Issue Twelve - 1st November 2017

Welcome to the twelfth issue of our e-newsletter Talking Trees. 

As ever, we’d appreciate you taking the time to give us some feedback about the newsletter. Please feel free to pass it on and share it with friends and contacts.

UPPER SCHOOL UPDATE:

With our first set of graduates leaving the school in July 2017, we have updated the Upper school section of our website. We’d love you to have a look at our Graduation page, where Jessica, one of our school leavers writes about her journey through the school.  Her final couple of paragraphs we found particularly moving and describe the essence of what we hope to provide for all our pupils.

The Final Year Projects page is still in development. However, we’ve uploaded 4 of the 13 student projects; more are to follow…..but do have a look in the meantime and let us have your thoughts.

Our new Alumni page provides information about our first cohort of students – where they are going next, including information about Universities and courses.

There is also updated information about the Level 3 Qualification, called the New Zealand Certificate of Steiner Education or NZCSE (formerly called the Steiner School Certificate, or SSC), with a ‘frequently asked questions’ section.  Parents who are interested in their son/daughter joining the upper school may find this page particularly useful.

UPPER SCHOOL FACT - You may not know……that although our oldest class (pupils age 16-18) is now in the first term of the second year of studying for the NZCSE (formerly the SSC), we can still take new pupils of this age and they can chose to enrol for these final two years of the qualification. Contact us for more details.

OTHER SCHOOL NEWS

The start of the academic year is always a busy and productive time for children and staff.  The new term is of course also drawing on and adding to experiences from last year.  Maple Class (age 8-10) harvested the vegetables they planted in spring in order to make soup for the Michaelmas Festival. 

Pupils dug up curly carrots, strange turnips, knobbly potatoes, and they had completely forgotten that onions had been planted! These were huge. The farming year began with an empty plot that filled with steaming manure and concluded with delicious soup and dragon bread that was shared with the whole school at Michaelmas.

Maple Class

Music and songs accompanied the story of the Michaelmas Dragon and then the whole school shared Maple’s huge pan of soup.  It was served by Sequoia Class (age 10-12.)

The kindergarten (children age 3-6) joined the school festival and also had a week of related activities, including using the apple press to make apple juice, making apple cake and dragon rolls.  They wore clothing which reflected the colours of the season in autumnal shades and also brought to the festival, small contributions of fruits, vegetables and hedgerow berries to create a beautiful harvest table (see top photo). 

Kindergarten

As part of their English main lesson block, Oak Class (age 14-16) went out to Norwich Playhouse to see a performance of the classic Greek tragedy Antigone by Sophocles.  This was a re-imagined version of the ancient story set in a dystopian future with close surveillance technology in the form of drones acting as the role of the State and The Chorus played by a computer!  This very 'now' performance helped to bring the works of 2,500 years ago into our present.

Willow Class (12-14) have recently had a main lesson block on ‘Pythagoras and the nature of Number.’  The photo below provides an example of ‘Bhaskara’s proof of Pythagoras’ Theorem’, measured, drawn and cut by a child in Willow Class:

Bhaskara's proof of Pythagoras' theorem

Oak Automaton

Oak Class have been making automata in woodwork.  These are models in woodwork where there are one or more mechanisms for movement incorporated into the model. Below is a short clip of one pupils Automata in movement and a photo of the same work in progress.

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