Comparing Waldorf Education to trends in Educational Philosophy and Practice:

By Keith McLean
Introduction: How do we define the role of "educator"?
1. A report on Rudolf Steiner and education, published by "UNESCO: International Bureau of Education"
2. The website of the first Waldorf school, a school still operational today
3. More on the founding of the first Waldorf school and the Waldorf movement
4. Steiner agreed to set up the first Waldorf school according to certain conditions
5. On the principles of Waldorf education
6. Teacher classroom experiences in the Stuttgart school in it's first years
7. Comments from some educators on Waldorf Education



How do we define the role of "educator"?

I think we have to realise the fluidity of approaches and pathways and
participation in the education area:


(i) "Main Entry: ed·u·ca·tor
      Pronunciation: 'e-j&-"kA-t&r
      Function: noun
      1 : one skilled in teaching : TEACHER
      2 a : a student of the theory and practice of education : EDUCATIONIST
      2 b : an administrator in education"

(source: Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
< http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=educator >)


(ii) "In education, teachers are those who teach students or pupils, often
a course of study or a practical skill, including learning and
thinking skills. There are many different ways to teach and help
students learn. This is often refered to as the teacher's pedagogy.
When deciding what teaching method to use, a teacher will need to
consider students' background knowledge, environment, and their
learning goals."

(source: "Teacher" < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educationalist >
[accessed 4th June 2005])


(iii) "Challenges in education

The goal of education is the transference of ideas from one person to
another, or from one person to a group. Can a group of people educate?
Problems with the current public education sytem include: the method
of knowledge delivery, how to determine what knowledge should be
taught, the use and relevancy of the imparted knowledge, and how well
the pupil will retain incoming knowledge.

In addition to the ability to the "Three R's", reading, writing, and
'rithmetic, Western primary and secondary schools attempt to teach the
basic principles of history, mathematics, including calculus and
algebra, physics, chemistry, and sometimes politics, in the hope that
students will retain and use this knowledge as they age. The current
education system measures competency with tests and assignments and
then assigns each student a corresponding grade. The grades usually
come in the form of either a letter grade or a percentage, which
ideally represents the amount of all material presented in class that
the student understood. These grades do not reveal the strengths and
weaknesses of a student. Many feel this grading scheme risks lowering
students self-esteem and self-confidence, as students may receive poor
marks for reasons unrelated to their level of intellegence or
capability, for example poverty, abuse, lack of interest in the
material, prejudiced or incompetent teachers, uncomfortable
classrooms, etc.

Albert Einstein, one of the most famous physicist of our time,
credited with helping us understand the universe better, was not a
model school student. He was uninterested in what was being taught,
and he did not attend classes all the time. However, his gifts
eventually shone through and added to the sum of human knowledge.

Every child has certain gifts and abilities, but early and later
childhood education rarely tries to find out what that may be and help
the students develop that. If children are good at something they will
excel in that subject, and if they do not, they may not do as well.

This brings us to a major critique of modern western education. It
exposes children to a wide variety of disciplines which is good, but
subjects are taught, tested, and then the children are generally not
required to remember the content from before. Time is always spent in
mathematics classes reteaching students the basic concepts they should
know from the year before, because students have forgotten most of it.

There are also some dilemas about the teaching of knowledge. Should
some knowledge be forgotten? What should be taught, are we better off
knowing how to build nuclear bombs, or is it best to let such
knowledge be forgotten?"

(source: "Education" <
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educator#Recent_world-wide_educational_trends
> [accessed 4th June 2005])


(iv) Here are some educators (go down to "Editorial", and click on the
coloured names to see the individuals' bios), all of whose qualifications
and experiences differ: some are theorists, others have a more
direct experience - in the main, they are academics or lecturers:

 http://www.infed.org/about_us.htm


(v) "When attempting to assist a weak, struggling or ineffective
teacher, one often notes that the teacher has no established
philosophy of education; no roots, no belief system, no standard upon
which she is able to base her policies and practices in the classroom.
She embraces every new technique as her own and tends to define
progress as adopting what is new because it is new; abandoning what is
old because it is old. Conversely, the talented and effective educator
seems to base her every action upon the firm foundation of an
established philosophy or belief system. Her strength flows from that
philosophy and she accepts or rejects materials or practices based
upon their compatibility with her established philosophical concepts.
This belief system has developed over time and has been adapted,
modified and molded by the colleagues and clients that she has
interacted with throughout her career.

Little is done in our teacher training institutions to encourage the
young professional to develop or examine her own educational
philosophy. Administrators sometimes ask for the applicant's
educational philosophy in an initial job interview, but the
prospective teacher is seldom required to defend these beliefs with
theoretical or pragmatic evidence."

