What does Waldorf Education Want to do Differently?

This has to do with a different perspective than is usually the case. If we only asked what the child must be able to do later, then music and myths would not be at the top of the list. Anthroposophy asks differently: How does this young being find a good way into its existence? How can it develop - physically, mentally, and spiritually - in such a way that it can develop the different sides of its personality well? Then it immediately becomes clear that direct experiences with the world through the eyes and hands will play a completely different role for young children than for adolescents, who have the opportunity to mentally penetrate mathematical or philosophical contexts. It is also clear that for ten-year-olds, for example, a heroic saga about courage and loyalty and proving oneself can be a great inner experience, even if they will probably never experience a battle on horseback and with lances later in life. It's all about primal emotional situations from which our attitude to life is formed.

Another special characteristic is that Waldorf education — in addition to the content of the lessons — also takes the personal and human side of education very seriously. It does not see a school class as an arbitrary group of children of the same age to whom a few teachers are then assigned; rather, according to Steiner, a «spirit of being brought together» should prevail: You walk a longer path together, even with the same class teacher for up to eight years. Only in this way are the teachers able to truly understand and support the individual child as «soul connoisseurs».

This is undoubtedly an extraordinary educational responsibility. Who would claim to be able to do justice to this great task? First and foremost, all education means self-education, Rudolf Steiner also said. It is clear that this may not always be fully successful in everyday school life. But it is the great and justified benchmark.

Other aspects of Waldorf culture are also a challenge, such as the idea of a self-governing school. «In a real teachers' republic, we will not have cushions of peace behind us, decrees that come from the principal's office,» said Steiner in 1919. «Everyone must be fully responsible themselves.» This can be exhausting in individual cases. But it also offers the opportunity for a free, authentic, human pedagogy.