Waldorf Education , also known as Steiner's education , is based on the educational philosophy of Rudolf Steiner, founder of Anthroposophy. Its pedagogy emphasizes the role of imagination in learning, strives to integrate the intellectual, practical, and artistic development of students holistically.
The division of child development by Steiner into three main stages is reflected in the school's approach:
- Early childhood education focuses on practical, straightforward and creative play activities,
- Primary education focuses on developing artistic expression and social capacity, and
- Secondary education focuses on the development of critical thinking and empathetic understanding.
The main objective is to develop a free, morally, and integrated individual who is equipped with high level social competence.
Qualitative assessment of student work is integrated into everyday life of the classroom, with quantitative testing playing a minimal role in basic education. Standard testing is usually limited to what is required for college admission. Each teacher and school has great autonomy in determining curriculum content, teaching methodology, and governance.
The first Waldorf School opened in 1919 in Stuttgart, Germany. There are currently about 1150 Waldorf independent schools, about 1,800 kindergartens and 646 specialized educational centers, located in 75 countries, is one of the largest independent school movements in the world. There are also a number of Waldorf-based public schools, charter schools and colleges, and a homeschooling environment. On the Continent of Europe, Waldorf pedagogy has become a well-recognized theory of education that has influenced public schools and many Waldorf Europe schools receive state funding. Waldorf public school funding in English-speaking countries is widespread but has been controversial.
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The first school based on Steiner's ideas opened in 1919 in response to the request of Emil Molt, owner and managing director of the Waldorf-Astoria Cigarette Company in Stuttgart, Germany, to serve the children of factory employees. This is the source of the Waldorf name, which is now trademarked in several countries that deal with this method. The Stuttgart School is growing rapidly and soon the majority of students come from families that are not directly connected to the company. Co-educational school is the first comprehensive school in Germany, serving children of all social classes, gender, abilities, and interests.
The Waldorf education became better known in England in 1922 through Steiner's lectures giving education at a conference at Oxford University. Two years later, on his last trip to England in Torquay in 1924, Steiner delivered a Waldorf teacher training course. The first school in England, now the school of Michael Hall, was founded in 1925; the first in the United States, Rudolf Steiner School in New York City, in 1928. In the 1930s, many schools inspired by the original school and/or Steiner's pedagogical principles have been opened in Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Norway, Austria, Hungary, the United States, and the United Kingdom.
The political intervention of the Nazi regime restricted and eventually closed most of the Waldorf schools in Europe, with the exception of British, Swiss and Dutch schools. The affected schools reopened after the Second World War, although they were in areas dominated by the Soviets again closed several years later by the Communist regime.
In North America, Waldorf schools number increased from nine in the US and one in Canada in 1967 to about 200 in the US and more than 20 in Canada today. There are currently 29 Steiner schools in the UK and 3 in the Republic of Ireland.
After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Waldorf schools began to proliferate in Central and Eastern Europe. Recently, many schools have opened in Asia, especially in China. There are currently over 1,000 Waldorf independent schools worldwide.
Maps Waldorf education
Approach development
The stated purpose of this approach is to awaken the "physical, behavioral, emotional, cognitive, social, and spiritual aspects" of each individual, encouraging creative and analytic thinking. A 2005 review found that Waldorf schools successfully developed "significant creative, social and other capabilities in the person's holistic growth".
Where is the book where the teacher can read about what the doctrine is? The children themselves are the book. We should not learn to teach from any book other than the book that opens up before us and consists of the children themselves.
Pre-school and kindergarten: until 6/7
Waldorf's pedagogical theory assumes that during the first years of life, children learn best by being immersed in an environment they can learn from through imitations of unconscious practical activity. The early childhood curriculum therefore centers on educational experiences, allowing children to learn by example, and the opportunity to play imaginatively. The overall purpose of the curriculum is to "inspire children with a sense that the world is good".
