How to Teach a Child to Knit the Waldorf Way

Start with finger knitting, then pick up the needles in grade 1, as many Waldorf schools do. Give your child short, thick wooden needles and a ball of chunky wool. Cast on for them, teach the knit stitch with a four-line rhyme, and knit together for 15 to 20 minutes, most days. The first project should be small and soon finished, like a little square that becomes a doll's blanket, or a cat stuffed with wool. You don't need to be an expert knitter. If you can knit a plain row, you can teach this.

Why handwork matters in Waldorf education

Picture a row of 6-year-olds, each with a ball of wool in their lap and a pair of wooden needles, saying a little rhyme under their breath. Handwork is a main subject in Waldorf schools, not an extra, and knitting is where it begins.

Waldorf teachers give several reasons. The Waldorf Resources handwork curriculum, written for Waldorf schools, says that knitting "inculcates the ability to think logically", and it puts weight on "relaxed and harmonious movements between the left and right hands". It also points to research on how fine-motor skills relate to learning numbers and letters. The Chicago Waldorf School writes that counting stitches brings in "multiplication, division, symmetry, and pattern recognition", and that knitting builds focus and a quiet pride in finishing something. A handwork teacher at the Philadelphia Waldorf School names self-esteem as one of the main gifts.

For a family at home, the reasons can be simpler. Your child makes something real and useful with their own hands. Two hands learn to work together, one holding, one moving. And a child who can knit a whole row has felt, in their fingers, that practice turns into skill.

What age can a child start knitting?

In many Waldorf schools, children start knitting with needles in grade 1, at about 6 or 7. The Waldorf Resources curriculum starts handwork in class 1, with "knitting simple, small useful objects and toys". Lavender's Blue Homeschool describes the same pattern for families. Around 5 or 6, children can begin simple sewing and finger knitting. In grade 1, "the primary goal is learning to knit".

Waldorf handwork teacher Shellie Smith suggests watching three things before the needles come out: fine motor skills, the ability to focus, and the ability to follow simple instructions. If your child can do a short, simple craft from start to finish with you, they're probably close.

Is 4 too young to learn to knit?

For needles, usually yes. Four-year-olds love to join in, though, and there's plenty they can do. They can wind wool into balls, hold the skein on their hands while you wind, or sit beside you with a big crochet hook and a length of yarn and "knit" too. Radcliffe writes that her daughter asked to learn at 3 but didn't yet have the dexterity. Just after she turned 5, she found her knitting bag and asked again. Waiting a year or two costs nothing. The wanting stays.

Start with finger knitting

Finger knitting is the gentlest way in, and it's a good fit for the Waldorf kindergarten years at home. There's no tool to drop, so your child just gets used to the feel of the wool moving through their fingers.

The simplest version is a chain made with the fingers. Make a slip knot and hold the loop open. Your child reaches through the loop, pulls a new loop of wool through, and lets the old one slide off. Again, and again. After a few days the chain is long enough to use. It can be a doll's belt, reins for playing horses or a garland for the nature table.

Lavender's Blue lists winding wool and finger knitting among the first grade 1 handwork activities too, before needles. If your child starts grade 1 without having finger knitted, give it a week or two first.

What you need: needles and wool

Needles. Short, thick and wooden. Wood and wool grip each other a little, so stitches don't slide off as easily as they do on metal. Knitting teacher Margaret Radcliffe suggests a US size 10 (6 mm). Long adult needles are awkward for small arms, so shorter is better.

Or make them together. Lavender's Blue lists making knitting needles among the grade 1 handwork activities, and The Wonder of Childhood describes how. Take a 1/2 inch wooden dowel and cut two 10-inch lengths. Sharpen one end of each in a pencil sharpener, sand them smooth all over, and rub them with beeswax on a cloth. A bead, an acorn cap or a ball of clay glued to the other end keeps the stitches from falling off. It's an afternoon's work, and your child will knit with needles they made.

Wool. Renee Schwartz, writing about Waldorf grade 1 knitting, recommends "fairly bulky, pure wool" and warns that thin yarn lets the stuffing fall out between stitches on a knitted animal. Pick a light, clear color so your child can see each stitch. Leave slippery cotton, acrylic and fuzzy yarns for later.

A basket or bag. Somewhere the knitting lives between sessions, so it doesn't get stepped on or unravelled.

