There’s a graphic I’ve seen recently on Facebook that briefly explains several different styles of homeschooling. Of course, I honed in on the part about Waldorf, which said something like “subjects are not taught separately.”
I don’t know who made the graphic or where that information came from, but not only is that for the most part not true about Waldorf, it doesn’t even come close to the essence of what Waldorf is.
But what is Waldorf?
Having learned about Waldorf education through Facebook groups and the occasional book for the past two years, I decided it was time to learn more from the source of this type of education—Rudolf Steiner, who lived from 1861 to 1925 and founded the first Waldorf school.
Through the transcript of a lecture he gave in 1919, I found out how deep his sorrow for humanity was as he experienced the destruction all around him wrought by World War I. He believed the educational system of the previous few centuries had developed the type of people who would commit these kinds of atrocities against fellow humans.
He wanted to create a new type of education that would develop not only the intellect, but also the soul and the spirit of people so they would have compassion on others.
He believed government was educating for the purpose of training up workers instead of shaping people into the fullness of humanity, and arbitrarily laying out standards of learning instead of teaching students through a proper view of child development. (What is Waldorf Education? Rudolf Steiner three lectures)
So what is Waldorf?
The blurb on the back cover of Peter Selg’s “The Essence of Waldorf Education” sums it up well.
“…Waldorf education is future-oriented, based on a holistic worldview that is simultaneously humanistic, scientific, and spiritual, and unfolds through a developmental curriculum and a teacher-student relationship based in love.”
There are many ways to do Waldorf education, but in order to truly be Waldorf, it must embody that spirit.
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