ART and SPECIAL SUBJECTS
The arts are integrated into the entire academic curriculum, including mathematics and the sciences. Through the arts, imagination and creative powers awaken, bringing vitality and wholeness to learning.
Precisely because the arts are present throughout Waldorf education, they are not listed as separate subjects in the curriculum summary. However, music, speech, drama, painting, form drawing, eurythmy, modeling, crafts and games are all included in the subjects taught at the Oakland Steiner School.
Knitting and other handwork projects play an important role in the development of fine motor skills, inner calm and intellectual clarity. Author and handwork teacher Rachel Magrisso from the Green Mountain Waldorf School in Vermont explains it this way:
"Handwork is the time for the children to be still within themselves. Suggested for parents, too. It helps the children in their thinking, in the ability to make judgments—is every stitch even, clear, consistent, and of the right tension? They work at finding an evenness and clarity of stitches, and getting the feel of it. When they are doing handwork there is harmony—the room settles down to a hum..."
The specific handwork taught in Waldorf schools also “grows with the growing child.” In the first grade, the curriculum calls for learning the basic knit stitch and creating a practical and useful project in a warm textile such as wool. In second and third grades, this is continued with purling and crochet, which add new movements and require more focus on each row and stitch. Around age nine or ten the children undergo a change of consciousness: they are individuals within themselves, no longer as open. The hats that the third graders knit to cover their heads represent this developmental milestone. Also the third grader is experiencing the beginning of critical thinking, and in the knitting of the hats, they are introduced to small patterns, thus engaging their new thinking skills. Cross-stitch, taught in fourth grade, reflects this more elaborate stage in their development.
The fifth grade begins woodworking and more complicated knitting, such as a sock. This is the age when they turn a corner in development on the road to themselves. They are perhaps less insecure than in fourth grade and are ready to start carving out and exploring this new individuality. Knitting a sock requires using four needles instead of just two, and it is a task that requires much perseverance. The child toils and works on the first sock and when s/he completes that one, s/he has to persevere and begin the second sock. This can be a challenging but very valuable lesson for a child.
Developmentally the sixth graders are coming into form. This is reflected in the academic curriculum in the precise tools used in the geometrical drawing block, and also in the block on ancient Rome, a society where humans began to make their own laws instead of living by the laws handed down by God. In the handwork curriculum, sewing is started in sixth grade. The children sew animals. This requires planning, patterns, cutting, basting, and other skills for a child who is now more intellectual in his/her planning and thinking. The sewing the children undertake in seventh and eighth grade requires extensive forethought and mathematical skills. In seventh grade, they sew sweatshirts by hand and in the eighth grade, sewing machines are used for various projects like patchwork quilts, wall hangings, and appliqués.
Handwork offers many opportunities for reinforcing math skills in practical, challenging, and enjoyable ways. But author and Waldorf teacher Eugene Schwartz points out an even more valuable result:
"We cannot underestimate the self-esteem and joy that arises in the child as the result of having made something practical and beautiful--something which has arisen as the result of a skill that has been learned. In an age when children are often passive consumers, who, as Oscar Wilde once said ‘know the price of everything and the value of nothing,’ learning to knit can be a powerful way of bringing meaning into a child's life."
Movement Education and Games in the Waldorf curriculum springs from the same understanding of a child’s development that underlies the academic curriculum in a Waldorf school. This deeper understanding of a child’s development is taken into account in a Movement Education and Games class: in the activities that are chosen; the shapes that are used in the group games; and on the emphasis of the class (i.e. emphasis on fun or on the rules). Each class contains a rhythm of joining together and moving apart, highly active games balanced with quieter games, working together as a group and taking a few moments to reflect on one’s own body and movement.
Games in grades one and two are relatively unstructured and have the gesture of the circle, keeping the children protected and as part of the whole. As we move up the grades, the children are slowly coming into their individuality and the games curriculum reflects this by, for instance, adding line games in the third grade to the now familiar circle games. In fifth grade there is a focus on beauty and form and in the spring, the fifth graders participate in the Greek Games, a gathering of fifth grade classes from several regional Waldorf schools. In grades 6, 7 and 8 the more conventional sports are brought into the curriculum because only now can the children have a real respect for the law of rules and understand how a team works together while at the same time developing their own self-discipline and competitive nature. They are aspiring upwards in terms of exactness, technique, timing and the spirit of the law, while also becoming more aware of the world around them.
In a culture where organized team sports hold such high status, children can sometimes think of movement only in these terms. The Movement Education curriculum tries to give the children basic coordination and movement skills that will help them when they decide to play organized sports. Depending on the grade, the children will play games or do relay races that serve to develop a skill that is also required for a conventional sport such as basketball. String games, jump rope and a balloon relay are all activities that develop skills that can be used in many different sports.
Not only does a movement class provide the opportunity for the children to play games and have fun, it also works with their social interaction, teaching them to play with each other before they play against each other, to play safely, and to gain an appreciation for all kinds of movement.
The spoken word is the key to learning languages in the early grades. Songs, poems, rhymes, tongue twisters, counting and group games - all these foster group knowledge of the language and appreciation of the folk soul of the peoples who speak that language. In the later grades, keeping a written record of all the oral work brings awareness of spelling and basic grammar in the language. Reading in the foreign language begins in grade four. Students in grades one through eight have both French and German instruction.
There are many important inner skills to be learned in the study of music. The discipline of practicing with an instrument helps a child find the inner discipline to face other challenges in life. Group music lessons offer a wonderful opportunity for a child to practice the ability to listen to others and to work cooperatively. It is quite a challenge for a group of children to work completely in unison in any realm, be it social, academic or physical. In trying to play their instruments as a group, with the same timing and pitch, the result of a harmonious sound allows them to directly experience the value of working well together. Playing an instrument is a wonderful means of self-exploration, self-expression and creativity that allows the student to grow into a more well rounded human being. Singing is also an essential aspect of the entire curriculum, from preschool through 8th grade.
Beginning in the first grade, the children at the Oakland Steiner School are taught to play the recorder and singing is a regular part of the school week in many classes. First and second grade children play a pentatonic flute and third grade children begin to play a diatonic flute.
In the third grade, beginning level violin lessons are also offered to the whole class. The lessons generally take place twice a week for 45 minutes during the school day. The children are taught the basics of how to hold the instrument properly, how to play by ear and how to read music.
The school orchestra is open to fifth through eighth graders. The orchestra provides an opportunity for students who are taking private lessons outside of the school to learn to play in an ensemble. All instruments are welcome in the orchestra (strings, woodwinds, brass and percussion). Rehearsal is scheduled once a week during the school day.
