| The following article is from the April 1987 issue of the
_Pine_Hill_Forum_. It continues the three-part article begun in
note 9.0.
-Neil Faiman
------------------------------------------------------------------
CONFESSIONS OF A WALDORF-SCHOOL PARENT. PART II
by Meg Gorman
Faced with the beautiful, yet strange and unusual, world of
Waldorf education, I decided that my only recourse was to steep
myself in this way of teaching and struggle with its difficult
questions as they came up. The more I learned, the more I became
aware that there was no nutshell--short of a magical one--which
could contain this philosophy of education. I took advantage of
the lectures at the school and the books in the office; however,
the more I read, thought, and attended lectures, the more confused
I became.
Early in my career as a Waldorf parent, I was faced with a
difficulty inherent in all Waldorf schools: the problem of
purity. From my own experience I agreed with Waldorf education
that children are better off with simple, useful toys because
these playthings stimulate the children's imaginations. However,
though I have a natural bent towards things natural, I feared a
kind of unnatural elitism of the natural. That is, if cute plastic
toys are unhealthy for small children, does that fact place a
value judgment on children and families who are heavy users of the
stuff? Furthermore, my children possessed these ungodly items and
enjoyed them. Again I got my what-is-a-mother-to-do feeling. How
could I carry this natural simplicity into my home and
neighborhood of Mattel, Fisher-Price and Coleco?
About this time I had the good fortune to hear a lecture at our
Waldorf school by the Viennese expert in Waldorf pre-school
education, Bronja Zahlingen. Her lecture concerned the importance
of simple, natural toys for small children. At the end of the
lecture, a young mother stood up and asked what she should do
about her three-year-old daughter. The child had an ugly rubber
baby doll to which she was deeply devoted and completely attached.
With tears in her eyes and guilt all over her face, this mother
asked if she should take the doll away from the child. Mrs.
Zahlingen replied, "By all means, let her keep her baby. She has
made this doll beautiful and thus has redeemed it with her love."
I returned home that night with an immense sense of relief. I did
not take Mrs. Zahlingen's answer as a carte-blanche endorsement of
plastic toys, but I knew that, from now on, polyester and plastic
would live in peace beside wool and wood at our house.
At a previous lecture, this time by John Gardner of the Garden
City Waldorf Teacher Training Institute, I was presented with a
different problem: the best way to answer the "whys" of small
children. Both my husband and I had made great efforts to explain
the world to our children in a scientific way. This was not so
much become this came naturally (the endless "whys" had become
something of a burden to us), but because we thought that this was
the most honest and educational way to explain things to our
children. For example, before Waldorf, if the children had asked
why a tree was so big, we would have told them how trees age and
lay down xylem rings every year. The evening that I heard Mr.
Gardner speak, he lectured on the way small children learn. He
felt it was useless and even damaging to use our phenomenological
and rational approach in answering the questions of children under
seven. As an example, he pointed to the flowers on the lecture
stage. "If a small child asks you, 'Why are the flowers so
yellow?', you should not give a description of plant pigmentation.
You should say instead, 'They certainly are yellow, aren't they?'
Then," Mr. Gardner told us, "the child will give you a gift from
his own perception of the world, and you will be better able to
understand one another." I didn't buy this one bit, and I went
away from the lecture with what was becoming a familiar mixture of
curiosity and skepticism about the Waldorf way of doing things.
However, a few days later, I had a chance to try out Mr. Gardner's
theory. On a lovely spring day, as I walked my four-year-old
daughter in the park, she looked up at me and asked, "Mommy, why
is the sky so blue?" Before hearing Mr. Gardner's lecture, I would
have come up with some explanation of outer space and the earth's
atmosphere. Absolutely gleeful at this opportunity to prove Mr.
Gardner wrong, I answered innocently, "It certainly is blue, isn't
it?"
There was a pregnant pause. Finally, she replied, "Mommy, I know
why the sky is so blue. It's because of your blue eyes." It was
a sacred moment for both of us. My poetic heart beat wildly, and
I looked with awe at this vast unknown who was my daughter. I
began to have a new sense of the small child's world. Perhaps Mr.
