Rhythm in the Home

There are numerous aspects to a Waldorf way of life that are appealing to me, but the one
that I hold closest to my heart, is rhythm.
Rhythm is the daily, weekly and yearly recurring activities in our lives. There is
something so magical about such a simple concept. Children thrive on familiarity and
consistency. It is a sense of security for them, they feel safe and reassured to always know
what comes next, to have a predictable day, a rhythm they can count on. My children
remind me of this every single day.

Is rhythm just a fancy word for schedule. NO. While they have similarities, rhythm is
more about a gentle flow, a knowing of what comes next, whereas a schedule is more
rigid and by the clock. I sometimes have to remind myself that rhythm is not cut and dry.
It is not some regimen that needs to be followed strictly, to a T. That will just drive me
crazy and destroy the peacefulness that rhythm is supposed to bring about. For example,
it is not important for us to have lunch at noon exactly every single day but for us to have
lunch after we have read our mealtime blessing and before some quiet play time. This
way my children always know what is coming next and knowing what to expect makes
them feel relaxed, safe and happy.

Rhythm already surrounds us all. The flow of the universe. The beating of our hearts
but nowadays it takes a conscious effort to bring it into our home lives. As Rahima
Baldwin Dancy (Midwife and Waldorf early childhood educator) put it, Doing things

rhythmically simplifies life. I couldnt agree more. Our family rhythm has saved us on
more than one occasion.

I am often asked how I introduced rhythms into our lives. I started with simple verses and
songs throughout the day to lead us from one thing to another. When we wake up and my
children are still half in the dream state, we say our morning verse. This helps to gently
wake them up and prepare them for getting out of bed to make breakfast. It is not an
abrupt transition but rather, a gentle flow. Once I felt this new rhythm was comfortably
established I was able to start adding more daily activities into our rhythm an activity
for each day of the week, and so on. I took it slowly but surely, just one step at a time, to
not overwhelm myself or the rest of my family. When things started to move more fluidly
and really came together easily, is when I knew I had a good rhythm that worked for our
family.

Of course our rhythms have been sculpted and changed over the years with the arrival of
our youngest daughter and our oldest becoming more grounded in this world, but thats
the beauty of rhythm. Its fluid enough that changes can be gently added. We recently had
a major change in rhythm by taking a ten-day drive cross-country to move from Virginia
to Oregon. Just the thought of my husband and I, our two daughters, two dogs and three
cats all in the same van every day for ten days in a row made my head spin. Thankfully
rhythm rescued us. Our days were long, fun and a bit exhausting, but our nights, oh, our
nights were perfect. We followed our nightly rhythm, just as if we were back in our
home, and everything returned to normal no matter how out of our element we were.

While every familys rhythm will be different, I thought Id share an overview of ours.
This is just a brief glimpse into our lives and is not a list of our rhythm in its entirety.
Daily rhythms include:
waking verse
mealtimes
activities of the day (i.e. if its Monday then we bake)
cleaning
quiet time
laundry
tending to our animals
outside time
bedtime
Weekly rhythms include :
Monday is baking day
Tuesday is painting day
Wednesday is handwork day
Thursday is drawing day
Friday is crafting day
Saturday is gardening day (when it is not gardening season we go for nature walks or
hiking on this day)
Sunday is resting day (a day just spent at home as a family)
Monthly rhythms include:
hand-washing our woolens (2 times a month)
beeswaxing our wooden bowls (the last Sunday of the month)
errands & grocery shopping (1 2 times a month)
Yearly and seasonal rhythms include:
birthdays
holidays
planting our garden
travel

If you are interested in incorporating more rhythm into your home, a wonderful resource
is You Are Your Childs First Teacher by Rahima Baldwin Dancy. I still thumb through
that book quite often. Another great resource is Beyond The Rainbow Bridge by Barbara
J. Patterson. For verses and songs that help with the daily transitions of one thing to
another, I have found Seven Times the Sun by Shea Darian, and This is the way we
wash-a-day by Mary Thienes-Schunemann to be my go to resources. I have also found
other Waldorf families to be extremely helpful, supportive and resourceful when I hit
snags in our rhythm or just simply need others to relate to.

The Knitted Waldorf Toy

The knitted toy plays a large role in a childs play experience within Waldorf philosophy.
There are so many knitted toys out there that are wonderfully made, but I think the ones
that Waldorf families gravitate towards have certain subtle elements that encourage
people to have these particular knitted toys in favour of others.
The knitted Waldorf toy is beautiful in its simplicity. It is this simplicity that draws this
type of toy into the consciousness of the childs play. When we look at other toys that are
available for children to play with, most are plastic and bright and have loud sounds
emanating from them. Waldorf inspired thinking sees these types of toys as being overstimulating. They might hold the attention of a child for a while but the child soon
becomes over-stimulated and, thus, bored. As it usually has only one play purpose, when
this has been fulfilled, it is no longer attractive to the child as all play possibilities have
been exhausted.
A knitted Waldorf toy is not shiny or noisy. It has no sharp edges and has an almost
organic sense to it. It is soft and natural and usually has a very simplified shape and
appearance. I believe it is this gentleness that resonates with the heart of a child causing
the child to want to experience this toy over and over again and hold it close. The knitted
toy is open ended, meaning that its simple nature lends itself to so many play
possibilities. It requires imagination and this is what makes it so attractive to children in
so many different play scenarios.
The majority of toys have just one facial expression, usually a happy, smiling face, with
large eyes and a smiling mouth. Knitted toys that are considered Waldorf, may have a

very slight expression on their faces, two eyes and a mouth that is neither smiling nor sad
and others that have no facial features at all. This allows the toy to exhibit whichever
emotion the child may wish the toy to portray at that particular moment. The childs
imagination is free to change the toys emotions as the moment takes him. However, with
a fixed expression of a smiling face, how could the toy ever be anything else

The way a knitted toy is made is magic in itself too. The materials that are used to create
knitted toys are a gift from the sheep. The transformation of fibre to yarn, yarn to
delightfully knitted toy, is a wonderful journey that is lovely to watch. The wool from the
sheep is sheared and cleaned, it is usually very soiled and greasy when the wool is
sheered. The grease is a substance called Lanolin, which has many uses. After the wool
has been cleaned it can either be hand carded to make it easier to work with, removing all
the knots or it can be sent to a mill to convert all this lovely wool into roving that can
easily be spun into yarn on a spinning wheel. If one would like to add a dye to the wool,
it can either be dyed as a roving or as yarn after the yarn has been spun. The yarn is still
in a skein at this point and is then wound into a ball that is ready to be knitted into a
beautiful treasure for a child to play with.
A wonderful story that you could read to your child is Pelles New Suit by Elsa
Beskow it follows the story of wool from the sheep to a completed item of clothing.
Here are some wonderful knitting books for knitted Waldorf toys:
A First Book of Knitting by Bonnie Gosse and Jill Allerton
Knitting for Childern A Second Book by Bonnie Gosse and Jill Allerton.
Traditional School :: Waldorf Home.

My children attend public school but our home life is influenced by the Waldorf
philosophy. For me, this means that I make an intentional daily effort to address the needs
of the whole childthe head, the heart, and the hands.
The head or the intellectual domain encompasses what one might call academics. My
kids are now in a traditional mainstream public school that doesnt do things the Waldorf
way. It might not be my first choice, but thats fine. Theyre still learning, and their
primary influence is still coming from home. My husband and I hold the ultimate
responsibility for our kids education, but weve delegated that authority during the time
theyre in school to their teachers. Well support their teachers in every way possible to
help them do their best. This means for example, that Im helping my kindergarten son
learn to read each evening, even though this goes against traditional Waldorf pedagogy.
Since much of their school day is spent in the head, I want to balance this with time at
home focusing more on the needs of the heart and hands.
Obviously, learning doesnt stop as soon as school lets out. Questions are asked and
curious minds want to know! Particularly when it comes to how the natural world works.
I try to keep explanations developmentally appropriate and simple. A detailed scientific
explanation of how the seasons work is not appropriate when a six year asks, for
example, why it gets dark so early in the winter. Thats why books that explain the natural
world in a whimsical, fun way, such as Mother Earth and Her Children, the Tales of
Tiptoes Lightly, and many of Elsa Beskows books are read frequently in many Waldorf
homes, mine included.
The heart is where I see the three Rs playing an important role. These are a different
three Rs.relationships, rhythm, and reverence. One way that we try to nourish
relationships in our home is to simply spend lots of time together. We guard our schedules
carefully in order to make plenty of space for each other. The hours that I do have with
my children at home are precious. Thats one reason we dont have a television. The kids
do watch DVDs on the computer, but coming home from school and flipping through the
channels out of boredom is not an option. Boredom can be a wonderful gift, prompting
the most creative, focused, meaningful play. It also opens the door to bickering among
siblings on occasion. These are the times that Im most tempted to get a TV, but again,
heres an opportunity to work on relationships!

An established rhythm to our days is vital to the successful functioning of our household,
it provides security and predictability. But this was wonderfully addressed in another
Discovering Waldorf post so Ill move along.
Reverence means honor or respect shown. I try to bring a sense of reverence into our
home by setting apart certain times of the day with ritual. A candle lit at dinnertime,
prayers said before bed, the same I love you hand gesture given each time before we
part, mandatory snuggles on the couch every morning before breakfast; these are little
ways to recognize and bring honor to each other and to our creator, and to address the
needs of the heart. A book that has helped me in simplifying my home life in order to
make room for these three Rs, is called Simplicity Parenting. Its written from a Waldorf
perspective, but it doesnt seem to assume that you are sending your kids to Waldorf
school, something I found helpful.
The hands, or physical activity is where I would place activities such handwork/crafts,
gardening, housework, cooking, and active play. All these activities have a place in a
Waldorf home. Varied practical and artistic abilities are all important in producing well
rounded individuals. With my kids in public school and gone for much of the day, Im
finding that I cant leave time for these things to chance. I have to plan ahead, and take
advantage of school vacation days, weekends, and evenings. Its helpful to have art
supplies set out and readily available at all times. Chores are important! Plenty of time for
unstructured, free play is an invaluable gift.
The needs of the head, the hands, and the heart can not really be separated as simply as I
have done for the purpose of this post, theyre all interconnected. I find that when things
feel a little off, in our home life, its often because these needs are not balanced. For
varied reasons, many of us cannot provide our children with full time Waldorf education,
but that does not mean that we cannot benefit from applying helpful aspects of the
philosophy into our home lives. Keeping a focus on balancing the needs of the head,
heart, and hands is a good place to start if you want bring a Waldorf influence into your
daily life.

Elemental Simplicity by Rick Tan

Balmy skies, fruit trees, sampaguita vines, chickens, and the tropical countryside of a
provincial town were the setting of my early childhood in the Philippines. I clearly
remember when I was five years old, enjoying the company of two younger brothers. We
were often barefoot, spending much of our days outside. The myriad of trees, sugar cane,
banana, papaya, and lemons that dotted our property, and a mix of grasses and gravel,
gave us our playground. We would play hide-and-seek, and tag, and be explorers.
Sometimes, we would chase the chickens. Our imaginations saw fallen branches as
swords or machetes, aiding us in adventures. My brothers and I would take water from
the deep well pump and fill buckets to make waterfalls and rivers, and bits of branches
and leaves became seafaring armadas. The gravel and rocks at our feet became a vast
urban city or ancient ruins. A discarded bicycle tire offered plenty of rolling and spinning
games. There was always the sound of laughter, and the cluck of chickens!
Within the sphere of Waldorf teaching, the playground of my youth had offered ideal
conditions for the sensuous experience of natural materials and forms. When given an
environment that exercises resourcefulness, a young childs creativity and imagination
blossoms. This is the pedagogical basis for the minimalist, elemental approach of Waldorf
for its classrooms, specifically for Kindergarten and the lower grades.
Elegantly simple, hand-carved toys, found materials such as stones, leaves, and branches,
beautiful hand-made furniture, and naturally-dyed silks celebrate the Waldorf approach.
Here, the teacher and the students work and play, building relationships and practical
skills. Waldorf provides the child with a holistic classroom setting that sparks creative
freedom, encourages the will forces, and enlivens the spirit.
One day, for grade one students, I brought a basket of items such as a potato, a river
stone, clothespin, and a piece of bark. I was telling a story about a trip to the river, and
showed them the stone that happened to appear to have two eyes, and it became a

character in the story. While Mr. Rock waited by the side of the river, unsure of how to
get across, I found the clothespin and squeezed it to open its clipping end. I asked the
children what it looked like, and they responded, an alligator! Soon, in the story, Mr.
Alligator helped Mr. Rock across the river, and they became the best of friends!
These days, our children are inundated with specialized, sophisticated toys that are overly
adorned and poorly constructed. Clever ad campaigns draw parents and children in to
purchase these toys, and after the initial excitement of the newness of the thing, the toys
value as a play item rapidly diminishes. Clearly, a magnificent, sophisticated toy does not
equate to hours of engagement of the childs imagination, nor does it equate to building
of the childs emotional or intellectual growth.
Consider the simple cut and smoothed branch of wood from the standpoint of human
physiology. In the childs hand, where touch is engaged, and the weight of the wood is
felt, hundreds of thousands of neurons are firing. The child smells the wood, sees its
textures, and more neurons are firing. The child relates the wood to hikes and camping
trips. The child then sees that it can be anything he or she chooses it to be: a cylindrical
cup of juice, a vase for flowers, a bridge, a bench, a locomotive, a bus, anything! With the
synchronization of the senses, the muscles at play, and the brain lighting up its memory
centers, language, personality, and visual cortex, a simple branch of wood has a lot to
offer in the way of development for the growing child.
Whether in a Waldorf classroom, a home school environment, or other parts of family
life, we must be mindful of the elegance and strength of material economy and elemental
simplicity. And we should also spend more time outside, barefoot!

Waldorf Birthday Traditions by Suzanne

One topic close to my heart is celebrating and honoring the passage of Birth. This
Waldorf celebration is practiced in our home year after year. We believe traditions bring
foundation. It promotes stability. Traditions give our children a link to their past and a
foundation for their future.

We start our Birthday preparation the night before one of our children change age. This
Waldorf Birthday tradition comes in the form of a verse. A dim flickering candle sets the
tone for the happy event the following morning. I have found one special candle I use and
it is brought out for celebrations in the home.
When I have said my evening prayer,
And my clothes are folded on my chair,
And Mother/Father switches off the light,
Ill still be__years old tonight.
But form the very break of day,
Before the children rise and play,
Before the darkness turns to gold,
Tomorrow, Ill be __ years old.
__kisses when I wake,
__candles on my cake.
Cozy and secure they go to sleep. The tradition we have embraced is to sing to the child
until she wakes. Every year I have composed a song and played it on the piano. A song of
their very own. This is one tradition they love.

The Birthday Book by Ann Druitt is a wonderful resource of information and ideas to
welcome in this shining day. The Waldorf Birthday story told by Nancy Foster in Beyond
the Rainbow Bridge by Barbara J. Patterson is one of the lovely stories we use. The child
is taken back to before coming to Earth, we walked with an angel. There is a goodbye and
a parting of a promise to be watched over all our life. How comforting..
There are so many ways we have celebrated. Our special tradition is giving the Birthday
child kisses and wishes. Their Daddy then takes hold of that little pair of hands and the
little one jumps out of the bed one year older. A long golden ribbon is then tied gently
around their wrist and the child then finds her way to her birthday throne having followed
the ribbon.
The gift of imagination is a wonderful thing. A Traditional Waldorf Birthday crown is
placed on her head as the occasion calls for royal treatment. We have also created
Birthday gardens. Thoughtfully planned in advanced with favorite colors and flowers. We
open presents and cards, made by the other siblings and Grannys.

We try to concentrate on homemade gifts. Every year we create these traditions because
we want to nourish our children , create confidence and build personalities of strength.
The Waldorf rhythm of life flows strongly Down in our meadow.

Helping Children to Play by Carrie

The number one thing is to know that in order to help your child to play, you need to
understand the stages of play development. Realistic expectations are very important!
From Ages Newborn to Two and a Half: Not many toys are needed. A special doll,
(arms and legs are not necessary), wooden spoons, pots and bowls are all lovely, along
with baskets to fill and dump.

Barbara Patterson and Pamela Bradley write in Beyond the Rainbow Bridge:
Nurturing Our Children from Birth to Seven: We may not be able to complete
our tasks with a child around, but HOW we do our work is more important than
what we accomplish. If we are only able to do fifteen minutes of concentrated work
when a child is present, it will be fifteen minutes well spent.
Notice there is NOT talk of sacrificing time with your child to do work, but that the work
enlivens the life and energy of the child and the household.
Two and a Half to Five Years: The first bit of fantasy play emerges around the age of
three so if you are expecting your two-year-old child to just take off and play a game
they make up, this may be unrealistic. Likewise, if you have a four and a half year old
who cannot create any kind of games with toys, then you may need to help them catch up
where they should be with play.

So, around three years of age comes lets pretend. Reality and fantasy are the same and
are not separated. This is the stage where open ended toys are so important, because the
play can shift dramatically from minute to minute and the toys need to keep up! Baskets
of silks, crystals, pinecones and such are all great things for this age group to create with.
Children of this age generally do NOT share toys well.
Five to Seven Years: Children are very involved in the creation of the game (which
really is the whole game, not so much the end product). For example, if children of this
age are playing restaurant, the play may be all about deciding a menu, writing a menu,
gathering things, setting up tables, and the real restaurant part where people sit down
and order and someone plays the waiter may not happen.

Children of this age enjoy dolls with arms and legs and clothes to dress and undress.
Simple arts and crafts are wonderful as well. The six-year-old who is going through the
six-year-old transformation and is restless and bored may not need more play, but
instead practical work until they are ready to play again.
The notion of practical work brings up an important point. As always, start with yourself
and what you are modeling for your child to imitate in their play. This is one reason
Waldorf in the Early Years has a great focus on practical work with the hands so your

child can see that! Gardening, knitting, baking, cooking, canning, music, cleaning things
by hand, hanging laundry out to dry are all good places to start.
As mentioned, children need less toys than you think, but open ended toys are good.
People get very caught up in buying the silks and expensive wooden toys, but really
homemade toys are the best. There are a number of books regarding toymaking with
children, one of my favorites is Toymaking with Children by Fraye Jaffke. This would
be a great book to get to make your children some gifts for the holidays! You can start
now and make some fabulous things! There are also examples throughout this book
showing playspaces that are set up with silks and open-ended toys so you can see how to
do this yourself at home!
Create your playspaces close to where you spend your time if you are in the kitchen,
have a playroom near the kitchen or take a corner of your kitchen and have a play corner
there.
Involve your children in your work your real work where they can contribute and feel
as if they played a vital role. Use singing, warmth, stories to draw your child in rather
than commands to help which usually causes the child to run the other way!
If you are working and child has nothing to do or needs your assistance to start playing
again, you can provide them an opportunity to help you, you can essentially become the
old woman who stirs the soup while the train is coming to town and provide a
framework for play without being completely enmeshed and immersed in the play, or you
can stop your own work for a few minutes and help solve the play problem by doing
whatever the child is requesting you to do.

In these ways we are close to our children, we exude warmth and love for our children
and welcome them with open arms for help with play. We dont push them away because
we have our own work, but strive to include the child as we can and help the child in their
important work, the development of play!

The Elephant in my Livingroom by Shannon

For a long time I had been fascinated with the Waldorf education model. I spent hours
researching schools and the practice online. It was not until the creation of a Waldorf
program near our home that I jumped in. It was so comfortable and easy to be at school
with my young son. It was like soul food to be honest. I felt like we had finally found our
community. The natural beauty of the world was welcomed in the form of the toys,
teacher and curriculum. There was really only one challenge for my family.no media.
In my families quest to deepen our waldorf practice, I had to tackle our love affair with
the television. As many of you are aware the waldorf philosophy sees media input as
detrimental to our childrens development. It hinders their imagination and blocks their
soul. As I began to pay attention to the play in our home, I saw how serious this really
was. My youngest, only two at the time, was mesmerized by the images flashing across
the screen. Even if he had begun to play something on his own, which was rare, he would
scream if you tried to turn off the T.V. I felt awful, I had created a tiny television addict.
This apathy was apparent in my whole family.
Thus we began our journey away from the elephant in my living room. Our play group
teacher suggested we start a weaning process. I began by just trying to distract from
turning on the t.v. as long as possible. We started to really play together and get out of the
house on outings more. We started to really reign in what there was to watch. The real
shift came for us when my now 3 yr old entered the pre-k/kindy class. Our teacher very
kindly and firmly asked us to restrict the media viewing even further as it was affecting
his play at school.
Our next step down the path was to cancel the cable and create family movie night. Not
only did this generate some quality together time but it stopped the constant asking for
t.v. time. The children know it happens ever week at the same time. The results have been
amazing. The children not only play on their own more, their creativity is through the
roof. My young son now asks for floor games instead of the television.

A floor game we developed called Crashing Castles. Each player builds a fantastic feat
of engineering. Then each player gets a turn to see if he can crash his car into the
opposite players castle. The player whose castle remains standing the longest is the
winner.
He relishes time spent with his father, making up games after work.
Everyone seems to be happier, less agitated and wound up.
We are not media free yet but we are working towards it.

Preserving Childhood by Nicole of Redbeet Mama

My penchant for living a calm and meaningful lifestyle and my deep desire to preserve
my daughters childhood led my family on a magical journey of setting free old thoughts
and following a simpler way of life. During my pregnancy with my second child, my
husband and I started to practice meditation daily. We were healing from a very traumatic
experience shortly after the birth of our first daughter.
My initiation to motherhood was chaotic, scary and full of love and hope. My energy
went to my daughter and her medical condition while trying hard not to fall apart. My
mind wasnt quiet. I was racing around occupied with errands and activities for the little
one not realizing that my home was the heart center of my life. It was where my daughter
and I needed to be to be one with each other and to make our house a home. Through
calming our minds and focusing on our breath my husband and I evolved into earthloving, meditative vegetarians who cut up our credit cards and went on a major plastic
purge. I sold all things plastic, chunky, garish and anything that made an unnatural sound
on Craigslist. I then went on to sell my fancy baby carriage and heaping bags of name
brand baby clothes on eBay. Our family wasnt hurting for money we were hurting to live
a more meaningful life. Our mantra had become The more you live without, the more
you live within.

After the birth of our second daughter, my husbands job took us to live in Connecticut.
This change allowed me to let go more, start fresh and gave me the confidence to go in
the direction of my hearts desires. I was immensely enjoying being a stay at home Mom
and I had never been happier in my life but I wanted to move back home. We moved

back to Pennsylvania and wholeheartedly began living a modern-Waldorf-inspired

lifestyle in our new condo perhaps an oxymoron to some. I make it work. I make the
effort to spend as much free time outside in nature everyday. As my husband likes to
say, There is no such thing as bad weather just bad clothes. (He is Norwegian)
The rhythm in our home is free-flowing and revolves around my chores and the little
ones needs. I involve them in all that I do and I enjoy the togetherness sometimes
though it requires me to reach deep within especially when it involves flour!The trick is
to feel unhurried and to remember to exhale.
The little ones help me with the laundry and the dishes. They each have their own
household routines like pouring the evening tea or watering the flower bed in the
morning.

Everything we own has a specific place in our home this makes clean up easy and the
house uncluttered. I believe living with less and living without clutter has made us all
happier. I do my best to be mindful and create an environment that is calm and inviting
the whole day through. In the morning after breakfast and chores, I warm lavender oil,
play soothing music and do handwork with the little ones.
Soon after their handwork the little ones intuitively set off to go on their own to play. I
use the expand and contract idea and it works. After focusing on handwork they like to
play freely and energetically. After morning snack we go outside our day unfolds with
this rhythm of inhaling and exhaling breathing very slowly staying in the moment. They
play with seasonal items such as shells, acorns, stones, crystals anything else they have
found in nature and with our much loved handmade toys.

With the proceeds from our plastic purge and clothing sale we invested in a Waldorf play
stand, silks, blocks, and a few wooden toys, true luxuries. On most days, while the girls
are deeply involved with their play there is a magical energy in our home a humming
that says do not disturb this is how childhood is supposed to be. I try not to interrupt
them with my adult agenda which is my biggest challenge in setting our pace for the day.
I am very mindful of how I plan our outside time, our social time and the time we use to
run our errands. As a general rule, the only store I take them to is our local childrens
consignment shop, health food store and the food market. Stores are just as bad as the
media when it comes to interfering with my attempts of preserving our daughters
childhood. The little ones watch very little television. As a family we watch shows like
Caillou, Little Bear and nature programs together. I also watch very little TV and when I
do the little ones are asleep. This alone has made a huge difference in my life I am no
longer influenced by the media or unnecessarily stressed out by what I see or hear.

The biggest influence in my life and where I gather my inspiration is from my meditation
practice, my husband, books, blogs and my Goddess circle. I was meant to take this path.
My daughters are happy our family is happy. It has confused some, but has made sense
to me and my husband the entire way. It is possible to go from being trapped in a fastliving, Fisher-Price, Gymboree buying Mama to an in the moment, mindful and
calm Redbeet Mama. I blog about the challenges and joys of living a Waldorf inspired
lifestyle in a condo, raising my girls, celebrating my inner Goddess ( all woman are
Goddesses whether or not they recognize it, I choose to recognize it and it has made me a
better wife, mother and self.) My blog is my gratitude journal and allows me to express
myself while my little ones sleep and it keeps me focused on my goals of preserving my
daughters childhood.

