The Secret Kindergarten | For Young Children

Self-defence Swans! The Secret Kindergarten Radio Show for Young Children Ep. 14 Gino pulls the Eight of Swords from the Tarot deck. The Eight of Swords speaks to the loss of self-esteem which creates distrust in the self. In Gino’s experience, as an early childhood teacher, the loss of self-esteem happens when young children aren’t allowed to act according to our natural rights or live according...

Gino pulls the Devil tarot card for this episode. Broadly speaking, the card means slavery. Slavery is a choice, just like Freedom. So the Devil card speaks of a choice to yield to evil or strive for good. So, this is the theme that is explored for this episode. There is a correspondence between this symbology and the dolphin! So we explore the dolphin. Many believe the dolphin is here to help us...

For this episode, Gino pulls the Temperance card from the Influence of The Angels Tarot. Temperance speaks of balance, moderation and self-control. In the early years, self-regulating behaviours are encouraged through body control in play. So, that’s why the freeze game is back! We can encourage young children to recognise emotions which promotes self-control later in life by promoting self-awaren...

Gino pulls The Lovers card from the tarot deck. Another repeated archetype with messages for the early years. We let the basic message of friendship guide the content of the show. The antelope brings a message of friendship in the nature segment. The old fable of The Woodpecker, The Tortoise and The Antelope shows us how friendship and valuing this can promote courage, valour and get us out of tri...

For this episode, Gino pulls the Strength card from the Tarot deck. This card is a mainstay of The Secret Kindergarten because of the innate desire to nurture courage and power in young children. Listening skills are one of the foundations of Strength. Understanding the environment and “reading the room” go hand-in-hand with self-esteem. So we do an active listening activity! We listen to a story...

The episode is guided by The Four of Wands. Peace and prosperity. A red castle. Bluebirds singing a sweet song. A hero’s journey must have been completed, so we play King Arthur and also Gino’s favourite, Jack The Giant Killer. Young children need to be the sons and daughter of heroes, in order to grow up to be heroes and prosperous themselves. If that’s not the case, never mind… the adults can jo...

Gino pulls The King of Wands as an indicator for the theme of this episode. The Whimsical Tarot points to Prince Charming as an archetype that corresponds to The King of Wands. So in episode eight, we listen to some stories that involve the Prince Charming character. It turns out he never seems very involved, yet when you pay attention to him, the stories seem to be about him achieving his goal… t...

In this episode Gino is feeling loved and pulls the lovers card from his tarot deck. We discover this card corresponds to the fairy tale Beauty and The Beast. We wonder how and why? We continue with The Adventures of Maya The Bee and play some Aesop’s Fables! Gino reads a story he knows from his own childhood, “Where The Wild Things Are”. When Max is left alone he connects with his imagination and...

In this episode we weave the connections between people, plants and animals through exploration, stories and music with guidance from the Tarot. We explore the spiritual aspect of trees through stories. We tell a Cambodian folk tale involving a cheeky rabbit. We also reveal the correspondences between trees and humans by reading a wonderful story called “Peter and The Tree Children”. Gino draws th...

Why does death feature in so many fairy tales and fables of old? Like life, popular stories for children have a strong start, a journey and a strong finish. There is already a metaphor to life in story. Birth and death is easily placed into children’s stories as children are immersed in the metaphors and symbolism. This is because of their situation… a developed subconscious mind and the hidden an...

In this episode we talk about feeling brave. Gino pulls The Fool card from The Influence of The Angels Tarot. Last week’s Two of Cups concerns the start of the adult-to-child journey. The Fool card concerns the start of the journey of the young child. The Secret Kindergarten wishes all young children to start the journey of The Fool at the appropriate time…. early childhood! We explore the similar...

In this episode we talk about resentment and how you must express your anger to feel better so you can grow and develop in a healthy way. We draw the Two of Cups once again. An important card regarding the development of young children. Gino shares a poem to explain The Two of Cups! We talk about the rat as a spirit guide as they are close spiritual helpers of young children! We check out Tiger sy...

In this episode, we re-visit the Two of Cups Tarot card. We further explore the meaning of the Two of Cups with regards to the parent-child relationship. The Two of Cups resonates so strongly with the message of The Secret Kindergarten, that Gino is thinking of changing the name of the podcast to “The Two of Cups”! We talk about correspondences with The Owl and The Pussycat, once again, and dive i...

In the first episode of The Secret Kindergarten Radio Show, I pull the Two of Cups card from the tarot deck and talk about friendship, love and connectedness. We found a correspondence between the Two of Cups and The Owl and The Pussycat. We take guidance and assurances from Animal Spirit guides of the owl, cat and also the rat! We talk about how the qualities of the rat show how the rat is a spir...