings order but not rigidity, form but not stultification. Repetition brings the opportunity for a deepening of appreciation and understanding, whether it is of a well-loved story or a regular weekly walk.

All living things, from the simplest life form upwards, work with rhythm and repetition, and it is this that makes complicated lives possible. The Steiner practitioner considers this is doubly so for young children who have the mission in their early years of trying to find coherence and meaning

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in their lives. In Steiner settings, this task is supported by working with rhythm from tiny routines, such as a sequence for careful washing of the hands, through the rhythms of the day, the week and the year. Repeating these rhythms, large and small, brings a feeling of security to the children. They can experience how things go and know that their experience will be reinforced. Life is not random but held by the adults in a safe way.

The overarching rhythm of the year brings something more through its connection first with the seasons and second with an appropriate cycle of festivals. These provide the high points, prepared for, celebrated and tidied away, which will be repeated and developed each year. Festivals lift everyone out of day-to-day life and build connections with a much wider community. Careful choice of festivals and seasonal celebrations gives the young child a sense of being a small part in a global community.

The importance of rhythm

Steiner practitioners advocate that rhythm is a fundamental source of secu- rity for children. The fact that their coats hang in the same place today as they did yesterday, that the paints and brushes are arranged in the same way this week as they were last week on painting day, and that the lantern festival comes at the time of year when the daylight is decreasing, all help them to feel that their world can be depended upon. When children feel safe, they feel free enough to explore and to take risks.

Children emphatically demand that they find ever again the order of things, thus signalling to adults how dependent they are on this experience. If those conditions exist, then the children can feel well and protected. If they do not exist, then the children can become restless and agitated. Any absence or disturbance of this order affects their feeling of well-being. It has an extraordinarily positive, even healing, effect on children when their daily activities are not chaotic but rather rhythmically organised, following a certain order every day.

(Patzlaff and Sassmannshausen 2007: 32)

Having rhythms in our lives helps us to feel connected to each other, to the natural world and even to the cosmos. Living things breathe and so live in a continual rhythm of in-breath and out-breath, receiving and giving until they stop and then cease to be alive. Breathing is not a rigid routine but responds to the needs of the body. If we are very active, we breathe more quickly; if we are sitting quietly, we breathe slowly and deeply.

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The rhythms and routines that are repeated in Steiner Waldorf early- childhood settings should be thought of in the same way, as responding to the needs of life. There is no need to stick to a rigid timetable. If needs be, the practitioner will speed things up a bit but then remember that the children need some quieter, deeper breathing in order to recuperate. When children are asked to contain themselves, to sit at the meal table or to gather quietly for story, this can be made easier for them by having each day follow the same rhythm, so they know what to expect and their bodies are accustomed to it. It is also easier for them if the practitioner ensures that an ‘in-breath’ of holding themselves contained is preceded and followed by an ‘out-breath’ of play.

If there is a part of the day that is not going well, for example, the children are not settling well to listen to the story, one important thing to consider is whether the daily rhythm is supporting a quiet adult-led activity at that point. The practitioner will consider whether the children have had enough time to ‘breathe out’ in active free play before being asked to sit quietly for story, are they hungry, and has the story telling space been prepared in such a way that a calm mood is encouraged?

Case study Story time in Rainbow Kindergarten

Preparation for story time begins at the end of the meal time. While most of the younger children in the mixed age group, with some older children to support them, go into the cloakroom to put on their outdoor wear, a group of the older children remains in the room to clear up the meal table. As part of this, the chairs are moved away so that the floor can be swept. The adult supervising the clear up team points out that the chairs need to be taken to the ‘moon boat’. This pictorial way of speaking reminds the children that when they listen to the story, they sit on chairs arranged in a semi-circle, the ‘moon boat’, around the adult story teller’s chair which is next to the seasonal table. The children place the chairs ready in the familiar shape. The adult reminds them to check that there is the right number of chairs, including one for the assistant and one for the visitor who is in the kindergarten today. This is a good opportunity for remembering who is present and absent today, and for some arithmetic. As the assistant leaves the tidied room, she closes the thin pink cotton curtains so that the room is lit by a pink glow.

