New Methods
Wind in the sails. Autonomous learning in lower school
How can we teach in a way that maintains the pupils’ pleasure in learning and lets each one go their individual way? How can the teacher change his or her role without giving up responsibility for the learning process, and what are the stages from independent to autonomous activity? These questions are investigated by Annette Neal, jointly responsible in the “Autonomous learning” research project. [more]
Publisher's View, Humans & Animals
Learning culture not arms
In Ohio (USA), the janitors of two schools will with immediate effect carry firearms when performing their duties. The director of the responsible authority praised the measure because it would “considerably improve” the safety of the children. He allayed the concerns of parents with the assurance that the two janitors would undergo two days of training. [more]
Series, Humans & Animals
A lesson in phenomenological chemistry
Polarities collide and form something completely different and new – that is how we might sum up the fields of teaching in class 10 which also resonate with the central questions of this age group. In the chemistry main lesson we deal with that from the perspective of the contrasting pairs of bases and acids as well as the salts they produce. [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, New Methods
“We only see clearly with the heart” – or how parents become educational artists
Bringing up a child appears to many parents today to be a task which is hardly to be managed. Physical and psychological neglect, refusal to go to school, increasing violence among children and young people – this is what confronts us in the media each day. Endless shelves could be filled with the self-help books on “Bringing up children”. Education gurus make their way through the talk shows. While one lot demand greater strictness and disciplin, others call for a return to an idealised version of family and society. [more]
Living lessons, Virtue & Morality
The world in my hand
It is Monday morning. I am standing in the classroom of class three. Silence still reigns. Thirty-six lumps of clay lie ready prepared, one for every child. The pupils stream into the classroom and quickly the space fills with voices. There is laughter and calling, but not everyone appears to be in a good mood. Some look tired or keyed up. [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, Individual & Community
Doing what’s necessary. Biography rescues the founder of the first Waldorf school, Emil Molt, from obscurity
There would be no Waldorf schools without the entrepreneur Emil Molt (1876-1936). Through his activities he preserved the “spirit” of the Waldorf school and became the real founder of a worldwide school movement. It was Molt who asked Rudolf Steiner to take over as educational director of a school for the children of his workers. In doing so, Molt risked everything – and almost lost everything. [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.