Gardner was right. I certainly had received a gift.
Another gift this education has bestowed upon me is a prickly one,
and it continues, even now, to behave like a benevolent porcupine
in my life. It has to do with learning through imitation. The
fact that children learn primarily through imitation was obvious
to me as a teacher and mother. This theory, for me, was one of
the soundest aspects of Waldorf education. But there was a catch.
If the child learns primarily through imitation, then he must have
parents and teachers worthy of emulation. Ouch! This gave me the
nervous pip. Like the issues of rhythm in the day and television
viewing, I was brought up hard against my flawed self. I knew that
my efforts to bring more rhythm into my children's lives, and the
strict limitation of the television, had paid off for my children.
I lived gratefully with this evidence on a daily basis, but this
business of being worth of emulation was really too much.
I was willing to do all sorts of things, read all kinds of books,
make all sorts of trips and sacrifices, and buy all all kinds of
materials to help my children be the best they could be. But to
make myself a good role model for them was another matter
entirely. This was a tall order, one which would require vigorous
inner housekeeping for the rest of my life as a mother or, more
simply put, the rest of my natural life.
I resented this piece of information, although I think I had known
and avoided it inside for a long time. Somehow, I guess I had
thought that the school could make up for my faulty life, and that
I could go on enjoying my bad habits. This Waldorf message was
really asking me to give up my adolescence. I didn't know if I
was ready. Yet I had two children and, by this time, a third one
in the hatch. I had to face up, and it was not easy. I wrote in
my journal about this time, "Motherhood is some career. It never
ends. Not even death can change maternity. It goes on and on,
and its deeds are intractable."
Although the reality of growing up was perfectly obvious to the
rest of the world, I resigned myself to this fact as though I had
made a new discovery. I set out on a self-improvement course
which I hoped would make me a creature worthy of emulation. I
have not arrived, nor have I come close. I suppose I never will.
I only solve one problem when some new defect, previously
unrecognized, rears its fierce head. I take comfort from the
words of Rudolf Steiner [founder of Waldorf education - NF] that
children are much benefited by observing an adult's striving to
know and overcome his weaknesses even if that adult falls far
short of perfection.
In the meantime, while I was on my high horse of self-improvement,
my son had entered nursery school and my daughter had begun first
grade. Here I ran smack into a wall. It was the biggest hurdle I
had yet faced in Waldorf education: the question of late reading.
Now, I am an English teacher and, as such, I have a large stake in
reading. Although, by my generation's standards, I read late at
age eight, I find reading a joy, and it brings me some of my best
moments. Because I find this such a satisfying experience, I am
enthusiastic about sharing it with others, the sooner the better.
I used to think, if I had read at age three, I could have had so
much more fun and learned so much more. Early reading must be
good. Just think of what a head start I would have had on life.
Besides, there is such a wealth of literature out there for
children. Why not get into it as soon as possible? Then there
were those neighborhood mothers who bragged about their children's
genius because their kids could read early. Why not my kids too?
Waldorf pedagogy, on the other hand, feels that reading is
generally unhealthy for children under seven. In fact, it says,
children should not begin to read until their baby teeth start to
fall out. This seemed plain silly to me. I felt certain that the
school would see my point of view when I discussed it with some of
the teachers.
At first, I tried to convince the school that their approach to
reading was archaic. Surely they could be wrong about something,
and this must be it. When I first met my daughter's class
teacher, he encouraged his class parents to come to him and
discuss any concerns we might have about the education our
children would be getting. I often wonder if he ever regrets that
remark where I am concerned. At first, I was a bit shy; but I
swiftly overcame my reticence as my sense of indignation rose on
the issue of reading. I took our class teacher at this word, and
I peppered him with questions about reading. He remained firm.