(continued)

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Once the clear up team has finished its tasks, they and the assistant join the other children outdoors in the enclosed garden space avail- able to this group. Here they meet up with the children in the other kindergarten group in this setting, which also has a balance of older and younger children, between the ages of about 3 and 6 years old (by the end of the school year, the oldest children will be about to turn seven years old). The children are outside for about an hour, engaged in social, physical play, with some helping the adults to sweep up the leaves, a daily task in the late autumn and early winter. When it is nearly time to go inside again, the adults organise the journey of the collected leaves to the leaf bin, put away the tools they have been using, and encourage their sweeping helpers to do likewise, Then they begin to tidy up the outside toys, buckets and spades, the pots and pans in the mud kitchen, the tyres, crates and planks that have been used in construction, again encouraging the children to help put everything back into its familiar resting place. Finally the sand pit is covered.

Now the kindergarten teacher brings out of her pocket a small wooden flute, stands by the door and begins to improvise a simple tune.

(continued)

Figure 7.1 Sweeping leaves

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The sound of the flute carries well across the garden and the children begin to gather at the door, as usual. Two children are still really busy digging a hole at the far end of the garden. The spades have been tidied away but these boys are so keen on their excavation that they are using their hands to continue the work. The assistant walks over to them and says, ‘The workers are all going to get cleaned up ready for the moon boat now.’ The frustrated excavators explain that they are digging right through the earth and must continue. ‘There will be time tomorrow and you will have lots of fresh energy then’, suggests the assistant. The children sigh and fall in with the rhythm, and the assistant silently notes that they will need some supervision and use of the nail brush if their hands are to get properly clean.

Meanwhile, the kindergarten teacher has done a well-known stamp- ing, patting and clapping game with the group by the door, to brush and shake off sand and mud. Then most of the children go into the cloakroom. However, two of the youngest suddenly run off as the other kindergarten group is still out and playing a final running game before going in. The impulse to join them is too strong. The kindergar- ten teacher notes to herself that tomorrow she must coordinate better with her colleague so that they can all play the running game together before going in. She calls to her assistant, now returning with the two muddy diggers, that there are two ‘little lost lambs’ still to come home. The assistant helps the muddy children to begin their clean up, with the same stamping, patting and clapping routine, and sends them in with the other children.

By now the other kindergarten group is also gathering to go in their door, and the two ‘lost lambs’ are easy to retrieve with the singing of the phrase, ‘Now we get ready for story’. Everyone is taking off and hanging up outdoor clothing and foot wear, and washing hands. It is quite chaotic but most of the activity is purposeful and the adults redi- rect those who wander off task with comments like, ‘Your slippers are waiting for you to put them on’. The adults encourage the children to achieve as much as possible themselves, including putting the boots tidily on the boot shelf and hanging up the waterproof suits that all have worn for outside play. Underneath these suits, the children are remark- ably clean and dry so it doesn’t take very long for everyone to be ready.

Two older children who are ready first and not engaged in helping anyone else are allowed to go into the room to put the glass lantern

(continued)

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onto the nature table and count the chairs once more. In this kinder- garten, the risk assessment has been done to allow the use of candles within closed lanterns like this one. The kindergarten teacher says in a very quiet voice, ‘Now we are ready’ and leads in the children, with the assistant at the end of the line. The tidy room and subdued light encourage a quiet calm mood. Taking a last look around the cloakroom the assistant notices one coat lying on the floor and goes to say quietly to the group, ‘There is one coat in the cloakroom that is pretending to be a carpet! I think it belongs to Jeremy.’ Jeremy, one of the older children and a bit inclined to rush things, gives a giggle and goes to hang up his coat. The other children are sitting down. In this group, there are no set places for story time, but there is a familiar golden rule that an older child will never sit next to another older child but next to a younger one because that is helpful. The children can quickly and quietly sort this out for themselves with no intervention required from the adults today. One of the more impetuous younger children some- times loses focus and gets wriggly in story time and the kindergarten teacher says, ‘Today we shall make a place for Mary (the assistant) next to Imogen’. This is easily accepted and done.

Now the kindergarten teacher lifts the lyre down from its safe shelf. This is a small wooden stringed instrument often found in the Steiner kindergarten. It is tuned to the pentatonic scale and either it can be lightly strummed or tunes can be picked out on it by stroking the indi- vidual strings. The kindergarten teacher improvises for a minute, then lays the lyre carefully down and lights the candle in the lantern with the matches she has collected from their safe place and put into her pocket. She puts the spent match into its dedicated container and closes the door on the lantern. She folds her hands in her lap and begins to sing the familiar story-time song:

Come across the silver sea, come to storyland with me, Come across the starry sky, story time is nigh, story time is nigh.

