At these recurring meetings, parents set the agenda with their questions and a conversation ensues.

RSVP to [email protected] by 3 pm the day-of for Zoom login info.

Relevant school topics and information will be shared by the Board of Trustees, College of Teachers, and the Leadership Council.

Zoom login info will be sent to families in advance of the Town Hall.

The Dandelion class enjoys each fall day in the dear fenced garden at the Community House. They begin each morning outdoors where they dig with shovels, crack rocks, and balance on stones, logs, and planks. The Dandelions have loved singing songs about all the woodland animals who are preparing for colder weather. The scurrying chipmunks, scampering squirrels, and slowly moving slugs and snails are the animals we see everyday in our garden! The children have been happily raking fallen leaves and jumping into the piles. After the leaves have been crushed sufficiently by boots and sneakers we move the leaf mulch to our garden beds using our big wheel barrow. The dandelion children often call on King Gnome to guard their earthly home. We are now listening to a fun Halloween story, the Hobgoblin. For our craft we are making little chipmunks from fallen pine cones and wool batting. On Fridays we meet Ms. Laetitia at the larger play yard for Eurhythmy and then the children enjoy swinging on the tire swing and balancing on the long fallen tree and then returning to our classroom to eat warm oatmeal. Our days are full and we are so happy and thankful to be together .

The Rose class is enjoying the beautiful Autumn weather. Our "Sun children" were knighted after sawing, drilling and sanding beautiful black walnut branches that they turned into swords. The swords are used, "only for good deeds, never for some silly quarrel or fight, but to drive away evil...I will try and to protect others who are weaker than I" (that is the code of the knight). We are enjoying finding leaves on the ground with their colors of red, golden yellow, russet and brown. We have been happily rolling down our sledding hill as acorns falling from the oak tree. Now with harvest time almost over, we are the, "five little pumpkins rolling out of sight" all the way down the hill. We enjoyed a fabulous afternoon in the rain on Friday making soup out of mud and leaves in the garden. We are working on an Autumn craft, creating a pom-pom pumpkin. We are grateful to be together during this magical time of the year!

The Sunflower children are very happy to be together at school again. We have two new children in the class and they have already become a tight group. Sometimes they all play hide and seek together and some Fridays they play cooking games when we play at the Community house playground.

The Sunflower class recently finished our circle about Michaelmas. The children made beautiful wooden swords. But now all of our activities are related to Autumn. The children are making apples out of pompoms, pumpkins and leaves out of beeswax, and singing songs and playing games about leaves falling on the ground and pumpkins growing over a pumpkin patch. They also made beautiful paintings with leaves.

The "sun children" in the class are already experts in jumping rope, which has allowed them to enjoy jumping rope two at a time, which they love. They are also experts in finger knitting and almost all of them have finished making a beautiful belt. They have also been doing some woodworking projects such as making swords, spinning tops, and a round wooden piece that is used for making yarn bracelets.

First Grade is incredibly busy learning their first consonants. We have learned about the B found in the bear, the M found in the mountains, and the C found in a cave filled with treasures galore, all through Grimm's tales. We are also learning the alphabet backwards, which is more of a struggle for me, than them! We have been busy outside every morning enjoying our circle time which has included being either a gallant galloping gelding or a terribly tired tortoise! We are gaining tons of ground practicing Melissa Merkling's "Pitter, Patter, Polt" and "Pease Porridge Hot" clapping games. Sometimes we are even crabs scuttling along the sandy beach on a hot day, singing "the wheels on the bus go round and round" (The crabs on the beach go 'round and 'round, 'round, and 'round...you get the idea.) We've also drawn some complicated form drawings with chalk tucked in our toes!

The Second Graders are studying mathematics. We began our block with a review of our two, three, five, and ten times tables and used a 10 circle to draw the patterns found in each. Then we moved on to place value with Bill Yun's Bun Shop, where each student had fun ordering buns in boxes of 1000, bags of 100, trays of 10 or by individual buns. We have also enjoyed creating seasonal paintings with Autumn leaves and creating pumpkins and gourds during beeswax.

The Third Graders have been studying the seasons, moths and lengths of each day. We are learning how ancient peoples measured the passing of time using sundials, water clocks, and candle clocks. We built our own sundials outside and are practicing with analog clocks in the classroom.

The Fourth Grade began the year with play practice! The twelve Fourth Graders rehearsed a story of one of the Norse Myths entitled Loki and Sif's Golden Hair. All play practices and the five performances on October 1st were held  outdoors. The students used the three field tents on the Compass Hall field as the scaffolding for three backdrops. Sometimes a colorful shower of fall leaves cascaded down on the Fourth Graders as they rehearsed! The students performed one of the most humorous tales about the trickster, Loki, and dwarves, giants, the god Odin and his court of dwellers in the kingdom of Asgard. Now the Fourth Grade is working on arithmetic with more outdoor activities. They will soon begin preparing for Martinmas, as the hosts of this year's lantern walk to be held on campus during the school day on November 10th for Grades 1, 2, 3, and 4.

It has been wonderful being back together in the classroom! We have gotten used to our new rhythm and routine and are enjoying spending more time learning in the outside classrooms.The Fifth Graders kicked off the school year in a Botany block. Students have been studying the lower plant kingdom during this first block, through a picture of the plant world growing in complexity from the fungi and mosses through to the coniferous trees. The Fall weather has been just perfect for making observations and nature journaling outdoors. Moving forward, Fifth Graders will enter into a math block, in which their study of fractions from fourth grade will be reviewed and deepened. Additionally, the Fifth Graders delighted in setting up the Michaelmas day obstacle course for their peers. Thank you to everyone who supported us in making it a special festival!

