Class two 2022
Looking into Class 2
Symbol: The lemniscate is the symbol for Class 2. It represents duality and polarity, but also balance and movement. Everything is changing and constantly in flux, yet following an ordered course. At this stage, the children still feel themselves integrated and part of everything - things are still connected. They have not yet made a clear distinction between ‘me’ and the ‘outside world’.
Teacher relationship: “Can you help me encounter the world?”
World relationship: Gently emerging.
Stories: Animal Fables & legends and stories of Saints.
The wholeness and fairy tale world of Class 1 is making way for something more earthly, more real. As the children ‘come down to earth’, and are connecting more and more to the physical world around them, the world which they experienced as a paradisal wholeness is separating and opening up as they become more aware of the complexity of feeling and expression which they begin to feel and of the duality of human nature. Now they need a more human element in their stories which mirror their own struggles and feelings and can help them find balance.
There are two kinds of stories which do this – the first is the Fables – in which animals not only speak and enjoy human powers as they do in fairy tales, but they personify some particular human quality, virtue or vice. Fables poke fun at weaknesses of one-sided temperaments. These stories are found in folk tales of nations all over the world and the temperament of the characters generally agree, sly fox or jackal; greedy wolf or hyena; powerful, slow bear; quick, sanguine naughty trickster of rabbit; steady but not stupid tortoise; powerful and easily angered lion; wise, aloof and majestic elephant. There is always a moral at the end of the story, but it is never told to the children, they need to come to the moral wisdom on their own.
As a balance, Class 2s also work with the stories and legends of great and good saints who have overcome the weaknesses within themselves and show human qualities of love and wisdom. We will look at some of the saints such as; St. Zita, St. Jerome, St. Odilia, St. Christopher, St. Bride, St. Francis...etc. These holy people live in such sympathy with nature that they communicate with an authority over the elements and over the animals. The saints present the possibility of the transformed human being – bringing into balance our instinctive nature with our higher selves.
Symbol: The lemniscate is the symbol for Class 2. It represents duality and polarity, but also balance and movement. Everything is changing and constantly in flux, yet following an ordered course. At this stage, the children still feel themselves integrated and part of everything - things are still connected. They have not yet made a clear distinction between ‘me’ and the ‘outside world’.
Teacher relationship: “Can you help me encounter the world?”
World relationship: Gently emerging.
Stories: Animal Fables & legends and stories of Saints.
The wholeness and fairy tale world of Class 1 is making way for something more earthly, more real. As the children ‘come down to earth’, and are connecting more and more to the physical world around them, the world which they experienced as a paradisal wholeness is separating and opening up as they become more aware of the complexity of feeling and expression which they begin to feel and of the duality of human nature. Now they need a more human element in their stories which mirror their own struggles and feelings and can help them find balance.
There are two kinds of stories which do this – the first is the Fables – in which animals not only speak and enjoy human powers as they do in fairy tales, but they personify some particular human quality, virtue or vice. Fables poke fun at weaknesses of one-sided temperaments. These stories are found in folk tales of nations all over the world and the temperament of the characters generally agree, sly fox or jackal; greedy wolf or hyena; powerful, slow bear; quick, sanguine naughty trickster of rabbit; steady but not stupid tortoise; powerful and easily angered lion; wise, aloof and majestic elephant. There is always a moral at the end of the story, but it is never told to the children, they need to come to the moral wisdom on their own.
As a balance, Class 2s also work with the stories and legends of great and good saints who have overcome the weaknesses within themselves and show human qualities of love and wisdom. We will look at some of the saints such as; St. Zita, St. Jerome, St. Odilia, St. Christopher, St. Bride, St. Francis...etc. These holy people live in such sympathy with nature that they communicate with an authority over the elements and over the animals. The saints present the possibility of the transformed human being – bringing into balance our instinctive nature with our higher selves.