Sunrise Waldorf School

10/02/2026

Last week, learning moved beyond our classrooms and into Bright Angel Park, where students gathered for a day of story, reflection, movement, and connection.

Throughout the day, Quw’utsun Elders shared stories and cultural teachings with our students. Pamela and Qwiahwultuhw worked with the younger grades, sharing traditional stories and movement activities through rich, living images. With our older students, Hwiemtun spoke about responsibility, connection to the land, and lineage, inviting students to consider how knowing about our impact on plants and those around us can deepen our understanding of who we are.

This learning continued back at school as we recognized Truth and Reconciliation and Orange Shirt Day. Through assembly, classroom stories, conversation, and reflection, students engaged with this learning at different levels of depth, appropriate to their age and development. Across the grades, the invitation was the same: to listen carefully, ask questions, remember, and continue learning.

And then, we moved.

The day at Bright Angel Park concluded with our annual Terry Fox Run, as students took to the trails together. After a day grounded in stories of courage, history, identity, and community, they finished in action - running with perseverance and contributing to Terry Fox’s continuing legacy of hope.

We are deeply grateful to the Quw’utsun Elders for sharing their time, stories, language, and teachings with our students, and for the opportunity to continue building relationships and learning together.

09/24/2026

Reminder PD Day tomorrow!
No school for Sunrise students on Friday, September 25th.
🌻 ☀️ 🌳

09/21/2026

Walking through Sunrise this morning, mathematics seemed to be everywhere.

In Grade 6, students were bringing art and geometry together as they explored perspective, vanishing points and the mathematical relationships that allow us to represent three-dimensional space on a flat page.

In Grade 5, geometry moved between head and hand. Students worked with freehand geometry in Main Lesson while carefully planning and stitching increasingly complex patterns in cross stitch.

Grade 4 students were thinking about proportion and scale, working together to create bird’s-eye-view drawings of their classroom.

Down the hall, Grade 3 partners were counting musical rhythms as they sang together, experiencing number through beat, pattern and relationship.

In Grade 2, colourful gems became a tool for grouping and counting in sets, laying tangible foundations for the multiplication patterns that are beginning to emerge.

From pattern work to perspective geometry, each experience builds upon the one before it. Mathematics gradually moves from something children can touch, move and experience toward something they can picture, reason through and understand abstractly.

One morning. Five classrooms. So many ways to meet mathematics.

09/14/2026

After the excitement of the first days of school, Friday afternoon gave our community a chance to simply be together.

Our Sunrise Welcome Picnic brought new and returning families, teachers and staff together to share food, conversation and connection. New families were welcomed into the community, familiar faces reconnected after the summer, and new relationships began to form.

Teachers and staff also shared a welcome song they had been practicing and introduced themselves to the families gathered, a small but meaningful reminder that at Sunrise, children are surrounded by a whole community of adults who know one another, work together and care deeply about the life of the school.

With potluck snacks spread across the tables and children and adults visiting throughout the afternoon, the picnic offered a warm beginning to another year of learning and growing together.

We are so glad to be back.

09/10/2026

When we stepped into Sunflower and Shining Star Kindergarten today, both rooms were remarkably quiet. The children were completely absorbed in kneading dough, their hands working steadily as gentle singing carried the rhythm of the morning.

What appears to be the simple work of making bread holds so much learning. Songs implicitly introduce counting and number sense, while kneading strengthens the hands and fingers, building the dexterity children will eventually need when they pick up a pencil in the grades.

Soup and bun day is a beloved weekly rhythm for all our Kindergarten students. The warmth of freshly baked bread, the shared meal and the satisfaction of meaningful work become part of their experience of belonging, and a memory many children carry with them through the grades and beyond.

09/08/2026

There were tears in parents’ eyes and wide smiles on the faces of our rising Grade 1 students as they took part in the Sunflower Ceremony.

This cherished Sunrise tradition marks a meaningful threshold. With care, the Kindergarten teachers honoured the children they have nurtured and prepared to hand them forward into the next stage of their school journey. Beside them stood our Grade 7 students who were steady, encouraging and ready to support the younger children as they stepped toward Grade 1.

In Waldorf education, transitions are given time and ceremony because growth is more than simply moving from one grade to the next. Children are invited to recognize how far they have come, feel the strength of the community around them and meet what lies ahead with confidence.

For our rising Grade 1 students, it was a moment of being truly seen: honoured for who they are today and warmly welcomed into who they are becoming.

06/19/2026

Sunrise Waldorf School is hiring for two part-time positions for the 2026–2027 school year:

🌿 Kindergarten Assistant / Kindergarten After School Care Provider
🌿 Grades After School Care Provider

We're looking for caring, kind, and dynamic individuals who enjoy working with children and creating engaging experiences through storytelling, movement, music, creativity, and play. If you're passionate about supporting children's growth and helping create a safe, inclusive, and nurturing environment, we'd love to hear from you.

At Sunrise, you'll join a collaborative and supportive community on a beautiful seven-acre campus in the Cowichan Valley, where meaningful relationships and child-centered education guide our work every day.

Apply today:

Founded in 1980, Sunrise Waldorf School is situated on a stunning seven-acre campus in the Cowichan Valley near Duncan, BC. As a full AWSNA member school and a Group One independent school under the BC Ministry of Education, Sunrise is dedicated to educating and inspiring students to reach their ful...

06/16/2026

As grade 7 students prepared to step into their final year at Sunrise, they took time to reflect on the teachers, mentors, peers and guides who have accompanied them on their journey. Through heartfelt words, stories, and expressions of gratitude, one message shone through clearly: relationships matter.

There wasn't a dry eye in the room as students and parents spoke about the teachers who have inspired them, challenged them, encouraged them, and truly seen them over the years. It was a beautiful reminder that while academics, arts, and outdoor education all play an important role in a Waldorf education, it is the quality of the human relationships that forms the foundation for everything else.

At Sunrise, the connections between students, teachers, and families are not simply a part of school life, they are the heart of it. They create the trust that allows children to grow with confidence, curiosity, and a sense of belonging.

These relationships are what our students remember. They are what families value most. And they are why we are here.

Thank you to our Grade 7 students for reminding us of the profound impact of walking alongside children as they grow.

06/10/2026

Yesterday, families, teachers, and the Sunrise community gathered to celebrate the Grade 8 Class of 2026.

For many of these graduates, the journey began years ago in Parent & Child, taking their first steps through our doors with a parent by their side. Yesterday, they crossed another threshold and ready for what comes next.

We are grateful to have witnessed their growth, their courage, their friendships, and the unique gifts each has brought to our school.

Congratulations, Grade 8 Class of 2026. We can't wait to see where your path leads.

06/09/2026

Today, our Grade 7 students stood at an important threshold.

As they prepare for their final year at Sunrise and begin looking toward the wider world beyond our school, we gathered as a community to honor who they have become, and who they are still becoming.

What makes this moment so special is that no child arrives here alone. Behind every confident adolescent ready for their next adventure stands a circle of teachers, parents, staff, and friends who have known them, believed in them, and carried them in their hearts for years.

Today was a reminder that at Sunrise, we do more than educate children. We surround them with a community that sees their gifts, nurtures their potential, and celebrates the light they have been, the light they are, and the light they are yet to bring into the world.

What a privilege it is to walk alongside them.