(source: "Developing An Educational Philosophy: If You Don't Stand Up
for Something, You'll Fall for Almost Anything"
< http://www.ricklavoie.com/philosophy.html > [accessed 4th June 2005])




The following are some pages on Waldorf education - it's origins,
principles and context:



1. A report on Rudolf Steiner and education, published by "UNESCO:
International Bureau of Education":

http://www.ibe.unesco.org/International/Publications/Thinkers/ThinkersPdf/steine\
re.pdf

(An HTML copy can be found here:

http://hem.passagen.se/thebee/comments/articles/Ullrich1.htm)


- Excerpt on the origins of Waldorf Education from this report:

"The revolutionary mood in a defeated Germany in the 1918 and 1919
brought Steiner the opportunity to try out his ideas on education in a
new school. On 7 September 1919, he ceremonially opened the first Free
Waldorf School as a combined co-educational primary and secondary
school for 256 children drawn mainly from the families of workers at
the Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory in Stuttgart (Germany).
Steiner's educational reform must be seen against the background of
the radical, political utopia of a tripartite structure of the social
body proclaimed by him at the time. The spontaneous foundation of new
educational establishments (kindergarten schools and colleges), each
with its own autonomous constitution, and the cooperative organization
of business ventures, was intended to distinguish between appropriate
forms of governance in the three areas of the cultural life, economic
activity, and political administration.

Steiner's political program of a free spiritual life and associative
economic activity failed. On the other hand, his school became a
success. When he died on 30 March 1925 in Dornach, while still working
on his autobiography, the first Waldorf pupils were about to take
their school-leaving examinations."




2. The website of the still in operation first school:

http://www.uhlandshoehe.de/index.htm



3. More on the founding of the first Waldorf school and the Waldorf
movement:

"Steiner's personal standing meant that his movement initially met
with enormous success. He gave lectures attended by thousands of
people, groups were set up to support his ideas all over Germany, and
in Stuttgart a group of industrialists grouped together to merge their
factories into an economic enterprise based on Steiner's idealistic
principles. One of these industrialists was the owner of the Waldorf
Astoria cigarette factory, and he asked Steiner to found a school for
the children of the workers of the factory (this is the reason why
many Steiner schools are called Waldorf schools).

Not surprisingly the movement for the Threefold Social Order soon ran
into trouble. It met with virulent opposition from more
well-established political groups and was riven by internal division.
Rudolf Steiner could see that the moment in time when he might have
been able to change the course of history was slipping away but,
undiscouraged, he threw himself into the task of ensuring that, even
if nothing else survived, the school in Stuttgart would be a success.

He gave a special training course for the school teachers; he
supervised the conversion of the school buildings; he met the parents;
he got to know the children; he attended the teachers' meetings; he
lectured, and he attended lessons. At the same time he was travelling
back and forth to Dornach in Switzerland, where he was supervising the
construction of a huge auditorium, the Goetheanum, (where he hoped to
establish a 'High School' to which the Stuttgart pupils could
graduate), and travelling around Europe, lecturing and trying to
initiate more educational initiatives.

He seems to have worked virtually round the clock for the last few
years of his life - perhaps aware that a darker phase of German
history was about to commence, in which there would be no room for
him, or for the things that he cherished. He died, exhausted, in 1925,
just 64 years old. His school was a success, having more than doubled
in size in the few years since its opening, but was shut down a few
years later when the Nazis came to power, and all its records destroyed."

(source: http://www.freedom-in-education.co.uk/Steiner.htm [accessed
3rd of June 2005])



4. Steiner agreed to set up the first Waldorf school according to
certain conditions:

"...Emil Molt, asked Steiner to establish and lead a school for the
children of the factory's employees. Steiner agreed to do so on four
conditions: the school should be open to all children; it should be
coeducational; it should be a unified twelve-year school; and the
teachers, who would be working directly with the children, should take
the leading role in the running of the school, with a minimum of
interference from governmental or economic concerns. Molt agreed and,
after a training period for the prospective teachers, die Freie
Waldorfschule (the Free Waldorf School) opened September 7, 1919."

(source: http://users.erols.com/kurrency/pcsfaqs.htm)


Steiner was actively involved in the first Waldorf school as educational
director. While he may not have taught classes directly, he apparently
made great efforts to make sure the curriculum was appropriate:

(i) "He gave a special training course for the school teachers; he
supervised the conversion of the school buildings; he met the parents;
he got to know the children; he attended the teachers' meetings; he
lectured, and he attended lessons. At the same time he was travelling
back and forth to Dornach in Switzerland, where he was supervising the
construction of a huge auditorium, the Goetheanum, (where he hoped to
establish a 'High School' to which the Stuttgart pupils could
graduate), and travelling around Europe, lecturing and trying to
initiate more educational initiatives."

(source: http://www.freedom-in-education.co.uk/Steiner.htm)


(ii) "It is important to remember that although an idealist who never
compromised what he believed, Rudolf Steiner was also a pragmatist. He
made an agreement with the authorities in Stuttgart that his school
would not follow the same curriculum as the state schools but that its
pupils would be able to transfer from one to the other at certain key
ages. He was very rigorous in ensuring that this promise was
fulfilled, and modified the work done in the school to ensure that the
children had covered the same subject matter, and attained the same
skills, as children in other schools at the appropriate ages."

