A Gift of Wonder is a beautiful collection of vignettes chronicling Waldorf teacher and mentor Kim Allsup’s journey with her first class. Each chapter focuses on a key element or trait – Curiosity, Resilience, Nurturing, Responsibility, and Balance to name a few – and the story that follows allows the reader to see how that capacity or quality can emerge…
Author: Kim Allsup
“A “must-read” Waldorf teaching memoir” : Homeschooling Parents Review A Gift of Wonder
Since retiring from teaching in Waldorf schools, I’ve enjoyed working with a homeschooling second grader who often comes up with an idea for our lesson time than is more engaging than what I planned. “Can we start in the garden today?” And why not? We are both more focused after time in the fresh air where she weeds her fairy…
Read Your Kids Chapter Books by Age Five
Soon the first grader would wave good bye to her four year old brother at my classroom door. But now they both sat in a wooded glade on a hot August day listening intently to my story during a home visit, a tradition in our school. I had been telling the same story at each home and I felt apprehensive…
Our Kids Need to Picture a Future Where We Avert Climate Catastrophe
Have you imagined a future in which we reversed climate change? This video shows such a future. My novel – in – progress also imagines a future in which people take action to avert climate catastrophe. Click here for article with video I started writing Rachel’s Way when my fourth graders started reading dystopian novels. Where, I wondered, could I…
Exploring Moss Gardens as a Play Space: Part One
Moss gardens bring nature inside. They offer children opportunities for imaginative play, experimentation, and hands on exploration of the world of plants. We started by collecting moss and a mossy log in the forest. Then we placed a layer of soil on a boot tray and added the pieces of moss. At this point my eight year old helper took…
Announcing a New Facebook Page: Seeking Waldorf Wisdom with Kim Allsup
This page launches on February 2,2019. You are welcome to join now. click here: https://www.facebook.com/waldorfwisdom/ As a participant in a number of very worthwhile Waldorf-related Facebook pages, I saw a gap that asked to be filled, hence Seeking Waldorf Wisdom. The goal is to work together in the manner of a Waldorf faculty meeting to explore topics that support our…
The world we wish for tomorrow depends on how we teach children today
My friend Robert tells me, “How we raise and educate our children is a key element in whether or not we survive! That’s why your book is so important! Because civilization is, in Victor Frankl’s term, “running on the wire.” “But,” I counter, “my teaching memoir is simply life in a Waldorf classroom, moments, conversations, little kids becoming big kids,…
Speak to the Heart of Children
I worry that as time goes on and, as schools increasingly focus on the “thing” that is the curriculum and the “thing” that is the test, we will forget what is missing at school. So, I want to invite you into my classroom in a school where teachers and their students are free to learn together without the interference of…
Real Kids Need Real Teachers
They sit in front of a screen for five hours a day, hundreds of people at desks moving through the programs, step by step. Once a week they meet with a person for fifteen minutes. Occasionally they join a group listening briefly to a speaker. But mostly they interact with a screen, reading and giving answers.They try to keep on…
Keep the Wind in their Sails
Growing Children 