Early reading, he told me, got in the way of healthy physiological
development. He saw his task in the early grades as building up
the child's physical strength, powers of observation, life of
imagination and sense of security. Then, he told me, the academic
education which was to follow would find rich soil in which to
grow, with the end result that the young person could make
educated decisions and think with few prejudices as an adult. He
explained that the grade-school child is still incarnating, that
is, coming down from another world. Waldorf education tries to
remove as many obstacles as possible for the child so that she can
grow into the person she needs to be. This means, loosely
translated, not the self I had in mind for my child, but some
mysterious unknown self which my child carried within her. I
squirmed. I had heard this sort of thing before from the nursery
school teacher and from various lectures. This kind of
explanation made me, an orthodox Christian, very nervous.
Besides, it just didn't seem rational. I tried to ignore these
"spiritual" aspects of Waldorf education as the kooky stuff that
some of the teachers believed. It was difficult because these
sorts of explanations came up over and over again. It always
seemed that, just as I was beginning to get a handle on Waldorf
education, something impossible appeared. The question of the
incarnating soul was eerie for me. I just didn't get its
connection to late reading. So, I swept my daughter's teacher's
remarks under my I'm-not-ready-for-this carpet which was already
bulging with Waldorf-related humps and bumps.
First, I had to get the issue of reading squared away. In
retrospect, now that my daughter reads well, the process which
follows seems ridiculous. At the time, it was urgent, and I spent
many hours reading, talking, and thinking about it.
I understood that part of the reason reading was delayed at
Waldorf schools had to do with the development of memory. If one
can read and write something, one need not remember the
information. The ancient story-tellers of every culture disappear
as a civilization becomes more literate. Was this progress? I
didn't know. The children at Waldorf schools memorize a great
deal. Does this improve their memories? My children's music
teachers have commented on how rapidly our children memorize
music. Is this Waldorf at work? I don't know for sure, but I do
know that my children's memories are far better than my memory was
at their ages.
And what about knitting, crocheting and other handwork projects of
these early years? These activities certainly improve hand-eye
coordination which, in turn, helps reading, but couldn't the
students read a little in between? There seemed to be so much
artistic work in these early years that there was no time for
reading. "Self-discipline and will power are best learned through
artistic work," came the answer from my daughter's class teacher.
I know now that this is true. Both of my older children seem to
be quite responsible and self-disciplined. I have had to struggle
mightily for self-discipline as an adult, so I now see this as one
of the major gifts of Waldorf education.
Still, back then, I wasn't convinced. I was plagued with
questions about reading and Waldorf education in general. I still
swept the difficult questions on things spiritual under my carpet
of procrastination, but I had plenty of other things which kept me
awake at night. I had to admit that I admired the teachers whom I
knew at the school. They actually seemed worthy of emulation.
Yet, could one teacher give a child what he or she needed over
eight years? [In a Waldorf school, a class stays with the same
"class teacher" from first through eighth grade, although there
are also special lesson teachers, especially in the later years,
where they teach subjects such as chemistry and physics. - NF]
And what about reading, writing, and arithmetic? Should I keep my
children at the Waldorf school for its warm, humanistic approach
and have them tutored in academics on the side? Should I continue
to press my daughter's teacher in the hopes that he would come
around on the issue of reading? Was it already too late? At age
four, my daughter had started to read and had not been encouraged.
Now, at age six, she had lost interest. I went out and looked at
other schools--something which has become an annual ritual for
me. I recommend it. It always makes me realize how special our
school really is.
Each time I came back to Waldorf because I sensed a depth and
moral quality at our school that I seldom found elsewhere. Each
year I made a new act of faith and decided to go one more round
with Waldorf education.
I also decided to do my best to cooperate with the requests of
Waldorf education. I left the television off, I did not have my
children tutored (nor did I tutor them myself), and I continued to
struggle for more rhythm in my life. In the dark of the night, I
prayed that I had made the right decision.
By day, in my own haphazard way, I continued to research the
question of late reading. I read around the subject and found, to
my surprise, that many educators supported the concept of late
reading, among them Bruno Bettelheim, David Elkind, Joseph C.
Pearce and Jean Piaget. Still, I wasn't sure. I comforted myself
by making lists of successful people who read late. Literary
people were well represented. My list included Margaret Mead,
Einstein, Churchill, Balzac, Lord Mountbatten, Mark Twain, George
Washington Carver, and the great Irish writer William Butler
Yeats, who was finally beaten into learning to read after the age
of nine.
