Soul's Voice
I sing, therefore I am. What we are missing when we use our voice only to speak
The human voice is designed both for singing and speaking. In a time which is fixated on bald information, we give precedence to spoken communication. But the emotional and spiritual dimensions of human existence are transmitted in a very special way through the singing voice. [more]
Publisher's View, Soul's Voice
Helicopters, tigers and doers?
“Can you imagine marrying a guy who was breastfed until he was six?”, author Tracey Morrissey asks in a blog and adds: “… and then having to deal with [his mom’s] domineering bullshit at Thanksgiving?” A year ago, a cover of the US magazine Time featuring a breastfeeding mother caused a stir. Because her son was standing upright on a little chair while he was suckling – he was approaching his fourth birthday. “Are you mom enough?” the magazine asked its readers and reported about the growing number of parents who no longer release their children out of their protective envelope at all and want to shield them against all... [more]
Series, New Methods
Goethean geography
The goal of geography lessons is to awaken an interest in the world and develop a concept of distance. Once children conquer distance, they unite with the world and awaken to their own self. [more]
Column, Individual & Community
Uplifting moments
“The consciousness soul strives to assert itself to its full antisocial extent,” Rudolf Steiner says. Did he therefore share the full neo-Darwinist dogma of innate egoism? Of course not. He was only clarifying that the invocation of natural social instincts misses the point at the heart of the social question as it presents itself today. His socio-psychological observations relate to an ethical attitude of a higher order which presumes inner freedom. Only a person who in a certain respect grows beyond anything that is biologically determined or is conventional sociality can develop true social competence. Steiner uses the word “antisocial” in a twofold meaning. Positively it describes the gesture of autonomy – with special emphasis of the striving... [more]
Early childhood, Soul's Voice
Before the concept we need conception. Against intellectualising early childhood
A social disease is increasingly gaining ground: the desperate need to keep explaining things. High time to look at the issue in greater detail and to show how dangerous it is for children at the age before they start school. [more]
Living lessons, Soul's Voice
Classics in class 5. Why a Greek main lesson still makes sense today
Class five pupils live in the transition from mythical and pictorial feeling and thinking to a rational observation of the world and human beings. Both these things can be found in the Greek main lesson. [more]
Living Teachers, Interculturality
In search of total freedom. An eurythmist sails around the world with his wife and children
Ben Hadamovsky is an anxious person. That is why he wanted to sail around the world with his family. [more]
Waldorf worldwide, Humans & Animals
Waldorf education is attracting lively interest in Turkey. An alternative to selection
Growing numbers of people in Turkey are developing an interest in Waldorf education. Kindergartens are being started, there is training and further training in Waldorf education and educational conferences and information weekends are being held. Public goodwill is evident and gives hope that Waldorf education can establish itself in the Turkish educational landscape. A Waldorf initiative in the southern Turkish city of Alanya aims to open a first Waldorf school on the Turkish Riviera in September 2013. [more]
Young writers, Life & Death
My brief life with death
“I will probably never knot a tie with such a peculiar feeling again,” I reflect and pull the wide end of the tie through the loop. Done. He looks good the way he is lying there, in his best suit and the wreath of roses around the pale, folded hands. Diego died a few hours ago at the age of 62. Diego was not related to me, we weren’t friends either. Nevertheless, my contact with him recently was very close – I nursed him until he died. The reason for that is my four-week work placement in a hospice in Zurich. I can’t say exactly why I particularly wanted to spend these four weeks with terminally ill people. I think I was interested above all in gaining an insight into life situations which were alien to me. Whereas I am young and have a thousand... [more]
Spotlight, New Methods
Teacher and pupils at Waldorf schools are more happy
A new study by Dirk Randoll, professor of education at Alanus University, investigates the job satisfaction of teachers at Waldorf schools. The results: teachers at Waldorf schools have a higher level of job satisfaction than their colleagues at mainstream schools. One reason for this is the collegial management, which allows the individual teachers the opportunity to help shape the school. A further study on "Educational experiences at Waldorf schools" from the perspective of pupils, also published by Professor Randoll together with Professor Heiner Barz and Sylvia Liebenwein (both form the University of Düsseldorf), reaches the conclusion that pupils at Waldorf schools are healthier, more motivated to learn, more confident and are less stressed by school than pupils at mainstream schools. [more]
Media
Finance at the Threshold
Because of its great importance for our understanding of the modern financial industry, here an English book is shown, that is unfortunately not yet translated into German. The author, Dr. Christopher Houghton Budd writes as proven professional. He has dedicated his entire life to the financial industry and is to be found much in the world. Professor Geoffrey Wood of the Cass Business School in London provides the book with an appreciative foreword. Houghton Budd describes the ongoing financial crisis since 2007 as a threshold event. It is not about the problems we have to solve today somehow, but a deep rift between the past and a future in which the thinking and behaviour valid till now are no longer valid. It depends on whether we are able to... [more]
Bund der Freien Waldorfschulen e.V.