tidings - summer 2009

The Quarterly Newsletter of Sun Haven Waldorf School Tidings 8

GRADE ONE-TWO: FABLES

Aesop's Fables is a collection of fables credited to Aesop (620–560 BC), a slave and story-teller who lived in Ancient Greece. His fables are some of the most well known in the world and remain a popular choice for the moral education of children today.

Fables (Aesop’s and other) are a part of the grade two curriculum in all Waldorf schools. The children hear the fables, then work with them in a variety of ways, such as drawing, writing, speech and drama. The Sun Haven Waldorf School grade one-two class performed three of the fables for the rest of the school : THE FOX AND THE GRAPES, THE LION'S SHARE and THE FOX AND THE LION.

The Fox and the Grapes

One hot summer's day a fox was strolling through an orchard till he came to a bunch of grapes just ripening on a vine which had been trained over a lofty branch. "Just the thing to quench my thirst," quoth he. Drawing back a few paces, he took a run and a jump, and just missed the bunch. Turning round again with a One, Two, Three, he jumped up, but with no greater success. Again and again he tried after the tempting morsel, but at last had to give it up, and walked away with his nose in the air, saying: "I am sure they are sour."

It is easy to despise what you cannot get.


SUMMER FAMILY POTLUCK

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The next Tidings

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On June 6, the Sun Haven Waldorf School Summer Family Potluck was held in the school field. It was a great day of fun for all. Stilt walking, sack races, maypole dances and of course the great food that Sun Haven Waldorf School has become well known for. Everyone came together to celebrate the past year of school and the summer that is to come.


Starting in grade 3, studying shelters and house building is part of the Waldorf curriculum. Facilitated by the Good Earth Building Collective (www.goodearthbuilder.com), in the spring the Sun Haven Waldorf School Grade 3/4 class, along with help from parents and friends of the school, began building a cob garden shed at a residence in Roberts Creek. Cob is a very old method of building with earth and straw or other fibers. Cob is normally applied by hand and the traditional way of mixing the natural materials is with bare feet; it is therefore fairly labor intensive. The wonderful thing about cob construction is that it can be a wildly free-form, sculptural affair.

GRADE 3-4 COB BUILDING FROM THE GROUND UP


Our Patchwork Garden© 2009 Sun Haven School, Roberts Creek, BC & Lowry Olafson

Chorus: In our patchwork garden We’ve been growingThe years have all been passingAnd we’re about to blossomIn our patchwork garden.

When we first met, we were like tiny seedlingsJust a glimpse of what we could becomeEager to grow tall, dig our roots down deepReaching for the light of the sun.

Chorus We’re all here in this garden for a reasonTo share our gifts and beauty all around.So many different flowers, so many different kindsFlourish in this fertile ground.

Chorus

And we know that we’ll never stop growingIn our hearts this garden will live onStronger every season, together like a familyNow it’s time to pass this garden on.

Chorus

GRADE 5-6 BOTANY STUDIES

Lowry Olafson works with schools in western Canada to write, record, and perform a unique song for their school. Through his workshop called "From the Page to the Stage,” he worked with the grade 5/6 class to create a graduation song called Our Patchwork Garden.

Visit www.lowryolafson.com to hear the recorded version of the song.

Raven Wall ~ Grade 6

Tara Butler ~ Grade 6

The Quarterly Newsletter of Sun Haven Waldorf School Tidings 10The Quarterly Newsletter of Sun Haven Waldorf School Tidings 13

http://www.whywaldorfworks.org

OLYMPICS FOR PEACE

At the edge of Gan Hashlosha (Sahne), there is a hidden archaeology museum that houses rare items from Ancient Greece. But even there, people are not used to the past coming back to life as it did, in the symbolic sense, at the Peace Olympics held last Saturday on the museum lawn. Some 200 children, aged 11 to 12, all of them students at Waldorf schools (adopting anthroposophist education), attended. All of them were dressed in white robes, much like those worn in ancient Greece, and competed in the pentathlon, the five main sports of the ancient Olympics: the javelin, discus, wrestling, running, and long jump. The children spent three days in the area, slept in tents, and trained energetically. The event did not emphasize competitive values and winning; instead, it focussed on the beauty of movement and the harmony among contestants.