The children join in, in a dreamy kind of way, and the teacher goes straight on to tell the Grimm’s fairy tale of ‘The Elves and the Shoemaker’. She has chosen this story because in has an indoor mood, suitable for the late autumn and a reference to Christmas. She also feels that the images of gratitude and patience in the story will be a good one for

(continued)

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this group. She tells the story quietly and clearly, being aware of her diction and keeping her voice lively, but without drama. Although the story has already been told four times this week, most of the children listen quietly and happily. Imogen is indeed not sitting very still and the assistant lifts the little girl onto her knee and encourages her to snuggle against her, which she enjoys doing. Two other children sitting next to each other start to interact over how their chairs touch each other, but then there is a cheerful little song when the little elves start to work, and they are distracted from their preliminary jostling as most of the chil- dren join in when the teacher sings that. At the end the song is repeated and more children join in this time. Then the candle in the lantern is snuffed out by one of the children using the snuffer waiting on the sea- sonal table. The teacher has opened the door of the lantern for this and indicated with just a gesture whose task this is today. Imogen wails that she wanted to snuff the candle and the teacher remarks gently that one day Imogen will sit really still and quiet all through story on her own chair and we shall see her snuff out the candle.

The quiet story-time mood is coming to an end now. The teacher invites the assistant to take all the children who are staying for lunch today into the washroom to wash their hands. Then she sends the other children, two at a time, to carry the chairs back from the moon boat to the meal table. While that is happening, she has little conversations about families and afternoon events and children share news while they wait for their parents to come to collect them.

The value of repetition

Everyone who lives or works with young children knows of their need for repetition, not just of familiar rhythms of meals, playtimes and outings, but also of favourite rhymes, songs and stories. The general principle of rep- etition as a support to learning is also acknowledged in the way that the Steiner Waldorf setting is organised. Through repetition, children learn in a spiral of development. When they learn to walk, they try again and again to overcome gravity and pull themselves upright. Again and again they fall down, but they persevere until at last, through repetition, they master the next step. In the same way, when small children revel in hearing the same rhyme or story again and again, they are developing the inner pictures

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conjured up by the experience. They may hear the same words as yesterday, but, if there is no picture book, the illustrations that their imaginations paint for them in response to the words will change as they change.

That is why the practitioner may tell the same fairy tale to all the children in a mixed-age group, perhaps aged from rising three to nearly seven, and each child will have his or her own experience. The story may well be cho- sen to meet the needs of the oldest ones in the group who will appreciate the difficulties that the princess has to go through in order for evil to be defeated and good to triumph, as it does at the end of all true fairy tales. But, as the story is told calmly and steadily, the youngest child will not be harmed by frightening images, for example of the wicked witch that the princess meets, because the images that he or she makes will be his or her own. Steiner prac- titioners do not put their own emotions into the telling of the story so that the children can make their own images, and these they will be able to cope with. The story will be repeated over days and perhaps weeks, and all the children’s inner pictures will metamorphose day by day in those retellings as they unconsciously absorb different ideas from the story.

Creating a breathing rhythm for the day

By a breathing rhythm, we mean one that has the right balance between the times that draw the children in to be focused and attentive and the times for activities that encourage them to expand and be active. Here you might imagine the practitioner as the conductor of an orchestra skilfully and deli- cately holding together all the players and every bar of the music to make a harmonious whole. When this works well, everyone reaches the end of the session feeling satisfied and well nourished. Young children especially need a balanced rhythm to the waking part of their day, with its own harmonisa- tion of in-breaths and out-breaths. In the Steiner Waldorf early-childhood centre, each group will have a suitable healthy daily rhythm, and, as Lynne Oldfield writes, ‘The rhythm soon becomes habit, and very quickly these habits are established and become unquestioned, removing the need for instruction and direction’ (2002: 72).

A typical daily rhythm

A typical morning session in a kindergarten with a mixed age range of three to rising seven might proceed as follows. The children arrive, hang up their

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coats and change into their indoor shoes or slippers. They come into the kin- dergarten room where the adults are already laying out the painting things. Some children see the familiar activity being prepared, put on their paint- ing aprons and begin to help. When the table is all set for painting, they sit down to paint, as does at least one of the adults. When each child comes to a conclusion with their painting, he or she takes it to an adult, who will make sure that it is labelled with the child’s name, and then the child will put it safely to dry and tidy up the painting things that have been used before going off for indoor play. As this is how the painting activity is conducted every week, there is no overt instruction needed.

