Waldorf in the Home

Rahima writes: There's a rapidly growing interest within the Waldorf community in Nonviolent Communication (NVC), developed by Marshall Rosenberg, PhD. I've been privileged to take several training sessions with Marshall, Lucy Lew and others and find it life-transforming. NVC is designed to help us stay connected with other people by listening with empathy to their underlying feelings and needs. It also encourges us to get in touch with our own feelings and needs and to replace domineering modes of communication with an observation, how this makes us feel, the underlying need we have, and a request to see if the other person would be willing to help us meet this need.

[For an introduction to Nonviolent Communication (NVC, developed by Marshall Rosenberg, Ph.D.), see our entry on "NVC and Waldorf." In the following article Susan Johnson shares her notes from a 9-day training in NVC that she attended with Marshall Rosenberg.]

Highlights from a 9-Day Conference with Marshall Rosenberg on Non-Violent Communication
Susan R. Johnson MD, FAAP, Raphael House

Expressing Our Feelings And Needs
1) Choose every moment of your life. There is no such thing as "I can't" or "I don't have time". We choose what we are going to do and not going to do based on priorities. We make choices so let our words reflect that truth. Don't fool yourself into thinking you have no choices in your life that is how we become stuck.

If you don't have the books on Nonviolent communication yet, take advantage of this special offer The month of April, 2006, the Center for Nonviolent Communication is offering a special price on its starter book package. You can purchase Nonviolent Communication": A Language of Life by Marshall Rosenberg, The NVC COmpanion Workbook by Lucy Liu, and Speak Peace in a World of Conflict for only $25.95. Marshall's book alone sells for $17.95, and the the regular price for the three is $53.85. Order from www.cnvc.org or call 800-255-7696 and ask for the NVC Starter Book Package.

Also, Suzanne Down and Nancy Blanning will be presenting a 5-day intensive for teachers, therapists and parents called "Elements of therapeutic Early Childhood Education" in Fair Oaks (near Sacramento) from June 26-30. Here is the information:

"In this 5 day intensive we will bring therapeutic understanding to the weavings of nursery rhymes, the 12 senses, puppetry/story, and circle time.

Our children today urgently need the support of healthy rhythm, deep breathing, right speech, and the integration of the 4 foundational senses. In this course we will work toward deepening our understanding of the 12 senses, especially the four foundational senses, and join this insight with the powerful circulation giving rhythm of the nursery rhymes. We will work strongly with the therapeutic mysteries that live in the nursery rhymes then develop puppetry story and circle that will embrace this wisdom. When we add to this an exploration of how to further incorporate therapeutic tools for the four lower senses , we offer our children truly balancing experiences. Nursery rhyme puppet making and the art of meaningful and artistic presentation, plus therapeutic circle development are valuable practical tools you will be able to use directly in your classroom or therapeutic practice.

Faculty: Nancy Blanning – Therapeutic early childhood specialist, consultant, and teacher trainer, co-author of ‘Therapeutic Movement Journeys and Circle Games’ and Suzanne Down Pioneer in Therapeutic Puppetry, Founder of Juniper Tree School of Story and Puppetry Arts, author of several story and puppetry resource books including the new “Lifting the Veil, the Renewal of Puppet Theater’

Course cost $425. includes all materials.

For registration and information contact: Suzanne Down – 1 888 688-7333 suzanne@junipertreepuppets.com For local information contact Anna Guzman @ 916 863-0146
Sponsored by Juniper Tree School of Story and Puppetry Arts
PO Box 1688 Port Angeles, WA 98362 www.junipertreepuppets.com

If you can't make this conference, you can purchase Daena Ross's keynote address on the "Developing and Protecting the 12 Senses" or recordings of Nancy Blanning's workshops on "Helping Our Children Get into their Bodies" and "How to Get Your Child to Do What You Want them to do without Talking Yourself to Death."