The preschool Waldorf uses regular daily routines that include free games, artistic works (eg drawing, painting or modeling), circular time (songs, games, and stories), outdoor breaks, and practical assignments (eg cooking, cleaning and gardening), with rhythmic variations. An open recess period is also usually included. The classroom is meant to resemble a house, with equipment and toys normally sourced from simple natural materials suitable for imaginative play. The use of natural ingredients has been widely praised as fulfilling the aesthetic needs of children, encouraging their imagination, and strengthening their identification with nature, although a pair of reviewers question whether the preference for natural ingredients and not produced is a "reaction to those aspects inhumane, nineteenth-century industrialization "rather than" a reasonable assessment of the needs of twenty-first-century children ".
Pre-school and kindergarten programs generally include seasonal festivals drawn from traditions, with attention placed on tradition brought out of society. The Waldorf School in the Western Hemisphere has traditionally celebrated Christian festivals, although many North American schools also include Jewish festivals.
Waldorf kindergartens and lower classes generally prohibit the use of electronic media by students such as television and computers. There are various reasons for this: this use is understood to be contrary to the developmental needs of young people, media users tend to be physically inactive, and these media often contain inappropriate or unwanted content that can inhibit rather than train imagination.
The Waldorf pedagog considers that the readiness for formal learning depends on increasing the independence of character, temperament, habits, and memories, one of the markers of which is the loss of baby teeth. Formal instruction in reading, writing, and other academic disciplines is therefore not introduced until students enter primary school, when students are about seven years of age. Steiner believes that involving young people in abstract intellectual activity too early will have an adverse effect on their growth and development.
Waldorf Primary School (ages 7-14) emphasizes fostering the emotional life and imagination of children. In order for students to connect more deeply with the subject matter, academic instruction is presented through artistic work that includes story-telling, visual arts, drama, movements, vocals and instrumental music, and crafts. The core curriculum includes language art, mythology, history, geography, geology, algebra, geometry, mineralogy, biology, astronomy, physics, chemistry, and nutrition. School days generally start with one and a half hours to two hours, cognitive oriented academic lessons, or "Main Lessons", which focus on one theme for about a month of time. This usually begins with introductory activities that may include singing, instrumental music, and repetition of poetry, generally including a verse written by Steiner to begin the school day.
The task declared by primary school educators is to present role models that children naturally want to follow, gain authority through relationship development and "nurture curiosity, imagination, and creativity". The stated goal of this second stage is to "inspire children with a sense that the world is beautiful". There is little dependence on standard textbooks.
Waldorf basic education allows for individual variation in learning speed, based on the expectation that a child will understand the concept or attain the skill when he is ready. Cooperation takes priority over competition. This approach also extends to physical education; competitive sports teams are introduced in the upper class.
Each class usually stays together as a group throughout their year, developing as a quasi-familial social group whose members know each other deeply. In the elementary years, a core teacher teaches primary academic subjects. The central role of this classroom teacher is to provide role models that support both through personal examples and through stories drawn from different cultures, educating by exercising creative and loving authority. Class teachers are usually expected to teach a group of children for several years, a practice known as looping. The traditional goal is to keep teachers in the classroom during the eight year "under school" cycle, but in recent years the duration of this cycle has been increasingly being treated flexibly. Already in the first grade, specialized teachers teach many subjects, including music, handicrafts, movements, and two foreign languages ​​from complementary language families (in English-speaking countries often German and Spanish or French); these subjects remain important to the curriculum throughout the elementary school year.
While classroom teachers serve valuable roles as personal mentors, establishing "lasting relationships with students", especially in the early years, Ullrich documents the problem when the same classroom teacher progresses to the high school years. Noting that there is the danger of any authority figure restricting students' enthusiasm for autonomy investigation and affirmation, he stressed the need for teachers to encourage independent thinking and explanatory discussions in recent years, and to cite the approval of schools where classroom teachers accompany six years, after which the specialist teacher plays a much larger role.
Four temperaments
Steiner considers the cognitive development, behavior and behavior of children to be interrelated. When students at Waldorf schools are grouped, generally not with a single focus on their academic skills. Instead Steiner adapted the idea of ​​four classical temperaments - melancholy, optimistic, apathetic and irritable - for the use of pedagogy in the base years. Steiner pointed out that teaching should be differentiated to accommodate the different needs that this psychophysical type represents. For example, "the person who is choleric is a risk taker, phlegmatic takes something calmly, melancholy is sensitive or introverted, and the sanguines take it lightly". Today the Waldorf teachers can work with the idea of ​​temperament to differentiate their instructions. Seating arrangements and classroom activities can be planned considering student temperament but these are often not easily visible to observers. Steiner also believes that teachers should consider their own temperaments and are prepared to work with them positively in the classroom, the temperament appears in children, and that most people express the combination of temperament rather than the pure single type.