In Grade Six we are studying geometry. We started the block by exploring geometry in nature: the inside of an apple and a cucumber, many shells, a honey comb, and a snow crystal all carry samples of living geometry within them. We discovered that the circle can be considered the most perfect geometrical form. It is not easy to construct a perfect circle made up of Sixth Graders and it is rather difficult to create one using a string and pencil. The compass has come to the rescue! We are now concentrating on the 6-division of the circle and how the hexagon, hexagram, and other polygons will emerge from it. We will also learn how to use the protractor when studying angles in triangles, for example. All of this work will appear in an artistic way in our main lesson book and continue in main lesson blocks in Grades Seven and Eight.

In their history block, the Seventh and Eighth graders have embarked on exploring daring, courageous, and adventurous world travelers. The student chose two lesser known, often non-European explorers who lived between the 12th century to present times. For one, they are tasked to write a biography and for the other, to design postcards from their travels. We talk about the impact European explorers had on the people that they encountered, and address the genocides of indigenous nations and slavery that followed. Utilizing the historic atlas we also find out more about trade routes and how economies were interconnected.

Our classroom discussions on the explorers has opened the opportunity to learn about debating and how to develop arguments. The students are embracing our debating exercises with delight and many witty comments.

Our Fall Traditional Dance session began on October 8th, and is in full swing. All dances were done outside with everyone wearing masks, but no hand-holding. Our concentration was on International Folk Dances because they lend themselves easily to doing "solo," staying safe distances apart from each other.

The 7th/8th Grades have been busy, creatively choreographing a dance for the Halloween Event. They had to first choose a formation (they chose a circle); then had to pick a tune by rhythm (either a reel or a jig - they chose a jig). Then they had to start suggesting traditional dance figures they've learned over the past years with me, and we had great input from multiple students. Each new figure was tried out against the music, and then some were tweaked a bit. Of course, added in were some flourishes created by the class. Lots of wonderful cooperation and fun!

The 4th Grade experienced dances from all over the world - Serbia, Turkey, Mexico, Romania - and they're still waiting to decide which dance they want to present at the Halloween Event.

The 5th/6th Grades traveled (in dance) to Catalan, Bolivia, and Russia, among other places. They began to choreograph their own dance.

And the 2nd/3rd Grades also traveled internationally - Serbia, Israel, Sweden, Occitane/France, as well as dancing some old favorites.

In Spanish class we got ready for the rain by making costumes with black plastic leaf bags. We played a game of hide-and-seek during which the children only showed their backs as they curled on the ground. Those trying to figure out who is who had to guess by asking questions while pointing at each hiding child: Quien es esta persona? The child answered: Esta persona es ....

Earlier this month, the Class of 2020 and their parents enjoyed the traditional graduation brunch that I have offered all of the classes that I have graduated at HVWS. This year's celebration had to be postponed but not canceled. It was great to see each other in person after almost seven months. There was a lot of catching up to do and of course the diplomas had to be presented.

Congratulations Class of 2020: Áine Ancona, Jackson DellaCamera, Sophia Merkulov and Alexis Steger. We miss you!

Áine Ancona is attending Staples High School, Westport

Jackson DellaCamera is attending Avon Old Farms School, Avon

Sophia Merkulov is attending Pomperaug High School, Southbury

Alexis Steger is attending Amity Regional High School, Bethany

Forrest Anderson deferred acceptance to Pacific University in Hawaii where he plans to major in Entrepreneurship/Business. He is traveling this year as a videographer and marketer for professional snow boarders and surfers.

Pauline Fernandez deferred acceptance to Connecticut College where she plans to study Architecture and Environmental Design.

Ryan Greguski deferred acceptance to Middlebury College where he plans to study Physics. He has taken a gap year and started an online tutoring business and plans to pursue many of his interests: photography, woodworking, and videography.

Maya Goode is attending Fairfield University to study History and Art.

Brady Knuff is attending University of Denver and majoring in Business.

Conor McCann is attending Drexel University majoring in Mechanical Engineering

Ellery McFarland is attending University of New Haven studying Fire Science & Administration. Rather than living on campus, he is residing in a live-in firehouse with other University of New Haven students, in Trumbull, CT. Enabling him to continue going on fire calls with the department and having boots on the ground experience.

Monika Mihok is attending the University of Connecticut.

Timothy Redpath is attending St Andrews University in Scotland and studying Biochemistry.

Kira Schoenberg is attending Mount Holyoke College and planning to major in Psychology or Neuroscience.

Danny Schum is attending the University in Colorado and majoring in Business.

Quinn Siddiqui deferred acceptance to Washington and Lee University where he will study Economics and is taking a gap year to travel and participate in 3-month NOLS trip in the Colorado Rockies.

Emily Stringer is attending the College of the Atlantic majoring in Marine Biology.

Aidan Usher is attending Naugatuck Community College to study Horticulture.

Calling all HVWS alums! A few of the opportunities that await you at Alums.WaldorfEducation.org:

HVWS alumni are amazing people doing amazing things!

Please consider a submission.

The Association of Waldorf Schools of North America (AWSNA) launched its Waldorf Alum Connect Spotlight campaign last January and is seeking published news about alums. The aim of this campaign is to spread the word about the amazing work that our Waldorf alums are undertaking as scientists, artists, teachers, engineers, musicians, advisors, entrepreneurs and more.

We are seeking published news articles, personal websites and published research about what our alums are doing out in the wide world.

Please consider nominating yourself or someone you know here!

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