(source: http://www.freedom-in-education.co.uk/Steiner.htm)



5. On the principles of Waldorf education:

(i) "A Definition of Steiner Education

Rudolf Steiner believed that education should be designed to meet the
changing needs of a child as they develop physically, mentally and
emotionally. He believed that it should help a child to fulfil their
full potential but he did not believe in pushing children towards
goals that adults, or society in general, believed to be desirable.

His approach was systematic, and appears to have been based on his own
extensive experience of working as a tutor, and on his study of
'anthroposophy' or 'spiritual science'.

Here are some of its key points:

* Up to the age of seven encourage play, drawing, story telling,
being at home, nature study and natural things.
* Do not teach children younger than seven to read.
* Teach a child to write before you teach them to read.
* Do not keep changing a child's teacher: allow one teacher to
carry on teaching the same class for seven years.
* Allow children to concentrate on one subject at a time - do
history two hours per day for several weeks and then do
geography for two hours per day etc.
* Find links between art and science.
* Engage with the child and make sure that they are enthusiastic
about the material being covered.
* Give a moral lead but do not teach a particular set of beliefs.
* Encourage learning for its own sake. Do not just work for exams.

He made specific curriculum suggestions for history, geography,
mathematics, languages, literature, science, handwork, gymnastics,
painting, music, shorthand and many other subjects that were taught in
the school in Stuttgart. Obviously, some of these are more appropriate
than others to today's conditions.

It is important to remember that although an idealist who never
compromised what he believed, Rudolf Steiner was also a pragmatist. He
made an agreement with the authorities in Stuttgart that his school
would not follow the same curriculum as the state schools but that its
pupils would be able to transfer from one to the other at certain key
ages. He was very rigorous in ensuring that this promise was
fulfilled, and modified the work done in the school to ensure that the
children had covered the same subject matter, and attained the same
skills, as children in other schools at the appropriate ages."

(source: http://www.freedom-in-education.co.uk/Steiner.htm [accessed
3rd June 2005])


(ii) "Summary of Rudolf Steiner's Principles of Education":

http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy/instructor/steiner.html


(iii) The authors of these pages and reports have gone through the material
examining what Steiner had to say about education, comparing it to other viewpoints.
What they found was a system which often reflected good sense ideas with wide applicability.
Here is another example:

"The physiognomy of the New Education

For a decade, Steiner's ideas on education remained no more than
abstract rhetoric. It was not until the year of the German Revolution
in 1919, at the height of the international movement in favor of a New
Education, that the self-taught specialist in pedagogics came to
prominence as the founder of a new school. Steiner's educational
anthropology now absorbed - sometimes contrary to his own ideological
concepts - many contemporary ideas based on the reality of education
that could not be arrived at merely through an abstract formula.

* In the historical and systematic perspective, the practical work
of the Rudolf Steiner schools (and kindergartens) shows particularly
close links with other trends of the New Education. This holds well in
the first place for its structure and organization which have remained
practically unchanged to the present day.

* They are establishments that maintain their own financial and
curricular autonomy and are characterized by a child-centered
educational tendency. Parents and children work together in the
interest of developing the child.

* The Rudolf Steiner kindergarten has the atmosphere of a living
room with a maternal educator. The guiding aims are to develop the
senses by imitation and the experience of community life with a
rhythmic progression. Factors that contribute to this are the two-hour
period set aside each day for free play with natural materials and the
particular emphasis placed on artistic creation and a natural
religious outlook.

* The Rudolf Steiner schools are continuous establishments in
which the pupils learn together in stable year-groups from the first
to the twelfth year of schooling, without any interruptions or repeat
years. Instead of official reports containing marks, the teachers
write annual character portraits or learning reports in their own free
wording. The syllabus and method of teaching are supposed to be guided
in the first instance by the genetic and organic development of the child.

* The all-round personality of the pupil is supposed to be
shaped through placing the equal weight on cognitive,
artistic-affective and technical-practical activities in both tuition
and school life. Practical training - through agricultural activities
in the school garden, handicrafts and industry - are intended to
develop a practical outlook on life.

* In the first eight years of school, the teachers see
themselves in the first place as educators. They remain in charge of
the same class for eight years as the class tutor. The teacher gives a
two-hour daily period of epoch teaching that covers one of the
traditional main subjects during a four-week cycle. Teaching takes
place without standardized textbooks; the most important learning
material consists of the epoch notebooks prepared by the pupils
themselves. Two modern foreign languages are learned from the first
year of schooling in play-conversation and recitation.

* Rudolf Steiner schools have no headmaster. They administer
their own organizational and educational functions at weekly
conferences arranged in a collegial manner. In most countries there
are national associations of Steiner Waldorf schools. The German
association has its headquarters in Stuttgart. 18

* These structural features of the Waldorf School generally
cause all observers - be they parents, educational scientists or
politicians - quite rightly to regard these schools in the first place
as a practical model of the New Education. In terms of the history of
these schools, as is already apparent from 1919, the year of their
foundation, a close relationship exists with the model of the living
community school that developed simultaneously with the experimental
schools in Hamburg in the 1920s. Their synthesis is in Peter
Petersen's Jena Plan School in Germany.