Secondary education: age 14 and over
In most Waldorf schools, students enter secondary education when they are about fourteen. Secondary education is provided by specialist teachers for each subject. More education focuses on academic subjects, although students usually continue to take courses in art, music, and crafts. The curriculum is structured to foster students' intellectual understanding, independent judgment, and ethical ideals such as social responsibility, aimed at meeting evolving capacities for abstract thinking and conceptual assessment.
At the third stage of development (14 years and over), children in the Waldorf program should learn through their own thoughts and judgments. Students are required to understand the abstract material and are expected to have sufficient foundation and maturity to form conclusions using their own judgments. The purpose of the third stage is to "inspire children with a sense that the world is true".
The ultimate goal is to provide basic youth to develop into free, morally responsible, and integrated individuals, with the aim of helping young people "go to the world as free, independent and creative." No independent studies were published on whether or not Waldorf education achieved this goal.
Education theory and practice
The philosophical foundation of the Waldorf approach, anthroposophy, underlies its main pedagogical goal: to provide education that enables children to be free human beings, and to help children incarnate "unresolved spiritual identity", carried from previous spiritual existence, like creatures body, soul, and spirit in this lifetime. Educational researcher Martin Ashley points out that the latter role will be a problem for secular teachers and parents in public schools, and a commitment to spiritual, child and educational backgrounds has been a problem for some people committed to perspective secular.
While anthroposophy underlies the curriculum design, pedagogical approach, and organizational structure, it is explicitly not taught in the school curriculum and research has shown that Waldorf disciples have little awareness of it. Tensions can arise in the Waldorf community between commitment to Steiner's early intentions, which sometimes act as valuable newscasts to subsequent educational trends, and openness to new directions in education, such as the incorporation of new technologies or methods of accountability and modern assessment..
Waldorf schools often have striking architecture, using walls that meet varying angles (not just perpendicularly) to achieve a more fluid, less boxed sense to space. The walls are often painted in subtle colors, often with lazy techniques, and include a textured surface.
Assessment
Schools primarily assess students through individual academic progress reports and personal development. The emphasis is on characterization through qualitative descriptions. Student progress is primarily evaluated through portfolio work in academic blocks and student discussions in teacher conferences. Standard tests are rare, with the exception of the necessary checks for college admission taken during the middle school year. Mail grades are generally not given until students enter high school at 14-15 years, because the emphasis of education is on the holistic development of children, not just their academic progress. Students are not usually required to repeat years of primary or secondary education.
Curriculum
Although the Waldorf School is an autonomous institution that is not required to follow a prescribed curriculum (beyond what is required by local government), there are many who approve the Waldorf curriculum guide, which is supported by the general principles of the school. Schools offer a broad curriculum "governed by close observation and recording of what content motivates children of different ages" and includes, for example, the UK National Curriculum, Welsh and Northern Ireland.
The main academic subject is introduced through a two-hour morning lesson block that lasts several weeks. This lesson is integrated horizontally at each grade level where the block topics will be infused into many classroom activities and vertically integrated where each subject will be reviewed during education with increasing complexity as students progress. their skills, reasoning capacity and individual self-awareness. It has been described as a spiral curriculum.
Many subjects and skills that are not considered a core part of public schools, such as art, music, gardening, and mythology, are the center of Waldorf education. Students learn a variety of fine and practical art. Elementary students paint, draw, sculpt, knit, weave, and crochet. Older students build on this experience and learn new skills such as pattern making and sewing, wood and stone carvings, metal work, book binding, and doll or doll making. Art instruction includes drawing shapes, sketches, sculpting, perspective drawings and other techniques.
The musical instruction begins with singing at an early age and choir teaching remains an important component until the end of high school. Students usually learn to play pentatonic flutes, recorders and/or lyre in the initial class. Around the age of 9, diatonic recorders and orchestra instruments were introduced.