Finally, at the end of third grade, my daughter began to read
well. What she read amazed me. Her standards were high and still
are. She plowed through the major children's classics until, at
the end of sixth grade, she amazed me by beginning her summer
reading with the two fat volumes of the _Complete_Sherlock_
_Holmes_. All for fun! The entire business of late reading was
no longer an issue for me at all. In fact, I now find it quite
inconsequential.
Recently, I ran across a quotation from another late reader, the
wonderful English writer Sylvia Townsend Warner. It comes from
her recently published collected essays, _Scenes_of_Childhood_.
She writes about her father:
He doubted--and very naturally, I'm sure, being a school
master--the benefit of learning to read. From the moment a
child discovers that information can be got out of books, he
averred, it desists from exercising its faculties of
observation, memory, and thinking itself. So long after my
contemporaries had become literate, I was left to be
observant, retentive, and rational.
Thank God, I say. Would that we all had these qualities to the
degree that Ms. Warner has them. Her father's points are well
taken and echo more reasons why late reading is useful.
With the reading issue finally at rest, I tried to relax about
Waldorf education. However, the lumpy material under my carpet
had piled up to such a degree that I could no longer ignore it.
Like it or not, it was time to take a closer look. With
trepidation, I lifted the corner of my carpet to peek at the
unpronounceable philosophy behind Waldorf education.
[End of Part I]
|
| The following article is from the May 1987 issue of the
_Pine_Hill_Forum_. It concludes the three-part article
begun in notes 9.0. and 9.6
-Neil Faiman
------------------------------------------------------------------
CONFESSIONS OF A WALDORF-SCHOOL PARENT. PART III
by Meg Gorman
I had hung around Waldorf education long enough by this time to
know that the amorphous items under my rug of procrastination
concerning Waldorf education were, in some way, connected to the
word "anthroposophy". Webster's _Second_International_Dictionary_
defines anthroposophy as "1. Knowledge of the nature of man;
hence, human wisdom. 2. A spiritualistic and mystical
doctrine, derived mainly from the philosophy of Rudolf Steiner
(1861--1925)." The dictionary definition, though intriguing,
was not very informative. However, it was clear that the key to
understanding the philosophy behind Waldorf education lay in
investigating the work of this man, Rudolf Steiner.
Up to this point I had strenuously avoided Rudolf Steiner. Long
before I had become interested in Waldorf education, I had read
some lectures and a book by Steiner which were supposed to help
me with my gardening. These turned out to be rather lengthy
treatises which described the birth of the planets and the
evolution of the cosmos. I must confess I didn't understand
them at all, nor could I figure out how all this information was
supposed to improve the quality of my herbs and vegetables.
Furthermore, as a stylist, Rudolf Steiner is far from breezy,
and his long sentences and unusual terminology were difficult
for me to grasp. I chalked these defects up to poor English
translations from Steiner's native German, and I stuck with
Steiner's interpreters in English rather than trying to struggle
through the works of Steiner.
In fact, until my oldest child was in the first grade, I didn't
have much to do with Rudolf Steiner at all. I simply avoided
him. Early in my days at our Waldorf school, someone had told
me, and correctly so, that Steiner's educational philosophy is
never actually taught in the Waldorf classrooms because Steiner
did not believe in prejudicing the thinking of children with
preset ideas about man or the world. In this way, the child
could discover the world on his own terms. This gave me a sense
of relief to some degree. Besides, my oldest child was too
young to understand such things anyway. I had also been told
that Waldorf education had been founded on Steiner's
"indications," which left me free to believe that the wonderful
and dedicated teachers at our school didn't really espouse
Rudolf Steiner's anthroposophy.
But, first grade was a different and serious matter. I was
supposed to entrust my child to a teacher who would follow her
progress through the eight years of grade school, and who might
not teach her to read until third grade. The more I talked with
my children's teachers and the more I read about Waldorf
education throughout that year, the more I came to realize that
I would have to come to grips with Rudolf Steiner and his
anthroposophy. Let me say from the outset that, although I have
now come to grips, I have not yet come to a resolution. There
were days in the beginning of my study of Rudolf Steiner's work
when I felt as though I were Br'er Rabbit grappling with the tar
baby. But, there were other days, which are most frequent now,
when I felt as though I had discovered a magnificent dance which
includes the entire universe.
