A Little Garden Flower, a Journey through Waldorf Homeshooling is our Waldorf Curriculum of choice. As a family this is the third curriculum we have bought and the best. The Curriculum is put together by Melisa Nielsen, who is a homeschooling mother of 4, with many years experience.

Now this curriculum is priced at an extremely low price, staggeringly low, in fact. But don't for a minute think that you'll get minimal information or poor quality. I'll go into the various Grades we're using a bit later, but a brief look at what you get and don't get follows.

If you're new to homeschooling, or specifically Waldorf Homeschooling, you don't just need your childs curriculum. You'll need to understand the theory behind what you're doing. And you'll need support! Now Melisa explains everything for you in a clear concise manner. There is everything from, "what is a block lesson?" to "what is form drawing?" She also recommends books written by other authors, I've purchased 2 of these purely for interest sake, and they were both as promised...useful and inspiring. She will also recommend various Rudolf Steiner lectures for the various lesson blocks, which is so important. Unless you understand Rudolf Steiners philosophy and intention, you're not going to do your best teaching.

There is help with understanding festivals, which if you're new to Waldorf, can be daunting. You also get an easy to read and understand schedule of the year, and each days lessons are laid out especially when it comes to block lessons for the foundation stage. Take grade 1 for instance and the block lesson, when the letters are introduced. Melisa has included a fairytale for each letter, a form drawing for the week, and there are additional optional lessons you can do. Say you're introducing the letter F. You get the story of The Lambkin and the Little Fish. And the optional lesson idea is, read a fun story about a fish, take a fishing trip or go to the pet store and buy a fish.

We're using Grade 4 for my daughter at the moment where there are blocks on Animal Studies and Norse Mythology. For the animal studies, the research on each animal has been done for us. This is great as there were some animals I knew diddly about! For Norse Mythology....well all the myths were included. This was a huge gift for me as the books on Norse Mythology are expensive. I had visions of having to buy many additional books. In fact one mother I spoke to made it clear I'd be paying a fortune in additional books. Well that was absolute rubbish.

The only additional book I had to purchase was a maths book, purely to make my life easier, it wasn't a necessity as the maths blocks were included. I chose Dorothy Harrer's "Maths Lessons for Elementary Grades". BUT...this book covers Grade 1 through 6. And at $18, is a steal!

I can't recommend Melisa Nielsen's Waldorf Curriculum highly enough. One thing I do advise is that you buy her year planner. This is how mine has ended up, messy, but fun. What you can see on those 2 x A4 pages is 3 days planned. Lessons, dinners, shopping lists.

In essence it's a huge diary, but you are able to set out your lesson blocks in it, as there is space, space, space. I put everything into mine, from lesson plans to verses, to plans for festivals, playdates, and the odd grocery list. Put simply, if our house was on fire, there'd be 2 things I'd grab, my laptop and my year planner!

To find out more about A Journey through Waldorf Homeschooling or to order vist A Little Garden Flower. I hope this review, as small as it is has been helpful to one of you.

Blessed be,
Sue.xx