The Waldorf curriculum always includes some intelligence.
Science
The Waldorf School cultivates a phenomenological approach to science education, that is, using an exemplar methodology of instruction-based learning aimed at "strengthening interest and the ability to observe". Their goal is to cultivate a sense of "meaningful wholeness of nature, wholeness from which man is not separated or alienated" while achieving appropriate scientific concepts. Empirical measurements, including several PISA studies, have shown Waldorf students to be more motivated to study science and achieve a significantly better scientific understanding than those achieved by comparable public school students.
One study of the science curriculum compared a group of Waldorf American school students to American public school students on three different test variables. Two tests measured logical verbal and non-verbal reasoning and the third was the international TIMSS test. The TIMSS test includes a scientific understanding of magnetism. The researchers found that Waldorf school students scored higher than general school students and the national average on the TIMSS test while scoring the same score with public school students on logical reasoning tests. However, when logical reasoning tests measure students' understanding of part-to-whole relationships, Waldorf students also outperform public school students. The study authors noted the Waldorf students' enthusiasm for science, but regarded the science curriculum as "somewhat archaic and out of date, and included some dubious scientific material". Educational researchers Phillip and Glenys Woods, who reviewed the study, criticized the author's implications of "unresolved conflict": that it is possible for science that is supposedly inaccurate to lead to better scientific understanding.
In 2008, the University of Stockholm ended the Waldorf teacher training course. In a university statement saying "the course does not include sufficient subject theory and most of the subject theory included is not based on a scientific basis". The dean, Stefan Nordlund, declared "a syllabus of literature that conveys a worse scientific inaccuracy of wool: they are really dangerous".
Information technology
Because they view human interaction as an important basis for children's learning and growth, Waldorf schools view computer technology as first useful for children in early adolescence, once they have mastered "basic, time-honored ways of finding information and learning, such as practical experiments and books ".
In the UK, Waldorf schools are granted an exemption by the Department of Education (DfE) from the requirement to teach ICT as part of the Foundation Stage education (ages 3-5). Educational researchers John Siraj-Blatchford and David Whitebread praise [DfE] for making this exception, highlighting Waldorf's education emphasis on resource simplicity and educational ways of fostering the imagination.
The Waldorf School has been very popular with parents working in the technology sector, including those from some of the most advanced technology companies. At one of the Silicon Valley schools, "three quarters of students have parents with strong high-tech connections". A number of tech-oriented parents from schools expressed their belief that younger students did not need computer and technology exposure, but benefited from the creative aspects of education; a Google executive was quoted as saying "I basically reject the notion that you need tech help at grammar school."
Spirituality
Waldorf education aims to educate children about various religious traditions without supporting any of these. One of Steiner's main aims is to form a spiritual but non-denominational setting for children of all backgrounds who recognize the value of role models drawn from literary and historical traditions in fostering children's moral fantasies and imaginations. Indeed, for Steiner, education is an activity that fosters human relationships with the divine and thus is inherently religious.
Waldorf schools are historically "Christian-based and science-oriented", because they extend to different cultural backgrounds, they adapt to a "truly pluralistic spirituality". Waldorf's theories and practices are often modified from their European and Christian roots to fulfill the historical and cultural traditions of the local community. Examples of such adaptations include the Waldorf School in Palestine and Japan, which celebrate festivals drawn from these cultures, and classes at the Milwaukee Urban Waldorf school, which has adopted American-American and Native American traditions. Such festivals, as well as the general assemblies, who play an important role in Waldorf schools, generally center on the class that presents their work.
The religious classes, universally absent from the Waldorf American schools, are mandatory offerings in some German states, where in Waldorf schools each denomination of religion provides its own teachers for those classes, and the religious class non-denominations are also offered. In England, Waldorf public schools are not categorized as "Faith schools".
Tom Stehlik puts Waldorf education into a humanistic tradition, and contrasts with his philosophical approach based on the "neutral-value" state secular school system.