Other children may have, of their own initiative, gone straight into play- ing on their arrival. They may be attracted by the painting session later when it is well under way and come to put on an apron and join in. Some children may be so busy with their play that the painting activity passes them by. The practitioner may choose to call the older children to come and paint while leaving the younger ones free to play. They will certainly be attracted to join in at some time, when they are quite ready in themselves.

When all the painters have finished and the activity is cleared away, then the adults go on to prepare the meal that comes in the late morning. There is bread to slice and butter and fruit to chop. Some children are drawn to help with that, while others continue to play out of their own free will. Again the practitioner might call on the older children to help, for example to set the table ready for the meal. There will be plates and cups to count, place mats or napkins to set out and a centrepiece of flowers and perhaps a candle to be arranged.

Tidy-up time

When work is finished, the daily miracle of ‘tidy-up time’ begins. By now there has been much play, all the furniture has been moved about in the construction of a mighty castle and the play area is strewn with clothes, logs and other equipment that has been used in all the games.

Having packed away their own work in the food-preparation area, probably with some small helpers, the adults begin by starting to put the bigger pieces of furniture in their places and sorting equipment into piles. It may be part of the rhythm of this group to sing a simple tidy-up song at this point, but even if this is not done some children will be drawn to help while others play with renewed fervour as they realise that the end of playtime is fast approaching.

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Now the experienced practitioner will work to draw in all the children to help with the tidying up. This could be done by making it part of a game (for example, truck drivers making deliveries) and by calling on the help of the oldest children in the group. The whole process is made easier when all the equipment has a proper ‘home’ to which it always returns. Knowing where everything goes and how it is stored is very empowering for the children, building their confidence both in the setting and in their lives generally. Through the power of imitation and example, rhythm and repetition, the daily miracle is achieved.

Personal care

When the physical care of the room is complete, perhaps finishing with some of the children sweeping the floor, all the children receive some phy- sical care themselves. With appropriate adult support, each child will pay a visit to the toilet and then wash their hands. For practical reasons, this activity, and it is truly an activity full of learning possibilities, often over- laps with tidy-up time. In the overall rhythm of the session, it can be seen that after the big out-breath of self-initiated play, the children have gradu- ally been drawn in through the tidying up. Now they will be supported with their personal hygiene.

The adults will make sure that the toilets are pleasant areas in which to spend time: carefully decorated, including natural decorations such as flowers and branches which change with the seasons and perhaps beautiful pictures. They will also encourage the children to take their time, to tuck in their clothes properly and will pay special attention to the care of hands with washing, drying and perhaps hand cream. In Steiner practice hands are an important symbol of humanness. With them we can achieve all kinds of practical things in the world – and we can reach out to each other. Some Steiner settings, especially those working with the youngest children, have the staff and facilities for each child to have his or her hands washed and dried by an adult. Others encourage the children to make a good job of it for themselves. Some settings provide individual soft cotton towels for each child as these give a much nicer sensory experience than paper towels and avoids the intrusive noise of the hot air blower while maintaining proper hygiene standards. As this personal care activity concludes, the children gather again in the main room of the setting, where the play has been. While they are gradually becoming ready for the next part of the rhythm of the day

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they might comb their hair, finding their own named comb or brush in its case in the basket where the combs or brushes live.

Ring time

Now the room is tidy and so are the children, and everyone is ready to move on to ring time. (See Appendix III for a sample ring time.) The children may be in need of some refreshment by now, even though it is not yet snack time, so fresh fruit slices or dried fruit and seeds are often shared at this point. Ring time is a combination of movement, music and words, gener- ally in celebration of the time of year. The practitioner will put together a flowing sequence of poems, songs, finger games and whole-group games that is repeated for several days or weeks and that includes plenty of rep- etition within the sequence. This gives opportunities for variation (loudly/ softly, quickly/slowly, for example) and well as allowing the children time to join in. Ring time will be learned through imitation of the adults – not through instruction or direct teaching but through doing. The children will join in because it is enjoyable, because children love to move and to play with words and music and because it always happens at this time of day and in this way. It may always begin and end with the same verse or song.

Here there is a real contrast to the time of free play. Now the children are all doing the same thing at the same time and following the lead of the adult (see Figure 7.1). Because they have had a good out-breath and have gradually been brought together into a group through tidy-up and toilet time, they are ready to spend fifteen or twenty minutes in this whole-group practitioner-led activity. At the beginning of the school year, when there are many new children, this in-breath of ring time may be shortened.

