drawing: plans

This morning I got out a big sheet of lining paper and some coloured markers in an an attempt to find out what exactly the children wanted to *do*. The result was a kind of spider chart/mind map. I was a bit disappointed as I thought once we'd started there might come out some interesting ideas that I didn't already know, but at least it got us all thinking about it and now it's on paper I won't forget what they have said.
The most interesting part for me was what they all decided they wanted to do in the future, under 'dreams'. Joy said she wanted to have her own equestrian centre and riding school; Fergus wanted to have his own sweetie shop; and Freddie wanted a farm with chickens and a rabbit. They all agreed they would like some land with animals. Fergus also expressed an interest in travelling to different countries, by plane and train. Most of the other stuff involved chocolate.
They carried on drawing quite freely on seperate sheets of big paper each. It is really fascinating to watch the boy's drawing developing. Freddie does all sorts of marks and people with eyes and legs, and big circles and spirals, round and round (according to Waldorf theory this is the earliest stage of expressive drawing that everyone goes through). I've noticed that Fergus often does circles with lines radiating out, but not meeting in the middle. This is often called a sun or spider, but with Fergus it is usually an alien or robot. This stage of drawing (I think) is supposed to express the self (circle) reaching out to meet other people and the world (radiating lines). About a year ago he was doing lots of crosses. This, and circles with crosses in them, or intersecting lines is focussing and centering on the self and finding your place in the universe. I have seen Joy go through all these stages of drawing too. This also confirms, in my mind, that Fergus is not at the readiness for writing stage yet.
That was something else I was talking to Joys's teacher about the other day. She said she, herself, did not start school (in Germany) till she was 7 and she knows plenty of other people now who are the same. She also said she has a lot of 7 year old boys wanting to come to the Montessori school. I pointed out that this was the obvious time to start, and some of these boys have not been to school, but there are a lot who have tried school and had problems fitting in. It seems that there are more boys than girls that have this problem with state school at a young age as they are not ready for reading and writing, or this kind of formal learning. I'm so glad Fergus is not at school as I'm sure he would be finding it very difficult.

Also: Joy did a quiz, and posted it on her blog.