Nevertheless, in the beginning, I was afraid. I feared that
Steiner's world view would shake the ground under the feet of my
own world view and, in so doing, would present me with
irreconcilable differences between Steiner and me which would
make me uncertain about Waldorf education. I didn't want to
face up to that possibility at all. My fears were well founded.
I am still reeling from the earthquake, but I have found the
education more firmly planted than any I have ever encountered.
Midway through my daughter's first-grade year, I saw an
announcement in the school bulletin welcoming interested parents
to join a Rudolf Steiner study group with an eye to starting a
high school at some future time. I was interested. Not only
was I a secondary school teacher and, therefore, very curious
about the way Waldorf education worked in the upper school, but,
as a dutiful mother, I wanted to be sure that any Waldorf high
school would be well established before my daughter would be
ready for it. I certainly did not fancy my child as a high
school pioneer. Besides, as far as the study group was
concerned, there seemed to be safety in numbers. I picked up
the telephone and called the school to ask if I might be
included in this group. The following week my husband and I
began to attend the study group. It was the beginning of a
profound change in my life.
In retrospect, it seems to me that I began to understand the
first book I read by Steiner only after I had finished the third
book by him. Steiner's thinking is amazingly diversified, and
yet very much one piece. As I struggled along with his ideas in
the study group, I was aware that one of the reasons he is so
difficult to grasp has to do with the vastness of the material
he is presenting. The man has something to say about just about
everything. It's a bit like trying to read the entire history
of Western civilization from the beginning of the universe
straight through to the present, without stopping and with an
extensive new vocabulary. Besides, Steiner's ideas turned my
ideas upside down. There seemed to be no area of my life---my
thinking, my religion, my eating habits, my parenting, my
teaching, my gardening---which Steiner did not force me to
re-asses or reconsider. His ideas popped up everywhere, like
mushrooms and, like them, I found it difficult to tell which
were and were not healthy for me. The study group was lively
and honest, and there were no bars to questions of any kind.
For this, I am thankful. However, the process was not a lark.
At first, it was quite painful.
I found myself examining every aspect of my life. "Why," I
would then ask myself, "should I put myself through this
tortuous self-examination when I really am not sure that this
man Steiner knows what he is talking about? Because," I would
answer myself, "you have entrusted your most precious gifts, your
children, to the hands of people who share Rudolf Steiner's
ideas." I simply had to understand what I was doing to or for
my children. So much of what I saw in the classrooms made good
sense to me, yet so much of Rudolf Steiner was impossibly
difficult for me.
Yet, the more I pushed and struggled with this anthroposophy,
the more I was drawn to it. A part of me was determined that
anyone who wrote so circuitously and drew his ideas from such
unusual realms had to be wrong. But, the more I worked with
Steiner's ideas, the more they made sense, especially in the
practical parts of my life.
My hours as a stay-at-home mother splashing in her kitchen sink
were enhanced by questions that came out of our weekly
encounters in the study group. I wondered about how man thinks,
the nature of memory, the tasks of Christianity in our time, the
nature of society, the spiritual basis of my compost heap, how
man learns, the evolution of the earth, and the very nature of
man. During these long days of mothering and housework, I began
to find aspects of Rudolf Steiner's work which I could
incorporate into my life. Following the repeated suggestions in
his writings and his lectures, I took Steiner's ideas into my
daily life and I experimented with them. I tested them against
the world I knew. Even though I did not agree with Steiner on
many fronts, I found that his practical suggestions were almost
always helpful in my daily life.
It was a short jump from here to one of the most obnoxious and
embarrassing periods of my life which, for want of a better term,
I shall call the "pure stage." After about three years of
weekly study group meetings, I found that Steiner's ideas began
to ring true for me, and I decided that his insights must, in
consequence, be useful to everyone I encountered. Steiner was
not (contrary to what is sometimes heard) a rigid and dogmatic
man. However, there is something in human nature which wants to
take the best part of a good thing and get moralistic about it.