Teacher education
The teacher education program provides training in the principles of child development, including pedagogical texts and other works by Steiner, and in the Waldorf pedagogy method. Especially for early childhood and elementary school teachers, this training covers considerable artistic work in storytelling, movement, painting, music, and handwork, as well as academic and practical studies to enable future teachers to work in all areas of exceptional curriculum large.
Government
Independent schools
One of the principal places of Waldorf education is that all educational and cultural institutions must self-regulate and must provide teachers with high levels of creative autonomy within the school; it is based on the belief that a holistic approach to education aimed at the development of free individuals can only succeed if it is based on a form of school that expresses these same principles. Most Waldorf schools are not directed by the principal or principal, but by a number of groups, including:
- Teacher college , which decides pedagogical issues, usually on a consensual basis. This group is usually open to full-time teachers who have gone to school for a specified period of time. Each school is unique in its approach, because schools can act only on the decisions of the teacher's college to establish policies or other actions relating to the school and its students.
- Supervisory Board , which decides governance issues, particularly those related to school finance and legal matters, including formulating strategic plans and central policies.
Parents are encouraged to take an active part in the non-curricular aspects of school life. The Waldorf School has been found to create an effective adult learning community.
There is a coordinating body for Waldorf education in both national (eg the Waldorf Waldorf Schools Association and Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship in the UK and Ireland) and at international level (eg the International Association for Waldorf Education and the Council of Europe for Steiner Waldorf Education (ECSWE)). These organizations authorize the use of registered names "Waldorf" and "Steiner school" and offer accreditation, often together with independent regional school associations.
School funded country
United States
Waldorf's first US-inspired public school, the Yuba River Charter School in California, opened in 1994. The Waldorf public school movement is currently growing rapidly; while in 2010, there were twelve Waldorf-inspired public schools in the United States, by 2015 there were forty-two such schools.
Most of the Waldorf-inspired schools in the United States are elementary schools established as magnetic or charter schools. The Waldorf medium-sized school was launched in 2008 with the help of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Although these schools follow a developmental approach similar to independent schools, Waldorf inspired schools must demonstrate achievement on standardized tests in order to continue receiving public funding. The standardized test scores showed that students at Waldorf-inspired schools tend to score under their peers in the early grades and pursue or exceed their peers with high school. One study found that students at Waldorf-inspired schools watched less television and spent more time engaged in creative activities or spending time with friends. The need for Waldorf schools to demonstrate achievement through standardized test scores has encouraged increased use of textbooks and extended teaching time for academic subjects.
A legal challenge stating that California schools inspired by Waldorf schools violate the First Amendment and Fourteenth United States Constitution and Article IX of the California Constitution were dismissed on the basis of their benefits in 2005, 2007 and 2012.
United Kingdom
The first UK-funded Steiner-Waldorf School in the UK, Steiner Academy Hereford, opened in 2008. Since then, Steiner's academy has been opened at Frome, Exeter and Bristol as part of a government-funded free schooling program.
In November 2012, BBC News broadcasted an item of allegations that the establishment of a state-funded Waldorf School in Frome was a misguided use of public money. The broadcast reported that concerns were being raised about Rudolf Steiner's beliefs, claiming he "believed in reincarnation and said that it was race-related, with black people (schwarz) being the most spiritually developed, white (weiÃÆ'Ÿ ) of most people. "In 2007, the European Council for Steiner Waldorf Education (ECSWE) issued a statement," Waldorf schools are against discrimination ", which says in part," Waldorf schools do not vote , sorting or differentiating among their disciples, but assuming all human beings to be free and equal in dignity and rights, regardless of ethnic, national or social origin, gender, language, religion, and political or other beliefs Anthroposophy, where education The Waldorf was founded, standing firm against all forms of racism and nationalism. "
The British Humanist Association criticized the reference book used to train teachers at Steiner's academy because it shows that the heart is sensitive to emotion and promotes homeopathy, while criticizing Darwinism for its tendencies of reductionist and Victorian ethics. Edzard Ernst, professor emeritus of complementary medicine, suggests that Waldorf schools "have an anti-science agenda". A spokesman for the British Department of Education replied that "no public schools are allowed to teach homeopathy as scientific facts" and that free schools "should show that they will provide a broad and balanced curriculum".