Waldorf Essentials by Melisa Nielsen

What is essential? It is a question that Rudolf Steiner tells us to ask of ourselves. I have been
at this a long time and the word essential always stops me cold. Of course, like many
moms, I love the beauty of a Waldorf home. Simple, clean lines, beautiful wooden toys,
beeswax crayons, soft tones. The stage is set for such a warming atmosphere one where we
would all love to curl up and stay. This isnt Waldorf though this is materialism. Often
when moms cant have that perfect home they get down, feel depressed or spend every extra
dollar on that next wooden toy. Is this essential? I say no. Ive been at this for many years
and yes, we have beautiful play things that we have acquired, we have many of the material
desires of the Waldorf heart, but it took me years to obtain them. Looking back, while I was
pining for the look of the Waldorf home, I really should have been working on me. The spirit
of Waldorf lies not in the toys, not in the trappings, not in beautiful blog posts and afternoons
spent sorting through pages of Flickr photos. It isnt in that wooden castle or in the basket of
perfectly sorted and folded play silks. It is in YOU. It is in the striving and more importantly
the understanding of Rudolf Steiners desire for children. In the book Rhythms of Learning
by Steiner, co-authored by Roberto Trostli, Robert McDermott writes the foreword. He
explains:
The self-education of adults is essential for the Waldorf approach to educating children,
because Waldorf does not consist solely of methods, techniques, or structures, but rather the
development of human capacities those of the children but also, and more importantly,
those of teachers and parents.
This passage sends a strong message that Waldorf education is about really understanding
Steiner and his work. The beauty of Waldorf isnt in what the eye can see it is in what the
heart can feel. When you tap into it at first, your senses are overwhelmed by the visual
stimulus the beauty of the Waldorf playroom or the wonder of the children dancing around
when their other schooled peers are playing video games or pretending to be older than they
really are. When you begin to pull back the layers and really begin to study the method, your
heart starts to understand something that your eyes and brain can not comprehend. Waldorf
is a feeling, a knowing and above all it is a TRUSTING. Our mainstream culture does not
teach parents to trust, it teaches them to question everything and to forget that faith plays a
very large role in parenting. Faith and patience are forgotten virtues in this world of I-

want-it-now so we must work to cultivate it within ourselves. When we develop our will in a
healthy way, our children benefit and we can really begin to live the essentials of Waldorf.
How do we develop this? Inner work is such a huge part. If I had to hang my hat on
anything, it would be my connection to God, Source, Goddess what ever that means for
you. Steiner believed that children need this strong connection as well and in this world that
continually dulls us, we need that connection to make us sharp again.
In The Renewal of Education Steiner writes:
If one observes children who, through proper upbringing, have developed a natural
reverence for the adults around them, and if one follows them through their various phase of
life, one may discover that their feelings for reverence and devotion in childhood gradually
transform during the years leading to old age. As adults, such persons may have a healing
effect on others, so that through their mere presence, tone of voice, or perhaps a single
glance they spread inner peace to others. Their presence can be a blessing, because as
children they have learned to venerate and to pray in the right way. No hands can bless in
old age, unless in childhood they have been folded in prayer.
This IS the heart of Waldorf. That essential connection to the Divine. This connection allows
us to then dream big, set goals, move forward without the connection, it is all just stuff. In
this world of materialism, we must work harder to bring to our children a sense of gratitude,
love and duty. A sense of Waldorf. It is in the heart, not the eyes.
What is essential? Steiner believed we all need three basic things: 1) our basic material
needs met, 2) to learn how to get along with our fellow man and 3) freedom in education.
These are Waldorf essentials. The rest is fluff.
Now, now I am hearing many of your already but wait! This stuff is awesome! It is
great! Shouldnt we have a wonderful natural home? YES! You should always strive for
those things that make your heart sing, always! But know first your god, then yourself,
then your children.cultivate the beauty there.then there is beauty every where.
A line from one of my favorite songs there is beauty all around, when theres love at home.
May this method bless your heart and soul, may you bless others with the knowledge of what
you have learned and may your children bless their children because of the great work you
have begun.

Eurythmy by Carrie of The Parenting Passageway.

Eurythmy was invented by Dr. Rudolf Steiner and his wife Dr. Marie Steiner-von
Sivers in 1912. It has often been called visible speech or visible song, and is not only
a performing art, but also part of the educational curriculum within the Waldorf School
setting. This is unique to Waldorf Education and eurythmy is often viewed as the pinnacle
of the artistic component of Waldorf Education.
Eurythmy essentially integrates all the subjects taught within the Waldorf curriculum in a
whole-body movement. The Guidelines for Eurythmy in the Waldorf School as put
forth by The Eurythmy Association of North American and adopted by best practices by
AWNSA and the Pedagogical Section of the School of Spiritual Science has this to say
about the place of eurythmy within the curriculum: The special skills children develop
in eurythmy include bodily and spatial orientation, a sense for rhythm and measure,
teamwork and social awareness, bringing poise, self-confidence, and the ability to think
for oneself. The movements of eurythmy are filled with meaning which is of the same
nature as language itself. The eurythmy curriculum offers exercises to provide a deeply
somatic, kinesthetic understanding of all the subjects in school, including, for instance,
math, geometry, botany, physics, chemistry, history, color, optics, poetry, and music. The
wisdom of eurythmy supports the totality of Waldorf education. It is the supreme
example of a principle in all Steiner education that movement comes first. For it is the
activity of the limbs which awakens and vitalizes the experience of the head.

A eurythmist typically graduates from a four-year to five-year program. The curriculum

involves attending eurythmy classes once a week from Kindergarten through Grade
Three, and then from Grade Four through Twelve attending twice a week. Certain
eurythmy exercises correspond to certain stages of development, and the eurythmist

works with the Class Teacher to support the subjects being taught. I have heard Eurythmy
referred to as soul gymnastics because the whole life of the soul can be moved through
these exercises the way a gymnast moves the physical body through exercises.

Many Waldorf homeschoolers want to try to bring this art to their homeschool. I feel this
could quickly become the children just imitating some of the physical gestures (if you
even know those!) and not really getting the essential part that makes up eurythmy the
etheric gesture. Furthermore, the gestures of speech should certainly be brought by a
trained eurythmist.
So what is a Waldorf homeschooler to do?
I would implore you to look for purposeful and precise movement that goes with verses
and rhymes and songs. Look for what movement and gesture you and your child could
experience with oral recitation and poetry in the grades.
There are many resources for movement and gesture in the Waldorf homeschooling
arena. Two resources listed specifically for eurythmy come to mind. These include
Eurythmy For The Young Child by Estelle Breyer (for the Early Years, some things are
suitable for Grade One) and the Come Unto These Yellow Sands by Molly van Heider.
(covers preschool through Grades Nine to Twelve). Neither of these resources will show
you what gestures to bring for things such as letters, but will give you suggestions for
what letters or purposeful movements go with the songs and stories and verses in the
books. If you would like to see what eurythmy in a classroom would look like, I suggest
you try the 2006 DVD of David-Michael Monarch entitled The Waldorf Curriculum
Through Eurythmy from the Whole Parent, Whole Child conference and available
through Rahima Baldwin Dancys website. Joyful Movement by Donna Simmons of
Christopherus Homeschooling Resources is not a eurythmy resource per say, but certainly
has many ideas for movement in the home environment and is very practical and
accessible to the Waldorf homeschooler.
But best of all, experiment with your own heartfelt gestures for stories and verses. Try to
bring out the exaggerated physical movement of the characters and archetypes in the

stories you tell to your own children. Work on incorporating singing and clapping
games into your homeschool. Work with skipping, stamping, tip-toe walking, walking on
heels and the polarities found between quiet and loud and small and big gestures.
Your homeschool can have as much beauty in movement as you can offer; from the small
points of beauty in your own rhythm to the sounds of careful recitation to precise
movement and gestures to beautiful music to warmth. These things build the etheric
body for the future health of our children.

Raising Singing Children by Angela Mobley

Nine years ago, I came to work at the Waldorf School of Louisville as a handwork
teacher. Nine years ago, I had to have two and sometimes three part-time jobs, and one of
those jobs was teaching voice lessons at a small music school. Positioned this way,
between the new (to me), wonderful world of Waldorf, and the outside world I was able
to

make

several

observations.

The first thing I observed was that the students in the Waldorf classes sang with energy,
joy, and were remarkably on pitch. In contrast, my private students often struggled with
this, even if I offered to sing with them. The second thing that struck me was the
confidence level of the Waldorf students. It wasnt at the level of bravado, but just a
knowledge that this is what we do, this is what I can do too. It broke my heart when I
would get an adult singing student who said, I was always told I couldnt sing, or a
self-deprecating, I cant carry a tune in a bucket. We have all heard people at parties
and gatherings insist they cant sing. It was even sadder when I got a younger student
who said those words.
While singing is not necessarily everyones forte (pun intended!), at some point in our
lives we are given messages about singingmessages of indifference, of nurturing, of
capability, or of incapacity. These messages are powerful, for our voices carry such deep
capacity for expression. Our voices express the full complement of human emotions, and
a simple tone of voice carries myriad nuances of communication. Thehuman voice is
remarkable in that it is an ever-changing, ever-modulating, very alive part of us. It is
affected by our mood, illness, allergies, what we last ate, and the very air we breathe.
Having a strong, confident speaking voice affects how others view us. And then there is
singingthe artistic use of the voice.
In music class, I ask my students a question: What body part is most important to singing
and making music on instruments? They will guess all the usual thingshands, voices,
even eyes. Eventually someone mentions ears. Yes! Your ears! They are very important
in making music! Our ears are assaulted with so many extraneous sounds every day. We
do indeed live in a very noisy world, especially if one lives in town. Theambient music in
stores, noises from machines, car radio, air conditioner, etc. all contribute to a lack of
hearing. When do we truly have time to listen? Often we dont know we are listening. A
friend of mine told me of a study where people were asked to hum a pitch. The pitch most

hummed corresponded exactly to the pitch of most refrigerators. Even though we might
not be aware of so much noise, it still affects us.
Listening and singing go hand in hand. While we cannot control every sound we and our
children are exposed to, we still have enough control to help our children sing. And this is
where my Waldorf learning comes in. Music in Waldorf education is such a vast and
broad subject, and I encourage you to explore the resources that follow this article and
many many more. What follows focuses on the child before the nine year change and on
singing, since singing can be taken anywhere and it is an integral part of the Waldorf
curriculum. If you have older children I hope you will still be encouraged to bring more
song into your body and your life, through singing and instruments.
First of all, I believe that singing parents and singing teachers make singing children. If
you as a parent or teacher are committed to your own path of learning and practicing
singing, your students and children will inevitably benefit from that an take in your
enthusiasm. Second, I have never met a child who isnt naturally a singing child. Every
child singsimitation is key in the first 7 years, and children bring out of themselves
things they hear in their environment. Waldorf encourages an environment that nourishes
the senses, so providing an environment rich in the warm tones of the human voice and
poor in electronic, canned music does just that. Children have teachers that sing from
the earliest age. They are given the implied message that singing is simply a part of life.
Third, the way to teach a child to sing is to not teach them at all, or instruct them or
bring attention to how they are singing, but rather, just sing!
So if adults bring more singing to their day and pay attention to creating a nourishing
environment of sound, they will be surrounded by children who naturally sing. Luckily
for most of us, this is pretty easy. Take the song, Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. The first
two words of that song contain all you need to know to start singing with children. Yes,
sing, twinkle, twinkle and you have just sung the interval of a fifth. There is a musical
principle employed in Waldorf schools called the mood of the fifth. Children are so
fresh from the world of spirit, and have not yet landed on this earth. Music with a
dreamy, floating, swinging feeling -music in the mood of the fifth- meets them right
where they are in their development. Most music in our environment is based on a major
scale and has a very strong feeling of coming homeof being eventually grounded.
Music in the mood of the fifth is based on the pentatonic scale, and to adults, can feel

unfinished or left behind. However, this is exactly what meets the needs of the child,
essentially before the nine-year-change. There are also many wonderful songs based on
the pentatonic scale, yet they have a very definite sense of resolutionof coming
home.
So how to even begin? One could take the simple Twinkle, Twinkle exercise and apply
those two notes to any nursery rhyme. There you have started singing with your child.
Sing your meal blessing on one notewhich can actually be a difficult thing to do! Have
a little waking up song, or sing a prayer. Sing lullabies! Children never seem too old for
the magic of lullabies. Sing in the shower.discover your voice and what it can do, and
your children will follow! Make up songs with your children just for fun. Make up songs
about a story you just read. Take singing lessons yourself to nurture your artistic
development. All of these efforts set the stage for future musical development in your
child, gives children a can-do attitude toward music, instills enthusiasm for singing, and
promotes a lifelong love of music.
Resources for beginning your singing journey:
Quintenlieder, Julius Knierim
Bringing Love, Giving Joy by Wilma Ellersiek
waldorfmusic.org
A Lifetime of Joy by Bronja Zahligen
I Love to be Me by Channa Seidenberg
Pentatonic Songs by Elisabeth Lebret
This, by no means, is a comprehensive list, but it will certainly start you on your way.

Modeling in Waldorf Education

By Kristie Burns
www.Earthschooling.com
www.HerbnHome.com
Modeling is one of the most important concepts in early Waldorf childhood education.
Many books are written on the topic and entire Waldorf parent-child and Early Childhood
programs are based on the concept. However, one must not lose sight of the fact that, in
Waldorf education, each year is intended to build upon the previous year, not replace it.
In Waldorf education what a child learns one year directly builds upon what they have
learned in the previous year. Modeling continues to be important in the upper grades,
even if it is not the central way of learning for the child.
In the early years emphasis is put on teaching the child through actions. When the
parent/teacher does the dishes, a child also learns responsibility, fine motor skills and a
sense of order. When the parent/teacher reads a book the child learns that books are
something of interest and will become attracted to learning more about the words that are
in them; and, when the parent/teacher knits a toy for the child the child may play with the
yarn and try to knit something themselves. All these experiences become part of who the
child is. At home, parents are encouraged to continue about their daily tasks rather than
becoming the entertainment for the child or enrolling them in numerous outside
activities for it is within the home and in watching the parent that the child will learn all
they need to learn to prepare them for the advanced learning processes.

Once a child reaches the age of seven, the emphasis is shifted to instruction rather than
modeling. However, modeling should not be forgotten. Rudolf Steiner, the founder of
Waldorf education, spent many hours lecturing to teachers in his first schools about being
good role-models. Many of his lectures began with a verse created to prepare the teachers
for learning and to center their minds. Although he spoke of numerous topics from
geography to math he constantly emphasized that the teacher should strive to be in the
best physical and emotional health possible and always set a good example for the

students. In his lectures to some of the first teachers Steiner said, First, teachers must
make sure that they influence and work on their pupils, in a broader sense, by allowing
the spirit to flow through their whole being as teachers, and also in the details of their
work: how each word is spoken, and how each concept or feeling is developed. Teachers
must be people of initiative. They must be filled with initiative. Teachers must never be
careless or lazy; they must, at every moment, stand in full consciousness of what they do
in the school and how they act toward the children.
By the time a child is in 6th grade modeling should be second nature to the experienced
teacher and this will naturally be reflected in how the class (or your student(s) at home)
act.
This point has been illustrated many times to me in the past year as Ive been doing
workshops for various private and public schools around Iowa. A typical day for me
includes a 45-60 minute presentation to 4-8 different classes with different teachers. The
students I work with are in 1st 6th grade well beyond early childhood. It continues to
amaze me how teachers are still so vividly reflected in their classes. It reminds me of
studying microcosms and macrocosms in sociology class. The class truly is the
macrocosm of the teacher, the microcosm.
If the teacher is sitting and listening to my presentation the students will too. If the
teacher is interested and curious so are the students. If the teacher participates in the
activity the students participate more enthusiastically and are more present and
cooperative. On the other hand, if the teacher is sitting in the back of the room talking to
another teacher, the students will be distracted and perhaps whispering themselves. If the
teacher stares off into space and looks bored and tired the students often have glazed
looks on their faces as well. And if the teacher does not participate and takes the
opportunity to take a break the students tend to walk through the motions of the activity
rather than throwing themselves wholeheartedly into it.
Of course, there are exceptions there are always those one or two students who are
enthusiastic no matter what. And there is the factor of the presenter. Eventually I work
hard enough to bring everyone to where they should be focusing, enthusiastic,

present and happy. However, depending on what state they are in when I start my job is
either much harder or much easier.
Another example comes to light in my temperament counseling sessions. During a
temperament counseling session the parent and I work together to determine which of the
four temperaments their child is and how best to teach and parent that child based on their
temperament. We also discuss any specific concerns or situations the parent may have
with the child. What is interesting, however, is that often the concerns have as much to do
with the parents temperament rather than the childs.
A choleric parent may often express themselves in enthusiastic and dramatic ways. When
this is reflected back at them from their child it often appears defiant and challenging.
The sanguine parent may tend to do things spontaneously in the moment. When this is
reflected back at them it may appear the child is doing tasks without thought or
consideration. I remember, once, a parent sharing how she was so upset with her child
once for putting sewing pins in her mouth. She asked her, why on earth would you do
such a thing? The child innocently responded, mama, when you sew you put the pins in
your mouth.
A melancholic parent who models a sense of order and routine may be frustrated with a
child who insists on keeping their own routine (which may not match their own) and a
phlegmatic parent who models a sense of steady motivation may wonder why their child
does not show the initiative that they are expecting from a child.
In the area of discipline modeling is also important. One of my favorite examples is that
of time-outs. Why do they work for some parents and not others? The reason is modeling.
If, as a parent, you model time-outs yourself and take them yourself then the child will
see these as something normal and useful and will not feel they are a punishment. Timeouts are a useful way for all people to stop and think about their actions. Parents, as well
as children, should take time-outs. Rather than telling a child You have a time-out! as a
punishment, time-outs can be modeled by the parent saying I think I need a time-out to
think before I talk to you. and then later suggesting that the child may need one

themselves. In this way we are teaching the child to learn how to balance their behavior
and be patient and thoughtful rather than punishing them.
As parents we will get the best behavior, work ethic, manners and speech out of our
children if we model these ourselves. I am constantly impressed at how effective
modeling is as a tool of teaching, discipline and learning. I agree with Steiner when he
concluded one of his lecture by saying, But our Waldorf school, my dear friends, will
depend on what you do within yourselves, and whether you really allow the things we
have considered to become effective in your own souls.

Why Waldorf Works: From a Neuroscientific Perspective

By Dr. Regalena Reggie Melrose
Why Waldorf works has more to do with how the brain develops and functions optimally
than Rudolf Steiner ever could have known. Sure the educator and founder of Waldorf
Education theorized convincingly about how children learn best, but until MRIs and other
sophisticated measures of the brain were developed, we had no way to prove or disprove
any of Steiners theories, not with the kind of precision and accuracy we can now. An
overwhelming body of evidence from the last 20 years of neuroscientific inquiry supports
Steiners theories, including some of the most fundamental foci of Waldorf Education.
Three foci thrill me the most, both as a parent of a Waldorf student and as an international
speaker on the topic of learning, behavior, and the brain: holism, play, and nature. An
emphasis on all three is consistent with how the brain learns best: when the whole brain is
engaged at any given moment, when its foundational neural connections have been given
ample time to develop, and when it is in an optimally aroused state.
Knowing how the brain develops is essential to understanding why these three foci are so
important to the success of any educational program. Let us first learn some basic
fundamentals of the brain. First of all, it is triune, that is, it has three parts. More
importantly, not all three parts are fully developed at birth as we once believed. In fact,
very little of a newborns brain is online and ready to go. When the brains of
newborn babies are observed with an MRI, the only part of the brain that is lit up or

active is the most primal part the brain stem, sensing brain, or animal brain, as it is
also called. (Small underdeveloped parts of the auditory and visual cortices are the only
exceptions.) This primal part of the brain is responsible for our experience of arousal and
stress. It kicks into high gear and mediates our fight or flight response when needed. I
like to call it the sensory brain because it only speaks the language of sensations, the
only language that most consistently enables our survival. When we encounter a bear in
the woods, for example, our words will not save us, but our heightened senses do.
The second and third parts of our brain the limbic, feeling brain and the neocortex or
thinking brain, respectively only begin to develop after birth. This is critical new
knowledge that provides a compelling answer to the long, highly debated question of
nature versus nurture. We now know that because we only have use of a very small part
of our brain at birth, the brain is literally sculpted by the experiences we have interacting
with others in the environment. It is not until 3 to 4 months of age, when the feeling brain
has become activated by experience that newborns are able to express more than just
states of distress or contentment, as it does with only the sensory brain. At this somewhat
older age, babies can share a wide range of emotions, thereby giving us a more social
baby.
The third part of the brain, the neocortex, thinking brain, begins to develop after the
limbic, feeling brain. Indications of this maturation include babbling between 6 and 9
months, a first word around the age of 1, and 2 to 3 words strung together by the age of 2.
Whereas sensations are the language of the sensory brain and feelings are the language of
the limbic brain, the neocortex speaks the language of words and mediates all of what
most educators value. For example, the neocortex mediates impulse control, the ability to
plan ahead, to organize, and to understand that a choice we make now may continue to
have consequences later. Empathy for another is mediated by the neocortex, as are our
abilities to use ration, reason, and logic. We think and analyze with our neocortex, and of
course, understand and have use of both receptive and expressive verbal language. If
youve heard about right brain versus left brain functioning, it will make sense to you
now that it is the neocortex that controls the functions of the left hemisphere whereas the
sensing and feeling parts of the brain control the functions of the right hemisphere. The
brain operates optimally when all its parts are equally developed, valued, and engaged.
Why Waldorf works is because it does just that.

Steiners approach to education was a holistic one. He recognized that our senses,
feelings, and cognitions must all be actively engaged at each stage of development in
order for students to maintain, over the long term, a joy and love of learning. Waldorf
educators do not make the same mistake made by a number of other more traditional,
conventional, and mainstream models of education. Waldorf educators do not overvalue
the development of the neocortex and left brain to the exclusion of the right brain, that
which senses and feels deeply. It does not focus at too young of an age, before the brain is
ready, on purely academic endeavors that attempt with rigor to engage a part of the brain
that the child has little access to, the underdeveloped neocortex. (The neocortex is not
fully developed until we are in our mid- to late twenties!) Instead, what Waldorf
educators do successfully is involve and nourish the sensing, feeling parts of the brain,
those easily accessed by young children, so that essential foundational neural connections
needed for later academic learning are solidly laid.
Let me expand: You now know that the brain develops in a hierarchical fashion from
more to less primitive, from the animal to more uniquely human. What that means is that
the healthy development of the more sophisticated neocortex DEPENDS upon the
healthy development of the feeling, limbic brain which DEPENDS upon the healthy
development of the sensory brain. The problem with todays mainstream educational
models is that they want the brain to walk before it can crawl. Well, lets be accurate:
Most school systems today want children to RUN before they can crawl. We encounter
proud parents who say, My child was walking at 9 months! She didnt even need to
crawl, just up and went! Isnt that terrific? And what I want to say is, No! No, thats not
terrific! Push her to the floor! Make her crawl! That might be an overzealous reaction,
but it is grounded in sound knowledge that every single stage of development is essential
to the next, laying a neural foundation to support what is to come. Our children need
ample time and practice to marinate in their mastery, of one skill or another, at each and
every juncture of their development. This is not happening in enough schools across the
country today, but it is happening at Waldorf.
Take the case of play. From the very beginning of a childs educational career at a
Waldorf school, he or she is supported to play in a variety of different fashions and
settings throughout the entire school day. Steiner knew that play is the invaluable
foundation for any kind of healthy, human growth, including academic progress. And

lets be clear about what kind of play this is. It is what Dr. David Elkind calls the purest
form of play: the unstructured, [spontaneous], self-motivated, imaginative, independent
kind, where children initiate their own games and even invent their own rules. This kind
of play, he warns us, is disappearing from our homes, schools, and neighborhoods at an
alarming rate with great cost to the health, well-being, and achievement of our children.
Numerous studies have shown that play at every stage of development improves IQ,
social-emotional functioning, learning, and academic performance. The findings of
several studies conducted over a 4 year period found that spending one-third of the school
day in physical education, art, and music improved not only physical fitness, but attitudes
toward learning, and test scores, according to Dr. Elkind. Furthermore, when the
performance of children who attended academic pre-schools was compared to the
performance of children who attended play-oriented preschools, the results showed no
advantage in reading and math achievement for the academic children, but did show
that they had higher levels of test anxiety, were less creative, and had more negative
attitudes toward school than did the play children.
This is precisely the point we are missing in todays achievement-driven culture. We have
bought into a myth in education that more equals more. A formula of more time spent
on academics, starting earlier in development, with more homework, is not increasing the
output of our children. Its decreasing it! Cutting time out for the arts, physical activity,
and time in nature, so our children can spend more time reading, writing, and doing
arithmetic is not the answer. It is the culprit. Our children are burning out and dropping
out at catastrophic rates not just because more doesnt equal more, but also because it
equals shut-down.
The brain functions its best only when in an optimum state of arousal. Our children
cannot attend, listen, process information, retain, or perform well when in an either
under- or over-aroused state. Overwhelm is what causes these states. When before the
brain is ready children are exposed to and required to participate in academics, media,
technology, and organized play, such as team sports, the premature and often prolonged
stress they experience can eventually shut the system down. Teachers all over the United
States and Canada tell me they see it by the beginning of third grade. In far too many of
their students, they say the light has gone out. The joy, curiosity, and wonder that are
essential to the learning process are already dulled by too much of one thing and not

another. Whereas the mainstream educational system today focuses almost exclusively on
academics, a mostly left brain function, Waldorf educators focus more on the whole
brain, emphasizing the right hemisphere at each stage of development. Steiner could only
have observed and therefore hypothesized that this keeps our children in the optimum
zone of arousal where all of learning and adaptive behavior are possible. With current
scientific findings, we now know he was right. Tapping into the sensory gifts of the right
hemisphere provides the flow necessary for the marathon of achievement, not just the
sprint.
Now that weve learned about the importance of holism and play to the learning process,
let us consider the invaluable role of nature. A given within education is the engagement
of the left brain. Learning almost always involves a verbal, analytical process. What is
not a given, is the stimulation and expression of the right brain. The functions of the right
hemisphere of the brain have somehow been deemed less important to the achievement
and ultimate success of our children, at least success as most define it in the U. S. Our
bodies are supported to move less, our minds to race more. Cuts have been made not only
to recess and physical education, but also to creative endeavors such as theater, music,
and fine art, all of which make important contributions to the optimal functioning of the
brain, achievement, AND success no matter how you define it. What does nature have to
do with it? A whole lot, according to the neuroscience: nothing stimulates and resonates
with the right brain more powerfully, and therefore, nothing keeps us in the optimum
zone of arousal better than nature.
Remember, the optimum zone of arousal, when anxiety is neither too high nor too low, is
the only physiological state within which all of learning and adaptive behavior is
possible. Nature beautifully promotes that state. According to years of research recently
compiled by Dr. Eeva Karjalainen, natural green settings reduce stress, improve mood,
reduce anger and aggression, increase overall happiness, and even strengthen our immune
system. Nature is one critical antidote to the increases in stress, overwhelm, burnout, and
dropout we are witnessing in the educational system today. Lack of exposure to nature
causes such a detrimental state to the brain, and is so pervasive today we have a name for
it: Nature Deficit Disorder. Dr. Karjalainen reports that after stressful or
concentration-demanding situations, we do not recover nearly as well in urban settings
as we do in natural ones. When we experience nature, our blood pressure, heart rate,

muscle tension, and level of stress hormones all decrease faster than when we are in
urban settings. In children in particular, we know that ADHD symptoms are reduced
when they are given the opportunity to play in green settings.
As a mother myself, I cant imagine a parent on earth that doesnt want all of these
benefits and more for their children. I cant imagine that once parents and educators know
the research findings pointing the way to optimal brain functioning, that any of us would
ever agree to the kind of educational system we have now. The alternative of Waldorf
exists, and I am grateful. I urge every parent to learn more about it and strongly consider
it for their children. I am also aware, however, that not every parent has access to a
Waldorf school for financial, geographical, or other reasons. For those parents and all of
us really, I have an additional urging, that we vote, petition, write letters, make calls, and
fight however we can to ensure that the reform about to take place in the current
educational system be founded on the invaluable neuroscientific findings of the last 20
years. We must demand changes that are backed by sound science, based on how we
know the brain works best, not just in the short-term, but for all the years to come.
Please
visit www.whywaldorfworks.com; www.racetonowhere.com;www.americasangel.org; w
ww.drmelrose.com; and, www.waitingforsuperman.com for more information and
resources.