"We nurture the social issue, everyone's personal achievement contributes to the group," explains Amin Souad, a resident of the Bedouin village of Souad Hamira. Souad is a physical education teacher at the anthroposophist school in Kibbutz Harduf, next to his village. "The goal is to neutralize the whole issue of competitiveness. The children don't even deal with the results, what they focus on is the beauty, the quality of the performance. In so doing we turn the javelin-throw, for example, into an aesthetic act and separate it from its original function as a tool of war."

Indeed, no major sports records were set at the event and no one bothered to record the results but the atmosphere was still one of sportsmanship. The children, who came from six different schools in Israel, were divided up into groups named after ancient Greek cities. Very quickly they began to evince loyalty toward their new peers and soon cheers for "amazing Ithaca" filled the air.

The Peace Olympics not only highlight the ancient Olympic sporting event, but also the Ekecheiria - the sacred Olympic truce that prevailed among Greek cities for the three months before and after the Olympic games. In fifth grade, the students of anthroposophist schools learn about the polis in ancient Greece, the Ekecheiria, and how sometimes the victor of the games would return to his city, and the city walls would be destroyed because contemporaries believed that no one would dare attack the city of the Olympic champion.

Destroying the city walls

"I think the story about destroying the walls is a legend, but myth can be taken as truth, regardless of its historical founding," says Dror Segal, the director of Sahne's Museum of Regional and Mediterranean Archaeology, where the events were held. "In Israel, for example, generations were raised on the myth that, 'It is good to die for our country.' And so it is of little importance whether [Joseph] Trumpeldor did indeed make this statement or whether he blurted out a Russian curse before his death. The same is true of the Ekecheiria; the idea is nice and it's important to nurture peace, tolerance and solidarity among children."

Building bridges

This is the guiding principle of the All in Peace organization, which in recent years has organized two children's festivals in Greece in the spirit of the Ekecheiria and is inaugurating a peace center at the Sahne Museum this week. The festivals in Greece were attended by children from several conflict regions - from Kosovo to Bethlehem. They participated in a week of pentathlon games in the spirit of ancient Greece, based on a belief that the power of sportsmanship can bridge different cultures and communities.

~continued~

By Ariel Rubinsky


The idea for All in Peace (a variation of the word "Olimpeace," which the International Olympic Committee forbade them to use) was born in 1999 at a conference on peace education at Kibbutz Ruhama in the Negev. This conference was attended by peace activists from all over the world, including Eyal Bloch, the principal of the anthroposophist Adam School in Jerusalem, and Amin Souad. Bloch and Souad suggested holding an international gathering of children in Greece to compete in the spirit of ancient Greece, much like the games held at Waldorf schools. The idea won the support of the Greek government and others, and in 2001, the first peace festival for children took place amid the ruins of Olympia in Delphi, Greece. Some 200 children from Kosovo, the Republic of Ireland, Greece, Egypt, Cyprus, the Palestinian Authority and Israel attended. The event was deemed a success and another festival was held in 2003.

Souad says that some of the ties established among the members of different communities after the events remain until today, including groups of Turks and Greeks in Cyprus, and children from Bethlehem and Jerusalem. In the years since, All in Peace has been working to spread the idea of Ekecheiria as a means for building a bridge between communities from conflict regions.

The peace center in the spirit of the Ekecheiria, which is to be dedicated this week at Sahne, is intended to serve as a center for disseminating the idea and for holding seminars and workshops on the subject for teachers and other groups from Israel and abroad.