Australia, New Zealand, and Canada
Australia has a "Steiner flow" incorporated into a small number of government schools in several states; In addition, independent Steiner-Waldorf schools receive funding from some governments. The majority of Steiner-Waldorf schools in New Zealand receive a small amount of state funds. In Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Quebec and Alberta, all private schools receive partial funding of the state.
Russian
The first Steiner School in Russia was founded in 1992 in Moscow. The 1060 School is an award-winning school that is now government funded with more than 650 students and nursery school classes and 1 to 11 years (Russian education system is a system of eleven years). There are 18 Waldorf schools in Russia and 30 kindergartens. Some are government-funded (no cost) and some are privately funded (with fees for students). In addition to the five Waldorf schools in Moscow, there are also Waldorf schools in Saint Petersburg, Irkutsk, Jaroslawl, Kaluga, Samara, Schukowskij, Smolensk, Tomsk, Ufa, Vladimir, Voronezh, and Zelenograd. There is the Russian Waldorf School Association which was founded in 1995 and now has 21 members.
Homeschooling
Waldorf-inspired home schools usually obtain their program information through informal parenting groups, online, or by purchasing curriculum. The Waldorf homeschooling group is not affiliated with the Waldorf Association of North American Schools (AWSNA), which represent independent schools and it is not known how many home schools use the Waldorf-inspired curriculum.
Education expert Sandra Chistolini recommends that parents offer their Waldorf homeschooled children because the "frustration and boredom that some children feel at school are removed and replaced with constant attention to the needs of childhood [and] the relationship between content and the world real."
Social engagement
Steiner's conviction that everyone is imbued with the spiritual core has triggered the Waldorf school's social mission. Schools are always coeducational and open to children from all social classes. They were designed from scratch to become a comprehensive school, 12 years under the direction of their own teachers, rather than state or other external authority, all radical principles when Steiner first articulated them.
Social reform and transformation remains the primary goal for the Waldorf School, which seeks to foster a sense of student social responsibility. Studies show that this works; The Waldorf disciples have been found to be more interested and involved with social and moral questions and have more positive attitudes than students from public schools, showing activism and self-confidence and feeling empowered to shape their own future.
The Waldorf School builds a close learning community, founded on the shared values ​​of its members, in ways that can lead to a transformative learning experience that allows all participants, including parents, to become more aware of their own paths, sometimes also at risk of being exclusive. Reports from small-scale research indicate that there is lower levels of harassment and bullying in Waldorf schools and that European Waldorf students have very low levels of xenophobia and gender stereotypes than students in other types of schools. Betty Reardon, a professor and peace researcher, gave the Waldorf School as an example of a school that follows a philosophy based on peace and tolerance.
Many Waldorf private schools are experiencing tension between these social goals and the way school fees act as a barrier to accessing education by disadvantaged families. Schools have sought to improve access to wider income groups by charging lower costs than comparable independent schools, by offering cost-scale, and/or by seeking state support.
The Waldorf School has linked polarized communities in a variety of settings.
- Under the apartheid regime in South Africa, the Waldorf School is one of several schools where children from both races attend the same class, despite losing state aid. A Waldorf training college in Cape Town, Novalis Institute, was referenced during UNESCO's Year of Tolerance for being an organization working towards reconciliation in South Africa.
- The first Waldorf School in West Africa was established in Sierra Leone to educate boys and girls who were orphaned by civil war in the country. The school building is a passive solar building built by local communities, including students.
- In Israel, the Harduf Kibbutz Waldorf school includes Jewish and Arabic faculty and students and has extensive contacts with the surrounding Arab community. It also carries on the training of Waldorf language teachers in Arabic. Kindergarten with the Waldorf-Jewish Arabs was established in Hilf (near Haifa) in 2005 while the Druze/Christian/Muslim Waldorf Muslim Arabic school has been operating at Shefa-'Arr since 2003.
- In Brazil, a Waldorf teacher, Ute Craemer, founded the AssociaÃÆ'§ÃÆ' o o ComunitÃÆ'¡ria Monte Azul, a community service organization that provides childcare, vocational training and work, social services including health care, and Waldorf education for more than 1,000 residents of the poverty-stricken region (Favelas) of SÃÆ' £ Paulo.