The dogmatism of my early childhood took hold of me and, as an
enthusiastic, budding convert, I was off and running.
With the pure stage behind me (I hope), I no longer recommend
the study of anthroposophy to everyone. It is not for everyone,
nor should it be. It is certainly not a panacea for one's ills,
a kind of aspirin for headaches. I actually think it has given
me far more headaches than it has relieved. But, for an
in-depth adventure, it cannot be beaten. Like a character in a
fairy tale, one weaves one's way through a maze of trials and
enlightenments. One minute, one is in the stench-filled belly
of one's dragon-self, and the next, one is on a mountain top.
The way out of the dragon's belly is rarely exhilarating, but
the struggle can be magnificent---in retrospect. From each new
peak one climbs afterwards, one can see a higher and more
challenging mountain, accompanied by a new set of dragons, which
one could not see before.
For me, the study of Rudolf Steiner's work has been and still is
the most exciting, eccentric, fulfilling, frustrating, and
common-sensible journey I have ever taken. I am still a long
way off from a knowledge of man or human wisdom. Yet, I feel
that I can approach these things from afar because of my
involvement with Rudolf Steiner and these curious characters
called anthroposophists.
It's a long, arduous journey, no question about it, and I have
only just begun. But the expedition has never been dull, and it
promises to be endlessly inspiring. For this I will always be
grateful.
|
| Having typed this in for another conference, I thought that I would
post it here, too. This is a portion of an article by Dorothea
Altgelt, the physical education teacher at the Pine Hill Waldorf
School in Wilton, NH, which is a report on a physical education
conference for North American Waldorf teachers. The article is
reprinted from the _Pine_Hill_Forum_.
-Neil
========================================================================
As teachers, we discussed the physical education curriculum in
connection with the changing relationship to space of the incarnating
child. In an evening session with Hawthorne Valley School parents we
shared some vivid pictures of the typical movements of the growing
child, beginning with the young baby, who lives in the periphery. Its
first exploration of the space around it is motivated by an interest
in something in its environment: perhaps the oil bottle on the
changing table, which it sees and tries to touch. We looked at the
preschooler, who is almost always running, a little ahead of himself,
to explore what is around him. In the early grades, the children live
into the world around them, motivated by their interest in the world
outside themselves. This interest gives us our approach for the
physical education program. We bring fantasy to the movements, moving
to rhymes, or we play games, using a picture or an image to lead into
the different movements. We let the children imitate us, without
correcting them (as we would a teenager). As the children grow older,
we challenge them more and more, but the main tool is imagination.
An example of a pictorial rhyme that takes third or fourth graders
through a series of movements about lumberjacks was translated--or
actually newly cast into English--for us by Jaimen during the
conference:
... To the woods, away, away,
To start our work at break of day.
Swing your axe, high and low,
Cut by cut, blow by blow,
Not too quick, not too slow,
One more chop ... down it gooooes!
Flashing teeth of sharpest steel
Eat their way with burning zeal;
To and fro the saw must chew
Till the log is sawn clean through...
And finally:
To our homes we're on our way,
Work well done at end of day!
By the fifth grade, the children are very coordinated and can do almost
anything. They are like young Greeks, and we practice the five Greek
exercises: running, jumping, wrestling, and throwing the javelin and
the discus. As they approach puberty, they become more and more clumsy
and heavy and are much more conscious of their movements. We challenge
their muscular capacities and abilities to the utmost. (We challenge
them, for example, through the difficulty of juggling.) Now we teach
them conscious skills and techniques.
As students move on into the high school, it becomes important in our
physical education classes to give them a sense for the freedom of the
human being. Learning to throw the javelin precisely, or the discus so
that it flies beautifully and far, working on skills in basketball,
baseball, volleyball, or fencing -- these are some of the activities
appropriate for high school students. ...
|
| I've received occasional questions by mail about Waldorf education.