As autonomous unified co-educational schools motivated by the
children themselves, the Steiner and Jena Plan Schools are
characterized by a school atmosphere which resembles that of the home,
intensive attention to school life, the continuation of the classrooms
by gardens, workshops and practical courses, attention to the physical
and spiritual well-being of the pupils, an emphasis on musical
education, and a rhythm of school life marked by festivals and
ceremonies. Parents are closely involved in school life. The teachers
see themselves primarily as persons who accompany the development of
the child. All forms of compromise with bureaucratic selection
criteria and state policies are outlawed.

Among the other schools founded on the ideas of the New Education, the
specific profile of the Rudolf Steiner schools and kindergartens
emerges from the strong emphasis:

(a) on educational leadership (class teacher, frontal teaching);

(b) artistic and religious experience (fairy tales, sacred texts,
eurhythmics, etc.); and

(c) the systematic and ritually-based organization of education and
teaching."

(source: http://hem.passagen.se/thebee/comments/articles/Ullrich1.htm)



6. Teacher classroom experiences in the Stuttgart school in it's first years:

And the teachers in that school in those years may have felt that his
techniques were effective in their daily classroom experience. The
following is from a member of the staff at the first Waldorf school:

"A few examples may be noted from observations made at the Waldorf
School, a school that owes its origin to the impulses of Spiritual
Science and is carried on under the guidance of Dr. Steiner. I call a
child out, for instance, for him to say something in front of the
class. Now it is possible that I may never before have observed what I
observe in this child to-day. Rising slowly, as if unwillingly, and
supporting himself with both hands on the desk, he approaches with an
embarrassed smile, that partly expresses a certain pleasure at the
notice taken of him, and has something in it too of fatigue and
annoyance at feeling himself disturbed. One notices the heavy eyelids,
the round, rather puffy, pale face, the unhappy to-and-fro movement of
the body, the spiritless, resigned smile, with which he receives a
gentle rebuke for his not altogether satisfactory performance. One
recognises in him the phlegmatic temperament, feeling at the same time
that his melancholy is conditioned by an unsound constitution, and
that if this were overcome, the boy would not be lacking in a certain
vigour and manliness.

If a teacher has once had the experience — and it is an experience
that is actually possible — of thus feeling his way right into the
temperament of a child, he is encouraged to believe that in the case
of the other pupils also, who are entrusted to his care, he will in
course of time be able to penetrate behind the outward appearance and
to solve the riddles of their individualities. He will of course, in
making such observations of the children, not confine himself to what
they shew him in the school hours, but observe them on walks, during
intervals, in their relationships with the other children.

To take another instance. A square-built, but sturdy and active little
person, with a shock of curly hair, sits through the lessons as if in
a dream, wrapt up in all kinds of affairs of his own, looks surprised
and taken unawares if he is called upon to do anything, flushes up and
is deeply hurt at the slightest rebuke, joining in with eagerness only
when something very special is expected of the class. Observe the same
child at play, and you will see him taking the part of the
high-spirited leader of his playfellows, the most brilliant, the most
pugnacious, the most cheery of them all. Evidently a boy with a
choleric temperament; he only works in a phlegmatic manner, when his
interest is not aroused from within and out of his own free will.

The manner in which a child reacts to the lesson will be a matter of
no small interest to the teacher. Here is a child, for instance,
continually holding up his hand, joining in with intense keenness,
raising himself on his seat, glancing up with an expression of delight
on his face, pleased with everything all the time, whether because he
knows it already or because it is something he is eagerly wanting to
know. Here again is another, whose disposition finds a different
expression. After the teacher has finished and is passing on to a
fresh subject, or else the school hours are at an end, he quietly
leaves his seat, and approaching the teacher with earnest gaze asks a
question in a half whisper, relating to what the teacher has been
telling them, either wanting to carry the matter to a fuller
completion, or indicating something that puzzled him, that was not
quite clear. By such signs can we recognise the sanguine and the
melancholic respectively among our pupils.

The teacher who lets the anthroposophic knowledge of man work upon his
thought and feeling, comes, as we have seen, to a kind of artistic
vision of the growing child, who is to him as individual, as full of
mystery and enigma, as is every great work of art. But this is not
all. Out of such a vision of the child proceeds also the manner in
which the lesson is handled, the actual art of teaching. Not that the
teacher consciously converts the knowledge of the child that he has
acquired — whether by study or by his own observation — into
educational formulae, into pedagogic maxims. The process is a more
instinctive one than that.