- In Nepal, the Tashi Waldorf School on the outskirts of Kathmandu teaches disadvantaged children from various cultural backgrounds. Established in 1999 and run by Nepali staff. In addition, in the southwestern Kathmandu Valley, a foundation provides poor, disabled and needy people with jobs on a biodynamic farm and provides Waldorf schools for their children.
- The T.E. Mathews Community School in Yuba County, California, serves high-risk juvenile offenders, many of whom have learning disabilities. The school switched to the Waldorf method in the 1990s. A 1999 study of schools found that students had "improved attitudes toward learning, improved social interaction, and excellent academic progress." This study identifies the integration of art "into each curriculum unit and almost every classroom activity" as the most effective tool to help students overcome the pattern of failure. The study also found significant improvements in reading and math scores, student participation, focus, openness and enthusiasm, as well as emotional stability, modesty interaction and tenacity.
Waldorf education also has links with UNESCO. In 2008, 24 Waldorf schools in 15 countries were members of the UNESCO Associated Schools Project Network. Friends of Waldorf Education is an organization that aims to support, fund, and advise the Waldorf movement around the world, especially in less favorable situations.
Reception
Evaluate student progress
Although the study of Waldorf education tends to be small and varied in a national context, a recent comprehensive review of independent literature concludes there is evidence that Waldorf education encourages academic achievement as well as "other creative, social and other capacities essential for holistic growth." someone. "
Compared to public school students, the Waldorf European students are significantly more enthusiastic about learning, reporting having more fun and less bored in school, viewing their school environment as a fun and supportive place where they can find their personal academic power, and have a view which is more positive about the future. Twice as many Waldorf students as public school students reported having a good relationship with teachers; they also reported significantly fewer diseases such as headache, abdominal pain, and disturbed sleep.
A German study in 2007 found that the median number of Waldorf students above became teachers, physicians, engineers, humanities scholars, and scientists. The study of artistic ability of Waldorf students found that they scored higher on the Creative Thinking Skills Tests, Drawing more accurate, detailed, and imaginative images, and were able to develop richer images than the comparison groups.
Some observers have noted that Waldorf educators tend to be more concerned about meeting the needs of every weaker student who needs support rather than them to meet the needs of each gifted student who can benefit from advanced work.
Graduate education
Professor of Educational Psychology Clifford Mayes considers that "Waldorf Students study in a sequence and step that fits developments, stimulate aesthetically, emotionally supportive, and ecologically sensitive." Profs. Education Timothy Leonard and Peter Willis stated that Waldorf education "fostered the imagination of young people to give them a strong emotional foundation for building a healthy intellectual life".
Education Professor Bruce Uhrmacher considers Steiner's view of education worthy of inquiry for those who want to improve public schools, saying this approach serves as a reminder that "holistic education is rooted in cosmology that places a fundamental unity with the universe and thus should consider the interrelationship between educational goals, growing children, and the relationship between humans and the universe in general, "and that the curriculum does not need to be technocratic, but may also be art-based.
David Elkind calls Rudolf Steiner one of the "early child development giants" and describes activities for children at Waldorf schools as "social," "holistic," and "collaborative", and reflects the principle that "early education should begin with children , not with the subject being taught. "
Thomas Nielsen, Assistant Professor at the University of Canberra's Department of Education, considers the imaginative teaching approach used in Waldorf education (drama, exploration, storytelling, routine, art, discussion and empathy) to be an effective stimulator for spiritual, aesthetic, intellectual and physical development. , expanding "the concept of holistic and imaginative education" and recommending this to mainstream educators.
Andreas Schleicher, international coordinator of the PISA study, commented on "the high degree of alignment between what the world demands of the people, and what Waldorf schools develop in their pupils", places a high value on creative and productive knowledge applying to nature new. This allows "in-depth learning" that goes beyond learning for the next exam. Deborah Meier, headmistress of Mission Hill School and MacArthur recipient, while having several "quibbles" about the Waldorf School, stated: "The adults I knew who left the Waldorf school were wonderful people. strong, cautious, and caring. "
Robert Peterkin, Director of the Urban Supervisory Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and former Superintendent of Milwaukee Public Schools during the period when Milwaukee funded the Waldorf public school, regarded Waldorf's education as a "healing education" whose basic principle was to educate all children..
