O and A celebrated their third birthdays this week. In their Montessori classroom they celebrated by holding an earth marble and walking around a candle representing the sun. The parent or teacher talks about the first year of life, and then the child walks around the sun. This is repeated for each year that the child has lived. It is a cosmic and magical representation of the time that the child has spent on the earth. As they walk, the class sings this song:
The earth goes around the sun, the sun
The earth goes around the sun
It takes 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days
As a teacher, I have led many of these walks around the sun, but none was as emotional for me as O's and A's. I am so lucky to have two happy, healthy, handsome boys!
p.s. I am going to take part in Joanna's Fall Challenge this week: To not watch TV for a week, or at least, cut way back. Wish us luck, and feel free to join in!
Oh Sage, this makes ME teary! Anouk went around the sun in your classroom before you were a mom and we loved that tradition from day one! Our little school here in Vienna does something similar but it still makes us miss Walden! Happy Birthday to the boys!
ReplyDeleteThat’s cute! They made it a venue NYC for their birthday celebration. It’s good. When I was a kid, my teacher would celebrate each and every student’s birthday very nicely and she even took out for lunch. She loved everybody and I miss her a lot.
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