In the first place, the children gradually sift themselves out for the
teacher. According to their characteristics, according to their
different dispositions, they form themselves into certain groups. This
means for the teachers in the Waldorf School an actual assistance, an
actual lightening of their work. Children who With all their
individual differences yet show a real similarity of temperament are
placed together in groups, and thus is provided a natural solution to
one great difficulty in teaching. Imagine a teacher standing up before
a large class of children, who are sitting all in confusion, not
according to any inner law, just as for the untrained eye the stars
stand arbitrarily in the heavens at night! How is he to comprehend his
class, how is he to set to work with such a crowd of children so that
each individual child may find his right place? This difficulty it is
that gives rise to the cry for small classes. But it is for the
teacher to carry out the task — and it is no light task, and is only
possible on the foundation of a spiritual understanding of man — the
task of so sounding the children in the depths of their being as to be
able to sort them out into groups according to their peculiar
temperaments. By this means order and harmony are brought in, where
before was confusion, and it is then possible to conduct lessons in
large classes; for as far as the actual class instruction is
concerned, instead of having to handle a great number of particular
children as so many individuals, the teacher is able to handle
particular groups of children whose inner natures resemble one another.

The effect of such group classification may be illustrated by
reference to a history class of children of 11 and 12 years old. After
classification, the lessons took on a form somewhat as follows:

Here sits a group of contented happy-go-lucky children, most of them
of slender and well-proportioned figure. They look about them in a
lively manner, and are fond of stealing a glance through the window or
a chat with the boy or girl sitting next them. They enjoy the lesson
and are all attention, but they enjoy just as well to have their
attention drawn away by something of no importance. Instinctively,
without hesitation, one would call upon these children to point out,
for example, on the map the line of march of Alexander the Great.
Pictures of Ionic and Doric pillars they looked at with interest; they
could give good descriptions of them, pointing out their differences,
and were delighted to make models of them in plasticine, which they
did with a fair measure of success. Their attention was easily gained
for everything that could be seen and looked at; in this way one could
meet their instinctive interest in the outside world, and turn it to
good purpose.

But now if one were relating to the children the story, for example,
of Alexander taming the wild horse Bucephalus, and how from a very
child the desire of fame burned in his soul, how he cut the Gordian
knot with his sword, how he swam through raging torrents, and so
forth, one would turn to the group of children who follow with the
closest attention whatever inspires them and arouses their human
interest, who are full of life and enthusiasm when the subject matter
in hand is such as to stir their feelings, but whose attention flags
at once, directly the personal interest is at an end. One turned, once
again almost instinctively, to these children in relating the stories,
and one would call upon them too to tell them back again to the class.
Being approached in this way, they will in due time show results in
their work in accordance with their temperament; whilst the
presentation of an example of heroism such as they cannot themselves
yet attain, tends to allay a little their self-assurance, which is
generally not inconsiderable.

Yet a third group of children are sitting quiet and good, but all too
inclined to do their work in a sleepy, uninterested fashion. One can
see among them pleasant round-faced, comfortable looking little
people, with smoothly brushed hair and an expression that is
thoroughly good-natured, if at times a trifle dull and slow. The first
thing to be done with them is to wake them up, they must somehow or
other be induced to listen and attend; one may even resort, as it were
in jest, to some such device as culling upon them suddenly to pull
their right ear with their left hand!

When they do however once give their mind to the lesson, they retain
what they hear faithfully and in orderly sequence, and they enjoy
repeating it over. These were the children to call upon, when one
wanted some events of history correctly set forth and related, and
they never tired of going over the same events. Only they do not
express themselves easily in speech, they prefer to do so in writing
and, given plenty of time, will do this well, in a neat clear hand. A
certain balance and rhythm in life is an actual need for children of
this kind; their love of order and their trustworthiness make them a
valuable element in the class and give it a certain stability. Where
the sleepiness is excessive, and goes with a dull brooding melancholy,
the task of the teacher is indeed difficult. Experience shows,
however, that such a child does take in, during a history lesson,
considerably more than his apparent listlessness would lead one to
suppose.

Once again, occasions arose in the course of the lessons when it was
desired to direct the children's attention to the deep historical
connections, to give them an understanding of how one great epoch of
culture differs from another — let us say, the Egyptian from the Greek
— and so lead them to select from the descriptions they had heard what
is symptomatic in each and to compare them. This time one would find
the greatest support in the group of children who bring to what the
teacher has to give a thoughtful understanding, who are already able
to grasp, if not actual ideas, something of the nature of ideas,
something that for the other children remains still in the background
of consciousness. They can understand, for instance, how the life of
Alexander the Great is symptomatic of an entirely new impulse in the
world's history, how it points to a culture that rests on the
development of personality, a culture that in the time of Aristides
the Just had not yet begun to work in Greece; they can enter into such
thoughts and reflect upon them, and in this way the inclination not
infrequently shown by such children already at their early age to be
pensive and brooding, and even introspective, will be diverted to the
great facts of history and their deep connections. These form a
strengthening and health-giving food for mind and soul, for the
growing child from let us say 12 years onwards, and especially for
children of this more melancholic tendency. The response of their more
developed power of thought and reflection makes them a source of great
joy to the teacher, they stand indeed at not so great a distance from
the grown-up mind and outlook as do children of other temperaments.