The person who sent the following questions thought that my response
was informative enough that it might be worth adding here.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'll do my best to answer your questions. Please remember that I'm very
enthusiastic about Waldorf education, so I can't really be objective; also that
I can only talk about my experiences with Pine Hill, and I'm sure that other
schools are different in many ways. Your best way of learning about a school
would be to give them a call, have them send you some info, and start dropping
in to their open houses, Christmas fairs, etc. Many of us didn't just say one
day, "That sound's like a neat school": rather, we became familiar with it
over the years, until it just became inevitable that that was where our
children would go to school.
> How young can/should kids start the Waldorf program?
Most schools start the formal program with kindergarten. At Pine Hill, about
half of the children do two years of kindergarten, so it blurs down into the
later nursery school years.
Elspeth had one year of 3-day nursery school in Nashua, then attended Pine Hill
kindergarten for two years before entering first grade.
Generally, the school is opposed to rushing children into school. At Pine Hill,
the current policy is that children must be six by the April *before* they enter
first grade.
Traditionally, the Waldorf approach to education has gone along with the feeling
that the best place for small children is in their home, and that they really
don't belong in school until they're seven. However, that isn't the way the
modern world operates; and with many children in daycare anyway, I think that
most Waldorf schools now see some real benefit in getting children into the
Waldorf setting earlier.
This doesn't mean starting the formal education earlier, though. A Waldorf
kindergarten is a very gentle, low-key place -- as much an idealized home
environment as a preparation for grade school.
Another aspect of this is that aside from enrollment in the school itself,
Waldorf education has a lot of insights about early childhood that you may be
able to pick up and apply to your own home life as you become acquainted with
your local Waldorf school.
> Do parents get some say-so in how the school operates?
Yes and no. This is a perennial issue at Pine Hill, and probably at other
Waldorf schools as well.
It is a fundamental principle of Waldorf education that the "pedagogy" -- the
education -- is the exclusive domain of the individual teacher in his or her
classroom and, at a higher level, of the entire faculty. As a parent, you
decide that you believe in the education, and then you put your trust in your
child's teacher.
This does not mean that we as parents have no input into what happens in the
classroom. Elspeth's class teacher has always been very happy to hear our
comments and suggestions, and has always been responsive to them. But
ultimately, what happens in her classroom is her responsibility.
Our school does have a Board of Trustees, on which some of the members happen to
be parents. The Board is responsible for budget setting, buildings, tuitions,
etc., but the faculty itself has exclusive authority over all issues of hiring
(and, heaven forbid, firing), salaries, admissions, and curriculum.
I know that there is substantial difference among schools in the precise
relations between the various bodies that support and control the school; but
as I understand it, any school in which the teachers do not have the ultimate
educational authority would not be a Waldorf school.
But this does not mean that the school is not *responsive to* (as opposed to
"controlled by") the parents. Frankly, Pine Hill has had some problems in that
area -- especially when an issue gets classified as "educational" because it
happens to have something to do with the classroom -- but the faculty seems to
be honestly committed to giving parents more of a voice in the school, and then
listening to it more attentively.
> Do you feel that the Waldorf education is "real-world-oriented" enough? (By
> this, I do NOT mean "does Waldorf prepare them to go out and make big bucks".
> I mean -- and I'm not sure how to phrase this without sounding judgemental--
> does it help kids deal with a world where people are often not kind?)
That is a very hard question, because I'm not sure what the right way is of
preparing children for that world. The best that I can do with it is to suggest
that a Waldorf school helps to prepare children for that world not by
"toughening" them against it, or giving them emotional callouses, but by trying
to help them grow into people who will have the inner strength to meet the world
and face its flaws without being broken by them.
I also have a hard time phrasing that without sounding judgmental. Personally,
I feel that the best way to introduce children to the real world is very gently
and very gradually -- but I could be wrong. I'm sure that Elspeth, at eight,
would not be prepared to cope with many aspects of the real world; but I also
believe that by the time she has to, she will be ready, and that she will be a
healthier person for the way she will have gotten there.
-----
Well, that's a lot of words. I hope that I've approached some of the things
that you wanted to know about. If you'd like me to amplify on any of this, or
to answer any other questions, please feel free to ask. As you can no doubt
tell, I'm rather enthusiastic about it all...
Regards,
-Neil
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