Meal time

Another hand wash, perhaps just a rinse this time, brings all to the meal table, which has been prepared earlier in the session. There may even have been a fine smell of soup or baking bread while ring time was going on, and the children are quickly settled in their places. The adults will settle themselves and put their hands to rest on the lap with a big gesture that the children will be drawn into. Then the candle can be lit, if that is the

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tradition in that kindergarten, and a blessing sung or spoken before the meal begins. Perhaps older children will be the ‘waiters’ carrying round the bowls of food to all the children as the adults dish up, or plates of food will be carefully handed from hand to hand around the table. Meal time has a beginning, with a blessing, and an ending, with everyone taking hands and saying ‘thank you for the meal’. It may be the habit to eat quietly, or this may be a time for conversation. The practitioner may even use this time to tell a little story that seems appropriate – stories of ‘long ago when I was little’ are often popular.

When the meal finishes, the dishes are collected and stacked and the chairs pushed in to the table or stacked at one side, most of the children will now go to get ready to go outside. A small team, perhaps of the older children, help to wash, dry and put away the crockery and cutlery and sweep under the table.

Outdoor time

Getting ready to go outside, like handwashing, is an activity in its own right not just something to be got through as quickly as possible. Steiner practitioners

Figure 7.2 Meal time

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believe that whenever young children are supported to take care of their physical bodies, this shows them that they are worthy of respect and encour- ages them to learn to respect others as they grow up. When they see care modelled, the children build habits of caring for themselves, others and the world around them. So it is a serious task to prepare to move from indoors to outdoors. As outdoor play takes place in all weathers and often involves sand, water and mud, wet-weather gear, including waterproof trousers or dunga- rees, are essential for much of the school year. Putting these on is a major task to a three-year-old, and accomplishing this unaided is an achievement. Buttons, zips, buckles and bows all bring challenges and opportunities for helping each other and for learning from each other.

Keeping a sense of order in the cloakroom or lobby areas is also impor- tant to the Steiner practitioner. This part of the kindergarten is designed so that the children are able to keep order there themselves with plenty of accessible pegs and shelves for hats and gloves and space for slippers, boots and shoes. Enough space is needed for the children to dress and undress themselves, and if cloakroom space is short then some do this in the kinder garten room. The sensible practitioner adds large loops to the outdoor clothes to make it easier for children to hang them up and provides pegs to keep boots and slippers in pairs.

Now is the time for a good out-breath in the fresh air. Here again the adults will have tasks to undertake, looking after the garden and play areas and, in fine weather, bringing out indoor cleaning, mending and food- preparation tasks that are portable and suitable for outside. The children are free to play and move about as they wish, remembering the golden rule that ‘we take care of each other’. There will probably be paths to run along, trees, logs or other play equipment to climb on, sand and mud areas to dig. Some may choose to help the adults who are sweeping or gardening or mending the indoor play frame that has become wobbly with use.

It is important that this is not just a ten-minute run around. The children need time to relax into their outdoor play in the same way as they did indoors, although the nature of outdoor play is different. Some kindergartens have found that the way to prevent this vital outside time from being shortened is to put it at the beginning of the kindergarten session when the children arrive in the morning.

Towards the end of the outdoor time, the children need a signal that it will soon be time to come in, and this is usually the beginning of a tidy-up of the outdoor equipment. Sand boxes must be covered and tools put away, then the children come in and prepare themselves for story time, leaving tidy the outdoor clothes that they have taken off and washing their hands.

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Story time and the end of the session

In the kindergarten room, preparations will have been made for story time, probably by the children who helped to clear away after the snack. This means that the children come inside to a familiar arrangement of chairs arranged in a semicircle around the practitioner’s ‘story chair’. This is a quiet time, a contrast to outdoor playtime, and the reliable use of rhythm means that the children become used to this transition and usually settle easily into the appropriate mood to receive the story.

In most Steiner Waldorf early-childhood settings, stories are learned by heart by the practitioner and told to the children. There is no book, no showing of pictures between the adult and the listeners. There will be a familiar start to the story routine, perhaps a candle will be lit, simple soft music played or a song sung, then the telling of the story will begin. It will be told in a simple non-dramatic way so that the children can take it in as they need to without the adult imposing any emotional content in the deliv- ery of the tale. The same story will be repeated for at least a week. At the end of the story there will be a familiar ending, maybe a song, music and a verse spoken (the same every day) which eases the children back from their immersion in the world of the story and signals that it is time to prepare to go home, or to the setting’s afternoon care provision.

The end has now been reach

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