Sharing the light of Advent by Kelly

As we walked through the woods on a crisp, misty November morning recently, we
passed along a familiar path that we have walked so very many times through fir trees
and past a beautiful mossy tree stump, around which it is our family tradition to walk our
Advent Spiral each December.
At this point, I mentioned to my children that we would soon be celebrating the start of
the Advent season.
And that means branches of fragrant fir, pine and spruce . . . prickly holly covered with
fat holly berries . . . the best pine cones and the brightest, softest moss from beside the old
Cotswold stone walls . . . all this wed be collecting to make our Advent Wreaths
together, as we do each year on the day before the first Sunday of Advent.
It was then I thought just how well we know these woods . . .
How we wander almost daily among these trees, just as the deer and the squirrels do.
How we have special dens in special spots. How last Advent Spiral our little apple-loving
Noah munched big holes out of all the apples which were meant to be candle holders.

Or how enchanting the woods appeared covered in snow in deepest winter as we trudged
along, almost expecting to see the Snow Queen ride by in an ice chariot.And how we all
marveled at the wonderfully vivid wild woodland flowers of early spring.
I then fondly remembered waddling along these paths with my very big baby belly during
Easter, all of us hoping to spot that Easter hare, who we know lives in the fields on the far
side of the woods. I remembered watching butterflies flutter among the shafts of sunlight
streaming through the dense green canopy of leafy summer trees. Making fairy baths in
tree hollows for Midsummers Eve, or captivated by a sky ablaze with red-and-purple
sunset dragons at Michaelmas in autumn.
So three seasons have passed, with winter now in the ascendancy. With these seasons, a
rich tradition of festivals has been celebrated hand in hand. Our three children are now
a year older, with a new babe since joining the clan. I am grateful for how our family
gently flows through these two cycles nature and festivals so entwined with each
other, naturally and simply, until here we are again, near the end of another circle.
Which brings us back to Advent!
I asked my eldest child what he looked forward to most about the Advent season.His
answer was that he loved how all the natural world gets ready for the birth of the Christ
Child. Children inherently know the essence of a festival through our family traditions,
expression and symbols of a festival simply and naturally.
But what is Advent, and how does it all work?
To be honest, I didnt have a good understanding before having children and discovering
Waldorf, but I can now confidently say that Advent includes the four Sundays prior to
Christmas, a time of inner searching, introspection and anticipation.
It is through the darkness of the Earth we await the birth of a new inner light to warm our
hearts and strengthen our thoughts and deeds. This is manifested in the Christ Child of

light born on the night of Christmas. All the kingdoms of nature Mineral, Plant, Animal
and Human from beneath to above await the coming birth. Advent is a journey inward
to the soul, where we become aware of the eternal light that lightens our way.It is also so
beautifully entwined in the northern hemisphere with Winter Solstice and the return of
the Sun, and in the southern hemisphere with Summer celebrating the Sun. Advent is a
fun, joyous time for children especially.A time that will forever be etched in their
memories.
For those celebrating the Advent festival, and to all spiritual beliefs and traditions, this
time of year has something special for everyone the Season of Light on so many levels.
It is a time of seeking and keeping that light aglow and sharing the light.
I share with you some of our Advent traditions.For our family, this weekend will be full
of activity as we reach the start of Advent. We will collect evergreens and prepare an
Advent Wreath. A circle of evergreen holding four candles.Beeswax or not, it is the light
that is important.There is much symbolism here within the circle and candles.
We will also clear away our autumn nature display, and in its place prepare Marys Star
Path our Nativity scene and Advent calendar all in one.We will add a blue cloth on
which to add the stars. We will place Mother Mary at the start of the stars a gold star for
each day of Advent, with a big star for each Sunday and a final big star for Christmas
Eve.The children take turns sticking up the stars and moving Mary along to the next star
on the path.They love the wonder of these two meaningful activities.Each week we will
also add stones, plants, animals, people and finally the Light in the manger.

On Sunday, the first Sunday of Advent, we recognise the mineral kingdom.This week is
the Festival of Stones.We light the first candle and around that candle add a special stone,
crystal, shell. Anything from the mineral kingdom dear to the children.We also add
stones, shells, minerals around the Mary scene.We also like to make crystals this week.
From the second Sunday of Advent we light the second candle on the wreath so we have
two candles aglow.It is the Festival of Plants.We add berries, nuts, flowers, pine cones,
moss, wood, and straw around the candle. Around the Mary scene we add plant
treasures.We also decorate our home with holly and make Christmas decorations using
plant treasures acorns, pine cones for the Christmas tree which we bring in and
decorate this week too.We also like to plant a tree or plant bulbs or seeds this week.
From the third Sunday, it is the Festival of Animals so we focus our attention on the
animal kingdom. We light three candles on the wreath and add something made of wool
or beeswax or a little wooden animal.
We add, sheep, donkey and an ox to our Mary scene.We think of ways to honour animals,
like setting out extra bird food, or other acts of kindness to animals and pets.
From the fourth Sunday, it is the Festival of Humankind.We add a human image around
the fourth lit candle.We now have all four candles glowing and spreading lots of light.We
add shepherds to the nativity scene. We think of ways to show extra kindness to
people.By now we hope our home is glowing with warmth, kindness and light!Outside,
the suns light continues to dwindle leading to Winter Solstice, the shortest day on
21stDecember.This is the time we walk our Advent Spiral in the woods.
Those woods are our second home and it just seems a fitting location for us.We all gather
up boughs of evergreens and we form a spiral with these around the special tree
stump.We bring warm tea in a flask to enjoy while we wait for dusk.

We have candles stuck in apples and, if it is windy, then we have tealights in jars.Then the
children, one by one, take an apple candle, and walk the spiral.They light theirs on the big
candle in the centre, and then walk out and place their candle somewhere on the spiral
itself, then pass out the spiral again.We hold hands with the little ones and walk
together.We search within and take light within us and share the light.
We keep our Advent celebrations simple so that it becomes a natural, gently flowing
tradition. We share stories, sing, bake, craft, make and prepare.
There is a wealth of Advent stories, crafts, ideas resources available.Two resources that I
turn to time and time again are All Year Round Druitt, Fyres-Clinton and Rowling for
an wide array of Advent ideas and Festival of Stones by Reg Down which has the most
delightful stories.
The light is sought and flows through the silent strength of beneath and within, the
mineral kingdom, up through the wind in the trees, the plant kingdom, through the bird
song and lion roar of the animal kingdom, through the sparkle in our childrens eyes and
the joy in our song, the light spreads and warms.
However you celebrate Advent, may light be with you and your family!

Encourage Art and Creativity

Art and Creativity are intrinsically connected as one is essentially the expression of the
other. Humans, especially children, are fundamentally creative beings. Through Art
Education children gain confidence in their creative thinking and problem solving
abilities.
Art Education is not about teaching children to be artist or creative but rather a means of
facilitating overall learning success. Through art and art appreciation children develop
understanding, empathy, expression, imagination, positive self-esteem and
communication skills.
Working as a docent and teacher, one is trained to ask leading questions. I am a huge
believer in child guided discussions when talking about art. It never ceases to amaze me
how one single piece of art work can garner so many different interpretations. I have
written down some guidelines to help facilitate talking about art work with children.
Remember: giving children the proper vocabulary is empowering and makes for a
thoughtful dialogue.
Taking children to art galleries and museums is a great way to teach them about art,
however, there are resources all around us that do not require leaving the home. Many
books, magazines, calendars, post cards and printed reproductions offer the opportunity
to discuss and thus stimulate imagination and encourage creative thinking.
Start off by emphasizing that artists create art as a means of expression and encourage
them to express how the art makes them feel. Remind them that there are no wrong
answers!

The Elements of Art are the visual tools that an artist uses to create a work of art. These
elements in turn help give us words to talk about what we see- when we look at a piece of
art.
The Element of Art (or Composition) are applicable to all styles and mediums of art.
Color:
Name the colors. Introduction of primary colors (red, blue, yellow) and secondary colors
(orange, green, violet).
Are the colors dark (sad), bright (happy), warm or cool? Does the use of color help us
establish the mood, time of day, weather or season of the work? How do certain colors
attract your attention? How is the artist using color?
Line:
A line can be the outline of a shape or used to create patterns, movement and sound. They
can give direction and attract attention. Examples of lines are straight, diagonal, curved,
zigzagged.
Where do you see lines? How is the artist using lines to tell a story or make a statement?
Shape:
Is a two dimensional enclosed space. Shapes are created by an outline or contrasting
colors. Examples of shapes are geometrical (square, triangle etc.) or organic (free form
with curving and irregular outlines). Is the use of shapes used to emphasize? Are the
shapes creating a pattern or rhythm? Are the shapes balanced? Are they in harmony and
organized?
Texture:
Simply put is the way the art would feel if you touched it. Texture is essentially
connected to the medium or material that the artist uses. Is a metal statue going to feel
hot, cold, smooth, bumpy? A painting may be manipulated through the use of layering or
brush strokes. Is there a part of the painting that looks smoother?

In our ever rapidly changing world we need to channel our creativity. Enjoying an artists
creation, combined with innovating and thoughtful thinking, creates sophisticated
thinkers and action oriented problem solves. Art education and confidence in creative
interpretations as well as initiation are essential skills to the development of learning.

Waldorf and losing that First Tooth

by Arianne

Ow! My six-year-old son, Sam, exclaimed after biting into a giant golden apple.
Whats wrong?
My tooth hurts!
He ran over to me and opened wide, pointing to a tiny tooth on the bottom of his smile.
Its loose! I exclaimed, wiggling the little thing back and forth.
After assuring Sam that having this part of him fall out and grow in anew was perfectly
normal, he ran off to play with his oak building blocks.
Losing ones first baby tooth was normal, yes. But at the same time, it was so significant.
This truth reached beyond what I could convey to my little one. I felt at once a thrill of
excitement and a pang of sadness.

In Waldorf education a child generally isnt considered ready for learning to read until
that first little tooth starts wiggling. This came as no surprise to me as a parent. Sam was
much more interested in fairy tales and imaginative play than in academic lessons.
Forcing him would be damaging, I knew. So I gave him the space to play. I considered
myself steward of his magic years, guardian of the kingdom of his early childhood.

Around the time my little guys tooth started wiggling, he taught himself to read. I was
amazed at this change in him. But the significance of the first tooth loss is so much bigger
than a reading lesson. It was as if Sam wasnt growing up, but growing down from
someplace heavenly. Now his toes were just starting to touch ground.
Waldorf educators believe in late reading instruction because the first few years of a
childs life are dedicated to physical development. They master monumental tasks like
learning how to crawl, walk, run, speak, and think. The change of teeth can, along with
other indicators, show that the first stages of body building are complete. The energy that
was put into growing can now be directed at learning.
What does that mean? I wondered after discovering Sams loose tooth. What would I be
letting go of? What would I be welcoming?

It was four months before that little tooth finally popped out. In that time my son filled
my days with questions about how things work, how he fits into the greater world, about
life and death. He really was going through a rapid transition, it seemed, where the magic
of his early years was lifting. He was entering an expansive period where his love for
learning ignited.
He smiled a sweet grin as he held his little tooth above his head to show it off to his
younger siblings and dad.

I sewed him a special tooth pillow for the occasion. Mr. Tooth is actually a pocket, made
of felt. My son tucked his tooth in the pillow and woke up to four quarters in its place.
Were thinking of using them to buy seeds to plant this spring. I can think of nothing
more fitting than a little tooth garden to grow with my growing boya natural reminder
of the fleeting beauty of early childhood.
My son would now be considered ready for Waldorf first grade. He can eat, drink, wash,
and use the toilet on his own. Hes developing hand-eye coordination. He can finger knit,
button clothing, climb stairs, and hop on one foot. And, yes, hes lost that significant first
tooth.

As I slipped those quarters in his tooth pillow, I thought of all this. I looked over at my
son, sleeping on his bunk bed. I stood on my tip toes to kiss his forehead.
Goodbye, little one, I whispered as a tear slipped down my cheek.
But the next morning I sat on the couch downstairs, excitedly waiting to greet my
curious, wide-eyed, bigger child.
Sam ran down to me with open arms. I threw mine open to meet him.

Music Through the Day by Melody

Born the daughter of a dancer and musician, I didnt come by the name Melody by
accident. Music has always been a large part of my life and Ive come to a new
relationship with it since starting a family of my own.
One of my first memories as a mother was stepping into the shower for the first time after
giving birth, starting to hum a song and reaching to gently rub my tummy, as had become
my habit in the last nine months, only to be startled into remembering that my tiny boy
was no longer there! Its true that from the very, very beginning, I not only spoke to, but
sang to all of my babies regularly. The songs that they became accustomed to in the
womb are the same ones that soothed and comforted them outside.
With the birth of my second son, corresponding with my delving deeper into the Waldorf
philosophy, I went from only singing lullabies at night, to singing throughout the day. By
the time our third child was born, we had joined a family folk chorus and singing for the
pure joy of it, with our community, had become a regular event for us. It was during this
time that it became really clear to me what a vast difference there is between listening to
music and making music. The music that we made spoke to us all in a way that the music
we only listened to could not. Ill never forget the day that my infant babe in arms started
humming Hot Cross Buns with amazing accuracy, after hearing his older brother
practice it over and over again on the recorder (with someones voice accompanying it,
more often then not).

Making music ourselves didnt come as easily as I felt it should have, after all, I grew up
surrounded by music, but somehow this was different. I started with songs that I knew
already, that were appropriate for singing with young children, which turned out to be
surprisingly few! But I sang the ones I did know, starting with the songs that I could
remember from my own childhood. In that way, I felt that I was passing down a little bit
of family history and culture as well. Eventually, we learned many new songs through our
folk chorus. I also invested in several songbook and CD sets by the talented Mary
Thienes-Schunemann. These were a wonderful resource for us! Especially, This is the
Way We Wash a Day, which added to our familial repertoire many work songs to use
throughout the day. We have songs for cooking, songs for brushing teeth and hair, one for
sweeping the floor. Once when an old friend came to breakfast, after watching and
listening to our preparation for a while, exclaimed, What are you, the Von Trap
family?!? But by the time the pancakes were on the table, she was singing and enjoying
herself too.
Another option is to make up your own little songs. An easy way to do this is to take a
verse you know and make up a little tune to go along with it, or come up with some lyrics
and sing them to a tune you already know! An example of this is my daughters bedtime
song. Its a silly little thing, but it brings her comfort and the ritual of singing it, every
time I lay her down to sleep, is such an important part of our day. It always makes my
heart swell to hear her little two-year-old voice singing it back at me.
Sung to the tune of Rock-a-bye Baby:
Mama, and Mairi na-nas* in bed
So Mairi can rest her wee sleepy head
Cuddle her gently, tuck her up tight
So she will sleep soundly, all through the night
*na-na is our word for nursing
I know, this is nothing spectacular. No one reading this is in awe of my artistic prowess.
Thats exactly why Im sharing it. Because it doesnt have to be perfect or amazing to be
meaningful. Children appreciate almost all of our little creative endeavors, especially the
ones that are for them! If I can make up simple little songs, then you can too. And you

should! Because its fun and a special thing that you can share between you and your
child.
Songs like the one above can also be useful for difficult transitions. For one of my
children who hated getting dressed for the day, I made up this silly tune, sung to the tune
of It Had to Be You (yes, really!):
Its time to get dressed! Its time to get dressed!
Put on a shirt, pull on some pants, maybe a vest.
Its time to get dressedits time to get dressed.
Its time to get dressed, time to get dress, its time to get dressed
Simple right? Ridiculously simple, but it worked and it helped to ease a time that would
have otherwise been a struggle.
One more very simple tune is the one that I sang one morning, many years ago, as some
of the little ones were getting up. It was requested so many times after that that it kind of
stuck. Youll have to come up with your own tune for this one, as the tune I sing it to is
my own.
Good morning! Good morning! Welcome to the day!
Good morning! Good morning! Mornings here to say
(repeat 3 times)
Good morning! Good morning! Welcome to the day!
Good morning! Good morning! Lets get up and play
Another way to personalize the music that you share with your family is to change tunes
around a bit to include your childs name or some other bit of personal information. In
our house, there is not vague little one in ten in the bed. Instead its the name of our
littlest one. And daddy, mommy, big brother and on down the line (sometimes teddy bears
and dollies take a tumble as well) all fall out, resulting in much giggling, especially when
some of the older kids get a bit dramatic and start calling out Ouch! when their time
comes up. Im really please that with 4 kids, so Six in the Bed, the song now feels full
enough. It was a little short with only 2!
Sharing music together can also be a way to bond and connect during difficult times. I
was extremely ill when my second son was a toddler. I was so ill that many days I was
unable to get out of bed for any length of time. It was painful to know that his babyhood
was passing by and that there was so little that I could do for him. On the days that I was

well enough, when I had strength enough to sit up and breath enough to do so, we would
sit together in the rocking chair next to my bed and sing. Some days, good days, we
would go through a whole song book from cover to cover. That time was a ray of light for
us both, during an otherwise dark and difficult period. I was so glad to be able to give
him at least that one thing. And so very deeply, profoundly, thankful for having that time
with him. Indeed its one of my favorite memories from his early years. One of the few
ones that isnt overshadowed by the stress of illness.
However you find a way to incorporate music and song into your life and your family
time, I hope that youll enjoy the richness that the sharing of song can bring to daily life.

Why Waldorf Teaching Is the Greatest Profession

by Henning Kullak-Ublick
Being a teacher not only involves professional and technical knowledge, but imagination
and fantasy, unbridled interest in the world, and especially the courage to explore new
things together with the children. Only those who love the world can reach children.
April 23, 1919:
The First World War is over and Germany is economically and politically on the rocks. In
a Stuttgart factory tobacco bundles are stacked everywhere, from which Waldorf-Astoria
brand cigarettes will be rolled. The workers are sitting on the bundles and a speaker calls
out to them: For more than a century, this mantra has echoed through humanity:
Freedom, Equality, Fraternity. Much was written in the nineteenth century regarding the
sheer incompatibility of these three words. They were right. Why? These concepts were
buried by the hypnotic effects of an emerging centralized federal government. Only when
these three words, these three impulses: the freedom of the spiritual life, the equality of
the democratic state, and the brotherhood of the association of economic life are put in
place, only then can they their true meaning be fulfilled.
After the lecture, the workers turn to their boss Emil Molt and ask him to set up a school
based upon these principles for their children, so that they would be better prepared for
their future. This was how the first Waldorf school came into being. Rudolf Steiner, who
gave the lecture, took over the management of the school and developed a revolutionary
educational concept that focused on training the teachers power of observation to replace

standardized curricula. It was radical and took into account and valued the developmental
capacity of everyone who was in the school, whether a student, teacher or parent.
May 8, 1949:
Three decades have passed since that lecture in the cigarette factory. The Germans are
working their way out of the ruination that resulted from the absurd extremes of the
unity government. The unholy alliance of the Nazi power machine with its radical
Darwinistic and racist ideology led to the total war against the human being. On May 8,
1949 the Basic Law (similar to a constitution) was adopted by West Germany to prevent
anything like the Nazi power structure from ever occurring again. The seventh article
guarantees, in deliberate contrast to a government school monopoly, the right of citizens
to have independent schools, regardless of their social status and income levels. The door
is unlocked to a free spiritual life, and it is up to people themselves to push the door open,
but few have become aware of it.
March 23, 2011:
In the Arab World a citizens movement has arisen overnight. The Japanese are fighting
with the forces of nature and an uncontrollable technology. The Earths axis has shifted
and the global financial crisis has severely tested our faith in the hand of economic
egoism. 900 million people are connected with Facebook, the first birds are chirping
outside and so many people in Germany voted for the Green party in the recent election
that all the politicians are rubbing their eyes.
Three vignettes from the past century. The world is changing so quickly that it can make
you dizzy. If we educate children today, we do so for a time and a world that we cannot
imagine. A simple extrapolation of todays world into the future is misleading. The
knowledge of humanity doubled between 1800 and 1900. Today it doubles in just
four years, in the computing world in only six months. By means of modern media we
can not only summon this knowledge whenever we want to, but we are also now
connected with the whole world like never before and we also know more about one
another than we ever did. With the sheer enormity of all the knowledge at our disposal,
it loses its meaning. What counts is not just the amount of knowledge, but the relationship
that each individual forms with it.
Only if we love the world can we educate.

It is more important than ever to create situations for children and adolescents, in which
they can engage wholeheartedly with the world and have truly-saturated encounters with
it. For teachers, this includes not only keeping up-to-date, but above all, working with
fantasy, an unbounded interest in the world and the courage to blaze trails together with
the children, on which they can discover a new way for the future. We must abandon the
idea that teachers are there to fill the children with facts and lifeless knowledge. Being a
teacher means masterings the art of relationships, both in relation to each individual child
(which can sometimes take time), as well as in the teachers relationship to the world,
through which the children can experience and understand the world. Only those who
love the world can educate children.
One of the best experiences that a teacher can have is realizing that that every child
becomes a mystery, who learns in her own way to set foot on the earth, to develop ideas
and to begin to do something with them.
In the January 2011 issue of The Art of Education Ute Hallaschka wrote that what is new
about globalization is the opportunity for humanity to reach an understanding of itself.
Every individual is created anew, when she has to ask herself, in a global context, Who
am I and who are you?
This question, in which the entire world is included in you, can only be answered by
those who have learned to discover the unexpected. What better place to practice this than
in a community of people who know each other and undertake this journey of discovery
together? This applies not only to a single class, but also to a college of teachers, the
parent body, indeed the whole school community. Waldorf Education is a social art; it is
about transforming the world through interest in one another.
Henning Kullak-Ublick is a Waldorf teacher in northern Germany and a board member of
the Bund der Freien Waldorfschulen.

Effort to Restore Childrens Play Gains Momentum

Brian Blanco for The New York Times
SARAH WILSON was speaking proudly the other day when she declared: My house is
a little messy.

Megan and Michael Rosker, with their children (from left), Jude Rosker, 2, Eli Gorman,
6, and Coko Rosker, 3, use their sunroom in Redington Shores, Fla., as a playroom.
Ms. Wilson lives in Stroudsburg, Pa., a small town in the Poconos. Many days, her home
is strewn with dress-up clothes, art supplies and other artifacts from playtime with her
two small children, Benjamin, 6, and Laura, 3. I let them get it messy because thats
what its here for, she said.

Ms. Wilson has embraced a growing movement to restore the sometimes-untidy business
of play to the lives of children. Her interest was piqued when she toured her local
elementary school last year, a few months before Benjamin was to enroll in kindergarten.
She still remembered her own kindergarten classroom from 1985: it had a sandbox,
blocks and toys. But this one had a wall of computers and little desks.
Theres no imaginative play anymore, no pretend, Ms. Wilson said with a sigh.
For several years, studies and statistics have been mounting that suggest the culture of
play in the United States is vanishing. Children spend far too much time in front of a
screen, educators and parents lament 7 hours 38 minutes a day on average, according
to a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation last year. And only one in five children live
within walking distance (a half-mile) of a park or playground, according to a 2010 report
by the federal Centers for Disease Control, making them even less inclined to frolic
outdoors.
Behind the numbers is adult behavior as well as childrens: Parents furiously tapping on
their BlackBerrys in the living room, too stressed by work demands to tolerate noisy
games in the background. Weekends consumed by soccer, lacrosse and other sports
leagues, all organized and directed by parents. The full slate of lessons (chess, tae kwon
do, Chinese, you name it) and homework beginning in the earliest grades. Add to that
parental safety concerns that hinder even true believers like Ms. Wilson.
People are scared to let their kids outside, even where I live, she said. If I want my
kids to go outside, I have to be with them.
Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a developmental psychologist at Temple University in Philadelphia,
concluded, Play is just a natural thing that animals do and humans do, but somehow
weve driven it out of kids.
Too little playtime may seem to rank far down on the list of societys worries, but the
scientists, psychologists, educators and others who are part of the play movement say that
most of the social and intellectual skills one needs to succeed in life and work are first
developed through childhood play. Children learn to control their impulses through
games like Simon Says, play advocates believe, and they learn to solve problems,

negotiate, think creatively and work as a team when they dig together in a sandbox or
build a fort with sofa cushions. (The experts define play as a game or activity initiated
and directed by children. So video games dont count, they say, except perhaps ones that
involve creating something, and neither, really, do the many educational toys that do
things like sing the A B Cs with the push of a button.)
Much of the movement has focused on the educational value of play, and efforts to
restore recess and unstructured playtime to early childhood and elementary school
curriculums. But advocates are now starting to reach out to parents, recognizing that for
the movement to succeed, parental attitudes must evolve as well starting with a
willingness to tolerate a little more unpredictability in childrens schedules and a little
less structure at home. Building that fort, for example, probably involves disassembling
the sofa and emptying the linen closet. (A sheet makes an excellent roof.)
I think more than anything, adults are a little fearful of childrens play, said Joan
Almon, executive director of the Alliance for Childhood, a nonprofit pro-play group.
Some people have a greater tolerance for chaos and have developed a hand for gently
bringing it back into order. Others get really nervous about it. Megan Rosker, a mother
of three (ages 6, 3 and 2) in Redington Shores, Fla., has learned to embrace the disorder.
She set aside the large sunroom in her home for the children and filled it with blocks,
games, crayons, magazines to cut up and draw in, as well as toys and dress-up clothes. I
think a big part of free play is having space to do it in, a space that isnt ruled over by
adults, she said.
The other key is not to instruct kids how to play with something, she said. I cant tell
you how many board-game pieces have been turned into something else. But I let them
do it because I figure their imagination is more valuable than the price of a board game.

The Ultimate Block Party play event in New York.

Roberta Golinkoff, Leslie Bushara and Kathy Hirsh-Pasek were organizers.