Waldorf's education has also been studied as an example of the notion of neuroscience education in practice.
German
In 2000, educational scholar Heiner Ullrich wrote that Steiner's pedagogy intensive study has been taking place in education in Germany since around 1990 and the position is "highly controversial: they range from enthusiastic support to damaging criticism". In 2008, the same scholar wrote that Waldorf schools have "not mobilized comparable discussions or controversies.... those interested in the Waldorf School today... generally tend to see this school form first and foremost as a representative of a recognized model internationally, implementing the pedagogy of classical reform "and that critics tend to focus on what they see as" occult occult neo-mythology "and to fear the risks of indoctrination in schools of world view but lose the" unprejudiced view of Steiner school practices ". Ullrich himself assumed that the school succeeded in cultivating dedication, openness, and love for other human beings, for nature, and for the nonliving world.
Professor of Comparative Education Hermann RÃÆ'¶hrs describes Waldorf's education as realizing original pedagogical ideas and presenting exemplary organizational abilities.
Relationship with mainstream education
A UK Department of Education and Skills report suggested that the Waldorf and state schools could learn from their respective strengths: in particular, that public schools can benefit from early recognition and Waldorfian language approach to modern foreign languages; combination of blocks (classes) and subject teaching for young children; speech and listening development through emphasis on oral work; good lessons through emphasis on rhythm; emphasis on child development guiding curriculum and examination; approach to art and creativity; attention is given to teachers' reflective activity and increased awareness (in collective child studies for example); and collegial leadership and management structures, including collegial studies. Keystream practice aspects that can inform good practice at Waldorf schools include: management skills and ways to improve organizational and administrative efficiency; classroom management; working with middle school-aged children; and assessments and records.
American and private schools are drawing on Waldorf education - "less than complete" - in ever increasing numbers. Education Professor Elliot Eisner saw Waldorf's education modeled on the embodied learning and fostered a more balanced educational approach than any American public school would ever achieve. Ernest Boyer, former president of the Carnegie Foundation for Advancement of Teaching commented on the important role of playing art throughout Waldorf education as a model for other schools to follow. The Waldorf School has been described as building "indigenous communities" and distinct from mainstream schools, which have been described as "residential areas partitioned by bureaucratic authorities for educational purposes".
Many Waldorf pedagogical elements have been used in all Finnish schools for years.
Ashley explains the seven main ways in which Waldorf education differs from the mainstream approach: its work methods from whole to part, attention to child development, the purpose of freedom, the in-depth relationship of teachers to students, emphasis on the experience of oral tradition, ritual and routine roles (eg welcoming students with handshakes , the use of opening and closing verses, and annual festivals), the role of art and play creativity, and Goetheanistic approach to science.
Public health
In countries such as Texas, Vermont, Washington and California - where legal vaccine exceptions - Waldorf schools are reported to have high rates of vaccine exemption in their student population. A 2010 report by the UK Government noted that Steiner schools should be considered "high-risk populations" and "unvaccinated communities" with respect to children's risks of measles and contributing to outbreaks.
References
Note
Further reading
- Clouder, Christopher (ed.). Education: Introductory Readers . Sophia Books, 2004 ( collection of works relevant by Steiner on education ).
- Steiner, Rudolf. "Children's Education, and Early Educational Lectures" at the Waldorf Education Foundation, Anthroposophic Press, 1996 ( including Steiner's first description of child development, was originally published as a small booklet ).
- Steiner, Rudolf. The Foundations of Human Experience (also known as The Study of Man ). Anthroposophic Press, 1996 ( this fundamental lecture on education was awarded to teachers just before the opening of the first Waldorf school in Stuttgart in 1919 ).
Note: All Steiner's lectures on Waldorf education are available in PDF form at this research site
External links
- Waldorf Online Library
- The Education Section at Rudolf Steiner Archive, An Online Library
Association of local schools
- North American Waldorf School Association
- Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship (UK)
- Steiner Education Australia
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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