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Our parade for the local fair of San Marcos La Laguna

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On the morning of April 24, all schools in San Marcos La Laguna participated in the parade which takes place during the Feria in our town. Our local fair is a joyous time that almost says goodbye to the dry season. San Marcos streets become full of music, games and activities, and thousands of people celebrate this occasion as it deserves.

The parade go across the streets of San Marcos La Laguna and ends with a common event in the football field , where local authorities celebrate the celebration with students , teachers, families and local residents .

Our parade began at Escuela Caracol, where teachers, students and parents met . Our delegation was led by the Kinder students. They carried the flag with the image of our school and a beautiful craft that they made in their classes, a ​​ paper and wool lion (see photos below). After the smaller children , the other courses were also carrying flags with the colors of our town and banners of their own making.

From our school we headed to the meeting point where we met with the other schools, and from there we started walking through the streets to get to our destination in the football field.

It was definitely a very special occasion and a time to enjoy together in a celebration where all schools come together to fill the streets with laughter and joy.

Alumna Family Returns to Help with Class Play

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The Devoe-Talluto Family — Kristin, Jim, Sienna, Willow & Kai — came from Vermont to Escuela Caracol in 2009 as a part of their family sabbatical. They stayed the entire year and took with them memories for a lifetime. In February 2014, the whole family decided to come back for a visit using “pay-it-forward” money that they received. They were impressed by how much the school has grown, and were eager to find ways of helping out while they were in town.

One of their contributions while visiting was to design and help make the costumes for the 2nd-3rd grades class play. It was a short play based on the fable, El Velorio de Tio Tigre (“The Wake of Uncle Tiger”) by Venezuelan writer, Antonio Arraíz.

Click here to read more about and see some pictures of the play.

Thanks Devoe-Tallutos!

Mineralogy Studies in the Sixth Grade

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The students are starting the year with a three-week study of mineralogy — a subject that is particularly potent when you live in front of three volcanoes! The students have learned a little about the volcanic history of Atitlán, as well as about the rocks of fire, igneous rocks, which comprise almost all of the rocks one finds around Lake Atitlán. The class is also studying the rocks of water, sedimentary rocks, and since it is nearly impossible to observe these rocks around Lake Atitlán, they hope to make a sixth grade class trip to another part of Guatemala in order to see first hand limestone rock formations and experience a sedimentary rock landscape. The cost will be about $100 per student, and if you would like to help the local Maya students in the class with this expense, you can make a donation by clicking here. Just be sure to write in “class trip” as a blank field (like “fax”). Thanks!

Below is an image of blackboard art in the sixth grade class at Escuela Caracol.

Mineralogia

Central American Waldorf Kindergarten Teachers Gather at Caracol

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Escuela Caracol is proud to be hosting this week the fifth annual Conference of Central American Waldorf Kindergarten Teachers with over 40 participants. The guest lecturers this year are Inés Spittler, from Peru, and Tamara Chubarovsky, from Spain. Inés is presenting the principal seminar on the 12 senses and their development in early childhood, and she is also leading a workshop on doll-making. Tamara is leading the morning rhythm, speech and singing, as well as presenting a seminar on the art of the word (working with Rudolf Steiner’s formative speech).

In these photos you can see an assortment of images from the week thus far.

Chalkboard Drawings

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If you walk into any Waldorf classroom in the grades, one of the first things to strike you is probably the chalkboard drawing. Chalkboard art has become a time-honored tradition in Waldorf schools. It is how the teacher brings to imaginative life the content of the lessons. In a day when dry erase wipe boards (and their fumes) have taken over, Waldorf schools remain a sort of classic throwback to the days of chalk and slate. Dry erase boards, however, simply do not lend themselves to the artistic sensibility and emotional range that bright colored chalk can bring to a classroom.

It is also an important part of how the teacher’s own artistic activity — his or her own development and activity — relates both directly and invisibly to the child. Children experience great anticipation of the teacher’s next awe-inspiring image, which they later have a chance to recreate in their own books, in their own way. The images connect to the curriculum content and take the child deeper into the experience, through his or her feelings.

Here you can see a few of our teacher’s recent chalkboard drawings at Escuela Caracol. We cannot get slate chalkboards here, so we have to make our own using plywood and homemade chalkboard paint. Sometimes the grain of the wood is a challenge for the teacher, but the overall experience in the classroom is worth it.

 

You can also see the video of one of the most famous Waldorf Teacher Brian Wolfe in action With Some chalk.

The art of our teachers

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Like every year, our teachers receive an specialized training for Waldorf educators. There they learn new artistic techniques that later on they will teach to the students in the Escuela Caracol.

This is only a sample of some of the pieces exposed this year in our school.

Congratulations to all our teachers and thank you so much for your efforts.