Saturday, September 25, 2010

michaelmas dragoneering

the task of the waldorf sixth grader


Michael:
Fear not good people your prayer is heard.
Michael am I, guardian of the highest word.
Oh dread dragon with this sword of light
I can conquer you in a single fight.
Your scaly hide it can easily pierce
And drain the life from your fangs so fierce.
But also to you a last chance I may give
To change your ways and so to live.
That the highest is served through your power
And a part of us you become from this hour.

Dragon:
Ah, Michael, conqueror from on high
If I may but live then I shall try
To serve the princess as best I can
And with her every woman and man.
I’ll plow the fields and plant the wheat
So that she and all her folk may eat.

People:
We’ll teach him to plough
And we’ll teach him to sow,
We’ll teach him to harrow
To reap and to mow.
He’ll garner the harvest
And grind all the flour,
Humankind will grow strong
In the strength of his power.


The Michaelmas play at Davis Waldorf was held in a stand of trees on our field. The second graders, directed by their teacher Patrice Rapp, presented their play with strong, fearless voices! The sixth grade students provided the dragon.

From the fire-breathing volcano of Mount Lassen to the fire-breathing dragon of Davis Waldorf, the sixth graders gave life to the dragon. I used chickenwire to form the head, and tarp for the skin. We draped the tarp over the children and with flour thrown to simulate smoke, they made a convincing dragon!

Enjoy the following pictures (I used publishing software to make them look like pencil drawings to maintain the children's privacy).


preparing to enter the dragon

the second grade townsfolk

with a loop and a puff of smoke, the dragon appears

the archangel Michael saves the day


pausing proudly with our dragon

5 comments:

Gabriele Kubo said...

Dear Rick,
as you know, we do visit a Waldorf School in Germany every year. They are taking
a movie there over 8 years with a class, the first 3 years are ready now.
There is a link to the movie, which will work only until next Tuesday, so only 2
days left.
http://mediathek-video.br-online.de/o16/br/b7/player/public/b7mediathek.html?bcc\
ode=both
go to upper part, where it says Mo Di Mi Do Fr and so on, click on the left "Di"
scroll 3 times down until the last box on the left side says: "Guten Morgen,
liebe Kinder".
The movie can be seen only until next Tuesday, then it is off the videothek. Its
quite long though and in German. But you can see one of the best teachers in
this world ( beside you, I would say!).
You do help the movie to get more famous by clicking onto it.
Thought, you might be interested.


Best

Gabriele

Joy said...

That's wonderful. Thanks for sharing! I love the fire breathing dragon. We had a small Michaelmas celebration (our first) with some local Waldorf-ish families yesterday, and it was so lovely.

Anonymous said...

Looks like a lovely celebration! Nice work on that beautiful, fearsome dragon!

momma rae said...

lovely dragon! i love the flour puffs of smoke. we celebrated michaelmas yesterday. we do not have a full waldorf school yet, but there are several early childhood programs that are waldorf or waldorf inspired (including my own). we ban together with the school initiative to put on festivals for the whole community. i will try to post about it later today.

happy autumn!

Anonymous said...

Is there a way to find the film elsewhere please on the Waldorfschule? I ask because I've been learning so much from it and would like it to be a permanent resource (and I'm sure other home educators would benefit from it).