But, Ms. Rosker added, I wont claim any of this has been easy for me or my husband,
noting that her husband used to be a total neat freak. She said they have learned to live
with disarray and to take other difficult steps, like strict limits on screen time.
Ms. Rosker has also campaigned, although unsuccessfully, to bring recess to her sons
elementary school. But school officials were too worried about potential injuries,
unruliness and valuable time lost from academic pursuits to sign on to her idea and, she
was surprised to find, many parents were similarly reluctant. They said: Im not going
to sign that. Im sure there is a good reason why this is good for our kids our school
has good test scores.
To try to reach more parents, a coalition called Play for Tomorrow this fall staged what
amounted to a giant play date in Central Park. The event, known as the Ultimate Block
Party, featured games like I Spy, mounds of Play-Doh, sidewalk chalk, building blocks,
puzzles and more. The National Science Foundation was closely involved, advising
organizers and emphasizing to parents the science and the educational value behind
each of the carefully chosen activities. Organizers were hoping to attract 10,000 people to
the event. They got more than 50,000.
We were overwhelmed, said Roberta Golinkoff, a developmental psychologist at
theUniversity of Delaware and a founder of the event along with Dr. Hirsh-Pasek. They
are now working with other cities Toronto, Atlanta, Baltimore and Houston, among

them to stage similar events, along with making the Central Park gathering an annual
one.
The goal, in some ways, is to return to the old days.
When I was growing up, there was a culture of childhood that children maintained, said
Jim Hunn, vice president for mass action at KaBOOM, a nonprofit group that is a leading
voice in reducing what it terms the play deficit. He noted that he learned games like
Capture the Flag from other children. To revive that culture, he said: Parents have to
reassert themselves in this process and teach them how to play. Its critical that parents
take some ownership and get out and play with their children.
But promoting play can be surprisingly challenging to parents. Emily Paster, a mother of
two in River Forest, Ill., a Chicago suburb, tries to discourage screen time and encourage
her children to play imaginatively. That usually works fine for her 7-year-old daughter,
who is happy to play in her room with her dolls for hours. But her 4-year-old son is a
different story, especially in the cold weather when hes cooped up.
If he wants to play, he always wants me to play with him, Ms. Paster said. This child
has a million toys. Every kind of train you can imagine. But he really wants a partner. If
Im meant to get anything accomplished dinner, laundry, a phone call then its
really difficult.
Encouraging brother and sister to play together only goes so far. It seems like theres a
ticking time bomb, Ms. Paster said. Someones going to decide theyre done before the
other ones ready. Sometimes, a video screen is the unwelcome but necessary
alternative.
If I want to get anything done its like, Heres the Leapster, she admitted, referring to
a Leapster Explorer, a video-like device for preschoolers.
But once theyre used to it, Mr. Hunn said, children will direct their play themselves a
situation Ms. Almon recalls from her own childhood. Our neighborhood gang organized
a lot of softball games, she said. There was no adult around. We adjusted the rules as

we needed them. Once the adults are involved it becomes: Here are the rules, and we
have to follow these rules. It still can be a good activity but stops being play.
In the vast world of organized childrens sports, a few parent-coaches are getting that
hands-off message. Ms. Almon knows of a soccer coach who started allowing children to
organize their own scrimmages during practice while he stood silently on the sidelines,
and a hockey coach in Chicago who ends practices by shooing all the adults off the ice
and letting the kids skate as they please.
There are more formal efforts, in addition to the Ultimate Block Party initiatives. The US
Play Coalition, a group of doctors, educators and parks and recreation officials, plans a
conference next month at Clemson University on the value of outdoor play. KaBOOM
has built 1,900 playgrounds across the country, most in low-income neighborhoods, and
in September helped organize Play Days in 1,600 communities. It also has added do-ityourself tools on its Web site to help parents organize and create neighborhood play
spaces themselves. Another Web site scheduled to start this
spring, LearningResourceNetwork.net, aims to create a broad educational source for
parents and teachers.
Our first big push will be on play, said Susan Magsamen, the executive director of the
group.
An important part of the movement is teaching children themselves how to play. The
average 3-year-old can pick up an iPhone and expertly scroll through the menu of apps,
but how many 7-year-olds can organize a kickball game with the neighborhood kids?
Toward that end, at the Central Park event, parents were given a 75-page Playbook
outlining research on play and offering children ideas for playful pursuits things that
generations past did without prompting and that may evoke in todays parents feelings of
recognition and nostalgia.
Climb on the couch with your friends and pretend you are sailing on a ship to a distant
land, reads one idea. Another, from the section on construction play: Lay a toy on the
floor and figure out how to build a bridge going over the toy with blocks.
Make paper doll cutouts from old newspapers and magazines, a third suggests, and let
your imagination fly!

New research shows that teaching kids more and more, at ever-younger ages, may
backfire.
By Alison GopnikPosted Wednesday, March 16, 2011, at 2:15 PM ET
Ours is an age of pedagogy. Anxious parents instruct their children more and more, at
younger and younger ages, until theyre reading books to babies in the womb. They
pressure teachers to make kindergartens and nurseries more like schools. So does the law
the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act explicitly urged more direct instruction in federally
funded preschools.
There are skeptics, of course, including some parents, many preschool teachers, and even
a few policy-makers. Shouldnt very young children be allowed to explore, inquire, play,
and discover, they ask? Perhaps direct instruction can help children learn specific facts
and skills, but what about curiosity and creativityabilities that are even more important
for learning in the long run? Two forthcoming studies in the journalCognitionone from

a lab at MIT and one from my lab at UC-Berkeleysuggest that the doubters are on to
something. While learning from a teacher may help children get to a specific answer
more quickly, it also makes them less likely to discover new information about a problem
and to create a new and unexpected solution.
What do we already know about how teaching affects learning? Not as much as we would
like, unfortunately, because it is a very difficult thing to study. You might try to compare
different kinds of schools. But the children and the teachers at a Marin County preschool
that encourages exploration will be very different from the children and teachers in a
direct instruction program in South Side Chicago. And almost any new program with
enthusiastic teachers will have good effects, at least to begin with, regardless of content.
So comparisons are difficult. Besides, how do you measure learning, anyway? Almost by
definition, directed teaching will make children do better on standardized tests, which the
government uses to evaluate school performance. Curiosity and creativity are harder to
measure.
Developmental scientists like me explore the basic science of learning by designing
controlled experiments. We might start by saying: Suppose we gave a group of 4-yearolds exactly the same problems and only varied on whether we taught them directly or
encouraged them to figure it out for themselves? Would they learn different things and
develop different solutions? The two new studies in Cognition are the first to
systematically show that they would.

In the first study, MIT professor Laura Schulz, her graduate student Elizabeth Bonawitz,
and their colleagues looked at how 4-year-olds learned about a new toy with four tubes.
Each tube could do something interesting: If you pulled on one tube it squeaked, if you
looked inside another tube you found a hidden mirror, and so on. For one group of
children, the experimenter said: I just found this toy! As she brought out the toy, she
pulled the first tube, as if by accident, and it squeaked. She acted surprised (Huh! Did
you see that? Let me try to do that!) and pulled the tube again to make it squeak a
second time. With the other children, the experimenter acted more like a teacher. She

said, Im going to show you how my toy works. Watch this! and deliberately made the
tube squeak. Then she left both groups of children alone to play with the toy.
All of the children pulled the first tube to make it squeak. The question was whether they
would also learn about the other things the toy could do. The children from the first group
played with the toy longer and discovered more of its hidden features than those in the
second group. In other words, direct instruction made the children less curious and less
likely to discover new information.
Does direct teaching also make children less likely to draw new conclusionsor, put
another way, does it make them less creative? To answer this question, Daphna
Buchsbaum, Tom Griffiths, Patrick Shafto, and I gave another group of 4-year-old
children a new toy. This time, though, we demonstrated sequences of three actions on the
toy, some of which caused the toy to play music, some of which did not. For example,
Daphna might start by squishing the toy, then pressing a pad on its top, then pulling a ring
on its side, at which point the toy would play music. Then she might try a different series
of three actions, and it would play music again. Not every sequence she demonstrated
worked, however: Only the ones that ended with the same two actions made the music
play. After showing the children five successful sequences interspersed with four
unsuccessful ones, she gave them the toy and told them to make it go.
Daphna ran through the same nine sequences with all the children, but with one group,
she acted as if she were clueless about the toy. (Wow, look at this toy. I wonder how it
works? Lets try this, she said.) With the other group, she acted like a teacher. (Heres
how my toy works.) When she acted clueless, many of the children figured out the most
intelligent way of getting the toy to play music (performing just the two key actions,
something Daphna had not demonstrated). But when Daphna acted like a teacher, the
children imitated her exactly, rather than discovering the more intelligent and more novel
two-action solution.
As so often happens in science, two studies from different labs, using different
techniques, have simultaneously produced strikingly similar results. They provide
scientific support for the intuitions many teachers have had all along: Direct instruction
really can limit young childrens learning. Teaching is a very effective way to get children

to learn something specificthis tube squeaks, say, or a squish then a press then a pull
causes the music to play. But it also makes children less likely to discover unexpected
information and to draw unexpected conclusions.
Why might children behave this way? Adults often assume that most learning is the result
of teaching and that exploratory, spontaneous learning is unusual. But actually,
spontaneous learning is more fundamental. Its this kind of learning, in fact, that allows
kids to learn from teachers in the first place. Patrick Shafto, a machine-learning specialist
at the University of Louisville and a co-author of both these studies; Noah Goodman at
Stanford; and their colleagues have explored how we could designcomputers that learn
about the world as effectively as young children do. Its this work that inspired these
experiments.
These experts in machine learning argue that learning from teachers first requires you to
learn about teachers. For example, if you know how teachers work, you tend to assume
that they are trying to be informative. When the teacher in the tube-toy experiment
doesnt go looking for hidden features inside the tubes, the learner unconsciously thinks:
Shes a teacher. If there were something interesting in there, she would have showed it
to me. These assumptions lead children to narrow in, and to consider just the specific
information a teacher provides. Without a teacher present, children look for a much wider
range of information and consider a greater range of options.
Knowing what to expect from a teacher is a really good thing, of course: It lets you get
the right answers more quickly than you would otherwise. Indeed, these studies show that
4-year-olds understand how teaching works and can learn from teachers. But there is an
intrinsic trade-off between that kind of learning and the more wide-ranging learning that
is so natural for young children. Knowing this, its more important than ever to give
childrens remarkable, spontaneous learning abilities free rein. That means a rich, stable,
and safe world, with affectionate and supportive grown-ups, and lots of opportunities for
exploration and play. Not school for babies.

Waldorf and Wonder

by Meredith Floyd-Preston

So many of us are initially drawn to Waldorf Education because of the beauty of the
materials, the connection to the natural world, and the warm, coziness of the early
childhood environment. We become even more convinced that Waldorf is for us when
we imagine our children enveloped in the nurturing environment created by the wool felt,
silk playcloths, and wooden toys.

And though these things are lovely, many of us dont realize the greatest gifts of Waldorf
Education until months or even years after our children have begun the journey.
A long time ago one of my mentors made a comment that has always stuck with me and
has guided my teaching ever since. She said, The one thing you cannot teach a child is
how to have a new, original, creative thought that no one has ever had before. What an
idea! How can I really teach children to think for themselves? The moment I open my
mouth (let alone teach my students a concept) I am filling them with pre-formed ideas
that many people (myself included) have thought about endlessly.

So I wonder, how important is it that my students have the ability to have new, creative
ideas? Maybe theyll make it just fine in the world without this ability. It doesnt take
long to wrestle with this question. The moment I think about Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and
other brilliant entrepreneurs I can see that the most successful people in our society are
those who think in a creative and inspired way. And then, when I think about the
condition of our world and the creativity that our current fast-paced world thrives upon
Im even further convinced that creative thinking is an essential skill.
But what can I do to help children have ideas that no one has ever had before? As Ive
thought about it Ive realized that the best thing I can do to support the development of
this skill is to create fertile ground, cultivate the seeds of thought and establish the form
and rhythm that will allow the childs own imagination to take over.
I have found that this is best done by engaging the childs imagination with moments of
wonder. With wonder, an opening comes that allows for the arrival of true inspiration.
What does that wonder look like? At different ages it takes on different forms.

In early childhood it comes around most often through experiences of the natural world.
Very often those moments of wonder are so striking that we remember them even years
later. I remember when I was a child watching the raindrops on the car window and
having a clear moment of awe and wonder as I tried to determine how the drops chose to
move around on the window.
In the grade school years those moments of wonder come about as children connect with
the world through their feeling life. Younger children immerse themselves in stories and
create the pictures in their imaginations. The story itself provides the opening.
Older children are inspired by observation that leads to thinking. I remember a physics
demonstration that I did with my sixth graders. We completely blacked out the windows
of our classroom and turned off the light. With a light on a dimmer switch I gradually let
the light fill the room while the students observed the changes they saw. They were
positively filled with wonder as they observed the shadows change to form and then
become full of color. They wondered why that happened and the opening was created.
Creating wonder for these older children is a huge passion of mine and it is the main
topic of my blog.
As children get older it is thought that inspires this wonder more than anything else and it
all comes about through our efforts to have our children experience the world in a
completely open way, rather than through fixed concepts.
Wonder is truly the most essential component of the Waldorf curriculum and, in truth, it
can arise in the most mundane experiences. The key to having children experience
wonder is to fill their lives with rich and varied sensory experiences.

The following are some things that we do to facilitate Real Play in our home. It
seems almost too simple, but it is quite enriching

Starting with my little babies, I help them to be a part of every day life by playing near
me on the floor, and when they want to be held they ride on my hip in a sling, or on my
back in a mei tai or Ergo. I chatter about what Im preparing for supper, sing little nursery
rhymes, and give lots of smiles while allowing them to see what goes on in every day
life. Letting them see you always being engaged in something, rather than just passively
being entertained (on the computer or TV) helps prevent boredom through example.
When I am sitting and listening to the radio or just having a conversation with my hubby,
if Im not nursing a baby, I try to have some handwork to do, like knitting or hand
sewing.
We dont allow screen time of any kind for children. No videos, no cartoons, no computer
games. Im not a purist, my daughter has seen me on the computer and she has seen
cartoons at other peoples house. But as a general rule, we stay away from that, so that
she doesnt get conditioned to where she needs something to watch to be entertained. You
will find that once your child develops a long attention span, they are happy to play
alongside you while you work and you will not depend on the TV to keep them
entertained while you accomplish your chores.

I make a point to slow down what Im doing and do things with purpose so my little ones
can see and imitate me, since thats what they do naturally. I dont rushidly fold the
laundry. I carefully smooth out each shirt, fold it, and place it in the stack. I take care to
place my dirty dishes in the sink, then gently wash them. I avoid looking as if Im a
chicken with my head cut off as I rush around to catch up on housework. I smile as I
work. Really, it doesnt take much more time at all, and it gives the children something to
imitate. This work is your quality time with the children, young children especially enjoy
an activity like making bread with mom just as much (or in our case more!) than a trip to
the fair or amusement park. It shows them by example how to care for belongings, to find
contentment in what must be done, and it gives them peace of mind to know that Mommy
isnt frazzled.
When possible, I involve my children in my work. It takes a little longer, but my toddler
receives much more joy in completely emptying the dryer into the laundry basket for me
than she would with a dozen Good Job! stickers. I also pay attention to what will trigger

a meltdown and avoid it. For instance, my little girl isnt happy just putting the two cups
of flour in my cookie batter; she wants to scoop the entire flour canister into the mixing
bowl. So, knowing this, scooping the flour is something that just Mommy does for now,
and she has a bin full of rice and scoops where she can scoop to her hearts content. When
helping isnt possible because of safety (like with sewing) or the tendency to trigger a
meltdown, I do try to provide some similar alternative for her, again, encouraging her
desire to imitate me.
We sing little songs throughout the day. Children love repetition and silly rhyming songs.
A verse of This is the way we wash our hands before lunch or after playing outside
makes hand washing into a pleasurable experience rather than a chore. A little song can
convince a reluctant toddler to do what needs to be done as well, This is the way we
buckle our carseat, buckle our carseat, buckle our carseat

Waldorf puts emphasis on outside time as well. And to allow childrens imagination to
flow, unstructured open nature areas are encouraged over playgrounds with play
structures. On play structures, children are confined to what is there. In a natural park
setting, children have more of an opportunity to notice small things. They watch the ants
trailing out of the ant hill. They collect pine cones. They make mud pies and daydream.
Natural toys are preferred, but if those are not available due to money constraints, openended toys are the best. The more specific a toy is, the faster a child will get bored with it.
Open ended toys are toys that can perform a variety of purposes. A basket can be a
bathtub one day, an oven for baking bread the next, and also turned upside down, covered
with a playsilk, and used as a stage for a play the next day. By contrast, a flashing box
with buttons that talks and tells the child what to do is limited to its one specific roll, and
quickly becomes boring. Having few toys is preferred to having many. With many toys
out, the child is overwhelmed and stops playing with them in search of more order and
simplicity.
My first summer job as a daycare assistant greatly influenced how I parent my children
and live my life. I learned to slow down and appreciate the little things with children. I
learned that faster isnt always better. I learned that children dont need to be constantly
busy to be happy. And I learned that children werent nuisances to be kept busy until
they could be taught later on, but they were to be joyously included in every day life right
along side an adult. I wanted to share since I feel that what Ive learned has enriched our
family life, and I hope it can enrich yours as well.

1. What is Waldorf education?

Waldorf education is a unique and distinctive approach to educating children that is
practiced in Waldorf schools worldwide. Waldorf schools collectively form the largest,
and quite possibly the fastest growing, group of non-profit, independent schools in the
world. There is no centralized administrative structure governing all Waldorf schools;
each is administratively independent, but there are established associations which provide
resources, publish materials, sponsor conferences, and promote the movement.
Return to list of questions
2. What is unique about Waldorf education? How is it different from other
alternatives (public schooling, Montessori, unschooling, etc.)?
The best overall statement on what is unique about Waldorf education is to be found in
the stated goals of the schooling: "to produce individuals who are able, in and of
themselves, to impart meaning to their lives".
The aim of Waldorf schooling is to educate the whole child, "head, heart and hands". The
curriculum is as broad as time will allow, and balances academics subjects with artistic
and practical activities.
Waldorf teachers are dedicated to creating a genuine love of learning within each child.
By freely using arts and activities in the service of teaching academics, an internal
motivation to learn is developed in the students, doing away with the need for
competitive testing and grading.

Some distinctive features of Waldorf education include the following:

Academics are de-emphasized in the early years of schooling. There is no
academic content in the Waldorf kindergarten experience (although there is a good
deal of cultivation of pre-academic skills), and minimal academics in first
grade. Literacy readiness begins in kindergarten with formal reading instruction
beginning in grade one. Most children are reading independently by the middle or
end of second grade.
During the elementary school years (grades 1-8) the students have a class (or
"main lesson") teacher, who stays with the class for a number of consecutive
years. Many teachers stay with their class from first to eighth grade. However, in a
number of schools, teachers are likely to stay with a class for a shorter period: a
class may have one class teacher for grades 1-5 and another for grades 6-8, for
example.
Certain activities which are often considered "frills" at mainstream schools are
central at Waldorf schools: art, music, gardening, and foreign languages (usually
two in elementary grades), to name a few. In the younger grades, all subjects are
introduced through artistic mediums, use the children respond better to this
medium than to dry lecturing and rote learning. All children learn to play recorder
and to knit.
There are no "textbooks" as such in the first through fifth grades. All children have
"main lesson books", which are their own workbooks which they fill in during the
course of the year. They essentially produce their own "textbooks" which record
their experiences and what they've learned. In some schools upper grades may use
textbooks to supplement skills development, especially in math and grammar.
Learning in a Waldorf school is a noncompetitive activity. There are no grades
given at the elementary level; the teacher writes a detailed evaluation of the child
at the end of each school year.
The use of electronic media, particularly television, by young children is strongly
discouraged in Waldorf schools.
Return to list of questions
3. What is the curriculum at a Waldorf school like?
The Waldorf curriculum is designed to be responsive to the various phases of a child's
development. The relationship between student and teacher is, likewise, recognized to be
both crucial and changing throughout the course of childhood and early adolescence.

The main subjects, such as history, language arts, science and mathematics are, as
mentioned, taught in main lesson blocks of two to three hours per day, with each block
lasting from three to five weeks.
The total Waldorf curriculum has been likened to an ascending spiral: subjects are
revisited several times, but each new exposure affords greater depth and new insights into
the subject at hand.
A typical Lower School curriculum would likely look something like the following:
Primary Grades 1 - 3
Pictorial introduction to the alphabet, writing, reading, spelling, poetry and drama.
Folk and fairy tales, fables, legends, Old Testament stories.
Numbers, basic mathematical processes of addition, subtraction, multiplication
and division.
Nature stories, house building and gardening.
Middle Grades 4 - 6
Writing, reading, spelling, grammar, poetry and drama.
Norse myths, history and stories of ancient civilizations.
Review of the four mathematical processes, fractions, percentages, and geometry.
Local and world geography, comparative zoology, botany and elementary physics.
Upper Grades 7 - 8
Creative writing, reading, spelling, grammar, poetry and drama.
Medieval history, Renaissance, world exploration, American history and
biography.
Geography, physics, basic chemistry, astronomy, geology and physiology.
Special subjects also taught include:

 Handwork: knitting, crochet, sewing, cross stitch, basic weaving, toy making and
woodworking.
Music: singing, pentatonic flute, recorder, string instruments, wind, brass and
percussion instruments.
Foreign Languages (varies by school): Spanish, French, Japanese and German.
Art: wet-on-wet water color painting, form drawing, beeswax and clay modeling,
perspective drawing.
Movement: eurythmy, gymnastics, group games.
Return to list of questions
4. How did Waldorf education get started?
In 1919, Rudolf Steiner, the Austrian philosopher, scientist and artist, was invited to give
a series of lectures to the workers of the Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory in Stuttgart,
Germany.
As a result, the factory's owner, 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 that
- the teachers, those 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 to the conditions and, after a training period for the prospective teachers, die
Freie Waldorfschule (the Free Waldorf School) was opened September 7, 1919.
Return to list of questions
5. How many Waldorf schools are there?
Currently, there are about 1,000 Waldorf schools in 60 countries.
Approximately 150 Waldorf schools are currently operating in North America. There are
also public Waldorf programs in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Detroit, Michigan.
A directory of schools in the United States or Canada is maintained by the Association of
Waldorf Schools of North America (AWSNA). Schools elsewhere in the Worldcan be

located through the mother site of the Waldorf world, the Bund der Freien
Waldorfschulen, (Federation of Free Waldorf Schools) in Stuttgart, Germany.
Return to list of questions
6. What is the philosophy behind Waldorf education?
Consistent with his philosophy called anthroposophy, Steiner designed a curriculum
responsive to the developmental phases in childhood and nurturing of children's
imaginations. He thought that schools should cater to the needs of children rather than the
demands of the government or economic forces, so he developed schools that encourage
creativity and free-thinking.
Return to list of questions
7. Why should I send my child to a Waldorf school?
The main reason is that Waldorf schools honor and protect the wonder of childhood.
Every effort is expended to make Waldorf schools safe, secure and nurturing
environments for the children, and to protect their childhood from harmful influences
from the broader society.
Secondly, Waldorf education has a consistent philosophy of child development
underlying the curriculum. All subjects are introduced in age appropriate fashion.
Finally, Waldorf schools produce graduates who are academically advantaged with
respect to their public school counterparts, and who consistently gain admission to top
universities.
Return to list of questions
8. Who was Rudolf Steiner?
Dr. Rudolf Steiner was a highly respected and well published scientific, literary and
philosophical scholar who was particularly known for his work on Goethe's scientific
writings. He later came to incorporate his scientific investigations with his interest in
spiritual development. He became a forerunner in the field of spiritual scientific
investigation for the modern 20th century individual.
His background in history and civilizations coupled with his observation in life gave the
world the gift of Waldorf Education. It is a deeply insightful application of learning based
on the Study of Humanity with developing consciousness of self and the surrounding
world.

Return to list of questions

9. How is reading taught in a Waldorf school? Why do Waldorf students wait until
2nd grade to begin learning to read?
Waldorf education is deeply bound up with the oral tradition, typically beginning with the
teacher telling the children fairy tales throughout kindergarten and first grade. The oral
approach is used all through Waldorf education: mastery of oral communication is seen as
being integral to all learning.
Reading instruction, as such, is deferred. Instead, writing is taught first. During the first
grade year the children explore how our alphabet came about, discovering, as the ancients
did, how each letter's form evolved out of a pictograph. Writing thus evolves out of the
children's art, and their ability to read likewise evolves as a natural and, indeed,
comparatively effortless stage of their mastery of language.
Return to list of questions
10. Why is so much emphasis put on festivals and ceremonies?
Seasonal festivals serve to connect humanity with the rhythms of nature and of the
cosmos. The festivals originated in ancient cultures, yet have been adapted over time. To
join the seasonal moods of the year, in a festive way, benefits the inner life of the soul.
Celebrating is an art. There is joy in the anticipation, the preparation, the celebration
itself, and the memories.
Return to list of questions
11. What are Michaelmas, St. John's Day, etc.?
The four seasonal festivals are Michaelmas (fall), Christmas (winter), Easter (spring), and
St. John (summer).
Michaelmas, September 29: St. Michael is known as the conqueror of the dragon, the
heavenly hero with his starry sword (cosmic iron) who gives strength to people.
Christmas: An ancient festival; celebrated when the sun sends the least power to the
earth, as a festival which awakens in the human being an inkling of the very wellsprings
of existence, of an eternal reality. It is a time when the soul withdraws into the innermost
depths to experience within itself the inner spiritual light.
Easter derives its name from pre-Christian goddess symbols of rebirth, fertility and
spring. The renewal of man's being is celebrated with that of the earth. Ancient symbols
of the hare and egg are both known as signs of the return of life after winter's sleep.

St. John - June 24 - Midsummer Day: Ancient peoples, watching the sun reach its high
point at this time, lit bonfires to encourage it to shine and ripen their crops. It is a time
when the cosmos brings the spiritual to man - a time when the spiritual, which animates
and weaves through everything in nature, is revealed.
Return to list of questions
12. Why do Waldorf Schools discourage TV watching?
The reasons for this have as much to do with the physical effects of the medium on the
developing child as with the (to say the least) questionable content of much of the
programming. Electronic media are believed by Waldorf teachers to seriously hamper the
development of the child's imagination - a faculty which is believed to be central to the
healthy development of the individual. Computer use by young children is also
discouraged.
Waldorf teachers are not, by the way, alone in this belief. Several books have been written
in recent years expressing concern with the effect of television on young children. See,
for instance, Endangered Minds by Jane Healy, Four Arguments for the Elimination of
Television by Jerry Mander, or The Plug-In Drug by Marie Winn.
Return to list of questions
13. What is the annual tuition of a Waldorf school?
Tuition costs vary from school to school and are comparable to other independent schools
in the same geographic location that are not subsidized through church affiliations. In the
United States, Waldorf schools are non-profit and independent, and are supported by
tuition income, fees, and charitable contributions. Most Waldorf schools have active
tuition assistance programs and many offer "sibling discounts". Some have a stated
principle that they will not deny a child a Waldorf education based strictly on financial
considerations. There now also are a number of public Waldorf charter schools, that don't
charge tuition. (See Public Waldorf Education)
Return to list of questions
14. What kind of education do Waldorf teachers have?
While requirements within individual schools may vary, as a rule Class Teachers will
have both a university degree and teaching certification from a recognized Waldorf
teacher education college or institute. Some Waldorf education programs can also grant
B.A. and M.A. degrees in conjunction with Waldorf teaching certification. Typically, the
course of study for teachers is from two to three years and includes practice teaching in a

Waldorf school under the supervision of experienced Waldorf teachers. Teachers must
also satisfy whatever state credential and licensing requirements might apply.
Rudolf Steiner, speaking in Oxford in 1922, defined "three golden rules" for teachers: "to
receive the child in gratitude from the world it comes from; to educate the child with
love; and to lead the child into the true freedom which belongs to man."
Return to list of questions
15. Why do Waldorf students stay with (ideally)the same teacher for 8 years?
Between the ages of seven and fourteen, children learn best through acceptance and
emulation of authority, just as in their earlier years they learned through imitation. In
elementary school, particularly in the lower grades, the child is just beginning to expand
his or her experience beyond home and family. The class becomes a type of "family" as
well, with its own authority figure - the teacher - in a role analogous to parent.
With this approach, the students and teachers come to know each other very well, and the
teacher is able to find over the years the best ways of helping individual children in their
schooling. The class teacher also becomes like an additional family member for most of
the families in his/her class.
It's worth noting that this approach was the norm in the days of the "little red
schoolhouse".
Return to list of questions
16. How are personality conflicts between students and teachers handled?
This is a very common concern among parents when they first hear about the "Class
Teacher" method. However, in practice, the situation seems to arise very rarely, especially
so when the teacher has been able to establish a relationship with the class right from the
first grade. Given the sort of person who is motivated to become a Waldorf teacher,
incompatibility with a child is infrequent: understanding the child's needs and
temperament is central to the teacher's role and training. If problems of this sort should
occur, the faculty as a whole would work with the teacher and the family to determine
and undertake whatever corrective action would be in the best interests of the child and of
the class.
Return to list of questions
17. Are Waldorf schools religious?