Our Waldorf homeschool supplies list covers the rest of the kindergarten and grade 1 materials.

The knitting verse: "off jumps Jack"

Many Waldorf handwork teachers teach the knit stitch with a traditional rhyme, one line for each movement. The Waldorf Handwork blog gives it like this:

In through the front door, run around the back, peek through the window, and off jumps Jack.

Margaret Radcliffe records a version with "out through the window" in her guide to teaching children. The wording varies a little from class to class. Here is how the lines match the hands:

1. In through the front door. The right needle goes into the front of the first stitch on the left needle.
2. Run around the back. The wool wraps around the right needle.
3. Peek through the window. The right needle draws the new loop back through the stitch.
4. And off jumps Jack. The old stitch slides off the left needle.

Say it slowly, together, while you knit alongside your child. After a few weeks the rhyme fades and the hands keep going on their own. If you'd like a book to lean on, A First Book of Knitting for Children by Bonnie Gosse and Jill Allerton gathers rhymes and patterns used in Waldorf handwork classrooms.

How to teach the first stitches

1. Cast on for your child. Radcliffe suggests you cast on and knit the first row yourself. About 12 stitches is plenty; one Waldorf handwork teacher casts on 12 for a first knitted cat.
2. Sit side by side, not facing each other, so your child can copy your hands. Children learn by imitation.
3. Knit a stitch slowly while you say the rhyme. Then guide their hands through one.
4. Let them try alone. Loose and wobbly is fine. Keep your hands in your lap as much as you can.
5. Stop while it's still going well. End the session before your child is tired of it.

Casting on and casting off can come later in the year, once the knit stitch feels easy.

How long should a child knit at one sitting?

Not long, at first. Shellie Smith notes that many Waldorf schools give handwork a 40 or 45 minute period. She suggests using only 25 or 30 minutes of it at the start, then moving or going outdoors. At home, with one child and no class to settle, 15 to 20 minutes is plenty. Many families knit in the afternoon, after lunch and quiet time, as part of the daily rhythm. A story read aloud while your child knits makes the time pass happily.

Knitting most days, at the same time, matters more than long sessions. Ten rows today and ten tomorrow add up quickly.

Easy first knitting projects for children

The Waldorf Resources curriculum describes grade 1 projects as "simple, small useful objects and toys". A few that work well:

• A square. Knit plain rows until it's square. It becomes a doll's blanket, a placemat for the nature table, or a rug for a dollhouse. Radcliffe suggests letting your child decide when to change color.
• A knitted cat. A favorite first toy in Waldorf classes. The knitting is a small rectangle; you help your child sew it up and stuff it with wool.
• A little bag or case, for a flute, a stone collection or a small treasure.

Keep the first project short. A child who finishes a square in two weeks is ready to start the next one with pride. A child still knitting the same scarf in March often isn't. Our guide to Waldorf grade 1 shows where knitting fits alongside the other subjects that year.

How to help with dropped stitches

Stitches will fall off. Holes will appear. Rows will grow and shrink. This is all normal, and your child hasn't done anything wrong.

For the first months, you fix them. Keep a crochet hook in the knitting basket, catch the dropped stitch and work it back up the ladder, then hand the knitting back. Radcliffe offers a picture: the dropped stitches are little birds that fell out of the nest, and you're the parent bird picking them up. Extra stitches can be birds that flew in to sit on the branch and now need to fly away.

Try not to unpick your child's work to make it neat. A slightly wonky square they knitted themselves means more to them than a perfect one you fixed. Learning to pick up their own stitches can come later, once knitting itself feels easy.

Keeping knitting joyful

Knit yourself. Children want to do what they see you doing, so keep your own knitting in a basket by the chair and pick it up while they work.

Stop before it turns into a struggle. If tears come, put the knitting away kindly and try again tomorrow.

Begin with a story. The teacher behind the Waldorf Handwork blog tells one before the needles come out, and a few minutes of listening settles the hands.

Let finished work be used. The doll sleeps under the blanket and the cat sits on the pillow. And try not to compare: some children knit quickly and some take the whole year to feel easy.

Knitting carries on through the grades. Starpath's grade 3 has a 10-day Fibre Arts block that follows wool from the sheep to the finished cloth. A child who learned to knit in grade 1 brings that feel for wool along.