Celebrating Festivals with Children

Celebrating Festivals with Children

In this thoughtful book, Freya Jaffke describes festival celebrations in relation to child development in the first seven years. She considers in detail the main festivals throughout the year—Easter, Pentecost, St. John’s, back-to-school, harvest, Michaelmas, lantern time, birthdays, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, and carnival.

Drawing on many examples, she shows how we can celebrate festivals in a meaningful way with children, both at home and in kindergarten. Every festival is prefaced with a deeper contemplation for adults before considering preparations with children. This is followed by the actual organization of the festival—with games, craft activities and decorations, stories, songs, poems and the seasonal nature table.

About the Author

Freya Jaffke (1937 – 2021) was an experienced Steiner-Waldorf kindergarten teacher who lived in Germany. She travelled throughout the world to give courses on Waldorf early childhood education. Her books on early childhood have sold over quarter of a million copies worldwide and include, Celebrating Festivals with Children and Work and Play in Early Childhood.