In the sense of subscribing to the beliefs of a particular religious denomination or sect,

no. Waldorf schools, however, tend to be spiritually oriented and are based out of a
generally Christian perspective. The historic festivals of Christianity, and of other major
religions as well, are observed in the class rooms and in school assemblies.
Classes in religious doctrine are not part of the Waldorf curriculum, and children of all
religious backgrounds attend Waldorf schools. Spiritual guidance is aimed at awakening
the child's natural reverence for the wonder and beauty of life.
Return to list of questions
18. How do Waldorf children fare when they transfer to "regular" schools? Is it true
that once you start Waldorf schooling it is difficult to "make it" in public schools?
Generally, transitions to public schools, when they are anticipated, are not problematical.
The most common transition is from an eight grade Waldorf school to a more traditional
high school, and, from all reports, usually takes place without significant difficulties.
Transitions in the lower grades, particularly between the first and fourth grades, can
potentially be more of a problem, because of the significant differences in the pacing of
the various curriculums. A second grader from a traditional school will be further ahead
in reading in comparison with a Waldorf schooled second grader; however, the Waldorf
schooled child will be ahead in arithmetic.
Return to list of questions
19. What is anthroposophy?
The term "anthroposophy" comes from the Greek "anthropos-sophia" or "human
wisdom". Steiner expanded an exacting scientific method by which one could do research
for her/himself into the spiritual worlds. The investigation, known also as Spiritual
Science is an obvious complement to the Natural Sciences we have come to accept.
Through study and practiced observation, one awakens to his/her own inner nature and
the spiritual realities of outer nature and the cosmos. The awareness of those relationships
brings a greater reverence for all of life.
Steiner and many individuals since, who share his basic views, have applied this
knowledge in various practical and cultural ways in communities around the world. Most
notably, Waldorf schools have made significant impact on the world. Curative education,
for mentally and emotionally handicapped adults and children, has established a deep
understanding and work with people who have this difficult destiny. Bio-dynamic
farming and gardening greatly expand the range of techniques available to organic

agriculture. Anthroposophical medicine and pharmacy, although less widely known in the
US, are subjects of growing interest.
It should be stressed that while anthroposophy forms the theoretical basis to the teaching
methods used in Waldorf schools, it is not taught to the students.
Anthroposophy has its roots in the perceptions, already gained, into the spiritual world.
Yet these are no more than the roots. The branches, leaves, blossoms, and fruits of
Anthroposophy grow into all the fields of human life and action.
Rudolf Steiner
Return to list of questions
20. Where can one get more information on Anthroposophy on the Internet?
The Anthroposophical Society in America is a good place to start. Wikipedia has a good
article on the subject. RSArchive publishes many of the works online by Steiner as the
founder of both Waldorf and anthroposophy (books, lectures, articles and essays on
anthroposophy). For most of Steiner's works on Waldorf education online, mostly lectures
and discussions with teachers, see here.AnthroMedia is one of the largest portals on the
net on activities born out of or inspired by anthroposophy.
Return to list of questions
21. How does Waldorf deal with kids that don't get it academically?
Waldorf schools hesitate to categorize children, particularly in terms such as "slow" or
"gifted". A given child's weaknesses in one area, whether cognitive, emotional or
physical, will usually be balanced by strengths in another area. It is the teacher's job to try
to bring the child's whole being into balance.
A child having difficulty with the material might be given extra help by the teacher or by
parents; tutoring might also be arranged. Correspondingly, a child who picked up the
material quickly might be given harder problems of the same sort to work on, or might be
asked to help a child who was having trouble.
Return to list of questions
22. How well do Waldorf graduates do on standard tests? How well do Waldorf high
school graduates do in college?
To the best of our knowledge, no controlled studies have been done on these questions,
but anecdotal evidence collected from various sources would seem to suggest that

Waldorf graduates tend to score toward the high end on standardized examinations such
as the Scholastic Aptitude Tests. As far as higher education goes, Waldorf graduates have
been accepted as students at, and have graduated from, some of the most prestigious
colleges and universities in the United States.
Return to list of questions
23. What is eurythmy?
Most simply put, eurythmy is a dance-like art form in which music or speech are
expressed in bodily movement; specific movements correspond to particular notes or
sounds. It has also been called "visible speech" or "visible song".
Eurythmy is part of the curriculum of all Waldorf schools, and while it often puzzles
parents new to Waldorf education, children respond to its simple rhythms and exercises
which help them strengthen and harmonize their body and their life forces; later, the older
students work out elaborate eurythmic representations of poetry, drama and music,
thereby gaining a deeper perception of the compositions and writings.
Eurythmy enhances coordination and strengthens the ability to listen. When children
experience themselves like an orchestra and have to keep a clear relationship in space
with each other, a social strengthening also results.
Eurythmy is usually taught by a specialist who has been specifically trained in eurythmy,
typically for at least four years. In addition to pedagogical eurythmy, there are also
therapeutic ("curative") and performance oriented forms of the art.
Return to list of questions
24. Is Waldorf education relevant to Special Needs children?
The Anthroposophy-based Camphill Movement has a particular focus on special needs
individuals. The social, cultural, and economic principles of the International Camphill
Movement were developed by Dr. Karl Knig (1902 - 1966). In Pennsylvania, for
example, Camphill Soltane attempts, "to build healthy social relationships in an
environment dedicated to personal and social renewal, healing, and caring for the land.
In these activities, both independence and interdependence are fostered by recognizing
the full potential of each individual. This enables each person to grow into the life of the
community while allowing the community to grow within the individual".

M Y T H B U S T I N G : H O W R E A D I N G I S TAU G H T I N A WAL D O R F
SCHOOL
Soon after I discovered Waldorf education, I had a conversation with a friend whose
daughter, like my son, was approaching kindergarten age. We lived in Los Angeles,
where getting ones child into the right kindergarten had as much significance as
getting accepted to Harvard or Yale.
Have you considered the Waldorf school? I asked her.
Oh, we looked at it, but ruled it out because they dont believe in books. We are a family
ofreaders, she emphasized.
I was taken aback. Did my friend think that my husband I, both college graduates,
didnt value books or reading?
I knew that reading wasnt formally taught in a Waldorf kindergarten, and Id heard that
children created their own textbooks, but in all my research, Id never heard that Waldorf

schools were anti-books. I would soon learn that this was one of many common
misconceptions about Waldorf education.
In the coming years, I not only enrolled my son in the Waldorf school, but I also enrolled
myself in Waldorf teacher training and came to a deeper understanding of how reading is
taught. I hope that the insights Ive gained will help some of you who may be considering
Waldorf education.

Blackboard Drawing by Allen Stovall

The Evolution of Language
In the evolution of humanity, spoken language developed first. Then came written
language, originally through symbols (think hieroglyphics). Finally, once there was a
written language, people learned to read.
This is exactly the sequence in which children master language, and so is the sequence in
which reading is taught in Waldorf education. From birth to age seven, the focus is on
the spoken word.
The children hear stories nursery rhymes, nature stories, folktales and fairy tales.
Teachers are careful to use the original language of fairy tales without dumbing them

down or simplifying the language. The teacher is careful to use clear speech and to
enunciate. This will help children later when it comes time to learn to write and spell.
In early childhood, language is taught through story time and circle time: songs, verses,
rhymes and poems are all incorporated. It may look like play, but language skills are
being developed daily.
Repetition
Because the same circle time sequence is repeated daily for 2-3 weeks at a time, children
learn the songs and verses by heart, and will retain them for life.
Rudolf Steiner, founder of Waldorf education, stressed the importance of repetition when
he developed the first Waldorf school in Germany in the 1920s. Current brain research
confirms that repetition aids a childs brain development. The connections of billions of
neural pathways in the brain are strengthened through repeated experiences.
Speaking
A visitor to a Waldorf kindergarten might notice the children are not being taught the
ABCs. They are not given worksheets, nor do they practice reading from books. But we
Waldorf teachers know that language skills are being built through the repetition of
stories, songs and verses. We are preparing children to read and write through the spoken
word.
On the other hand, that same observer is likely to be impressed by the childrens
precocious verbal abilities; their impressive vocabulary, and the number of poems and
stories that they can recite by heart.
In addition to our work with speech, we work on building a childs fine motor skills
through activities such drawing, finger knitting and sewingto prepare children for the
next stage of language development: writing.

Writing
It is during first grade in a Waldorf School when the alphabet is formally introduced, but
in an imaginative, pictorial way. Think again of hieroglypics. Each letter of the alphabet
is introduced as a symbol, representing an element from a story the children are told. For
example, they might hear the story of a knight on a quest who had to cross mountains and
a valley. The children will then draw a picture with the letter M forming the Mountains
on either side of the V for Valley.

Blackboard Drawing by Allen Stovall

In this way, the child develops a living relationship with each letter and the written word.
It is not dry and abstract. Writing is taught in a way that engages the childs
imagination.
After learning all the letters, the next step is to copy the teachers writing. Typically the
children will recite a poem together until it is learned by heart.
Then the teacher will write the poem on the board, and the children will copy it into their
main lesson books, the books that children in a Waldorf school create themselves.
Because the children already know the poem and they have learned the alphabet, they
will begin to make connections. Oh, this must spell brown bear because both these
words start with B and those are the first two words of the poem!

Reading
The final step is learning to read, which generally starts in second grade and continues
into third grade.
It is important to know that reading requires decoding skills that develop in children at
varying ages. In Waldorf education we understand that learning to read will unfold
naturally in its own time when a child is given the proper support.
Just as a normal, healthy child will learn to walk without our teaching her, and just
as a child miraculously learns to speak her native language by the age of three
without lessons, worksheets or a dictionary, so will a child naturally learn to read
when she has a positive relationship with the spoken and written word.
Books
Yes, it is true that early readers and textbooks are generally not used in Waldorf
education. Instead, the children are fed real literature starting in the earliest years.
Once students are fully reading, they turn to original source texts such as classic literature
and biographies, and students will read many great books throughout their grade school
years.
What they avoid are early readers of the See Spot run variety, and dry, lifeless
textbooks.
My Children
It can be hard to trust that this system works, especially when your childs public school
peers are reading at 5, 6 or 7. But I offer you the example of my two sons.
My younger son Will taught himself to read in kindergarten; my older son Harper wasnt
fully reading until third grade. Yet, for each of them, once the decoding skill was
unlocked, they became voracious and insatiable readers, consuming piles of books for

pleasure throughout their childhood. In high school, Harper scored in the 98th percentile
for reading on the SAT.
The age at which they learned to read had no bearing on their lifetime love of
reading. However, I believe that the way they were educated had everything to do
with it.
Thinking again of my old friend, I wish I knew then what I know now, and could have
corrected her misguided perception. Perhaps her children, like mine, might have reaped
the bounteous fruits of Waldorf education.

Cultivating a Waldorf Home

by Nicole Justice-Kleeman

Children were most relaxed and played best if the space was fairly
simple but pleasing to the senses. It should be calming and lovely, but not so beautiful
and
complete that the children hesitate to move anything or disturb the order.
-Joan Almon, Coordinator of the U.S. branch of the Alliance for
Childhood, and former chair of the Waldorf Early Childhood Association of North
America
I will never forget the Sunday that I first discovered Waldorf. I was sitting in church
before service fingering through a Nova Natural catalog that my friend Sarah had
excitedly given me. It was as if time stopped. I just sat in its beauty and was truly
bewildered. Everything in the catalog was such a departure from what I had ever seen
offered for children before. Something deeply resonated within me on those pages. When
I got home I started to dig deeper online. It was then that I first came across Waldorf
Education. It couldnt have been better timing for us either. For months I had become
increasingly discontent during my last year of my Masters in Teaching program. While I
loved learning about children, I was very disheartened by what was being done in
practice in our schools and by society- which seemed to contradict all of what we had
been learning for the past two years. And I did not want that for my children.
Over the next few weeks I devoured books and articles on Waldorf. I found a thriving
online community of other mothers who discovered Waldorf. I had finally found a
cohesive parenting voice that I had been trying to gather on my own to no avail. Waldorf
gave my mothering, home life, and teaching direction that I had been searching for since
the birth of my first child three years earlier. I felt at peace.

Transforming Our Home and Home Life

Since I discovered Waldorf when my children were three and almost one years old, my
husband and I had already had a way of life and home in place. The journey that led me
to Waldorf had already been one of discontent and seeking a different way than what I
had seen around me. I had tried to embrace Baby Einstein and Little People, but it never
felt right for us. As I looked around my home with new eyes, I knew we needed a change
but it was daunting and a bit scary. It meant taking a new reality that was in my heart and
mind, and putting it visibly into practice in our home and lives- which could invite more
outside scrutiny. It meant making hard decisions to part with possessions and gifts. It
meant reassessing everything and possibly offending others who did things differently
than we did now. It also meant a bit a sacrifice and having less in the eyes of the worldbut truly gaining so much more.

Toys and the Playroom

One of the things that initially drew me to Waldorf was its beauty and their toys. As our
journey has progressed weve come to love Waldorf for more than the fluff, but it ascetics
still resonate deeply within us for good reason. Children, and I would even argue adults
as well, need beautiful and soothing environments to unfold in. Since Waldorf is centered
on nurturing the whole child, it was important that we work on our home life and
environment.
I began a process of looking at all of our possessions, not just the childrens toys. We, up
to this point, had lots of plastic toys. Tons of little people playsets, electronic learning
toys, hard plastic dolls, the whole nine yards. Before our upcoming move, I went through
our playroom and got rid of ALL of our plastic toys. All of them. It was painful. I saw as
a donated and sold many of our sets the money I had spent on these things. I felt guilty. I
also felt silly for spending so much time, energy, and money on all of that junk- most of

which my children never played with! I asked myself these questions with each toy I
came across, Is it beautiful? Do I even like this? Do we need this? Can this be played
with in more than one way? Was this made sustainably or ethically?

We kept very few toys. I was worried that my children would be upset or be missing out.
But much to my surprise they did not ask about the old toys. They mostly did not seem to
notice. They also began to play more and for longer periods of time. I also began making
them new toys which they treasured. They were very intrigued by mommy making
things- since up to that point I had never knitted or done any sort of wood working!

Gift Giving

I let family know about our preferences and why we were doing things differently now.
Many of them respected that. Some did not. I came to a good compromise that if a
plaything did not fit our homelike, that it would either be returned, donated, or it could
live at their house and not ours. I am happy to say after 3 years of this approach our
holidays go very well. I also taught my children why we dont do plastic at home and
they dont ask for it to come in anymore either. Instead of giving lots of gifts at holidays
we try to get one big gift that all the children will love and one smaller homemade gift for
each child.

The Household

I did not just stop with their toys, I went through the whole house. I reassessed all
possessions. I parted with many of mine. We phased out plastic in the kitchen. We did
with less. Life became lighter and simpler. But it was still tough. I went through my
clothes and we adopted new buying habits with all of our things. I asked many of the
same questions when it came to our clothes and household items, Is it beautiful? Do I
like this? Do we need this? Was this made sustainably or ethically? I also rearranged our
rooms so that all spaces were well used and inviting to the children. We has a dining
room that we hardly ever used and it became our school room. It was one of the best
decisions I made!

We started cloth diapering, homeschooling, and raising some of our own animals for food
. I learned to knit, sew, quilt, and do some woodworking. I let the kids play in the mud
and rain. Craig became a composting fiend. We began to eat healthier, do with less, and
make more of our own things from jam to laundry detergent. The kids stopped watching
TV at home and my husband and I began to watch much less- and we got rid of cable. We
adjusted our perception of more is better in regards to not only the children but ourselves
and began on a path on being contented with what we have and having less. We stopped
feeling as if we and the kids must keep up with and beat the Joneses. I said no to more
activities and yes letting my children just be kids. We bowed our of the race altogether.

Empowered Change
Everything in our lives came together. I had more free time that wasnt being consumed
by so much stuff. Our child rearing, teaching, eating, living, and doing synced all under
the umbrella of Waldorf. Instead of our home life feeling like a guilty disjointed race, it
began to ebb and flow peacefully from one stage to the next.

Waldorf gave practical ease and direction to our lives, but more importantly it also gave
me my voice as a mother and as an educator. The confidence and validation that it has
given me is immeasurable. The uneasiness that I experienced for so many years before of
what society was telling me and what my heart felt was validated . It never felt right to
let the babies watch a DVD. It never felt right to put them into preschool for
socialization. All of what I spent six years studying was confirmed. My intuition was spot
on and my uneasiness was warranted. And for that I am so very grateful to Waldorf.
No matter where you are on your Waldorf journey, you can cultivate a Waldorf home. It
will and should look different for each family. Big or small changes, you know best
where your family is and what is right at which time. While the ways in which I went
about some change was drastic, as with our toys, others took time- like phasing out all
TV and introducing a strong rhythm. There are also stages in life where things change
and thats OK too. There is no need to let guilt eat you up and make you feel like youre
not Waldorf enough. When I was pregnant with my third child and suffering from severe
hyperemesis, my little ones watched more TV than I would have liked. But once I was
better, we happily readjusted. I hope this empowers you to begin or continue cultivating a
Waldorf home. It is never too late to start and I havent missed our old way of life yet. In
fact, I am enjoying my life more fully than I ever thought possible.

Drawing with Hand, Head and Heart: Beyond the Right Side
of the Brain
The following is an excerpt from the forthcoming book Drawing with Hand, Head and
Heart: A Natural Approach to Learning the Art of Drawing by Van James. Available
September 2013.
The laborer works with his hands, the craftsman works with his hands and his head, the
artist works with his hands, his head and his heart. Francis of Assisi (1182-1226)
Over the past few decades, the theory that postulates dual operations of the brain has
become a popular and practical model for understanding the contrasting cognitive
functions of the brain and resulting human behavior. The widespread acceptance of this
theory has in no small way occurred with the help of mainstream work such as Betty
Edwards book, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain.*1 This workbook approach
helped to popularize the idea of lateral brain function because it demonstrated the theory
by means of observable, practical applications in drawing. If one recognizes right brain

activity (artistic, holistic, imagistic, intuitive, simultaneous, present-future oriented) and

left brain functions (logical, analytical, verbal, literal, sequential, present-past oriented),
one can begin to utilize the appropriate brain operations for specific tasks at handin this
case, the right brain activity for the purpose of visual thinking to improve ones drawing.
According to this theory, various exercises, such as drawing from a picture that is placed
upside-down, can shift the brain (that is ones perception) into a more artistic, imagistic
way of seeing, thus making drawing easier. This theory makes the great mysteries of
consciousness, cognition, perception and creativity a bit more accessible and
understandable. It is helpful as a starting point for understanding aspects of brain activity
and the rich nature of our learning process.
However, twofold, lateral brain functions occur within the wider context of the trifold
brain the so-called reptilian hindbrain (Rhombencephalonmade up of brainstem and
cerebellum that deals with involuntary actions and survival mechanisms), limbic
midbrain (Mesencephalonthalamus, hypothalamus, and other brain centers which
control emotion, sexuality and memory), and neocortex forebrain or cerebral cortex
(Prosencephalonneomammalian brain involved with muscle function, sense perception,
and thought processes).
According to contemporary neurology, up to age three, children learn by way of imitation
with the engagement of the reptilian and limbic brains. After age three, there is a growth
spurt activating the right hemisphere of the neocortex. The right hemisphere brings
intuitive, imaginative, non-linear thinking into action as well as an integrated functioning
between the three brain regions. This integrative functioning is responsible for what
Joseph Chilton Pearce calls the magical relationship a child has to her world, expressed
in simple play and untutored creativity.*2 Around eight years of age, children develop
foveal focus; the ability to visually scan two-dimensional space. About the age of nine,
the left hemisphere of the neocortex begins to function more actively. This hemisphere of
the brain gives us abilities for abstraction, objectivity, and linear thought. These latter two
events allow a momentous leap in learning as they open the possibility for reading and
writing to organically take place, not to mention, continued creative activity.

Fig. 1. The magical relationship a child has to her world, is quite observable in her
drawings. Around eight years of age, children develop foveal focus; the ability to visually
scan two-dimensional space. This drawing was done by a first grader.
These functions of the three brains, as described by neuroscience, are integrated into the
still wider nervous system and sense organization, respiratory and circulatory systems, as
well as the metabolic and limb systems. This threefold picture of the human organism
the nerve-sense system, where thinking is headquartered; the rhythmic system, where the
heart of feelings and emotions live; and the metabolic-limb system, the hands, feet, and
gut of our willwhich Rudolf Steiner*3 articulated and related so clearly in the context
of child development, is naturally important in ones approach to learning almost
anything, especially drawing. It is the basis for speaking of drawing with head, heart and
handthe representative areas of the three bodily systems that serve our capacities for
thinking, feeling and will. Thinking, feeling and will are in turn faculties of our soulspiritual being that allow for understanding of and experiential meeting with the world, as
well as our awakening to individuality and selfhood. Ultimately, when we act in the
worldwhen we drawwe do so with the use of both our brain hemispheres, the three
brain regions, and the three bodily systems, all of which are active to some degree. When
we speak of thinking we generally mean the left-brain activityreflective, logical
thinking. If we act or draw with engaged emotion, with awakened feelings, we engage
our right-brain activity and supercede the strictly analytical processes of the left-brain.
Naturally, our limb system is engaged when we draw, and this involves the deeper limbic
and reptilian brain functions, ie. hand-eye coordination and engaged will impulses.
According to this picture we know things with our heads (IQintellectual quotient), we
feel things with our hearts (EQemotional quotient), and we experience things through
active doing at a gut level or in our fingertips (WQwill quotient).*4 All three spheres
are forms of knowing and ways in which we learn as human beings.

In teaching and learning any subject it is helpful to keep in mind these three spheres of
human activity, recognizing that especially in the child, access to understanding usually
occurs from an active doing, simultaneously involving the engagement of feelings, and
only later arriving at the formulation of concepts in thinking. When teaching children it is
almost always best to first engage the will in an activity that may be experienced
inwardly through the feelings, and then be brought to reflection, after the fact, in order to
understand it. As a general guideline, before the age of seven to nine, children learn from
doing things by example because they learn from imitation not from being told
information. One can not tell a child of this age, please, dont pick the flowers, and
expect them to follow these instructions if you yourself are constantly picking flowers
and demonstrating the opposite behavior. They will always imitate what they see being
done around them more than what they are told.
Based on research into childrens brain development, Jane Healy*5 describes this type of
first-order learning in children as concrete knowing. Harvards Howard Gardener calls it
sensori-motor learning and intuitive knowing.*6 By the change of teeth and through
puberty, roughly ages seven to fourteen, children learn best through their cognitive
feeling, through pictures and symbolic knowing (Healy) or notational learning
(Gardener). This is why the arts are such effective learning tools for children of this age.
Only in adolescence, between fourteen and twenty-one, does independent judgment and
abstract learning (Healy) or formal conceptual knowledge (Gardener) begin to come into
its own. In each of these life periods learning can be approached differently in order to be
most effective, hygenic and developmentally appropriate.
These three stages of knowledge were clearly noted millennia ago by Confucius (551-479
BCE) who declared: Tell me and I will forget, show me and I will remember, involve me
and I will understand. Telling, showing and involving are the three qualitatively different
and progressively deeper forms of knowing: Tellingabstract (thinking), neocortex leftbrain function; Showingsymbolic (feeling), neocortex right-brain activity; Involving
concrete (willing), limbic-reptilian and other brain functions. In order to understand the
way children, and adults, learn it is important to take a larger view of learning as a
process (fig. 2).