But Souad stresses that post-workshop implementation is up to the participants: "We spread the idea, but the real work has to be done by the conflicted communities themselves, each in their own city or country."

The age of the children participating in the Peace Olympics was originally set to be between 11 and 12, in accordance with the Waldorf belief that children begin to turn into teenagers at this point but their muscles have yet to develop. "At this age, the children's movements are marked by unique beauty and harmony. That is why we believe they're in the 'Greek period'," says Souad. "We believe that once the competitiveness is neutralized and the focus is on harmony and nonviolent communication between people, you create an experience that changes the participants. This change slowly spreads and will eventually impact the entire community."

~continued~OLYMPICS FOR PEACE

The Greek Olympics Ode

Hannah Schmitt ~ Grade 6Lily Larsen ~ Grade 5

As the Greek Olympics draw near,The excitement rises in me.Meeting new friends, showing our talent.Let the gods be at my side.And Athena stand with me, alwaysOh, to wear the garlanded wreathWould give me glory,And to see a friend receive this prizeWould make me feel proud.The discus flying through the air,The javalin arking high, like a rainbowThese moments I will cherish,Always.


GRADE FIVE-SIX: GREEK OLYMPICS

On May 4-7, the Grade 5-6 class of Sun Haven Waldorf School attended the Northwest Greek Olympics in Duncan, where 106 students from six neighbouring Waldorf schools gathered in the spirit of the ancient Greek Olympics. This Waldorf tradition has inspired the international All In Peace Organization to establish a similar event, most recently in Israel, for children living in areas of conflict (see article page 13-14). Likewise the "Peace Olympics" have inspired a more non-competitive format to the Waldorf event, in which the students form a relationship with a "witness" (vs. a judge), who charts their progress and acknowledges both their personal and athletic strengths and their contribution to the harmony of the Games.


Robyn Wareham ~ Grade 2

IN THIS ISSUE~Celebrating a new name & itentity~Eugene Swartz Speaks~Art, Poetry + Thoughts from grade 5~Fundraising Fun~Painting with the Pre-schoolers~Making bread with the Kindergarten class ~Art from grade 1

Message from the Board PresidentMessage from the Board President

NewsletterSummer 2009

IN THIS ISSUE~Mid-Summer’s Eve Gala ~Dove Day in Kindergarten~Fables for Grade 1-2~Summer Family Potluck~Grade 3-4 Cob Building~Grade 5-6 Botany~Grade 5-6 Greek Olympics~A letter from Eugene Schwartz

Tidings

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Sun WALDORF SCHOOL

Haven

The Quarterly Newsletter of Sun Haven Waldorf School

Welcome to the second issue of our quarterly newsletter, Tidings!

How timely it is to read about Sun Haven's Grade 5/6 class Greek Olympics! The poem by grade 6 student Hannah Schmitt brought home for me how integrated a Waldorf education is in combining movement and activity with arts and language. The article describing how this Waldorf tradition has spawned a similar event bringing together children from war-torn regions was also inspirational. As Vancouver finalizes its own preparations for the Olympic Games, my wish is for the 2010 Olympics to also promote cross-cultural understanding as athletes and attendees from around the world engage.

Our Grade 5/6 class graduated at the end of June. Sitting at their graduation ceremony, it struck me again how fortunate we are to have our children attend a Waldorf School. These children, many of whom were together since kindergarten, developed an appreciation, understanding, and depth of friendship for each other. Teacher Karen Broom's comments on each child highlighted how well she came to know and love each child in her class. The words of their graduation song echo my sentiments about our Sun Haven community:

"We're all here in this garden for a reasonTo share our gifts and beauty all around.So many different flowers, so many different kindsFlourish in this fertile ground.”

I hope that your gardens and families have been flourishing this summer and I look forward to our coming together again in September!

Jenine GobbiPresident, Sun Haven Waldorf School




















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Welcome to the second issue of our quarterly newsletter, Tidings!

