Curriculum by grade

Grade 2 Waldorf-inspired main lesson blocks

At seven and eight, children start to notice that people, and animals in stories, are not all the same: some are clever, some are boastful, some are patient. Grade 2 meets this with fables, trickster tales and the lives of good people.

Level Grade 2 (Foundation Phase)
Blocks 1
Weeks of lessons 3
Outcomes 12

The full Grade 2 year is planned for a later release. Today the library holds a sample block of fables, with the year's outcomes already written, so that a family can see how Grade 2 will feel.

The block

Grade 2, 3 weeks, 4 days a week, about 100 minutes a day

Hare, Tortoise and Other Clever Ones

Three weeks of trickster tales and clever-animal fables for Grade 2. Hare, Tortoise, Jackal and other small ones outwit the strong in retellings of Southern African tales and in new fables. Each main fable is heard, retold and written, then acted and drawn, and the fourth day of each week is for word families, spelling in rhythm and the children's own fables.

Week by week

Week 1
Hare
Hare sews Lion's tail into a roof and sets Elephant and Hippo pulling against each other. A striped mouse finds the elephants a better road.
Week 2
Tortoise
Tortoise wins a race with help from her cousins and catches Hare at the waterhole. In a new fable she knows where the shade will go.
Week 3
Jackal and the small ones
Jackal leaves Lion holding up a cliff, a dikkop leads Jackal away from her eggs, and a weaver builds his door below. The block ends with a fable feast.

What a morning looks like

A real day from Hare, Tortoise and Other Clever Ones: Hare and Lion thatch a roof.

10 minin-breath
Opening: Candle and verse
Light the candle. Stand facing each other and teach The Clever Ones verse, two lines at a time, with the movements. Say the whole verse together twice. Greet your child by name and tell them, "For three weeks we will meet some very clever animals."
20 minout-breath
Rhythmic work: Hop and Step
Teach Hop and Step: hop lightly round the room for the hare verse, step slowly and low for the tortoise verse. Sing it three times. Then clap the animals' names in beats: li-on is two claps, e-le-phant three, hare one, tor-toise two, hip-po-pot-a-mus five. Let your child find more animals and clap them.
35 minout-breath
Main lesson book: The title page
Open a new main lesson book. Your child copies the words Clever Ones from the board in their best writing, large, across the top. Below, they draw a hare sitting up with its ears high, in brown and ochre, on green grass under a blue sky. If there is time, they draw a border of hare footprints round the page, two long and two short, from left to right.
25 minin-breath
The new story: Fable: Hare and Lion Thatch a Roof
Sit close, with the candle lit. Tell the fable in your own words. Give Lion a deep, slow voice and Hare a quick, light one. Weave your hands over and under when Hare sews the tail into the thatch. End with Lion's tail twitching in the rain. Do not ask questions or explain; let it rest until tomorrow.
10 minout-breath
Closing: Closing
Put the crayons away together. Stand and say the last four lines of The Clever Ones. Blow out the candle.

The evening before

Read Why Fables Suit Seven and Eight Year Olds. 10 minutes
Read Hare and Lion Thatch a Roof twice, then tell it aloud once to yourself. 15 minutes
Write the words Clever Ones large on the board, in clear lower case with capitals. 5 minutes
Learn The Clever Ones verse and the first verse of Hop and Step. 10 minutes

The block begins with a title page and the first fable, Hare and Lion Thatch a Roof, told at the end to sleep on. The whole morning runs about 100 minutes.

Materials to have at hand

Main lesson book
Block crayons and stick crayons
A pencil
A chalkboard or a large sheet of paper on the wall
A skipping rope
A scarf and a blanket
A candle and matches

What a parent can expect to see

Selemo's outcomes describe what you can notice, never a test. Coverage counts only the outcomes you confirm from your own record.

Language and story

Retells fables and trickster tales, naming what each animal is like and how the cleverness works.Look for: Explains how the hare tricked the lion in their own words
Tells a short fable of their own with animal characters and a turn at the end.Look for: Invents a fable with a beginning
Listens to a told fable, pictures it without help, and says what the small animal noticed that the strong one missed.Look for: Says what Tortoise or Hare noticed before the others did

Literacy

Writes several sentences retelling a story, in lower case with capitals and full stops.Look for: Starts sentences with capitals and ends them with full stops
Reads their own written work and simple texts aloud with expression.Look for: Reads a page of their main lesson book fluently
Spells common words and uses word families (all, ball, call).Look for: Writes three words from one family
Spells words in rhythm, stepping or clapping each letter, and then writes them from memory.Look for: Steps out the letters of a four letter word

Number

Knows times tables up to five times ten in rhythm and uses them in stories.Look for: Says the three times table forwards and backwards
Adds and subtracts two digit numbers using place value.Look for: Explains tens and ones with bundles of sticks

Arts and handwork

Draws running and symmetrical forms with crossings.Look for: Draws a crossing form without lifting the crayon
Draws a scene from a fable in the main lesson book with the animals in their setting, building colour in layers.Look for: Fills the page with sky and ground as well as the animals

Movement and music

Acts out a fable with clear gestures and voices for each character.Look for: Changes voice and posture for each animal

Where the timing differs from CAPS

Selemo meets most CAPS topics in its own order. These notes say where it comes earlier or later. They are written in Selemo's own words and are being checked against the Department of Basic Education's documents.

Retells fables and trickster tales, naming what each animal is like and how the cleverness works.

Selemo meets fables and trickster tales told aloud first, then in the child's own writing; CAPS meets them mainly as texts to read.

Tells a short fable of their own with animal characters and a turn at the end.

Selemo children tell their own fable aloud before writing it down.

Writes several sentences retelling a story, in lower case with capitals and full stops.

Selemo children begin writing their own sentences in Grade 2, about a year later than CAPS.

Writes several sentences retelling a story, in lower case with capitals and full stops.

Lower case becomes the everyday hand in Grade 2 in Selemo; CAPS uses it from Grade 1.

Reads their own written work and simple texts aloud with expression.

Formal reading starts later in Selemo and begins with the child's own written work, where CAPS expects reading of graded readers from Grade 1.

Listens to a told fable, pictures it without help, and says what the small animal noticed that the strong one missed.

Selemo children hear fables told and picture them before reading them; CAPS meets fables mainly as texts to read and answer questions on.

Safety notes

Light and blow out the candle yourself, and keep it away from paper and costumes.
In tug of war games, pull gently and never wrap the rope round hands or wrists.

Teach it at home

Selemo plans these blocks into your year, prepares each evening with you, and keeps the record as you go.

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