Fig. 2. The education of a child is like the architectural elements of a building, requiring
a firm foundation, strong supports and walls, and a protective, over-arching roof or load.
Hands-on, concrete-intuitive learning provide a foundation for early childhood, while
artistic, symbolic-notational learning establishes the columns of support in the middle
school years, and the formal conceptual, abstract knowing becomes a kind of roof for the
education in adolescence.
How we teach the art of drawing will depend on the age of the child and its particular
developmental learning needs: abstract (tell me), symbolic (show me) and concrete
(involve me) knowing. As the avenues of hands-on, concrete-intuitive learning provide a
foundation for early childhood, and artistic, symbolic-notational learning establishes the
walls and columns of support in the middle school years, so the formal conceptual,
abstract knowing becomes a kind of capping-off and roofing-over in the architecture of
education through the first twenty-one years of life. As foundation, support and load of
education are established, all three types of knowing need to become integrated (fig. 3).
Brain plasticity advocates a balanced education of head, heart, and limbs, according to
psychologist and Professor Emeritus of Educational Science, Christian Rittelmeyer.
Only through such whole experiences can human beings, through their organic brain
rudiments, react to given challenges in a flexible, socially correct, and creative way.*7

Fig. 3. As hands-on, concrete-intuitive learning,

symbolic-notational knowing, and formal conceptual, abstract understanding become
established, all three types of knowing need to become integrated and work harmoniously
together. Here is a main lesson book drawing by a high school student.
With a comprehensive picture like that of the threefold human being we begin to see what
a pivotal place the arts hold in the dynamics of learning; for it is between cognition and
action that the arts stand as a great mediator. The arts are a form of knowing-doing/doingknowing that bridge thinking and will. They imbue thinking with warmth, imagination,
originality and enthusiasm, while they strengthen, focus, discipline and give order to the
will. Therefore, more and more educational research such as the Visible Thinking, Artful
Thinking, Studio Thinking, and other arts integration programs move in this direction of
recognizing artistic activity as knowing in action. As Gardener points out: artistic
forms of knowledge and expression are less sequential, more holistic and organic, than
other forms of knowing.*8 Artistic forms of knowing are the result of repetitive practice
on the one hand and on the other, fresh, new delight each time the art is practiced (fig. 4).
The artistic is enjoyed every time, not only the first occasion, observed Rudolf Steiner.
Art has something in its nature which does not only stir one only once but gives one
fresh joy repeatedly. Hence what we have to do in education is intimately bound up
with the artistic element.*9 Art serves as the balance in education and a bridge to what
can make us more fully human in our thoughts, in our feelings, and our deeds.
Teachers should love art so much that they do not want this experience to be lost to
children, says Steiner. They will then see how the children grow through their
experiences in art. It is art that awakens their intelligence to full life [The arts] bring a

happy mood into the childrens seriousness and dignity into their joy. With our intellect
we merely comprehend nature; it takes artistic feeling to experience it. [C]hildren who
engage in art learn to be creative people they feel their inner nature uplifted to the
ideal plane. They acquire a second level of humanity alongside the first.*10
According to Rittelmeyer,research contradicts the intellectual or cognitive
interpretation given to it by demands for brain exercise, Baby Einstein,*11 PISAPower [Program for International Student Assessment] training, or similarly uninspiring
neuro-didactic recommendations. Instead, brain research shows clearly that
instructional learning does not lead, in the long run, to storage of what has been
learned. Rather, sensual experience, happiness and disappointment, and wonder and
discomfort are constituent elements of learning and brain development. The ordered
multiplicity of experience and association-rich artistic and creative activities, produce an
association-rich brain structure, one that in itself seems to be an organic condition for
creative thinking and complex emotional cultures. An educational- and socio-economic
condition that favors channeled experiences [as in excellerated learning programs,
ironically] leads to an impoverishment of the pathways of the neuro-logical
landscape.*12
When we make art, when we create drawings, we give expression to our will impulses
and urges, our feelings and emotions, our sense experiences, perceptions, imaginations
and our thoughts. Art can engage our entire human being, from our dual brain functions
and tri-brain system to our threefold bodily organism and triad of soul capacities. Within
this picture of our trifold humanitybody, soul and spiritit is art and the creative process,
that serves as the great mediator between our physical-material and our soul-spiritual
activity. This is why Steiner suggested: Art must become the lifeblood of the soul.*13
Art must become a vital part of our lives, an essential part of our inner life, whatever our
profession or lifestyle. And this is why, if we are not to become a robotic thinking
machine on the one hand or a willful, desire-driven animal on the other, but are to realize
our full potentials, our true gifts, it will be in the sphere of creative capacities, the artist in
us, that we may find our universally human attributes. In the end it is essential that we
look at human beings as complete organisms in relationship to the world, and not to stop
short at considering only brain functions or measurable cognitive processes. After all, we
are more than just brains. We are not just our head, we are also hands and heart as well!

.[T]he production of a work of genuine art probably demands more intelligence than
does most of the so-called thinking that goes on among those who pride themselves on
being intellectuals.John Dewey (1859-1952)
Notes:
1. Edwards, B. The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain.
2. Pearce, J.C. The Magical Child.
3. Steiner, R. Study of Man.
4. Although educators acknowledge IQ and in recent years have confirmed an EQ,
recognition of a WQ is only just being considered in studies on Studio Thinking (see
Hetland, L. and E. Winner, S. Veenema, K. Sheridan. 2007. Studio Thinking: The Real
Benefits of Visual Arts Education. Teachers College Press: New York).
5. Healy, J. Endangered Minds.
6. Gardener, H. Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the 21st Century.
7. Rittelmeyer, C. Advantages and Disadvantages of Brain Research for Education,
Research Bulletin, p. 27.
8. Gardener, H. p. 42.
9. Steiner, R. Study of Man, p.70.
10. Steiner, R. Lecture delivered in Dornach, CH. March 1923. GA36.
11. Walt Disney Company, which holds the copy right on Baby Einstein, Baby Mozart,
and Baby Shakespeare, has recently offered consumer refunds on these products because
of the unsubstantiated claims that technological tools can advance the education of
infants.
12. Rittelmeyer, C., p.17.
13. Steiner, R. The Younger Generation, p. 120
Van James is a teaching artist at the Honolulu Waldorf School and chairman of the
Anthroposophical Society in Hawaii. He is an art instructor at the Kula Makua
Waldorf Teacher Training program in Honolulu and a guest teacher at Rudolf Steiner
College in California, and Taruna College in New Zealand. He is the author of several
books on culture and the arts, including the forthcoming Drawing with Head, Heart and
Hand: Learning the Natural Way to Draw.

Parenting lessons I learned from a waldorf kindergarden.

All I wanted was to work in that beautiful, quaint school with the wooden toys and the
sheer silks where everything smelled of lavender.
The Waldorf School looked like the calmest, coolest place on earth and when I set foot in
the spare, yet homey kindergarten classroom where I was interviewing for a kindergarten
aide position, I felt like Id found the place where I was meant to be.
A few days later, the teacher called and told me the position had been given to someone
else and I was crestfallen.
A week after that when she called me again to tell me that the person theyd hired had
changed his mind about the job after all, I knew that fate had intervened on my behalf.
Waldorf education was founded by Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner in Germany just
after World War I and is based on the principles of Anthroposophy.
Waldorf pedagogy believes that the human being is threefold: made up of mind, body and
spirit and that all three must be educated. The schools promote creativity, hands-on
learning, problem solving, art, music, spiritual growth and service as well as the
appreciation of beauty.
I spent a year working in the Waldorf Kindergarten and the lessons I learned have stayed
firmly with me ever since. When I became a mother almost four years ago, these lessons
and the wisdom imparted to me at the Waldorf school, took on a whole new value and
continue to positively influence my parenting.
Parents dont need to believe in Steiners philosophies (yes, some of his beliefs are pretty
out there) or even send their child to a Waldorf school to reap the benefits of the core
beliefs of Waldorf education. These are simple, good habits that any parent can practice
regardless of how they choose to educate their kids or what their family believes.
Kids Need Lots and Lots of Unstructured Play.
If you do nothing else on this list, let your children play freely.

Todays young people live harried, rushed and over-structured lives where they are
shuttled back and forth from school, activities, camps, sports and lessons of all kinds and
they have very little free time in which to roam, rest, imagine and learn to entertain
themselves.
Stop over-scheduling and let your kids find ways in which to fill their own time.
Stop with the hovering and helicopter parenting. When children are immersed in their
play, let them be and only interfere if someone is in danger. If children need redirection,
do so subtly and gently.
Turn Off the TV.
I agree largely with the Waldorf anti-TV philosophy, but not wholly. Spending too much
time in front of a screen creates individuals who cannot envision pictures in their minds,
which is fatal to the growth of the imagination and can seriously hamper reading
comprehension later in life. It makes kids lazy mentally and physically. Turn off the TV
and get the kids engaged in dramatic play (aka playing pretend).
Fairy Tales and Telling Stories is Important.
Were talking the gory Grimms versions here, too, which I absolutely loved as a child.
I get that some of these original tales can be a bit horrifying to us grown-ups, especially
when we are used to the whitewashed Disney versions. Cinderellas sisters cut their feet
to fit in the slipper? Babies get kidnapped by witches? Abusive stepmothers abound,
cannibalism is fairly common and all sorts of double crossers commit scores of wicked
deeds in fairy tales, but children perceive these stories quite differently than adults.
Dont worry. Your kids wont get scared. In fact, these fairy tales actually help children
work through their fears and subconscious insecurities about the world.
In addition to reading or reciting fairy tales to your little ones, tell them stories from their
lives, your own life and their grandparents lives. Make stories up, too. Children love
listening to their parents telling stories and speaking directly to them.

Your Kid Doesnt Need to Read and Write at Three Years Old, Calm Down.
Todays parents mistakenly believe that the earlier a child learns to read and write the
better, but this is a dire mistake.
The thinking is that children need a head start in order to excel in school, but the best
head start they can get is by becoming creative and socialized.
How do they do that? Through lots and lots of playing, of course.
Encourage the imagination first and academics will follow. Trust me, there are plenty of
Harvard students who couldnt read and write until they were six. Theres plenty of time.
Spend as Much Time Outside as Humanly Possible.
Nature is enormously restorative and Waldorf schools understand this. Some even have
classes which are held entirely outdoors all year round, regardless of weather.
Human beings have lived largely outdoors for thousands of years. Our bodies are durable
and made to be outside in the elements so dont be frightened of nature. Its the healthiest
thing for everyone, kids and grown-ups alike.
Deepen your childrens connection to the natural world by hiking, picking fruit,
collecting shells, gardening, rolling in the grass, climbing trees, visiting a farm, playing in
the sand at the beach, splashing in a natural body of waterthe possibilities for outdoor
fun are endless.
You Can Trust Your Children With Knives and Fire, Seriously.
Supervised, of course, but still. Its safe and reasonable to let your children learn to use
real tools, real knives and matches.
Teach them how to use these things with caution and care and let your five year old use a
butter knife to cut bread, spread almond butter on his crackers or slice cucumbers for
dinner.
Beginning in the Waldorf Kindergarten (where some kids are barely four) children
regularly use knives and real tools for their intended purposes. Lit candles decorate the
classroom tables and shelves and surprisingly, everything is just fine.

Children can do more than we thinkyou should see the way the five and six year olds
can knit and hammer nails, its astonishing and enlightening.
Instill a Strong Sense of Rhythm and Routine.
Children thrive in routine. They feel safe with consistency and when they know whats
coming next. Try to create a sense of daily, monthly, yearly and seasonal routines for your
children. It grounds them in space and time and provides a strong sense of security.
It is Perfectly Normal, Healthy Even, For Kids to Get Filthy on a Regular Basis.
Ive noticed that most of todays parents are hyper-vigilant about dirt and bacteria and are
terrified of their kids getting messy.
Look, just breathe and go with it. Kids need to play in the dirt. Yes, actual soil and sand.
They need to splash in puddles, squish berries, feel dough ooze between their tiny
fingers. They need to experience their worlds through all of their senses and often this
means a full body immersion in things we consider totally filthy. Its healthy!
Many recent studies blame the explosion of childhood allergies and autoimmune
conditions on a too clean environment for kids. Getting dirty nourishes the human
microbiome with healthy bacteria and strengthens our immune systems.
You can always give them a bath later.
Fill Up the Whole Page.
This was an odd thing I noticed when I worked in the Waldorf school. When the children
created art they had little to no direction but they were strongly urged toward filling the
entire sheet of paper with layers of color.
This lesson really stuck with me. Waldorf students create magnificent works of art from
very young ages and I think that much of that has to do with their being taught to fill the
whole page before moving on to a new project. This teaches children to focus and to
finish what they start and it creates an appreciation for an aesthetic that doesnt involve a
hapless crayon scribble on a scrap of paper. Their creations are taken very seriously.

Every Moment is a Learning Opportunity.

I like to say that all parents are homeschoolers, regardless of where they do or do not
send their children to school.
Children learn from our example so its important for adults to comport themselves
calmly, assertively and compassionately. Children are in a constant state of learning. They
learn through our example, so be mindful of that, and they learn through the experiences
we bring to them.
Everything we do with our children is a chance to teach them something.
Show them exotic fruits in the grocery store. Let them weigh lentils in bulk. Explain to
them the movement of the tides at the beach. Tell them how the sun moves across the sky
each day. Let them stay up to see a meteor shower. Build something with their help.

Practicing Art, Dance, Singing and Handwork Builds the Brain.

Waldorf students and teachers are extremely well rounded. Everyone works on art, music,
dance and handwork (knitting, sewing, building, weaving, etc.) regardless of age, gender
or inherent talent.
These activities are seen as purposeful work and created a balance human being with an
integrated body, mind and spirit. One of the greatest tragedies of our public education
system is the removal of the arts from the curriculum in favor of rote memorization and
test prep. This kind of zombie education creates students who are empty and unfulfilled
and who lack passion for learning and living.

Teach your Children Abstract Skills Like Math Through Practical, Hands-On Activities.
People, especially little ones, learn best when they can see how abstract concepts like
math and science are applied in the real world. Learn about measuring through building
and cooking. Observe science at work in the natural world. When taught this way,
children attain a deeper understanding of abstract subjects, plus they learn a lot of useful
skills!
Your Children Are On Their Own PathRespect Their Autonomy and Individuality.
Celebrate your childrens unique spirits no matter how different from you they are or how
unexpected they may be.
Our children come to the world through us and we must keep them safe and well until
adulthood, but they dont belong to us. They are their own and their individuality should
always be respected and encouraged.
This often means letting them find their own way, their own passions, interests, joys and
diversions without parental pressure to conform to any set standard.
The goal is to raise children into balanced, well rounded, confident people who are
innovators and free thinkers, not anxious followers desperate to fit in.

The Magic of Boredom.

Mom, Im bored.
Mom, theres NOTHING to do.
MOM, Teddys irritating me!
Mom, Kitty wont play with me.
Ive heard these sentences a hundred times this summer. The summer is long.

We dread these sentences. They make us feel bad, dont they. They make us feel guilty,
like we are not doing a good enough job of entertaining our children. Like we are letting
our children down by letting them experience bored.
They make us feel like we are neglecting our children. This is when we wish wed signed
them up for those expensive summer camps or art classes or when we wish that the
summer wasnt so long.
STOP!
DONT.
DONT feel guilty or bad or dread the bored word.
We have it wrong. Being bored is GOOD for our children.
We are NOT being good parents by making sure our children are constantly busy.
We are, in fact, doing our kids a disservice. We are keeping something really amazing
FROM them.
For, it is AFTER these dreaded declarations of boredom that our children tap into
something magical.
It is after theyve traveled through the discomfort of having nothing to do, after they have
flopped onto the couch in dismay and stared out of the window at the rustling leaves.
It is after this emptying of their minds that wonderful imaginings come to them. Beautiful
unique thoughts and ideas.
THIS is when they find their creativity and imagination and inspiration. Its
AMAZING to watch.
Being bored is infinitely good for our children.

So, next time our children say that they are bored, lets smile inwardly and say YES to
our selves.
Next time our children say they are bored, lets NOT jump to their rescue but lets rather
let them experience their boredom, travel through it and find the seam of magic that is
waiting for them on the other side.

Let them get bored.

Thoughts from a Waldorf Teacher

by Dr. Christine Gruhn
Davis has one of the best public school systems in the state, if not in the country. Still,
children are growing up too fast all around us and are burned out by schoolwork,
before they even reach high school.
My husband and I have chosen instead to pay for a Waldorf education for both of our
academically talented children. What is so special about Waldorf education?

Waldorf education was the inspiration of the Austrian philosopher, educator, scientist and
artist, Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). He designed a system that educates the whole child,
that is developmentally appropriate, and that teaches the child to live in harmony with the
natural world.
Many of Steiners ideas, considered radical in 1920, are now being supported by modern
research on education and brain development, and some ideas are being adopted by
public school systems.
What is a developmentally appropriate education? Steiners answer is that a childs life
needs to be enriched, but not accelerated.
Dr. David Elkind, in his book The Hurried Child, stated that children are being pushed
to grow up too fast and to accomplish more than should be expected of them. Our own
children would undoubtedly succeed in accelerated academic programs, but we want
them to enjoy their childhood. We know there will be time later for intense academics and
sports, and when the time comes, our children will not be burned out.
The Waldorf curriculum is not boring, even for very bright children, as children paint,
draw, garden, dance, cook, knit and learn one or two foreign languages in their early
years.
Every day, each child in every Waldorf School is greeted by their class teacher, with a
handshake and a personal greeting. This is the same teacher that they, hopefully, will have
from first through eighth grade.
By eighth grade, their class teacher may teach them for only two hours per day, as special
subject teachers are increasingly introduced in the grades.It is a wonderful steadying
force for the students, in our tumultuous world, to have the constancy of another adult,
besides the parents, who cares deeply about them and their education.
The entire class begins its day with a morning verse, thanking God for the blessings of
the earth, and asking God's help in learning and in work. While acknowledging a higher
spiritual power, Waldorf schools do not promote any particular religion, and families at a
Waldorf School come from the entire spectrum of religious backgrounds.
After the morning verse, children in a class sing and play instruments together and
engage in a brief period of physical activity before they begin their two hour academic
main lesson.
During main lesson, first graders learn the shapes and names of the letters through
imaginative stories told by their teacher, and they learn words and sounds through
memorization of poetry and other works. Children in Waldorf schools do not typically

learn to read until second or third grade, and as a result, most of them become incredibly
good listeners.
Some parents panic when they learn of this late reading, but current research shows
that there is no academic benefit to early reading. By third or fourth grade, children in
Waldorf schools are reading at or above grade level.
First graders are still in the world of imagination, and love to hear stories of elves, fairies,
gnomes, dragons and good triumphing over evil. How much more valuable this is to their
development than to be struggling through See Jane run.
Early reading might provide parents and schools with a certain level of comfort but it
does not enrich the child, nor does it make reading fun or enjoyable. Waldorf schools are
not trying to delay reading, but are providing a literacy experience, which involves
enriching childrens lives with words from the beginning, reading and telling complex
stories to children at home and at school.
Children in the first grade will learn to knit and to play the recorder. Steiner believed that
children who learn to knit will read better, and that learning music will help a child
develop skills in mathematics. By 2002, we have learned that the same areas of the brain
are active in reading and in knitting, likewise is true for mathematics and music.
By third grade, students are leaving the world of the imagination to wonder about their
role on the earth. They will learn from a variety of religious traditions, stories of people
who tried, and failed, and tried again. They will learn to cook, to sew, to grow crops and
care for animals.
Like many fourth graders in the area, Waldorf students learn of the pioneers and go to
Sutters fort. The difference is, that learning to work hard and do things by yourself is not
a two-day field trip, but is practiced throughout the years in a Waldorf school.
In the third or fourth grade, all children in the Waldorf School will begin the study of a
string instrument, usually the violin. Ensemble playing is added in sixth grade.
Academic homework does not begin in earnest until fifth grade. Of course, there is
homework before then children are to develop their physical bodies by climbing trees,
swimming and riding their bikes, they are to draw and paint, they are to pack their own
lunches, help prepare meals, care for the family pets, and participate in household chores.
This homework strengthens the family and the childs role within it.
Fifth graders study ancient Egypt and Greece in stories, song, art and movement. Waldorf
schools do not use textbooks, but each child produces a main lesson book for each three week long - academic block; a book filled with written and artistic work. How

much greater is your understanding of the culture and ways of the Egyptians when you
have drawn their clothing, their cities, their boats and their landscape, made their food,
learned of their plants, and sung their songs!
Last years Davis Waldorf fifth grade spent a week in Yosemite studying botany, Native
peoples, and learning how to rock climb. We are not alone among Waldorf parents in
wishing that we had been able to experience such a holistic education!
Science is taught in a wonderful way in the Waldorf School. Children in the lower grades
learn about science through experiences in the garden, at the tidepools, and walking in the
woods. Physics, chemistry, anatomy and physiology are taken up in the sixth through
eighth grades.
All science is taught from the phenomena. This means that children observe the results
of a scientific experiment demonstrated by their teacher, and then they discuss the results.
They take what they have observed into their sleep, and come back the next day to work
with their teacher to explain the phenomenon they have observed. The Waldorf classroom
the day after a science experiment is an exciting place, as children develop their creative
thinking skills. This differs from conventional methods of teaching science, where
children are told what to expect, and perform an experiment to prove what they have been
taught.
Rudolf Steiner was considered radical in his time for believing that learning could
continue while an individual was asleep. However, current research has demonstrated that
it is during the REM period of each sleep cycle (humans have three to five of these per
night) that the brain integrates new information. It is for this reason that Waldorf teachers
never begin and end a lesson in a single day, and teachers stress to parents the critical
importance of adequate sleep on a regular schedule for their childrens learning.
Each day the Waldorf curriculum educates the head of the child through rigorous
academic work, presented when the child is developmentally ready to receive the
information.
Each day childrens hearts are nurtured through music, dance, painting and drawing, and
each day, the childs will is strengthened through handwork, gardening, cooking and the
chores that each child does at the end of the day to care for the school.
If you have read many of the same parenting magazines that we have, you notice that
most parents seem to agree that one of the major challenges of parenting in the 21st
century is the influence of the media on their childrens desires and development.
Children are growing up too fast and many parents are having conflicts with their
preadolescent children that earlier generations of parents did not deal with until much

later. This is just one of the reasons that Waldorf schools ask that children have almost no
exposure to television, movies and other mass media until they are in third grade, and that
this exposure be limited even as the children get older.
Research is showing the detrimental effects of media, especially television and computer
games, on brain development, weight, attention span, concentration, and the development
of social skills. Steiners ideas about keeping the young child close to the natural world
and away from modern technology do not seem very strange to us any more. As parents,
we have found it a blessing to find a school where the teachers and many of the other
parents feel the same way about the effects of media on our childrens health, academic
performance and social development. Our children do not feel that they are strange or
different for not watching television or going to movies. They also do not feel the need to
dress, act, and talk in the way of television actors and actresses.
We are both successful graduates of the California public school system. I have a
doctorate in Biology and Robert is a pediatrician who studies, among other things, how to
help children achieve school readiness.

WHY KIDS NEED NATURE

Whether you grew up in a suburb, on a farm, or in a big city, you probably spent a lot of
time playing outside, getting dirty, and coming home happy. Maybe you watched ants
making anthills in your backyard, climbed trees in the park, or simply lay in the grass
contemplating the drifting clouds. Unfortunately, young children today do not have as
many direct experiences with nature, and it's taking a toll. Richard Louv, author of Last

Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder, maintains that
this disconnect from the natural world is producing ill effects in both mind and body. But
he's optimistic that well-meaning, forward-thinking parents and educators can close the
kid-nature gap. "We should not think of a child's experience in nature as an
extracurricular activity," says Louv. "It should be thought of as vital to children's health
and development." The editors ofScholastic's Parent & Child talked with Louv about
his book.
Parent & Child: Why do children need a meaningful relationship with nature?
Richard Louv: Research suggests that a connection to nature is biologically innate; as
humans, we have an affinity for the natural world. When children spend most of their
time indoors, they miss out. Problems associated with alienation from nature include
familiar maladies: depression, obesity, and attention deficit disorder. Kids who have
direct access to nature are better learners. Exposure to nature has been shown to reduce
stress and increase attention spans.
When a child is out in nature, all the senses get activated. He is immersed in something
bigger than himself, rather than focusing narrowly on one thing, such as a computer
screen. He's seeing, hearing, touching, even tasting. Out in nature, a child's brain has the
chance to rejuvenate, so the next time he has to focus and pay attention, perhaps in
school, he'll do better.
But even if kids don't have any of the specific problems mentioned above, kids who don't
get out much lack the sense of wonder that only nature can provide. I've taken kids into
the woods who've never been there. At first, they're scared because it's unfamiliar, but
then you can see them open up and start exploring.
P&C: What's changed over the past generation or so that's caused this disconnect
with the natural world?
Louv: There are some obvious reasons, such as the fact that many families are
overscheduled, which chips away at leisure time. Parental fears of traffic, of crime,
even of nature itself, such as with Lyme disease or the West Nile virus also play a big
role in keeping kids indoors. What's unfortunate is that these fears have been
overamplified by the media, and the overall effect is that kids spend more time in their
homes, or very close to home.
In many places, children's access to nature has been cut off. The woods at the end of the
cul-de-sac were made into a new subdivision. New neighborhoods are carefully planned,
and as a result, they often dramatically restrict what kids can do with nature. Even parks
are manicured there may be a nice smooth soccer field or a baseball diamond but no
rough edges. Rough edges are the places children gravitate toward to explore, where they
find rocks and weeds and bugs. Efforts to provide nice-looking and safe outdoor spaces
are well intentioned, but they give kids the message that nature is not something you go

out in to get your hands dirty.

P&C: Don't children in rural areas still have access to nature and haven't city
kids always been restricted from participating in it?
Louv: Interestingly, the answer is no to both questions. These days, kids in rural areas are
just as indoor focused as their suburban peers, and for the same reasons parental fears,
less unscheduled time, an emphasis on computers and other indoor activities. And while
we might think that, historically, kids in cities have had limited contact with the natural
world, it's not always true. In older cities, especially, there are lots of green spaces, lots of
unplanned areas like vacant lots. Sure, it's not the woods, but when we talk about nature
it's not about the kind of nature, it's about children having the opportunity and freedom to
explore what's out there in their surroundings. That may mean a city park, a farm, a patch
of woods in a suburb even a tiny roof garden counts.
P&C: What can parents do to help their children get the safe outdoor experiences
they need?
Louv: You would think it would be ideal to let kids run loose and come back dirty and
happy at end of the day, but in reality this is not likely to happen anymore. We have to
come up with new ways for kids to have direct contact with nature. This probably means
parents have to get out there with their kids, and explore with them. Schools, too,
including preschools, can incorporate natural surroundings. In many schools in Western
Europe, nature is incorporated into the design of child care centers and schools, and there
have been positive results in terms of kids' attention spans and stress levels.
A lot of parents are already doing the right thing, almost instinctively. Perhaps they
remember how they used to play, and strive to provide the same thing for their kids.
While they may not let their kids roam free in the neighborhood, they do take their
children hiking or let them run around in the local park.
P&C: What are some easy ways to experience nature with preschool-age children?
Louv: The best thing you can do is to be enthusiastic about nature yourself. Go out in
your backyard. Instead of a manicured lawn or garden, leave some spots untamed so kids
can dig in the dirt and find rocks or interesting weeds. If you have a vegetable garden,
have your child help you plant seeds or pick tomatoes. Even walking to your local park
can be a nature walk to a preschooler he can collect leaves, you can point out trees and
bushes and show him the bugs crawling along the curb. Let your kids get down in the dirt
so they can see at eye level the whole universe there. Nature is good for everyone's
mental health. Nature isn't the problem; it's the solution.

Want to get your kids into college? Let

them play
Editor's note: Erika Christakis, MEd, MPH, is an early childhood teacher and former
preschool director. Nicholas Christakis, MD, PhD, is a professor of medicine and
sociology at Harvard University. Together, they serve as Masters of Pforzheimer House,
one of the undergraduate residential houses at Harvard College.
(CNN) -- Every day where we work, we see our young students struggling with the
transition from home to school. They're all wonderful kids, but some can't share easily or
listen in a group.
Some have impulse control problems and have trouble keeping their hands to themselves;
others don't always see that actions have consequences; a few suffer terribly from
separation anxiety.
We're not talking about preschool children. These are Harvard undergraduate students
whom we teach and advise. They all know how to work, but some of them haven't
learned how to play.
Parents, educators, psychologists, neuroscientists, and politicians generally fall into one
of two camps when it comes to preparing very young children for school: play-based or
skills-based.
These two kinds of curricula are often pitted against one another as a zero-sum game: If
you want to protect your daughter's childhood, so the argument goes, choose a play-based
program; but if you want her to get into Harvard, you'd better make sure you're brushing
up on the ABC flashcards every night before bed.
We think it is quite the reverse. Or, in any case, if you want your child to succeed in
college, the play-based curriculum is the way to go.
In fact, we wonder why play is not encouraged in educational periods later in the
developmental life of young people -- giving kids more practice as they get closer to the
ages of our students.
Why do this? One of the best predictors of school success is the ability to control
impulses. Children who can control their impulse to be the center of the universe, and -relatedly -- who can assume the perspective of another person, are better equipped to
learn.

