Sunflowers

“Never underestimate the creative intelligence of a child.” 

 Maria Montessori

What better place to start than with sunflowers?  They've been a perfect way for us to say good-bye to summer and hello to fall.  As I write this in mid-October, just one sunflower remains in our raised beds, with its last flowers fading.  We’ll leave it out there for the yellow finches and bluejays to find – they had already been pecking away at the earliest seed heads, which are now being shared with chickens, chickadees, and chickarees, and a few are drying on our windowsill, to put out during the winter.    

A multi-layered story unfolded around these sunflowers through the months.... 

The children planted them in late spring, in little pots out back.  They marveled when they sprouted and began to develop leaves.  We had out all the botany materials at that time, learning about pistils and stamens, pollination and chlorophyl; we  sprouted seeds indoors in jars and on plates, so we could see the process.  When we transplanted them out to our new raised beds at the beginning of June, it was hard to imagine what they would become!  At that point I also lost track of which plants were whose, but fortunately, no one cared. 


Through the summer we watched them grow tall and strong - they were even taller than usual because of the raised beds.  As the children played in the sunshine, I would remind them to look way up; we compared them one to another; and sometimes I lifted the children up high on my shoulders to see the flowers up close.

As September began we had three kinds of sunflowers blooming. This one was some kind of mutant, with petals in the middle, interesting for all of us, and something I had never seen.

During the summer we often sang this song, and acted out growing like a sunflower, from a sprouting seed, rising up from the earth, until the children were tall and straight with circled arms overhead.  Music and even the simplest songs are a deeply satisfying way to express and honor the children's impressions, learning, and experiences.

Sunflower sunflower yellow and round,

You are the prettiest flower I've found.

Tall, straight, full of grace,

I love the light in your bright yellow face.

The tall teddy bear sunflowers had multiple blooms, so in September we could lift the kids up to cut stems for big bouquets inside.  And then, at the perfect moment, I came across a wonderful book called “Camille and the Sunflowers” - a true story about Vincent Van Gogh, and a little boy and his father who knew him in the village where he  painted his sunflowers.  

So we began this year's art experiences with the children painting their own sunflowers.    Remember the quote that began this post?  "Never underestimate the creative intelligence of a child." Think of it!  While the children painted, they were connecting with their memory of those sunflowers, from their planting and growing to our singing and reading books.  They were looking at the vase of flowers and thinking of another artist named Vincent who painted sunflowers.   They were exploring the wonder of color and the freedom of artistic expression.


At the end of this sunflower cycle (although there never are "ends" to nature's cycles, are there?) you found a folded painting in your child's take-home folder, a painting that may or may not resemble sunflowers.  Did you guess at the richness of experience that led up to that paint on that paper?   Does it help to read about it here?   I remind you as I remind myself:  the child's creative, amazing intelligence is active, expressing itself in unique and multiple ways, learning and growing, All The Time!