Living lessons
The art of making music
In Waldorf education, the use of musical instruments already begins in kindergarten. The author is a Waldorf teacher and instrument maker and describes elementary experiences with a range of Choroi instruments in the first and second seven-year-periods of life. [more]
Ecology & Sustainability, Living lessons
In the footsteps of the "Der Blaue Reiter" group of artists
As a special feature at the Daglfinger Waldorf School there is a "Blaue Reiter" main lesson for our two class 7s right at the beginning of the school year. We start the colourful autumn with a trip to the artist towns of Kochel and Murnau. After an introduction in the school, we then walk locally in the footsteps of the artists of the "Blaue Reiter", we sketch in nature and paint indoors in the evening. Immediately after the trip, the classroom becomes a studio and the pupils spend two days painting a large-scale oil painting. A visit to the Lenbach House rounds off this main lesson. [more]
Living lessons, Educate for peace
Why form drawing is more than a game
Form drawing is certainly not a cure for all recognisable developmental disorders, but in an increasingly sedentary society it prevents adverse developments that can lead to serious disadvantages later in life. [more]
Living lessons, Body, Soul & Mind
Bothmer gymnastics. Relict of a previous time or impulse for the future?
In 1929, the first article on Bothmer gymnastics appeared in Erziehungskunst. In it, Count von Bothmer described the form of movement he had developed. In 1922, Rudolf Steiner asked the Count to join the staff of the first Waldorf School in Stuttgart as a gymnastics teacher. This was at a time when the principles of Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, the father of gymnastics, and the Prussian school gymnastics of Adolf Spiess still predominated, and the main focus was on physical training in the sense of training for military service. [more]
Living lessons, Generations
More calm in the classroom
Children who come to my practice for art and rota therapy with restlessness, attention, concentration and hyperactivity disorders also show certain physical symptoms in addition to these conspicuous features. [more]
Living lessons, Teamwork
Waldorf and the push towards digitalisation
Dr Edwin Hübner, professor at the Freie Hochschule Stuttgart – Seminar for Waldorf Pedagogy and author of several books on media education, has come to the following conclusion: online teaching has not passed its practical test. [more]
Living lessons
Crafts as an elective – concealed education
This text was written to introduce parents and colleagues to the underlying ideas of the Mannheim Waldorf School’s crafts concept. The term “Crafts elective” means that pupils in upper school can choose one of the crafts of wood or metal working or tailoring as a firm subject, provided they have decided to aim for the lower or intermediate secondary school leaving qualification or a qualification to study at a university of applied science. [more]
Living lessons, Birth and Spirit
Does Joseph belong in the Nativity scene?
Every year at Advent, class teachers are faced with the challenge of creating a suitable Christmas blackboard drawing for their class. While younger children prefer to discover and name the contents of the picture, middle school pupils also want to comment on it and if possible even help to create it. If the Christmas blackboard drawing is created over several days in smaller work steps, many suggestions from pupils can be incorporated. This provides the class with opportunities for very personal conversations. Experience shows that these dialogues can touch on depths in children and young people that are otherwise not touched upon in any of the main lessons provided for in the curriculum. [more]
Living lessons
Class trip with media fasting
For the past fourteen years, Hans-Wolfgang Roth from the Stade Free Waldorf School has undertaken an at least three-week long art trip with class 12. Over the years, there have been a lot of changes, both in the itinerary for the trip and in the behaviour and every-day habits of the pupils. One of the greatest changes concerns the use of media, particularly the communication media. They disrupt the “vision search with creative means”, so they are done without. [more]
Bund der Freien Waldorfschulen e.V.