You Provide...
- The overarching homeschool environment for your student outside of the Sun Star routine, including their core-work and annual testing (should you wish to participate, Lighthouse Education Services comes to Sun Star Farm to administer the Woodcock Johnson Test, which satisfies the state requirement for annual testing)
- Additional support needed such as core-work completion, reteaching a concept that may not have been fully grasped in class, or supporting your student with good study habits or executive functioning skills.
- Documentation of online certificate that your family has established a NC homeschool status (link)
We Do Not Provide...
- Direct instruction for common core standards, however we incorporate aspects into the curriculum.
- Special assistance if your child needs 1:1 support to successfully move through their day.
- A co-op experience, although parents do have many volunteer opportunities throughout the year.
We Embrace...
- Waldorf Education
- Cultural Diversity
- Holistic principles
- Music, Dance, and Folklore
- Natural materials
- Community & Seasonal Festivals
- Stewardship and Practical arts such as handwork, cooking, modeling, building, gardening, developmentally appropriate chores...
- An ambitious no-waste program!
Like other Waldorf-inspired schools....
...we encourage the love of language through story-telling, puppet shows, songs, and verses. Hearing and speaking are an essential part of literacy development in the early years. We focus on the rhythm and the sounds of the spoken sentences and words. The children recite verses and retell stories and act them out. They bring the stories to life through crafts and pictures. Pictures become words, and the children begin to copy and write. Written words are further broken down into letters and phonological sounds in first grade using fairy tales. Thus the letters and their sounds become part of the story and are illustrated in a creative, connective, pictorial way. The letters are experienced and searched out in nature and through movement and various tactile tools and reinforced in more stories, movement and art. The children learn to read what they have written, creating their own stories to share with the world. It is an emotional and creative approach of teaching the whole child; head, hands and heart that is embodied in the Waldorf method.
Math is something to be experienced, not worksheets to be completed. The children dive into the quality of numbers through stories, art and life, once again using the whole child approach. Gnomes and squirrels help us to add, subtract, multiply, and divide. We build towers with groups of blocks and sing skip-counting songs while jumping rope in preparation to memorizing multiplication tables. Movement with numbers is very important. We count stitches and rows while knitting (a great precursor to coding!)
The importance of age appropriate learning is emphasised and the child's academic capacities are strengthened by educating the whole child with activities and lessons that inspire the head, heart and hands.
Sun Star Folk School is now enrolling for our 1&2 grade class for Fall 2024!
What We Offer…
- A rich, dynamic, supplemental Waldorf-inspired curriculum that supports your child’s growth in developmentally appropriate ways Monday-Friday from 9am-1pm
- Small class size with 1 wonderful licensed teacher + 1 assistant
- Curriculum materials and necessary workbooks
- Daily teaching and practice time on the “3R’s”.
- A non-competitive, but physically rigorous outdoor program
- A wholistic and artistic approach to learning that makes academics fun!
- A mixed age, one-room school house setting with individualized instruction and social inclusion
...a school for homeschoolers, for folks who want something different
2024 © Sun Star Family Farm 2092 Marthas Chapel Road, Apex NC 27523 | 919.699.4429 | Email Us
Please email Heidi to schedule a tour
We may be a great fit for your child and family if you value…
- Experiential, environmentally sound project-based, hands-on learning
- Engaging the multiple intelligences in an integrated curriculum
- Taking ownership of your child's education outside of a traditional classroom setting and bureaucracy.
Sun Star Folk School
Sun Star Farm School
WHERE CHILDREN GROW AT THEIR OWN PACE...