Festivals

A rich festival life provides the heartbeat of our school year. Many seasonal occasions are celebrated, drawing on the diversity of our community and of our world.

We believe that children who grow up in community and celebrating festivals are likely to become adults who are connected to the world. Our aim is that each student in our care will be supported in maintaining a sense of wonder and reverence for all forms of life and the changing of the seasons. Festivals provide a natural way to understand other traditions and cultures, because the experience of joy and celebration and human courage in adversity are universal.

Our parents often tell us that the Festivals are one of the most important connections between their family life and their community at the school. Beginning with the beautiful Rose Ceremony, when each new first grader receives a rose from a member of the oldest class in token of welcome to the grades school, the festival calendar continues with autumn festivals of harvest and preparation for the coming winter. Moving into the darkest time of the year is a time for courage, self-reflection and renewal and celebrating light is a universal impulse.Michaelmas is a pageantry of courage and archetypes, including a grand tug-o-war, fighting dragons, and the image of the blacksmith. At the Martinmas Lantern Walk, the younger students carry their handmade lanterns through evening walk. At the Winter Garden of Light, an evergreen, spiral labyrinth and magical, silent candle-lighting echo elements of Diwali, Hannukah, Advent, and others. Lady Spring and a May Festival celebrate the return of warmth, and light, and green. May Pole and Morris dancing are a highlight of each year.

Individual classes also celebrate specific festivals, which are chosen to resonate with their particular ages and curriculum. For example, in our school the kindergartners are excited every year to polish their shoes and put them out for Saint Nicholas at the beginning of December, while the second graders traditionally lead a Swedish Santa Lucia procession, with buns and candles, through all the classes.

The larger festivals serve to draw the wider community together. Celebrating festivals in the cycle of the year with our children helps us align our lives with the rhythmical breath of the Earth and the Cosmos. We come home to ourselves, to each other, to our deepest connection with the cycles and seasons of nature, and to what makes us truly alive and creative.