How timely it is to read about Sun Haven's Grade 5/6 class Greek Olympics! The poem by grade 6 student Hannah Schmitt brought home for me how integrated a Waldorf education is in combining movement and activity with arts and language. The article describing how this Waldorf tradition has spawned a similar event bringing together children from war-torn regions was also inspirational. As Vancouver finalizes its own preparations for the Olympic Games, my wish is for the 2010 Olympics to also promote cross-cultural understanding as athletes and attendees from around the world engage.

Our Grade 5/6 class graduated at the end of June. Sitting at their graduation ceremony, it struck me again how fortunate we are to have our children attend a Waldorf School. These children, many of whom were together since kindergarten, developed an appreciation, understanding, and depth of friendship for each other. Teacher Karen Broom's comments on each child highlighted how well she came to know and love each child in her class. The words of their graduation song echo my sentiments about our Sun Haven community:

"We're all here in this garden for a reasonTo share our gifts and beauty all around.So many different flowers, so many different kindsFlourish in this fertile ground.”

I hope that your gardens and families have been flourishing this summer and I look forward to our coming together again in September!

Jenine GobbiPresident, Sun Haven Waldorf School


Sun Haven Waldorf School's first Midsummer's Eve Gala took place on Saturday, June 20th at the Eric Cardinal Hall in Gibsons. Over 90 friends and family of Sun Haven enjoyed an evening of amazing local organic fare prepared by our wonderful chef, Rita Asfar. With the constant flow of organic food and wine, the amazing musical talents of Keely Halward and Headwater, and the fabulous fire dancing display from Kim Barbaro, the evening was by all accounts a wonderful success.

The evening raised approximately $5000 for Sun Haven’s capital projects. This was in large part due to the fabulous silent auction items donated by our local business and service providers. Huge thanks to everyone who came together to produce this wonderful event: the organizing committee, Chef Rita Asfar, tireless and cheerful volunteer servers, all the businesses who donated goods and services, and everyone who supported the school by coming out to the event. We hope everyone had a great time. We can’t wait until next year!

2545 StudioAAA Septic Tank ServiceAlchemyAlice ColemanArbutus Tree InteriorsBob MiltonBonar HarrisCafe Deux SoleilsCanteris HartleyCharles PatrickChelsea SleepDallas GrieveDiane ClarkDog River PotteryEd HillElements Local & Eco WaresFairy Tale Toys & BooksFairy Tale WoolFarm YardsGibsons CinemaGibsons DentalGibvey Laser Skin ClinicGordon HalloranGuillermo BrightHarbour Self StorageHoliday Inn Downtown VancouverJean’s OrganicsJenet HodgekinsonJenn Broom

Judy HeyerKalijo PilatesKaren BroomLenore HalloranLindsay HatloeLotus HouseLynn ThorsteinsonMarcia’sMaria IrishMarje UmezukiMarlena BlavinMarney CoulterMitchMonkey ChipsNadine LloydNancy RyderPastimesPatrick MarkRoseMarie PeirceSea Breeze ApiariesSilke BilligSue MillarSunshine Coast Slipper FactorySunshine Reiki HealingTale Wind Booksthis is it. designTofino Swell LodgeTrading CompanyWestPoint Chiropractic

WheatberriesWindSong GalleryYoga By The SeaYour Choice OrganicsYzabelle Meltor

Thank you to our sponsors:

FIRST MID-SUMMER’S EVE GALA: A SUCCESSFIRST MID-SUMMER’S EVE GALA: A SUCCESS




















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MID-SUMMERS EVE GALA:Organic wine, local food, a magical outdoor setting and a great fundraiser.




















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PRE-SCHOOL : A YEAR-END FAREWELL

DOVE DAY IN THE KINDERGARTEN On May 28th, the kindergarten class celebrated Whitsum Day, also called Dove Day by the students. Kindergar-ten teacher Mary Rocha Leite and assistant Lyne Lantaigne led the students through a lovely day of celebration. All wearing white, the children decorated the classroom with white flowers and the white paper doves they had made.

