GUEST POST FROM CLAUDIA P, Experienced Waldorf Teacher
A young child's fascination with a newfound object. Or, how to distract a young child to allow you to move on with your day.
Two year-old Melanie was adamant: she was not going home after a long walk in the wintry cold. Then something caught her eye. It was a pine cone. She was so interested in it she forgot everything else.
I put one in the toboggan to see if that would catch her interest. It certainly did and so I put another one in and another one and another one. Finally, there were 10 pine cones in the toboggan and I said: "Now you may sit in there with all the pine cones." She couldn't believe her luck and carefully stepped in and sat down focussed only on these newfound treasures.
I couldn't believe my own luck, with her now safely sitting, and not paying attention that we were quickly heading home. We reached the house within a few minutes and she looked up in surprise. We rang the bell and when mother opened the door, Melanie excitedly pointed to her treasure. In fact she had gotten so attached to these lovely pine cones that she wouldn't let the door close behind her without bringing a couple of them inside with her.
