The Raccoon and the Bee Tree

Rebkah and I have been loving her "schooling" so far. After circle time had become part of our daily rhythm it was time to add a story telling time. Rebekah was excited for this, it was I who was as little apprehensive. Waldorf stresses that you tell the story, not read the story. I have always read to my girls, read lots. But tell a story. A story teller I'm not. Luckily there was lots of advice to be gleaned about ways to make story telling easier on me and better for Rebekah. But how to be a better story teller is a post for another day. Today I want to tell you about our first story, The Raccoon and the Bee Tree. This is a sweet story from the Earthschooling curriculum. I had never heard the story which made telling it harder, but I persevered. It is a nature story about a little raccoon who sets out to look for his dinner. He doesn't catch any birds around the pond, steers clear of the skunks, and can't lure the squirrels out of the tree. However honey seems free for the taking until the bees come to protect their golden sweetness. The poor little raccoon is stung all over and falls from the tree. Being covered in honey he ends up covered in leaves. When he cries for help another raccoon comes to the rescue but is frightened away by the scary leaf covered beast. Finally the little raccoon is able to wash himself off and return to his hollow tree to lick his wounds and nap.

Story time begins with lighting our story time candle and saying our verse that helps the little one settle in for a story and keep her hands quiet. We followed the three day story rhythm: On the first day I introducing the story, telling the whole thing myself. the Rebekah draws a picture from the story in her main lesson book.

On the second day Rebekah wore a raccoon mask I made for her and she helped retell the story. It was easy to tell what parts of the story spoke to her. Then we went on our nature walk to collect leaves just like the little raccoon had been covered with.


We brought our leaves home and made a leaf print shirt. Rebekah loved designing her shirt just the way she wanted it.


We covered it with wax paper and hammered the leaves until they left an impression on the shirt. Now Rebekah could be the little raccoon covered in leaves.


On the third day we told the story again. It always surprises me how many time a young child can hear the same story and not tire of it. Of course I got better and better at telling the story as well. Then we made buttermilk biscuits and had them with some honey comb from a friend's hive for snack. We got to eat honey just like the little raccoon did.

Thanks to Earthschooling and a few other Waldorf groups I have Septembers stories and activities planned out. Hopefully all of them will go as smoothly as this one. And hopefully I will be come a better story teller.