June was a busy and happy month at the preschool. The children were supercharged with energy from the sun and the full moon and were active and clamouring to be outdoors. We watered our flourishing garden daily and the sandbox as well!

Children painted their pictures outdoors on the deck. Other art projects included making cards for Father’s Day. We created beautiful butterflies form coloured wool and they were integrated into the free play. Children experimented with beeswax. Bread baking continued to be a highlight of the week.

Our puppet stories were seasonal; one told the story of some green and glittering bugs who were learning how to play together. By the end of the year it is wonderful to see the children creating their own puppet plays, often with seating, tickets, and many props. At circle we continued on with the Maypole dancing and played games and sang old favorites.

We had a fine day for our end of class potluck on June 11th. Clarence, Janice, and the talented Keely on accordion offered songs at our goodbye circle. We had a delicious feast outside, with flowers brightening the tables. Clara’s family made a piñata, which was a great hit. It was a special treat to see our friend Luella and her family. The great pictures taken by Mike Clarke were handed out along with a small gift for the children. Thank you Mike.

We thank all the parents and children for a fantastic year. From the get go parents were supportive and helpful, moving the classroom in September, ironing curtains and unpacking boxes, making dolls, creating gardens and potted plants, phoning and keeping the lines of communication open, helping with the emergency kits, bringing treats and fresh fruit for snack, letting us know when there were any problems with the children, and just being such an important part of our Waldorf community. Bless you all.

We thank our dear Jayne in the office for all that she does to keep the school functioning in a smooth way. We thank Silke for always being there to provide support and wool and silk and a kind smile. We thank Mary for her wisdom and last-minute wish-fulfilling powers. I need thread! I need wool! I need a large brown bear!

Thanks also to the committees and the board who gift us with their labours of love. The school could not have happened this year without them. We wish all of you a happy summer and look forward to being together again in the fall.

Clarence Deis Pre-school Assistant

Janice Hendry-CotePre-school Teacher

by Janice Hendry-Cote and Clarence Deis




















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A VISIT FROM EUGENE SCHWARTZ

“A healthy social life is found only, when in the mirror of each soul the whole community finds its reflection, and when in the whole community the virtue of each one is living.”

~Rudolf Steiner

Millennial ChildAuthor: Eugene Schwartz

On May 14th, renowned educator and author Eugene Schwartz paid a visit to the Sunshine Coast. During his stay he attended the classrooms, presented to the parents of Sun Haven during a luncheon, and gave an evening presentation to the greater community in Gibsons at St. Bart’s Church.

Available through Janet Lacroix at Fairy Tale Toys & Books [email protected]

Eugene Schwartz (fourth from right), along with many of the faculty and board who were instrumental in bringing Eugene to Sun Haven Waldorf School.

After the parent luncheon, parents were able to engage Eugene with some more personal dialogue and questions.




















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Several weeks ago, I spoke to many parents at the Sun Haven School during a luncheon. When I opened the floor for questions, the subject of children playing with toy guns (real or imaginary) was raised. I responded that this was a normal activity for many boys (and far fewer girls) and that, unless it became compulsive, there was nothing to worry about. For parents who were uncomfortable about such gunplay, I suggested that setting aside a time of day for “gun practice” with your child, preceded and followed by more meaningful activity, would be a good way to “regulate” such play. Most children in the Waldorf nursery and kindergarten setting find many other games to play and activities to emulate, and the gunplay eventually fades away.

RoseMarie Pierce brought to my attention an article by Susan Johnson, M.D., an anthroposophical physician, and I would like to comment on it. The article, entitled “Guns, a Plane Ride, and War” appeared on the web site http://youandyourchildshealth.org/articles.html a week after my talk, and I am glad that it has been made available to Sun Haven parents. Let it never be said that everyone connected to Waldorf education moves in lockstep, or is of one mind with everyone else! There are some clear disagreements between Dr. Johnson’s views and my own, and airing them both gives parents much greater freedom in making their own decisions.