Psychologists calls this the "theory of mind": the ability to recognize that our own ideas,
beliefs, and desires are distinct from those of the people around us. When a four-year-old
destroys someone's carefully constructed block castle or a 20-year-old belligerently
monopolizes the class discussion on a routine basis, we might conclude that they are
unaware of the feelings of the people around them.
The beauty of a play-based curriculum is that very young children can routinely observe
and learn from others' emotions and experiences. Skills-based curricula, on the other
hand, are sometimes derisively known as "drill and kill" programs because most teachers
understand that young children can't learn meaningfully in the social isolation required
for such an approach.
How do these approaches look different in a classroom? Preschoolers in both kinds of
programs might learn about hibernating squirrels, for example, but in the skills-based
program, the child could be asked to fill out a worksheet, counting (or guessing) the
number of nuts in a basket and coloring the squirrel's fur.
In a play-based curriculum, by contrast, a child might hear stories about squirrels and be
asked why a squirrel accumulates nuts or has fur. The child might then collaborate with
peers in the construction of a squirrel habitat, learning not only about number sense,
measurement, and other principles needed for engineering, but also about how to listen
to, and express, ideas.
The child filling out the worksheet is engaged in a more one-dimensional task, but the
child in the play-based program interacts meaningfully with peers, materials, and ideas.
Programs centered around constructive, teacher-moderated play are very effective. For
instance, one randomized, controlled trial had 4- and 5-year-olds engage in make-believe
play with adults and found substantial and durable gains in the ability of children to show
self-control and to delay gratification. Countless other studies support the association
between dramatic play and self-regulation.
Through play, children learn to take turns, delay gratification, negotiate conflicts, solve
problems, share goals, acquire flexibility, and live with disappointment. By allowing
children to imagine walking in another person's shoes, imaginative play also seeds the
development of empathy, a key ingredient for intellectual and social-emotional success.
The real "readiness" skills that make for an academically successful kindergartener or
college student have as much to do with emotional intelligence as they do with academic
preparation. Kindergartners need to know not just sight words and lower case letters, but
how to search for meaning. The same is true of 18-year-olds.

As admissions officers at selective colleges like to say, an entire freshman class could be
filled with students with perfect grades and test scores. But academic achievement in
college requires readiness skills that transcend mere book learning. It requires the ability
to engage actively with people and ideas. In short, it requires a deep connection with the
world.
For a five year-old, this connection begins and ends with the creating, questioning,
imitating, dreaming, and sharing that characterize play. When we deny young children
play, we are denying them the right to understand the world. By the time they get to
college, we will have denied them the opportunity to fix the world too.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Erika and Nicholas
Christakis.

About a year ago, I made the circuit of kindergartens in my town. At each stop, after the
pitch by the principal and the obligatory exhibit of art projects only a mother (the
students own) could love, I asked the same question: What is your policy on
homework?
And always, whether from the apple-cheeked teacher in the public school or the earnest
administrator of the child centered private one, I was met with an eager nod. Oh, yes,
each would explain: kindergartners are assigned homework every day.
Bzzzzzzt. Wrong answer.
When I was a child, in the increasingly olden days,kindergarten was a place to play. We
danced the hokeypokey, swooned in suspense over Duck, Duck, Gray Duck (thats what
Minnesotans stubbornly call Duck, Duck, Goose) and napped on our mats until the WakeUp Fairy set us free.
No more. Instead of digging in sandboxes, todays kindergartners prepare for a life of
multiple-choice boxes by plowing through standardized tests with cuddly names like
Dibels (pronounced dibbles), a series of early-literacy measures administered to

millions of kids; or toiling over reading curricula like Open Court which features
assessments every six weeks.
Photo

CreditJulie Blackmon
According to Crisis in the Kindergarten, a report recently released by the Alliance for
Childhood, a nonprofit research and advocacy group, all that testing is wasted: it neither
predicts nor improves young childrens educational outcomes. More disturbing, along
with other academic demands, like assigning homework to 5-year-olds, it is crowding out
the one thing that truly is vital to their future success: play.
A survey of 254 teachers in New York and Los Angeles the group commissioned found
that kindergartners spent two to three hours a day being instructed and tested in reading
and math. They spent less than 30 minutes playing. Play at age 5 is of great importance
not just to intellectual but emotional, psychological social and spiritual development,
says Edward Miller, the reports co-author. Play especially the lets-pretend, dramatic
sort is how kids develop higher-level thinking, hone their language and social skills,
cultivate empathy. It also reduces stress, and thats a word that should not have to be used
in the same sentence as kindergartner in the first place.
I came late to motherhood, so I had plenty of time to ponder friends mania for souped-up
childhood learning. How was it that the same couples who piously proclaimed that 3year-old Junior was not developmentally ready to use the potty were drilling him on
flashcards? What was the rush? Did that better prepare kids to learn? How did 5 become
the new 7, anyway?
Theres no single reason. The No Child Left Behind Act, with its insistence that what
cannot be quantified cannot be improved, plays a role. But so do parents who want to
build a better child. There is also what marketers refer to as KGOY Kids Getting

Older Younger their explanation for why 3-year-olds now play with toys that were
initially intended for middle-schoolers. (Since adults are staying younger older 50 is
the new 30! our children may soon surpass us in age.)
Regardless of the cause, Miller says, accelerating kindergarten is unnecessary: any early
advantage fades by fourth grade. It makes a parent proud to see a child learn to read at
age 4, but in terms of whats really best for the kid, it makes no difference. For at-risk
kids, pushing too soon may backfire. The longitudinal High/Scope Preschool Curriculum
Comparison Study followed 68 such children, who were divided between instruction- and
play-based classrooms. While everyones I.Q. scores initially rose, by age 15, the former
groups academic achievement plummeted. They were more likely to exhibit emotional
problems and spent more time in special education. Drill and kill, indeed.

Thinkers like Daniel Pink have proposed that this countrys continued viability hinges on
what is known as the imagination economy: qualities like versatility, creativity, vision
and playfulness that cannot be outsourced. Its a compelling argument to apply
here, though a bit disheartening too: must we append the word economy to everything
to legitimize it? Isnt cultivating imagination an inherent good? I would hate to see
childrens creativity subject to the same parental anxiety that has stoked the sales of Baby
Einstein DVDs.
Jean Piaget famously referred to the American question, which arose when he lectured
in this country: how, his audiences wanted to know, could a childs development be sped
up? The better question may be: Why are we so hellbent on doing so?
Maybe the current economic retrenchment will trigger a new perspective on early
education, something similar to the movement toward local, sustainable, organic food.
Call it Slow Schools. After all, part of what got us into this mess was valuing
achievement, speed and results over ethics, thoughtfulness and responsibility. Then again,

parents may glean the opposite lesson, believing their kids need to be pushed even harder
in order to stay competitive in a shrinking job market.
I wonder how far Im willing to go in my commitment to the cause: would I embrace the
example of Finland whose students consistently come out on top in international
assessments and delay formal reading instruction until age 7? Could I stick with that
position when other second graders were gobbling up War and Peace or at least the
third Harry Potterbook?
In the end, the school I found for my daughter holds off on homework until fourth grade.
(Though a flotilla of research shows homework confers no benefit enhancing neither
retention nor study habits until middle school.) Its a start. A few days ago, though, I
caught her concocting a pretend math worksheet. All the other kids have homework,
she complained with a sigh. I wish I could have some, too.

Compassionate Communication By Marshall Rosenberg

At an early age, most of us were taught to speak and think "Jackal." This language is
from the head. It is a way of mentally classifying people into varying shades of good and
bad, right and wrong. Ultimately, it provokes defensiveness, resistance, and
counterattack. "Giraffe" bids us to speak from the heart, to talk about what is going on for
us-without judging others. In this idiom, you give people an opportunity to say yes,
although you respect no for an answer. "Giraffe" is a language of requests; "Jackal " is a
language of demands.
Human beings the world over say they want to contribute to the well-being of others, to
connect and communicate with others in loving, compassionate ways. Why, then, is there
so much disharmony and conflict?

Setting out to find answers, I discovered that the language many of us were taught
interferes with our desire to live in harmony with one another. At an early age, most of us
were taught to speak and think Jackal. This is a moralistic classification idiom that labels
people; it has a splendid vocabulary for analyzing and criticizing. Jackal is good for
telling people what's wrong with them: "Obviously, you're emotionally disturbed (rude,
lazy, selfish)."
The jackal moves close to the ground. It is so preoccupied with getting its immediate
needs met that it cannot see into the future. Similarly Jackal-thinking individuals believe
that in quickly classifying or analyzing people, they understand them. Unhappy about
what's going on, a Jackal will label the people involved, saying, "He's an idiot" or "She's
bad" or "They're culturally deprived."
This language is from the head. It is a way of mentally classifying people into varying
shades of good and bad, right and wrong. Ultimately, it provokes defensiveness,
resistance, and counterattack.
I also came upon a language of the heart, a form of interacting that promotes the wellbeing of ourselves and other people. I call this means of communicating Giraffe. The
Giraffe has the largest heart of any land animal, is tall enough to look into the future, and
lives its life with gentility and strength. Likewise, Giraffe bids us to speak from the heart,
to talk about what is going on for us-without judging others. In this idiom, you give
people an opportunity to say yes, although you respect no for an answer. Giraffe is a
language of requests; Jackal is a language of demands.
By the time I identified these two languages, I had thoroughly learned Jackal. So I set out
to teach myself Giraffe. What would I say, I wondered, if someone were doing something
I found unpleasant and I wanted to influence him to change his behavior? Giraffes, I
realized, are aware that they cannot change others. They are not even interested I
changing people; rather, they are interested in providing opportunities for them to be
willing to change. One way of providing such an opportunity, I decided, would be to
approach the other person with a message such as: "Please do this, but only if you can do
it willingly-in a total absence of fear, guilt, or shame. If you are motivated by fear, guilt,
or shame, I lose."
As Giraffes, we make requests in terms of what we want people to do, not what we want
them to feel. All the while, we steer clear of mandates. Nothing creates more resistance
than telling people they "should" or "have to" or "must" or "ought to" do something.

These terms eliminate choice. Without the freedom to choose, life becomes slave-like. "I
had to do it-superior's orders" is the response of people robbed of their free will.
Prompted by directives and injunctions, people do not take responsibility for their
actions.
As time passed, I learned much more about giraffe. For one thing, they do not make
requests in the past. They do not say, or even think, "How nice it would have been if you
had cleaned the living room last night." Instead, Giraffes state clearly what they want in
the present. And they take responsibility for their feelings, aware that their feelings are
caused by their wants. If a mother is upset because her son's toys are strewn about the
living room, she will identify her feeling: anger. She will then get in touch with the
underlying want that is causing this feeling: her desire for a neat and orderly living room.
She will own the anger, saying, "I feel angry because I want the living room to be clean
and instead it's a mess." Finally, she will ask for a different outcome: "I'd feel so much
better if you'd just put these toys away."
Whereas Jackals say, "I feel angry because you," Giraffes will say, "I feel angry
because I want" As Giraffes, we know that the cause of our feelings is not another
person, but rather our own thoughts, wants, and wishes. We become angry because of the
thoughts we are having, not because of anything another person has done to us.
Jackal, on the other hand, view others as the source of their anger. In fact, violence,
whether verbal or physical, is the result of assuming that our feelings are caused not by
what is going on inside us but rather by what is going on "out there." In response, we say
things designed to hurt, punish, or blame the person whom we imagine has hurt our
feelings. Aware of this tendency, a Giraffe will conclude, "I'm angry because my
expectations have not been met."
As Giraffes we take responsibility for our feelings. At the same time, we attempt to give
others an opportunity to act in a way that will help us feel better. For example, a boy may
want more respect from his father. After getting in touch with his anger over the decisions
his father has been making for him, he might say: "Please ask me if I want a haircut
before making a barbershop appointment for me."
Giraffes say what they do want, rather than what they don't want. "Stop that," "Cut it
out," or "Quit that" do not inspire changed behaviors. People can't do a "don't."

Giraffes ultimately seek a connection in which each person feels a sense of well-being
and no one feels forced into action by blame, guilt, or punishment. As such, Giraffe
thinking creates harmony.
STATING A REQUEST CLEARLY
Stating a request in simple Giraffe is a four-part process rooted in honesty:
Describe your observation.
Identify your feeling.
Explain the reason for your feeling in terms of your needs.
State your request.
In describing the situation, do so without criticizing or judging. If you have come home
from a busy day and your partner seems preoccupied with the newspaper, simply describe
the situation: "When I walked in the door after an especially trying day, you seemed busy
reading." Identify your feelings: "I feel hurt." State the reason for your feelings: "I feel
hurt because I would like to feel close to you right now and instead I'm feeling
disconnected from you." Then state your request in do-able terms: "Are you willing to
take time out for a hug and a few moments of sharing?"
The same process applies if your teenager has been talking on the phone for hours and
you are expecting a call. Describe the situation: "When you've got the phone tied up for
so long, other calls can't come through." Express your feeling and the reason for it: "I'm
feeling frustrated because I've been expecting to hear from someone." Then state your
request: "I'd like you to bring your conversation to a close if that's all right."
In Jackal culture, feelings and wants are severely punished. People are expected to be
docile, subservient to authority; slave-like in their reactions, and alienated from their
feelings and needs. In a Giraffe culture, we learn to express our feelings, needs, and
requests without passing judgment or attacking. We request, rather than demand. And we
are aware of the fine line of distinction between these two types of statements.
In Jackal, we expect other people to prove their love for us by doing what we want. As
Giraffes, we may persist in trying to persuade others, but we are not influenced by guilt.
We acknowledge that we have no control over the other person's response. And we stay in
Giraffe no matter what the other person says. If she or he seems upset or tense, we switch
into listening, which allows us to hear the person's feelings, needs and wishes without
hearing any criticism or ourselves. Nor does a Giraffe simply say no; as Giraffes we state
the need that prevents us from fulfilling the request.

RESPONDING TO A "NO"
Responding to a refusal is a four-part process rooted in empathy:
1. Describe the situation
2. Guess the other person's feelings.
3. Guess the reason for that feeling, together with the unmet need;
then let the person verify whether you have correctly understood.
4. Clarify the unmet need.
When people say no in a nasty way, what they invariably want is to protect their
autonomy. They have heard a request as a demand and are saying, in effect, "I want to do
it when I choose to do it, and not because I am forced to do it." Sighing, sulking, or
screaming can likewise reflect a desire to protect one's freedom of choice, one's need to
act from a position of willingness. If people scream at us, we do not scream back. We
listen beneath the words and hear what they are really saying-that they have a need and
want to get their need met.
If a mother has asked her daughter to please do her chores and she has refused, the
Giraffe dance may go something like this:
Parent: Are you feeling annoyed right now because you want to do your chores at your
own pace rather than being forced to do them?
Child: Yeah, I'm sick and tired of being a slave. (Note the defensive mode, indicating a
need to be listened to.)
Parent: So, you really want to do things when it feels good to do them, and you're not just
avoiding them altogether?
Child: You order me around! (The child still needs to be listened to. The parent must keep
guessing what the child is saying about feelings and wants.)
Parent: So, it's frustrating when I seem to be ordering you around and you have no choice
about when to do your chores.
Child: I don't want to do chores! They're stupid. If you want them done, you do them.
Parent: You really hate doing chores and you would like me to do all of them?

Child: Yeah.. no.. I don't know. I just don't feel like being bossed around. (The child is
becoming vulnerable and starting to open up because she's feeling heard without
judgment.)
If we have been Jackalish and demanding in the past, the people close to us may need a
lot of empathy at first. So we listen and listen, reflecting back with guesses about what
they are feeling and wanting, until they feel heard and shift out of being defensive. We
don't take anything personally, for we know that upset, attacking, defensive statements
are tragic expressions of unmet needs. At some point, the person's voice and body
language will indicate that a shift has occurred.
At a meeting I attended at a mosque in a refugee camp near Jerusalem, a man suddenly
stood up and cried, "Murderer!" As a Giraffe, all I heard was "Please!"-that is, I heard the
pain, the need that wasn't being met. That is where I focused my attention. After about 40
minutes of speaking, he did what most of us do when we sense we have been accurately
heard and listened to: he changed. The situation was immediately defused of all tension.
In international disputes, as well as in relationship, business, classroom, and parent-child
conflicts, we can learn to hear the human being behind the message, regardless of how
the message is framed. We can learn to hear the other person's unmet needs and requests.
Ultimately, listening empathetically does not imply doing what the person wants; rather,
it implies showing respectful acknowledgment of the individual's inner world. As we do
that, we move from the coercive language we have been taught to the language of the
heart.
Speaking from the heart is a gesture of love, giving other people an opportunity to
contribute to our well-being and to exercise generosity. Empathetically receiving what is
going on in others is a reciprocal gesture. Giraffes experience love as openness and
sensitivity, with no demands, criticism, or requirements to fulfill requests at either end of
the dispute. And the outcome of any dialogue ruled by love is harmony.
In the end, Jackals are simply illiterate Giraffes. Once you've learned to hear the heart
behind any message, you discover that there's nothing to fear in anything another person
says. With that discovery, you are well on your way to compassionate communication.
This form of dialogue, although offering no guarantees of agreement between disputing
parties, sets the stage for negotiation, compromise, and most importantly, mutual
understanding and respect.

Dr. Marshall Rosenberg, founder of the international nonprofit Center for Nonviolent
Communication, has taught these empowering skills for over 30 years to the general
public as well as to parents, diplomats, police, peace activists, educators, and managers.
Based in Switzerland, Dr. Rosenberg travels worldwide in response to communities that
request his peacemaking services and skills. He has provided mediation and training in
over two dozen countries, including war-torn Rwanda, Croatia, Palestine, Sierra Leone,
and Ireland.

AN ASCENDING SPIRAL OF KNOWLEDGE

Each subject studied should contribute to the development of a well-balanced individual.
In the Waldorf grades, the school day begins with a long, uninterrupted lesson. One
subject is the focus; the class deals with it in-depth each morning for several weeks at a
time. This long main lessonwhich may well run for two hoursallows the teacher to
develop a wide variety of activities around the subject at hand. In the younger grades,
lively rhythmic activities get the circulation going and bring children together as a group;
they recite poems connected with the main lesson, practice tongue twisters to limber up
speech, and work with concentration exercises using body movements.
After the day's lesson, which includes a review of earlier learning, students record what
they learned in their lesson books. Following recess, teachers present shorter "runthrough" lessons with a strongly recitational character. Foreign languages are customarily
taught from first grade on, and these lend themselves well to these later morning periods.
Afternoons are devoted to lessons in which the whole child is active: eurythmy
(artistically guided movement to music and speech), handwork, or gym, for example.
Thus the day has a rhythm that helps overcome fatigue and enhances balanced learning.
The curriculum at a Waldorf school can be seen as an ascending spiral: the long lessons
that begin each day, the concentrated blocks of study that focus on one subject for several
weeks. Physics, for example, is introduced in the sixth grade and continued each year as a
main lesson block until graduation.
As the students mature, they engage themselves at new levels of experience with each
subject. It is as though each year they come to a window on the ascending spiral that
looks out into the world through the lens of a particular subject. Through the main-lesson
spiral curriculum, teachers lay the groundwork for a gradual vertical integration that

deepens and widens each subject experience and, at the same time, keeps it moving with
the other aspects of knowledge.
All students participate in all basic subjects regardless of their special aptitudes. The
purpose of studying a subject is not to make a student into a professional mathematician,
historian, or biologist, but to awaken and educate capacities that every human being
needs. Naturally, one student is more gifted in math and another in science or history, but
the mathematician needs the humanities, and the historian needs math and science. The
choice of a vocation is left to the free decision of the adult, but one's early education
should give one a palette of experience from which to choose the particular colors that
one's interests, capacities, and life circumstances allow. In a Waldorf high school, older
students pursue special projects and elective subjects and activities, nevertheless, the goal
remains: each subject studied should contribute to the development of a well-balanced
individual.
If the ascending spiral of the curriculum offers a "vertical integration" from year to year,
an equally important "horizontal integration" enables students to engage the full range of
their faculties at every stage of development. The arts and practical skills play an
essential part in the educational process throughout the grades. They are not considered
luxuries, but fundamental to human growth and development.

The Daily Rhythm in a Waldorf School :: Early Childhood

Parenting in todays fast paced world can be quite challenging. We strive to meet the
needs of our children, spouses, extended family, workthen we find time for obligatory
(yet also very rewarding) volunteer dutiesand when there is time, we remember to
nourish ourselves. Often I hear parents say they want to spend more focused time with
their young children. They want to enjoy being in the moment with them, but they are
faced with the struggle of simultaneously fulfilling all of their daily responsibilities.

This is where the Parent/Toddler class at Maple Village School comes into the picture.
When developing the class, I wanted to make sure it was crafted to be as much for the
parent as for the child. It is a place to connect with your little one, while enjoying the
company of other like-minded adults in a calm and inspiring environment. Many parents
have told me that they have delighted in seeing their normally reserved or shy child
somehow come out of a shell. It is my goal that each parent is also given a place of
peace, strength and renewal to take with him/her for the week ahead. How does this
occur? Well, it seems to be a feeling much more than a tangible take-away. Participants
have told me the room is filled with warmth, magic, and reverence. They feel they can
breathe. Perhaps a description of the class might help to understand the source of these
feelings.
Parents and children begin the morning by walking onto our grounds and past our
wooden raised garden bed, in which the children planted seeds. They admire the growth

of our carrots or sunflowers before entering the courtyard gate. Once inside the gate, the
child places a piece of fruit (brought from home) in our communal basket to be later
shared during snack time. They then breathe out and greet each other while stretching and
moving their bodies in play. Children work their arms at the antique pump and delight in
the falling water, fill wheelbarrows with wood chips, run, dig, climb, and play in the
sandbox (which is built in an octagon around the trunk of a tree). After a half of an hour
has passed, I begin to sing a song Pails and buckets and shovels away, for today, thats
the way Pails and buckets and shovels away, for today. I sweep the pathways while
repeating the song until everything has been put away. Then I pick up the fruit basket and
flow into the Come Follow Me song. Parents and children gather their belongings and
trail behind me into the building and up the stairs into the classroom. We continue singing
as everyone takes off their shoes in the entryway, hangs their coats and comes into our
circle. A guitarist then begins to strum, and our circle time begins. Keep in mind all this
happens without me speaking a single word. It is all done through song and imitation.
This is what reaches our youngest children.

A child enjoying the bounty from their class veggie garden at Maple Village School
During our circle, children hear and learn songs about the world around them, move their
bodies with others, laugh and dance, while finding their relationship to the space around
them. I also include simple sign language and short poetry. At the close of the last song,
the guitarist continues to strum as I bring out the velvet blue story blanket and lay it every
so gently onto the floor. It is so heartwarming to see all the children gather on the fabric
and lie down quietly on their tummies, waiting to see which story will be told What
will come out of the basket today? I light a candle in a lantern, and begin to set up my
props (all made from natural materials woolen animals, wood pieces from trees, colored
silks..) At the end of the story, one child is called up to put out the story light with an
candle snuffer, we recite a little poem, and this, accompanied by song, is our signal to

begin hand washing. Once again, I have not spoken to the children, but reached them
through music and rhythm.
The children then gather around the table, and we sing a simple blessing before enjoying
a lovingly prepared snack and fruit together. The children eat from enamelware bowls
and sip water from enamelware mugs. These are lightweight and unbreakable. The adults
also eat well, as healthy food is provided at the counter.
As the children finish their snack, they are invited to weave in and out of inside play and
participation in a seasonal activity or craft, with the parent/guardian helping the child.
Activities include squeezing oranges for juice, using cabbage to dye silks, grinding wheat
seeds into flour, baking bread, carding wool, painting, decorating candles with beeswax,
building bark boats to sail
Inside time includes the opportunity for the children to play with the creative, natural
materials around the room tree blocks, a completely stocked wooden kitchen, doll
house and barn, puppets, wool balls, dress-up cloaks and crowns, a rocking horse and
cloth baby dolls with cradles and clothing.

As the children are immersed in play, we transition to clean-up with another song. This
time, I bring out our friend, the little wooden mouse. As I sing the song, I travel around
the room, having the mouse kiss each child on the cheek. It is simply amazing how
quickly our room is put back together!
Our morning closes by joining, once again, in a circle to recite a centering verse and sing
our good-bye song. I then continue to hum softly while everyone puts on their shoes and
gathers their belongings. I lead them down the hallway and through the front door to the
spot where my assistant and I float a silk rainbow over their heads and sing one final song
as they walk away. To build our childrens sense of order, everything has a beginning and
an end, clearly defined in a nurturing way.

Leaving under the Rainbow Bridge at Maple Village School

I have had the pleasure of teaching this class for eight years and enjoy seeing not only
mothers and fathers bring their child, but grandparents and nannies as well. If you are in
the area, we invite you to become a part of our mornings together. If you are not, I
encourage you to find a program with which you can connect in your area a program
that resonates with you. Or carve out a window of time for yourself and your child
breathe, sing, dance and play.

Why is Rhythm so Important?

by Donna Ashton of The Waldorf Connection
Rhythm, rhythm, rhythm. You see this word everywhere, right?
In my opinion, it is the foundation of our days and the secret
to having a happy, smooth running household. If you are homeschooling
it is a must or you will quickly discover the consequences of
what the lack of rhythm means.

There are so many benefits to having a solid rhythm!

Rhythm affects your children as much as you, so
it is well worth the time and effort to get this foundation set up.
*Good Rhythm Supports Mom*
Frees Your Energy-If you find you are spending all your time wondering what
is coming up next in your day. Or just trying to stay one step
ahead of your children when they ask Mom, whats for lunch?
Having a daily rhythm will free up your energy.
Having a plan already in place will allow you to concentrate
on what is happening in the moment instead of rushing around
wondering what you are forgetting.

Less Stress- Knowing you have it together gives you piece of mind, less
stress and a chance to breathe. Everything wont always be perfect, but with
a plan to start with there is a much better chance!
Less Discipline Issues- Good rhythm becomes a predictable routine of
rituals and habits, therefore side-stepping many discipline issues that can arise.