Thus can the child of every kind of temperament have his value in the
class; every kind is absolutely necessary in its place, every kind
completes the others, even leaves the others lagging helplessly behind
if it is wanting. It will be readily seen that this arranging of the
children according to inclination and talent will help very greatly to
the promotion of the right kind of social outlook. There is indeed no
question that by its means the children have already developed quite a
strong sense of their need of one another and their power to
supplement one another in class — altogether irrespective of whether
they come from a High School, a "School for Young Ladies," an
Elementary or a Secondary School. The seed of a social understanding
is one of the most gratifying signs the class teacher can observe as a
result of his method of teaching. Light will also be thrown by these
considerations on the ruthless one-sidedness of what is known as the
selection of "promising" scholars.

A further effect of this intimate understanding of the child is to be
found in the special character it gives to the relationship of the
teacher to his pupils. The loving concern, with which it must be the
aim of the teacher to meet every child entrusted to his care, grows,
and gradually outgrows even the personal sympathies and antipathies
which very naturally arise in the first place in respect to a great
number of the children. This loving understanding takes the place of a
more moral judgment and estimation of character, and makes of course a
great difference to the attitude of mind with which the teacher
approaches the pupil. Eliminating as far as possible all personal
feelings, he confronts the child as a phenomenon, as an object to
which he consciously gives himself up in order that the law of its
being may declare itself in his soul; and the remarkable thing is
that, with all this apparent coldness, with all this impersonality,
the human relationship does not suffer. Out of the interest that seeks
to enquire and to know, there begins to grow up a true love, resting
on real fact and knowledge and uniting teacher and child with a depth
and freedom of intercourse hitherto undreamt of.

In their school years, mid especially between the ages of 7 and 14, it
is right and natural that children should without any compulsion look
upon their teacher as an authority and respect him as such. It is
quite pathetic to observe how children, to whom the chance is denied
of looking up to persons really worthy of their respect and reverence,
try to make up for the loss, choosing either someone they have met in
real life or else a figure in history or literature, and, with the
help of a vivid imagination, turning this person into the example, the
hen, that they need.

The question may be asked — it is often asked of the teachers in the
Waldorf School — what is the effect of such an authority-relationship
in the best sense of the world? We are not now speaking of its effect
on the lesson as such, but on the moral education of the children and
on what is known as school discipline.

A year and a half's teaching in the Waldorf School, during which time
one has tried to establish such a relation between pupil and teacher,
has brought many interesting experiences bearing on this question.

The children were aware of an emancipation from the customary coercive
methods, and the discipline suffered accordingly. At first this was
disturbing to the progress of the lesson, and the children themselves
felt it to be so. It often happened indeed that they sought to help
matters, exhorting each other to be quiet and to attend. Punishments
had also to be resorted to.

As the year went on, however, it became increasingly evident that, as
punishment could only be of use when carried out consistently and
repeatedly, its introduction made ail too easy the return of the old
relationship of distrust between teacher and pupil. One was more and
more persuaded that the very best means of education — taking the word
in its widest sense and to include education through discipline — lies
to the teacher's hand in the subject matter of the lesson itself, and
in the handling of it; it is not to be found in tasks and punishments
lying outside the scope of the lesson, nor even in a strong personal
influence over the children. Setting aside exceptional cases, it is
indeed in and through the actual teaching alone that the personal
relation with the children should make itself felt. For example, the
turning point in the discipline difficulty in a certain large class of
children was reached, and a marked improvement began to shew itself,
when the knowledge of the plant world was opened up to them — opened
up in all the method and clearness made possible by its penetration
with Spiritual Science. Children's feelings are more pure and
unbiassed than those of grown people, and these children divined the
fulness of that knowledge that is finding its way to man through
Spiritual Science and whose treasures the teacher was bringing within
their reach. Not that the teacher was giving them Anthroposophy, far
from it; Anthroposophy would of necessity have been to them of the
nature of dogma; but he was directing them to connections that they
could really find in the world and understand and see for themselves.
In this way their eyes were opened to many things hitherto unnoticed,
many things that were there all the time, but generally never brought
near to them at all. They divined how much that is interesting and
wonderful and mysterious lies hidden in the universe, they felt
something living in the soul of their grown-up teacher which they with
their childish understanding were not yet able to reach. And the
result of this was not only that the children of their own free will
accepted the position of subordination to the teacher, it also widened
out their too often narrow horizon, gave them a larger outlook and a
happiness which was for them every bit as real and whole-hearted as
the happiness they felt in play or in companionship. Especially, for
instance, in the case of girls approaching the "flapper" age and apt
to find pleasure in all sorts of frivolous and foolish things, one
could observe excellent results from teaching of this kind. The joy in
the great world, the feeling of oneness with the world around them,
which they were beginning to be able dimly to apprehend, could be more
and more fully awakened in the children, and the effect of this again
on conduct and behaviour was far greater than one would perhaps at
first imagine.

There is one thing that all children enter into with great animation,
and that is the stories that are told them. In the light of
Anthroposophy it becomes clear to the teacher that when he wants to
make an impression on the memory and the will of small children, he
will do this with the most lasting effect by clothing what he has to
teach in the form of parables and allegories. Parables and allegories,
that is, of whose inner truth he is himself convinced in his inmost soul.