Dr. Johnson's article begins: I recently evaluated a kindergarten-aged child who began having physically and emotionally violent nightmares since November of last year. In her first nightmare, she and her classmates were standing up against a wall and their teacher was shooting at them. In her kindergarten class, gunplay had been allowed in the playground for most of the school year. According to her parents, children were shooting one another, sometimes in the back, with “imaginary” automatic weapons. Her parents wanted her out of that kindergarten class. There were other kindergarten classes at that school where the teachers did not encourage gunplay and usually redirected it. The parents wanted my help and advice.

It sounds as if the gunplay permitted in that kindergarten was rampant, and very likely at least some of that play was not “directed” at all. I agree that the role of the teacher is to redirect children’s energy when it is becoming antisocial or hurtful. Every teacher will have her own level of tolerance and must make a creative decision about “how much is too much,” but I don’t think that this particular girl’s specific experience means that all gunplay is going to lead to nightmares. In fact, the large role that the teacher plays in this nightmare may say more about the child’s relationship to the teacher as an authority figure than to guns in general.

Dr. Johnson acknowledges that, like most boys, her son played with squirt pistols and a suction-cup dart gun, but that she wisely directed his energy away from hurting human beings. As both the kindergarten events and Dr. Johnson’s example show, the understanding and directing presence of an adult is a crucial factor in healthy children’s play. The adult need not hover over the child at play, but he or she should certainly be aware of the nature and tenor of the child’s activities.

The paragraphs that follow Dr. Johnson's opening section seem to me to be a non sequitur, but it is an important non sequitur because it reflects the strong feelings of many parents involved with Waldorf education. Dr. Johnson now describes a meeting on a plane with a soldier on leave from duty in Iraq. She and he strike up a conversation, and he describes his gun: He told me, that as strange as it may seem, what he missed the most right now was his gun; even though he didn’t want to miss it. “You see," he said, “I clean my gun every day, I care for it, and I sleep with it. My gun is my friend and it makes me feel safe.

Dr. Johnson tells the soldier that she would not want her son to go to war because she “just didn’t believe that killing ever solved any problems” and the soldier agrees:

He said that he had enlisted in the military because he wanted to serve our country, and he was promised tuition for education, good pay, health benefits, and of course travel all over the world.

GUNS AND DOSES by Eugene Schwartz

~Continued~


The soldier then agrees that war is awful and that he, too, would not want his son to go to war. Following this conversation, the plane lands and we return to the parents of the daughter having gun nightmares. Dr. Johnson notes:

I told them that they had to excuse me for I was feeling a little overwhelmed from my plane ride. “I hate war”, I said. “It makes no sense. When will we as Human Beings learn to respect each other, to love each other, and just get along?”

Dr. Johnson concludes the article by gazing at the kindergartener’s mother and saying, I did not need to ask her what she felt about gunplay in her daughter’s kindergarten class. The answer was already in her eyes.

By weaving together the soldier's story and the gun nightmares, there is a clear implication that playing with guns leads to war. I call this part of the article, moving and impassioned as it is, a “non sequitur” because there is nothing in Dr. Johnson’s conversation with the soldier that could lead us to conclude that gunplay in his childhood led to a love of war in adulthood. Even if we assume that the soldier on the plane did play with guns as a little boy (we never learn that he did, but it is probably a safe assumption), we would then have to assume that he now loves and misses his gun because it gives him the power to kill people. What he actually tells Dr. Johnson is that “My gun is my friend and it makes me feel safe.” He makes his gun sound less like a weapon and more like a security blanket or the symbol of the parent whose attention he may have lacked as a boy.