It becomes just the way we do it which leads to much less questions and arguments.
A real benefit indeed!
More fun Sprinkled in: Once your basic pieces of the day are mapped out, you
will find opportunities to add some fun! Use your precious time for activities you
love because you know the rest is taken care of.
*Good Rhythm Supports the Child*
They know someone else is in charge- When there is indecision in the household,
some children feel they have to step up into a leadership role. This is stressful on the
child
and obviously will cause friction with the parent.
Consistency- Good rhythm creates a predictable, consistent flow that children crave.
Remember that bedtime story they asked you read 30 times? Kids like to know whats
coming next.
And it is vital to their development and knowing where they stand in the world.
Less Choices- Children can be overwhelmed by breakfast with questions and choices if
we are not careful. Red shirt or blue? Pancakes or Waffles? Coloring or painting?
When rhythm is in place, choices decrease and so does all that stress on your child.
Let them Play- Playing is your childs main job in these younger years. Having a solid
rhythm in place will guide them joyfully through their day instead of having a hodgepodge.
They will be free to create, learn and grow without the hindrance of a chaotic
environment.

Discover Waldorf Education: Assessing Without Testing

Abstract
No Child Left Behind has solidified the ranks of those who believe that high-stakes
testing is the only way to advance education. We examine the innovative Waldorf

approach to assessment in which learning outcomes are judged in myriad ways all of
them child-friendly, and all of them effective.
Roots or Leaves?
Waldorf teachers are fond of characterizing their method of assessment by relating a
story about a King and his trusted, though somewhat dull steward. One day the King,
having to leave his palace and venture on a journey of several months duration, asked his
steward to look after his beloved rose garden. Unfamiliar with flowers and their care,
the steward asked what his most essential task would be.
Above all things, replied the King, Be sure that the rosebush roots receive
enough water.
Much to the Kings great surprise, he returned some months later to a rose garden in
which not one living plant remained.
My instructions could not have been simpler! he cried to the shamefaced steward,
What have you done?
Exactly as you commanded, was the stewards response. Every day we pulled up
the rosebushes to determine and examined their roots. If the roots were dry we watered
them well and returned the plants to the soil.
As the King knew well, there are other ways to determine if the roots are receiving
sufficient water! Wilting leaves, desiccated buds or withering flowers would all have
been adequate indicators that water was needed. And, above all, using these indicators
would eliminate the need to destroy the plant in order to understand it. Educators active
in the Waldorf school movement are convinced that most contemporary methods of
assessment of children in levels K through Eight take the Pull Up The Roots
approach. With the zeal of the steward, they undermine the very abilities that they seek
to evaluate.
The Waldorf method of evaluation might be characterized as the Look At The
Leaves approach. To facilitate this indirect and qualitative assessment method, several
important elements must come into play:
The Class Teacher. In the Waldorf system, this is an individual who remains with
the same group of children from grades one through eight. A relationship is thereby

cultivated in which the teacher comes to know the children, their learning styles and
their developmental needs in a comprehensive manner.
The Patient Parent. We are a culture devoted to instant gratification and geared
up for short-term results. Just as the Class Teacher commits herself to the long-term
development of the child, so must the parent be willing to put a number of culturallydetermined anxieties aside and accept an educational method that allows the childs
capacities to unfold gradually. Rather than acting as the passive consumer of evaluative
judgments made by the school, the Waldorf parent is asked to be an active part of the
assessment process.
A closely-knit Community of Evaluators. In making her evaluation of the child,
the Class Teacher has to work with a group of special-subject teachers who can speak of
the childs progress and so contribute to the total picture of the child. Other class
teachers are in turn active in mentoring and assessing the class teachers judgments.
A variety of assessment instruments and methods. Eschewing the graded quiz or the
standardized test as the only objective methods, the school community must be willing
to work with a portfolio style approach that includes the childs drawings, paintings,
knitting, facility of movement, musical skills, oral expressiveness etc. as factors that are
no less important than the more easily determined powers of cognition and verbal
memory.
Conversations. As the above criteria must make clear, the Waldorf assessment
method is time and labor intensive in nature. It cannot function without numerous
meetings and conversations between teacher and teacher, and teacher and parent. The
final written evaluations, described below, are only the final step in a process that goes on
ceaselessly throughout the school year.

The Class Teacher

If we accept the premise that the child is a being who unfolds her capacities over the
course of time, then it follows that the most valid assessments that can be made of a
childs development are those that are compiled over the course of long periods of time.
It is also helpful if the dynamic and rapidly changing developmental stages of the child
can be overseen and accompanied by the stabilizing consciousness of one adult. This is
the role assumed by the Class Teacher.

All too often, teachers feel like workers on an assembly line, specializing in but one
year of the childs life, only vaguely aware of the experiences undergone by the child on
an earlier level, and slightly able to control the type of experiences the child will have in
grades yet to come. Such awarenessand such responsibilityare the hallmark of the
class teachers work. That which he perceives to be a problem for a given child at the
close of first grade will not simply be noted and passed on to a new second grade teacher;
on the contrary, both child and problem will continue with the class teacher! Thus the
class teachers evaluations of children do not only delineate problems, but also describe
the measures that the teacher will take in the year, or years, to come in remediating the
problem.
No less significant is the potential that such a long-term relationship provides for the
involvement of a teacher with the whole child. By whole I mean not only the child as a
being of body, soul and spirit, but in its connection with family, community and
environment. The class teacher avails herself of opportunities to visit the child at home,
and comes to know the childs parents, grandparents and/or step-parents. She leads the
child on challenging hikes, accompanies him on canoe outings or lives with him and his
classmates for days at a time on camping trips. She observes his changing and maturing
response over the years to the joys and tragedies that accompany all growth.
She knows well how he performs under pressure, and whether he tends to be content
with quick nibbles of knowledge or prefers to savor it slowly and privately. In short,
the class teacher has the unique possibility of developing a long-term, involving and yes,
loving relationship with every student in her class.
It is interesting that there is no place for love in the quantitative methodology that
underlies most standardized testing. Indeed, the love that a teacher bears for a child is
perceived as an obstacle to the objective assessment provided by an examination.
Although the a love too strongly tinged with sentimentality can make one blind to the
faults of another, the love that the class teacher strives to cultivate can awaken one to the
highest potential that lives in another. By measuring a childs performance in relation to
such a realm of possibility, the class teacher acknowledges that the only valid standard
in testing is that of the unique individual.

Peers and Parents

Although it might be accepted that the long-term relationship of the child to the class
teacher could be a fruitful one, it still might be argued that having teacher and evaluator

rolled up into the same personespecially when so much of the work is of a qualitative,
rather than quantitative naturecould present a moral challenge. What is to prevent the
class teacher from skewing his assessments, if ever so slightly, so that by ever and again
stressing the childrens improvement, he makes himself look good?
By way of responding to this question, I will pose another one: Why did
standardized testing arise to begin with? Could it not be said that standardized methods
of evaluation arose when colleges no longer had a collegial relationship with the
secondary schools attended by their applicants, or when superintendents of schools no
longer knew and trusted their principals, who in turn no longer had time-tested
relationships with their teachers? When the community of colleagues disappears, the
objective examination is born.
No method of assessment is in itself proof against human frailty. It is significant that
standardized tests are themselves often subject to incidents of large-scale cheating on the
part of students, and now and then educators under pressure have been known to tamper
with the results. For this reason, among others, the community of teachers within the
Waldorf school assumes great importance in our assessment process.
In any Waldorf school, the teachers meet frequently with one another. A Waldorf
teachers training is never simply ended, to be supplemented now and then with
continuing credits. Rather, the weekly faculty meeting is a key in every teachers ongoing self-education, as colleagues discuss pedagogy, share new insights into children,
and hone their teaching skills with one another as subjects.
Younger teachers usually are mentored by older, more experienced faculty members.
All colleagues are encouraged to visit one anothers classes and to critique each others
approaches and results. Out of this sense of community and colleagueship, the faculty is
able to oversee and evaluate the evaluator, helping him to maintain objectivity in regard
to his classs achievements. Whereas the conventional syllabus, driven by the
standardized test, compels teachers to work apart from one another, each striving to
improve the scores of his particular group, the Waldorf curriculum calls for a community
of peers, a true colleagueship.
The parents role in the ongoing assessment process is also an essential one. In most
Waldorf schools, parents are expected (or even required) to attend three or four Parent
Evenings a year, in the course of which the class teacher, often with the assistance of
special-subject teachers, shares his picture of the class as a whole. The teacher will often
engage parents in the sorts of artistic/pedagogical activities done by the children of that

grade level, discuss aspects of child development, and share her approach to the subject
matter being studied at that time. While these meetings take place, the work done by all
the children is on display, so that parents not only see their own childs work, but see it in
the context of the whole class. Rather than have their childs work judged against an
abstract standard which is statistically derived, parents can judge for themselves where
their childs achievement stands in relation to a very real and visible peer group.
As teachers in an independent system of schooling in which individual schools are
faculty administered, Waldorf educators are answerable not to the fiats of school boards
and legislators, but only to those they serveparents and their children. We are cognizant
of the fact that our soft methods of evaluation, and our slower,process-driven method
of teaching run against the grain of much that is fashionable in modern education. This
unquestionably puts a burden on our parents, most of whom are themselves the products
of educational systems that used only hard assessment methods and were generally
test-driven. Parents are also barraged with a ceaseless flow of research generated by
the testing services and their affiliates espousing the need for ever more testing on the
state and even the national level. With this in mind, Waldorf schools regularly organize
Parent Education Workshops, in which evenings or weekends are devoted to sharing
aspects of Waldorf pedagogy which cut across specific grade levels. In conjunction with
displays of student work from grades one through eight or beyond, such gatherings give
parents insight into the way in which our methods of assessment, like our education
itself, unfolds over the course of time.
Obviously, a qualitative evaluation method depends on the trust and support of
parents. The more these parents know about the rationale for such an approach to
assessment, the more their trust and support will be justified. The Waldorf method
depends upon the patience of parents, and works hard to help the patient parent
recognize that, in the Waldorf school at least, patience is its own reward. Just as
qualitative evaluation demands the community of teachers, so it demands a community of
teachers and parents, which is, after all, a well-recognized component of any truly
effective educational method.

The Assessment Instruments

Not only are graded tests missing in the Lower School years of the Waldorf school;
textbooks are rarely to be found either. For many children in mainstream education,
learning is a process of vacillation between text and test; rapidly ingesting the contents
of the book (like so much fast food) they rapidly regurgitate those contents at the

command of the tester. Any sense of a digestive process, of taking the subject matter
within and genuinely making ones own, is missing from this process.
In the Waldorf school, the Main Lesson Book serves both as text and test; it
performs the seemingly contradictory purposes of imparting knowledge and skills and
evaluating the degree to which the child has mastered them. It is thus able to serve as the
keystone of the Waldorf evaluation process.
A main lesson book may either be a collection of loose sheets which are bound
together after the child has worked upon them, or, in its more common form, a softbound
book with twenty-four to sixty blank pages. Younger children work with books with
large pages, 12 by 12 or even 12 by 18; older classes books have pages that are 9 by
12. The main lesson book is a text created by teacher and child together which
represents a quintessence of all that the child has learned in a Main Lesson Block (the
term given to Waldorf units and usually lasting between two and four weeks) in the
course of which a particular subject is studied intensively.
In the lower grades, a main lesson book for a subject such as Fables would consist
of retellings of a number of stories, with accompanying illustrations. Much of the
younger childs book contents would have been copied in beeswax crayons from
drawings and writing done by the teacher on the blackboard. As the children write, the
teacher moves about the room, commenting on the childrens work, giving advice and
assistance, and making mental notes on the students struggles and triumphs. Is the child
reading what is on the board with comprehension, or merely copying a succession of
words? Is the child penetrating his drawing by firmly pressing on his crayon and
filling the page with color, or is he tending to create a light, pastel effect?
In the middle years, main lesson books for subjects as diverse as Housebuilding or
Botany or Ancient History increasingly include the childs own compositions (rough
drafts are first corrected by the teacher and then entered into the book) and drawings and
diagrams which the child has herself developed. By seventh and eighth grade the main
lesson books are almost completely created by the youngsters themselves, with strikingly
original compositions and drawings throughout. Math books will have pages describing
the new concept or operation learned, as well as sections with practical problems, and
may be supplemented with folders containing the years math homework. Science main
lesson books are replete with descriptions of laboratory demonstrations, as well as essays
about the general scientific principles that have been explored.

Page from a Grade 5 History main lesson book

Page from a Grade 8 Chemistry main lesson book

All of these books are collected at the end of a main lesson block and reviewed and
critiqued by the class teacher. When they are returned to the student, these books become
catalysts for conversations between students and their parents concerning what has been
learned in a block (or school year). The author has see individuals who were students in
the first Waldorf School proudly showing their main lesson books to their grandchildren.
Could one imagine anyone doing that with an old textbook?
Thus the main lesson book is a textbook that arises out of real-life lessons, rather
than a pre-written volume that shapes the lessons in advance. Before the child writes, or
draws, or places diagrams, math problems etc. into her book, she has heard it fully

discussed in class. If she is still unclear about an assignment, she is free to ask questions
of the books author, her class teacher. How different from the conventional textbook,
which is written by a distant committee of authorities who quiz the student at the
conclusion of every chapter but are themselves unavailable for questioning!
Another assessment instrument utilized by the Waldorf teacher is the oldest testing
method of allasking students questions in class discussions. From first grade on, a
portion of every main lesson is devoted to review, which is primarily oral in nature. In
first grade, various children are asked to retell a fairy tale or recite a poem. In third
grade, a child will stand in the front of the room with a clock with moveable hands,
setting it to different times and asking classmates to correctly tell the time; another child
will begin a poem and throw a beanbag to a classmate who is to say the next line and
throw the bag again. In eighth grade, two students, portraying monks at the time of the
Reformation, engage in a lively debate about Martin Luther and his conflict with Pope
Julius; later that year, they invite their parents to visit the classroom while the youngsters
demonstrate electrical and magnetic phenomena.
This Socratic dialogue, though endangered in many spheres of modern education,
remains alive and well in the Waldorf schools. We continue to believe that a real
conversation between a child and an adult of flesh of blood is a profoundly superior
experience to the point-and-click conversation a student might have with the dialogue
boxes found on educational software programs. The Waldorf teacher judges not only the
correctness of the childs answer, but also weighs the way in which the child stands, the
clarity of speech, the childs enthusiasm or lassitude in answering and a host of other
subtle nuances which transcend any standardized formulae.
The typical Waldorf main lesson not only involves desk time, but brings the children
into movement. From first through fifth grade, many subjects are approached through
rhythmic games as well as through discussion and book work. Thus a teacher is able to
assess the youngster not only as a developing intellect, but also as a being of heart and
limbs. This calls for the faculty of active observation to be developed by every Waldorf
teacher, for in the last analysis it is the teacher who is the ultimate assessment
instrument. The child is thereby assessed as a whole person engaged in activities that
challenge every component of the developing human being.

Communicating Assessment Results

Parents of children in the Waldorf school movement learn of their childs progress
through two methods; the required parent meeting with the class teacher (mentioned
above) and the written report which is sent home once or twice a year. Conversations
with parents usually take place immediately before or after the written report has been
received. In a situation where parents and teacher discover that they disagree strongly
over a report or evaluation, further discussions will be scheduled; it is essential for a
consensus to be reached about the childs needs and progress.
The written report takes on a number of forms in Waldorf schools across the country.
In most cases, it is a narrative description of the childs work, attitude, social integration
etc. presented without any number or letter grades; rarely is any sort of grid utilized to
make the report appear standardized. Although the class teachers report is the longest
and most descriptive, each of the special subject teachers is also required to write at least
a paragraph or two about the childs performance in the time period under discussion.
The parents of a Waldorf fifth grader may receive three or five pages (in total) of reports
midyear, and six to ten pages at the years end.
As the years go by, the advantages of the community of teachers, mentioned above,
becomes evident. Every new report is enhanced by comparisons of the childs
performance in prior grades, and subtle changes may be noted which would fall in
between the cracks were the child only passed on from one teacher to another through the
grades. The on-going dialogue between the class teacher and special subject teachers
also helps to bring consistency and clarity to the various voices heard in the reports.
Many Waldorf teachers accompany this parent-directed report with a report written
directly to the student. This may be simply a letter to the child which recapitulates what
has been written to the parents in simpler terms. More often, it will be a creative effort
on the part of the teacher to capture the essential nature of the child in a story, poem, or
even a drawing or painting. While we acknowledge that parents need the facts to
evaluate their childs progress, we recognize that the child needs a picture, or better yet,
an imagination in which the childs own nature is envisioned in terms of the outer
world.
Here is an example of a section of a report written to the parents of a fifth grader:
Susans initial reaction to any new work in math is to cry out, I dont get it!
and to convince herself that she never will get it. After this initial period of uncertainty,
however, she quiets down, makes the requisite effort, and gradually masters the work
along with her classmates. Susan followed suit by resisting our transition from fractions

to decimals, even though her teacher insisted that she would find that decimals were
much easier to manipulate.
Working with decimals in the abstract or in relation to fractions did not do the trick
with Susan, but as soon as we looked at the decimal system that underlies the monetary
systems of the world, she was thoroughly engaged! Her workbook will make it clear to
you how her neat and clear methods of working with numbers make it very easy for
Susan to trace any mistakes she has made, and you will note that after three lessons
about decimals, her mistakes are few and far between. Susan shows full comprehension
of adding, subtracting and multiplying decimals. She is well able to divide whole
numbers into decimals, but still shows some hesitation when dividing decimals into
decimals. We will be reviewing this last, challenging operation early in sixth grade,
before we take up percentages, and I think that Susans usual persistence will lead her to
mastery in this area as well
Susan herself received a poem from her teacher, based on the
study of Alexander the Great that the class had undertaken at the end of fifth grade.
Bucephalus was a spirited horse who could not be broken by Prince Philips staunchest
generals:

Bucephalus stood wild and free,

His nostrils proud and flared;
He seemed to whinny and neigh to all,
Come tame me, if you dare!
So many were thrown as they mounted him
That all were filled with fear.
Ill tame this steed! Alexander said,
Rushing in where generals feared to tred.
Around the horse was gently led,

Away from the shadow that caused it such dread,

And now towards the sun it galloped instead.
Tempting though it might be to add another few lines providing a moral to the tale,
the teacher chose instead to let the girl make her own connections. Over the summer, her
parents would help her to memorize her report verse, and during the next school year,
she and her classmates would recite their verses to the class on a regular basis.
For the teacher, the possibility of communicating the same evaluation in one way to
the parents and in another way to the child is challenging and energizing. The
opportunity to respect the profound differences in consciousness between the adult and
the child is but one of the potentials afforded by the Waldorf method of assessment. As
our nation questions the rationale for standardized and quantitative testing ever more
profoundly, it is to be hoped that the experience that Waldorf educators have had with
their innovative modes of evaluation over the course of seven decades will serve as an
example to all who are concerned about the proper development of the child.

Discipline
Waldorf Education has many creative and adept ways of handling the disciplinary
possibilities and/or requirements within a Kindergarten setting. First of all, an ounce of

prevention is worth a pound of cure. Our primary form of preventing difficult

behavior from the children is by establishing a well-balanced breathing rhythm to
the daily routine.
Just as breathing involves an in breath and then an out breath and then another in breath
we lead the children from an activity that requires them to contain their energy to an
activity that allows them to release the energy they just drew in to an activity that draws
them in again. For example, right after Ringtime, an activity that requires the children to
stay in a circle and follow along with the teacher for up to a half-an-hour we release them
into Free Play. Then, after an hour or so of free play they are ready to be guided into a
quieter, more restful time to breath back in. We follow a microcosm of this pattern
within the times of the day where more concentration and stillness is asked of the
students, such as in Ringtime and story time. For example, during Ringtime we will stand
still and reverently say a poem or play a game where the children must be quiet for a
time, and then lead them into singing a song in which they get dance,run or jump for a
time and then we bring them down to the ground again with a quiet or small movement
activity.
Waldorf teachers are trained to observe their students to look for signs that they are ready
to transition from an in breath to an out breath or visa versa. If the children begin to lose
color in their cheeks, for example, it is time to transition to an out breath activity. If the
children are becoming overly wild and beginning to nag at one another it is time to bring
them in. It is an art form to never keep the children in or out for too long. We also
have clever ideas up our sleeves for individual students who may need to be brought in
during the middle of free play time, for example. Little activities such as grinding grain,
sorting shells from the stones basket, or molding some beeswax lets the overextended
child take a time out from the free play environment. This time out is in no way
conveyed as a punishment. The teacher simply suggests to the child that she or he needs
their help for a moment and lovingly guides them to the task. This breathing rhythm of
our day works wonders it keeps the childrens energy balanced and content. When
we ask them to change activities they are truly ready for the transition, it is as natural and
unconscious as our readiness to breath in or out. The day, therefore, tends to move along

joyfully and harmoniously without forceful, difficult demands being made of the
children.
When it happens that a child does do something to harm themselves, another person or
creature in the class, or any materials in the classroom our first approach to the situation
is for the teacher to model the behavior we wish to see from the child ourselves. This
works very well because of the childs instinct for imitation. If one child causes physical
harm to another, instead of correcting the child with words and instructions we take up
the child who has been hurt in our loving arms and model caring for them. We might say
something like,oh, our hands are for hugging and then tend to the childs wound with a
comforting stroke or a band aid. If a child knocks down a fort that another student has
built, for example, we simply move into the situation and begin rebuilding it
lovingly. The constant modeling of moral and ethically sound behavior does much
more for the disciplining of a young child than any scolding ever will.
If the behavior we wish to see is modeled by the teacher and the child still continues with
the hurtful or disturbing behavior the teacher will generally take the child to the big
rocking chair and hold them in their laps quietly, sing them a little song or tell them a
pedagogical story. The pedagogical story is a brilliant way to impart corrective
information to a young child. Waldorf teachers are trained to be able to take a situation in
which a child is not behaving morally and create a story that mirrors the situation but is
not obviously the situation. For example, the story will contain a den of wolf pups where
one pup is constantly taking and gobbling up the food of another pup. The story describes
the same type of behavioral problem as the child is up to and results in the pup learning
its lesson like maybe the mama pup eventually puts it outside the den until all the other
pups have finished eating and then lets the others go out and play while the other one
comes in and eats alone. By making the story interesting and endearing the young
child will open up to it in its feelings and receive the true moral of the story without
ever having to be lectured or shamed.
If the child continues to misbehave and is not responding to either modeling, a
pedagogical story, or a task to help the teacher we may then consider whether the child
should go home and rest for the day and set up a conference with the parents to learn

more about what might be happening outside of school and ways we might be able to
remedy the situation.

Povestea lui Mos Nicolae,

A fost odat, e tare mult de atunci, un tat ce avea trei fete. Fetele erau mici cnd mama lor murise.
Tatl, care era olar, se chinuia singur cu creterea fetelor. Familia abia i ducea zilele de srac ce
era. Dup o zi istovitoare, n care nu reuise s vnd nici mcar un ulcior, tatl se ntorcea tare
amrt acas, fr nici o bucic de pine. Era nceput de decembrie, prima zpad se aternuse
deja. Cerul era senin i nstelat. Ger grozav era afar. Zpada scria la fiecare pas. Btea un vnt
rece, care ptrundea pn la oase. A intrat n cas infrigurat, infometat, dar mai ales plin de
amrciune. Omul le spuse celor trei fete ale sale:
-Fetele mele, azi nu am putut s v aduc nimic de mncare. Eu sunt btrn i ostenit, aa c mine
va trebui s v ducei singure s cutai de-ale gurii, descurcai-v cum putei. n pdurea vecin
gospodriei lor, ntr-un mic castel cu turnulee cochete i cu flori de mac, floarea soarelui i
albstrele, pictate pe geamuri, tria un btrn nobil al crui suflet bun era cunoscut de oamenii de
prin mprejurimi. Btrnul avea prul alb, iar barba i ajungea pn la mijloc, cci muli ani trecuser
peste el. Peste haine purta, ntotdeauna, o mantie viinie, care flutura n urma lui ca nite aripi,
atunci cnd grbea pasul. Acest btrn nobil tria n castel doar cu un singur, devotat, slujitor.
Acesta era urt la chip, cci faa i era negricioas i ncreit de riduri. Prul vlvoi, de parc ar fi
avut scaiei, i cdea n lae unsuroase pe frunte. Ochii, negri, erau acoperii de streaina
sprncenelor stufoase i aspre. Era ghebos i purta, indiferent de vreme, o blan de urs, aruncat
peste cocoa. Cei doi bntuiau inutul tcui, ca nite stafii. Numele nobilului era Nicolae i, din
respect pentru anii lui, oamenii i spuneau Mo Nicolae. El avea ochii ageri, mintea ascuit i inima
dreapt, vedea imediat binele i desluea buntatea. Purta n mini o carte mare, mbrcat n aur
strlucitor n care, cu o pan de gsc, nsemna faptele bune ale oamenilor.
n acelai timp, Rupert, cci acesta era numele servitorului, mergea n urma sa, ca o umbr docil.
El purta o carte neagr, ferfeniit, n care, cu mna dreapt, nota faptele rele ale oamenilor. Iar n
mna stng avea o nuia lung, de salcie, cu care i lovea pe spinare pe furitorii de fapte rele.
Nobilul Mo Nicolae avea n spate un sac plin cu fructe i dulciuri din care mprea oamenilor ale
cror nume erau trecute n cartea sa.
i ntreg inutul se temea de Rupert i se bucura de trecerea lui Mo Nicolae.
n seara despre care v spuneam la nceput, Mo Nicolae tocmai trecea pe lng casa celor trei fete
srace. Se apropie de fereastr i auzi toat discuia. l cuprinse mila pentru srmanele fete
netiutoare care au cunoscut greutile vieii att de tinere. Atept ca acestea s se urce n pat i
cnd crezu c au adormit. Arunc cte o pungu cu bani n fiecare pereche de pantofi.
Fiica cea mic auzi un zgomot. Sri din pat i privi pe fereastr. Zri doar o mantie roie fluturnd ca
nite aripi imense. Apoi descoperi darurile din nclminte. Tare s-au mai bucurat! Tatl putu gsi
biei destoinici pentru fiicele lui i tri i el cu ele n bun nelegere. La scurt vreme dup aceast
ntmplare, Mo Nicolae muri, de btrnee, urmat la numai cteva zile, de slujitorul su credincios.
Dumnezeu care vede totul i care tia cum cei doi i-au petrecut viaa, i-a ntrebat dac au vre-o
dorin. Mo Nicolae a rspuns:
-Doamne, te- a ruga, dac se poate, ca o dat pe an s m pot ntoarce pe pmnt i s pot drui
oamenilor din sacul meu de odinioar. i s m nsoeasc i credinciosul meu prieten, pentru ca
mpreun s facem dreptate, cci el va drui cte o nuia celor care vor face fapte rele.

Dumnezeu i-a ndeplinit rugmintea i astfel, n fiecare an, n dimineaa de 6 decembrie cei doi
prieteni trec prin casele oamenilor i le las n ghetue daruri, dup faptele lor.