Not Sariah, at least not most of the time.
Sariah is fascinated with the big, bad wolf. For weeks now, she's loved the story of Little Red Riding Hood (although when we tell it, it has to be "Little Red Riding RiRi"). James told her the story one night when she was falling asleep, and that did it. A few days later, I asked her if she would tell me a story, and that's the one she told. She also talks constantly about her "grahnd-mudder", and it took me forever to figure out that she got it from that story. I couldn't imagine why she kept referring to Grandma as "my grahnd-mudder", since we are never that formal.
This week, with Dallin in school, we've been having Rocking Chair Time every morning. It's supposed to be circle time, but we're not in a circle, we're in the rocking chair, where we read stories and sing songs. And for the past several days, we've been reading Little Red Riding Hood, er, RiRi. Today she actually plopped down on my lap and said, "I want a story about the big, bad wolf". I asked her if she wanted the little pigs one or the riding hood one, and she opted for both, so both it was.
Today we've extended the storytelling to actually playing Big, Bad Wolf. She put a laundry basket upside down and crawled under it, then called out to me, "I'm the little pig, and I'm in my house. You're the big, bad wolf and you need to come knock on my door!" We switched off being the pig and the wolf several times, knocking, answering, and then blowing the house down. Then we ended up in the play kitchen cooking for Little Red Riding Hood while trying to hold cute little imaginary piggies. Obviously she is trying to work out her fear of wolves and other such scary creatures through lots of storytelling and play.
But it's not helpful when Daddy decides it would be funny to scare her and jumps from out of nowhere yelling "Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf!!!" at the top of his lungs. Poor Daddy had no idea she would be THAT scared, and he felt terrible afterward. But big brother thought this was hilarious, and now he has to try the same trick about once a day. Poor Sariah, no wonder she's needing to act this all out in her play... Luckily, now she thinks it's funny, even though the initial shock still gets her every time.
I am looking into various aspects of Waldorf education, an alternative educational philosophy, to incorporate into our home life, and the telling of fairy tales is a huge component of the curriculum. Fairy tales are archetypal stories, they have symbolic elements of good and evil that children really relate to and learn truths from. We've had a great fairy tale volume for several years, but I haven't done much with it until lately. I wondered if Sariah would be too young for these stories, but from the way she's taken to them, I think they are perfect for her little mind right now. They really resonate with her. We read books all the time, but these stories are different--there is something about them that grabs her.
Sariah is fascinated with the big, bad wolf. For weeks now, she's loved the story of Little Red Riding Hood (although when we tell it, it has to be "Little Red Riding RiRi"). James told her the story one night when she was falling asleep, and that did it. A few days later, I asked her if she would tell me a story, and that's the one she told. She also talks constantly about her "grahnd-mudder", and it took me forever to figure out that she got it from that story. I couldn't imagine why she kept referring to Grandma as "my grahnd-mudder", since we are never that formal.
This week, with Dallin in school, we've been having Rocking Chair Time every morning. It's supposed to be circle time, but we're not in a circle, we're in the rocking chair, where we read stories and sing songs. And for the past several days, we've been reading Little Red Riding Hood, er, RiRi. Today she actually plopped down on my lap and said, "I want a story about the big, bad wolf". I asked her if she wanted the little pigs one or the riding hood one, and she opted for both, so both it was.
Today we've extended the storytelling to actually playing Big, Bad Wolf. She put a laundry basket upside down and crawled under it, then called out to me, "I'm the little pig, and I'm in my house. You're the big, bad wolf and you need to come knock on my door!" We switched off being the pig and the wolf several times, knocking, answering, and then blowing the house down. Then we ended up in the play kitchen cooking for Little Red Riding Hood while trying to hold cute little imaginary piggies. Obviously she is trying to work out her fear of wolves and other such scary creatures through lots of storytelling and play.
But it's not helpful when Daddy decides it would be funny to scare her and jumps from out of nowhere yelling "Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf!!!" at the top of his lungs. Poor Daddy had no idea she would be THAT scared, and he felt terrible afterward. But big brother thought this was hilarious, and now he has to try the same trick about once a day. Poor Sariah, no wonder she's needing to act this all out in her play... Luckily, now she thinks it's funny, even though the initial shock still gets her every time.
I am looking into various aspects of Waldorf education, an alternative educational philosophy, to incorporate into our home life, and the telling of fairy tales is a huge component of the curriculum. Fairy tales are archetypal stories, they have symbolic elements of good and evil that children really relate to and learn truths from. We've had a great fairy tale volume for several years, but I haven't done much with it until lately. I wondered if Sariah would be too young for these stories, but from the way she's taken to them, I think they are perfect for her little mind right now. They really resonate with her. We read books all the time, but these stories are different--there is something about them that grabs her.
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