But surely he must have voluntarily enlisted in the wartime army because all of that childish gunplay instilled in him a love of death and destruction. What he actually tells Dr. Johnson is that, “He had enlisted in the military because he wanted to serve our country, and he was promised tuition for education, good pay, health benefits, and of course travel all over the world.” (People join the faculties of Waldorf schools for the many of the same reasons, except perhaps the pay.)

In the course of his plane conversation with Dr. Johnson this war veteran does not speak about shooting, killing, or even hurting another Human Being. It is Dr. Johnson who juxtaposes the story of the kindergartener with nightmares and the soldier who misses his gun as if all of these threads were connected, when in reality they are two different stories altogether. Dr. Johnson’s emotional reaction to the child, the soldier, her plane trip, etc. connects them in her soul (and thank goodness for an M.D. who is so open about her soul life!) but that does not mean that there is any objective causal relationship between children playing with guns and the actual practice of war.

In my work as an educational consultant I have made hundreds of school visits and I have seen many young boys at play. My own experience has been that more boys play with toy fire engines (real or imaginary) than with toy guns. If Dr. Johnson’s correlation between toy guns and soldiers is true, then why aren't there more firemen in our world? Another scenario I see repeated thousands of times involves boys working hard to build great towers of blocks or lofty mounds in the sandbox only to joyfully knock them down until they are gone. Could this be the seedbed of future terrorist acts?

From time immemorial, the interplay of upbuilding and destructive forces has been a fact of earthly life that human beings have had to encounter and understand. Hinduism pictures these forces as Brahma and Shiva; physiologists point to the anabolic and catabolic activities that underlie human life; Rudolf Steiner spoke of the battle between the etheric and astral bodies that lives within every human soul.

In her medical practice, Dr. Johnson very likely prescribes anthroposophical remedies. Like homeopathic medicines, these remedies may contain substances or forces that are akin to -- not opposed to -- the ailment that they are treating. A doctor knows that often “like cures like.” I would propose that gunplay in the kindergarten years, if permitted and guided in “homeopathic doses,” may pre-empt the need for “allopathic doses” of guns in later years. By acting out the interplay of upbuilding and destructive forces, little children may be learning how to deal with a dynamic that they will carry all of their lives. In this respect, while Waldorf schools may have the key for ending war on earth, they may help today’s children find their way to inner balance and security.

~Continued~Guns and Doses by Eugene Schwartz













The next Tidings










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OLYMPICS FOR PEACE







Building bridges


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By Ariel Rubinsky



Sun Haven Waldorf School was founded in 2001 and is located in Roberts Creek on the beautiful Sunshine Coast of British Columbia, Canada. The school offers a developmentally appropriate, experiential approach to education, integrating the arts and academics for children from pre-school through fifth grade. The aim is to inspire life-long learning in each student and enable them to fully develop their unique capacities. Founded in Germany in the early twentieteh century, Waldorf Education is an independent and inclusive form of education that is regionally adaptive and has grown to include hundreds of schools worldwide.

Throughout the 2008/2009 school year, Sun Haven Waldorf School received generous donations from community members. We would like to take this opportunity to thank them all, our annual events would not have been possible without their support.

Christmas Faire:IGA (Wilson Creek)IGA (Gibsons)ClaytonsSeaweedsRoberts Creek Health FoodsElphinstone Rock and GemExtra FoodsGumboot CafeJean's OrganicsOcean Light II AdventuresPier 17Straight CoffeeStarbucks (Sechelt)Wheatberries (Gibsons)Jamie SheppardFrances DelaneyUwe MummenhoffBill Wareham

Always:Roberts Creek Health FoodsJean’s OrganicsSharkey’s

Grade 5 Greek Olympics:IGA (Wilson Creek)IGA (Gibsons)Leos RestaurantDaphnes RestaurantClaytonsSeaweedsRoberts Creek Health Foods

A GENEROUS AMOUNT OF SUPPORT.......

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