In this connection the whole attitude of mind of the teacher and his
relationship with the children are of the utmost importance. It was
found again and again that when an allegorical story of this kind was
being told to the children, they would sit drinking it in in
breathless silence, with full and undivided attention; provided, that
is, the story were the outcome of the teacher's own work and thought,
and not just one that he had read somewhere or other and deemed
suitable for the occasion. Never did one feel so close to the children
as in such moments. The experience that teacher and children have gone
through together in this way — the teacher, out of his own knowledge
of the children, giving them in the form of pictures what will meet
the needs of their moral life — such an experience has an influence
that spreads over the whole of the life they share together. No
disciplinary measures, no education in morals by means of discussion
and appeal to the reason, can compare with the deep and lasting
impression made by parable and allegory. Many instances could be
cited, when boys of about 9 or 10 years of age, who were by nature
very difficult to manage and who were a considerable source of
disturbance to the conduct of the class as a whole, have made a most
satisfactory change for the better after the repeated narration in
class of such stories.

Children have a touch of genius; they live with their whole being,
they do not want to take things in only through their head! What is
put in artistic form makes the strongest appeal to them, they
understand it, it remains fixed in their memory, it takes hold of
their feeling and their will.

It often happens that the conduct at school of an individual child may
give the teacher occasion to single him out with the definite purpose
of working upon him for his good. Almost every class has its child,
who through his continued restlessness, inattention and mischievous
behaviour drives his teacher as well as his fellow-pupils to despair.
The causes of such a state of things may be many and various; in
addition to an inner weakness of character, nervousness and ill-health
of some sort are often present. With these children the teacher will
go very carefully to work, knowing that probably at home they are just
as troublesome and are accustomed there to be scolded, beaten and
punished. Not infrequently there are signs of an inward discontent, at
times of an unhappiness bordering on bitterness, and the very
features, though the features of a child, may assume an evil, sullen
expression. The teacher will bear in mind that he will effect no real
change in the child by exercising a sudden restraint on each occasion
of disturbance, still less by checking with severe measures every
outward expression of naughtiness. The child bottles up his naughty
feelings, and they will be absolutely sure to come out later in some
far worse, perhaps morbid form, it may be when he is growing up into
manhood and is no longer under the eye of the teacher.

On the basis of advice given by Dr. Steiner to the Waldorf School
teachers, the experiment was made of handling such children in the
following manner. One did not come down on them in the very act of
some breach of discipline and punish them for it on the spot; but, so
far as was possible without disturbance to the lesson, let them go
their way, always however keeping an eye upon them. One noted silently
all they did, remaining at the same time quite calm and friendly and
refraining from blame. Handled In this way, a child did not get into
that irritated condition, that a perpetual fault-finding was apt to
induce, and that was spoiling his work in the class. Next morning, at
the beginning of the lesson, the teacher recalled to him, shortly but
impressively,, his behaviour on the previous day, in such a manner
that the child could not but perceive he was being met with real
sympathy and that the teacher had an honest desire to help him. He was
still fresh from his night's sleep, peaceful, and in a manner
receptive, as he by no means was later in the day. Nothing had yet
occurred to irritate him, and generally he was very ready to make good
resolutions and to be put on his guard. I was able to observe good
results in the case of a boy, with whom before using this method one
could do absolutely nothing, and whom even his school-fellows all
looked upon as the bane of the class. The child was inclined to be
melancholy and to feel himself in the black books of the whole world;
so one had at the same time to encourage him by laying especial stress
on his few good points, such as, for example, a neat handwriting or a
readiness to lend a hand when help was wanted. This much at any rate
has been attained; the boy feels he belongs to the class, has his
place in it and, in his right place, is a necessary member of it. It
is to be hoped that this will also react favourably on his unpleasing
physiognomy and his physical health.

In the case of some children an influence on their moral development
may be greatly assisted by the use of the principle of repetition.
Whatever they have to say and do over and over again impresses itself
deeply upon them and has a strengthening influence on the will. If a
child for instance showed a particular failing, quite his own, it was
possible in certain cases to have a helpful influence by putting into
a short sentence — preferably rhythmical — or into a verse, whatever a
deep insight into his nature led one to desire to impress upon him.
The child had then to repeat this at a fixed time every day. Such
sayings, not of course tedious moralisings, but short pregnant
sayings, will naturally vary greatly according to the individuality of
the child. The faculty which Dr. Steiner in his "Philosophy of
Freedom" (Note 3) calls "moral imagination" will indeed be
indispensable to every teacher. He will need it if he is going to meet
with presence of mind the various problems that face him in his
educational work, meet them in such a way as to find their answer and
solution: he will need it in his dealings with each individual child.
He can attain the faculty by making a thorough study of the knowledge
of man as it is contained in Anthroposophy."

