
On the last day of term, the Apple Tree gathered together for the Celebration of Work, a sharing of each group’s learning to the community.
After a rousing rendition of People Look East from parents, teachers and children, the youngest group, the Oakens started off the presentations with songs and poems that they had been learning. Their gleeful exuberance charmed the whole audience and it was a joy to see their confidence, feeling undaunted and welcomed by the community.


The Voyagers, who had been recently focusing on the measurement of time in their Main Lesson maths block, recited a poem about the seasons. They then performed a quodlibet piece Don’t Put Your Trash In My Backyard with their Choroi flutes and sang The Twinkling Stars, a translation of the German lullaby Weißt du, wie viel Sternlein stehen.

The Discoveries’ Main Lesson has been focused on Ancient Rome. They recited the poem Romulus and Remus by Rudyard Kipling, which was dramatically enhanced by incorporating acrobalancing. They also performed the play Romulus and Remus by Pelham Moffat and sang a beautiful rendition of Dona Nobis Pacem as a round.






The Pippins performed a poem and sang the round Sure as the Wind as a whole group, and then a few students shared a report of some of the individual projects they had been working on. Two were focused on a particular artist they had chosen to study – Van Gogh and Hokusai respectively, talking about fascinating elements of their life and distinguishing features of their artwork. The students also showed a copy of a painting they had done from their chosen artist. Two other students talked about their chemistry projects and enthralled the whole gathering with their demonstration of mixing different elements together.
Singing together is a central part of Steiner-Waldorf education, as well as strengthening community bonds.




The Pippins, Discoveries and Voyagers sang a song If The People, and the Discoveries together with the Voyagers sang a pairing of the songs Shalom Chaverim and What a Goodly Thing, two Hebrew-based songs.
After the formal presentations, refreshments were served.


The Voyagers, who have been working on building a pizza oven since September as part of their homebuilding block, cooked dough balls and pizza to share with everyone. Other groups distributed the abundance of mince pies and mulled apple juice.
Parents had the chance to view bookwork and projects displayed from all the groups, admiring and appreciating the broad variety of subjects throughout the ages, as well as the effort put in by both students and teachers.
Oakens Work



Voyagers Work






Discoveries Work






Pippins Work











Celebration of Work is a massive highlight for the Apple Tree community, with mutual appreciation of each other’s work. It’s a chance for younger ones to watch older ones’ and aspire to be where they are in their learning journey – comments could be heard to the tune of “I can’t wait when we do that!”
What a brilliant way to finish the end of 2023!