For the young child especially, but for all children as well, it is a rich life-lesson to experience “whole process” learning. We live in a fast-paced, fragmented world. With the SOLs and Kindergarten Boot Camp looming large on our national landscape, when does a child have the opportunity to take a field trip to the apple orchard, bring the apples “home” to school, process and cook them into apple butter to eat, weekly, on their home baked bread? Or plant bulbs in the fall, and jump for joy as they peek through the late winter snow. Activities as simple as working day after day on the apple butter, or using growing muscles to dig a bed for an autumn bulb….then sweetly forgetting all winter long….only to be amazed by early crocuses, teach endurance, patience and the reward of caring-for. The young child learns it is good to live in a strong body, to work and care for the earth and oneself. And to share this sense of goodness with those we love. The buzz-word these days is self-regulation, but we just call it a healthy childhood.