(source: "Education at the Waldorf School." <
http://wn.rsarchive.org/Education/Educat_index.html >)



7. Comments from some educators on Waldorf Education:

- What some educators have been saying about Waldorf Education
(source: http://www.waldorfanswers.org/WaldorfComments.htm):

1. "Ernest L Boyer (1928-1995), Former President, Carnegie Foundation
for the Advancement of Teaching:

"Those in the public school reform movement have some important
things to learn from what Waldorf educators have been doing for many
years. It is an enormously impressive effort toward quality education,
and schools would be advised to familiarize themselves with the basic
assumptions that undergird the Waldorf movement. Art as it helps to
reveal the use of language, art as it can be revealed in numbers, and
certainly in nature""

2. "Thomas Armstrong, Ph D, Author: "In Their Own Way. Discovering and
Encouraging Your Child's Personal Learning Style":

"Cultural literacy is the key concern throughout a Waldorf
program, and here Waldorf educators are also in accord with other
experts in their field. Apparently many parents are discovering that
Waldorf fills a need for a creative, artistic approach to learning
that is hard to find elsewhere."
(Parenting Magazine, August 1988)"

3. "Konrad Oberhuber, world leading expert on Raphael, former Director
of the Museum of Art Albertina in Vienna, former Professor of Fine
Arts, Harvard University, now at International Christian University,
Mitaka, Tokyo:

"No other educational system in the world gives such a central
role to the arts as the Waldorf school movement. Even mathematics is
presented in an artistic fashion and related via dance, movement or
drawing, to the child as a whole. Anything that can be done to further
these revolutionary educational ideas will be of the greatest
importance.""

4. "Douglas Sloan, Ph D, Professor of Education, Teachers College,
Columbia University:

"Based on a comprehensive, integrated understanding of the human
being, a detailed account of child development, and with a curriculum
and teaching practice that seeks unity of intellectual, emotional and
ethical development at every point, Waldorf education deserves the
attention of all concerned with education and the human future.""

5. "Jack Miller, Professor, Coordinator of Holistic and Aesthetic
Education in the Department of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning at
the University of Toronto:

"Waldorf education has been an important model of holistic
education for almost a century. It is one of the very few forms of
education that acknowledges the soul-life of children and nurtures
that life. It is truly an education for the whole child and will
continue to be an important model of education as we move into the
21st century."
(Personal statement 14 July, 2002)"

6. "Paul Bayers, (earlier) Professor at Columbia Teachers' College:

"The importance of storytelling, of the natural rhythms of daily
life, of the evolutionary changes in the child, of art as the
necessary underpinning of learning, and of the aesthetic environment
as a whole - all basic to Waldorf education for the past 70 years -
are being "discovered" and verified by researchers unconnected to the
Waldorf movement.""

7. "Dee Joy Coulter, Ed.D., Instructor of Neurology and Learning, and
core faculty member at Naropa University, Colorado, adjunct faculty
member of the University of Northern Colorado, former Waldorf parent,
keynote speaker at Waldorf conferences:

I first heard of Waldorf education about five years ago, after
having carried out extensive study of the neurological aspects of
cognition, movement, and maturation. I was delighted to discover such
a neurologically sound curriculum. I heartily support efforts to
spread the awareness of Waldorf education and hope that it will spawn
not only an increase in Waldorf schools, but an infusion of at least
some of the ideas into the mainstream where they are so sorely needed.
In Colorado, I am working with several districts to incorporate
various Waldorf strategies into the teaching of reading and
mathematics. The ideas are very well received and very much needed.
(Personal statement, 1984)"

8. "Jane W. Hippolito, Ph D, Professor of English and Adjunct
Professor of Liberal Studies, California State University, Fullerton:

"For the past ten years my teaching responsibilities have
compelled me to inform myself not just about what would-be teachers
need to learn. All of my instructionally related research into
childhood has pointed toward the superiority of Waldorf education over
all other current educational methods.""

and (source: http://www.steinercollege.edu/waldorfed.html):

1. "Programs such as Montessori and the Waldorf Schools offer small
classes, individualized instruction, and flexible, child-centered
curricula which can accommodate the child and do not demand that the
child do all of the accommodating . . . Rudolf Steiner was troubled by
the overly academic emphasis of schools; he felt that the aesthetic
side of children was being overlooked and that this should be
developed along with the intellectual powers. Waldorf schools
emphasize creativity in all aspects of children's work. The same
teacher may stay with the same group of children for as many as eight
grades. In so doing the teacher has to grow and learn with the children.

- Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind,
Ph.D., Professor of Child Study, Tufts University Author,
The Hurried Child, All Grown Up and No Place to Go; Miseducation:
Preschoolers at Risk"

2. "American schools are having a crisis in values. Half the children
fail according to standard measures and the other half wonder why they
are learning what they do. As is appropriate to life in a democracy,
there are a handful of alternatives. Among the alternatives, the
Waldorf school represents a chance for every child to grow and learn
according to the most natural rhythms of life. For the early school
child, this means a non-competitive, non-combative environment in
which the wonders of science and literature fill the day without
causing anxiety and confusion. For the older child, it offers a
curriculum that addresses the question of why they are learning. I
have sent two of my children to Waldorf schools and they have been
wonderfully well served.

- Raymond McDermott,Ph.D.,
Professor of Education and Anthropology, Stanford University"

Copyright © 2005 Keith McLean

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