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Sophia Institute online Art of Teaching Waldorf Program

Art of Teaching Waldorf Grade 7

Lesson 2

HELP

Waldorf Curriculum

Introduction

A curriculum could be compared to the list of ingredients for a recipe. However good the recipe, the quality of the ingredients is crucial but to make a start the components also need to be available. When they are to hand, the next question is whether the cook is skilled enough to combine and adjust flavors so that each item plays its part without overwhelming the others. An experienced cook may be able to substitute one ingredient for another, even to improvise in such a way that something new is created. But we should not forget that emotion, even love, goes into the preparation of food and this will influence how it is received. And, of course, the expectations, health and culinary experience of the diners also makes a difference.

A curriculum guides an entire learning process. It should not, like a dish into which a chef has thrown every possible taste, explode in an overwhelming, sensation-bursting blowout; it should bring to the table ingredients that are well- balanced, digestible and nutritious, that promote health and stimulate, not stupefy, the senses. Over time, as with diet, a curriculum can introduce items that may not be immediately appealing, stronger tastes or more subtle and complex ones: intellectual chillis, subjects initially sour or astringent, as well as flavors, textures and scents that help to educate the palate. A primary school curriculum, in particular, sets out ingredients for the hors d'oeuvres of lifelong learning.

Of course, many school curriculums share common ingredients, but the distinctive qualities of the Steiner-Waldorf curriculum framework are, we believe, unique:
  • The curriculum unfolds over time, is wide and richly experiential: not merely designed towards narrowly-defined 'achievement', but intended to promote capability for the art of living
  • The curriculum is really only a series of 'indications', as Steiner described them, pointers inviting interpretation and free rendering, i.e. it calls on and encourages the creativity ( or artistry) of teachers
  • The importance of content is fully recognized (young people need certain skills and useful knowledge), but as a creative framework, the Steiner- Waldorf curriculum is embedded within a developing practice and method. The curriculum outline takes its cue from the development of the child: subject, or content, provides a medium for a meeting and collaboration of teacher and learner. Thus, since meaning and knowledge are built over  time, this is co-constructive learning in which understanding unfolds as a process of learning to learn encompassing both students and teacher
  • Subject content and necessary competence are always relative to the child: the curriculum is midwife to the emerging individuality, rather than suit of clothes into which the child must be made to fit
  • The shaping principles of the curriculum are extraordinarily robust and resilient. Many independent educators recognize this fundamental coherence, which has stood the test of time and many generations of children
  • The creative freedom within the Waldorf curriculum framework enables it to be successfully adapted for a variety of settings, languages and cultures. Schools founded on the principles and example of the first Waldorf School (Stuttgart 1919), can be found around the world, including every inhabited continent. What started as a central European curriculum has been modified by applying its essential principles to the education of children in -the Americas, many parts of Africa, the Middle East, India and the Far East, as well as most of the rest of Europe.

Course Outline

Sophia Institute Waldorf Courses: The Art of Teaching Waldorf Grade 7
Lesson 1 / Waldorf Curriculum / Introduction
Lesson 2 / Waldorf Curriculum / Grades 7 and 8 (Part 1)
Lesson 3 / Waldorf Curriculum / Grades 7 and 8 (Part 2)
Lesson 4 / Waldorf Methods / Reading and Math / Introduction
Lesson 5 / Waldorf Methods / Reading and Math / Reading / Grade 7 and 8
Lesson 6 / Waldorf Methods / Reading and Math / Math / Grade 7 and 8
Lesson 7 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Chemistry / Introduction
Lesson 8 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Physics / Introduction
Lesson 9 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Life Sciences / Introduction
Lesson 10 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Geography / Introduction
Lesson 11 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Geography / Grades 1 - 8
Lesson 12 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Gardening and Sustainable Living
Lesson 13 / Waldorf Methods / Sciences / Technology
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Tasks and Assignments for Art of Teaching Waldorf Grade 7 /AoT72

Please study and work with the study material provided for this lesson. Use additional study material as wanted/needed. Then please turn to the following tasks and assignments listed below.

Summarize the study material in your own words and add comments and questions with focus and emphasis on grade 7. Use the following format:

A. Class 7/Developmental Profile
B. Class 7/Aims and Objectives

Please send your completed assignment via the online form or via email.

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Study Material for this Lesson

The Lower School: Classes 7 and 8​

Class 7 (age twelve to thirteen)

Developmental profile


In Class 7 the pupils turn thirteen and become  teenagers. Two fundamental gestures characterise  this phase of life: an outer, active principle and the  stirring of a dynamic, inner, psychological state.  An appetite for knowledge of, and about, world  phenomena, mingles with a budding capacity  for reflection and the first promptings of self-  reflection. In this picture of emerging forces, the  physical changes which establish sexual identity  and capacity begin to manifest more clearly. The  physical changes tend to be somewhat in advance  of the psychological development. While a feeling  and yearning for independence and solitude  may be experienced, a certain anxiety, emotional  sensitivity and embarrassment can run alongside.  Sporadic bursts of energy and an appetite for  expanding outer horizons vie with periods of  lethargic heaviness and subdued introspection.

Generally, there are significant differences in  the manner in which boys and girls face up to and  deal with the challenges of this age. Curriculum  themes which mirror the pupils' outer exploration  of the world and the inner journey include: the  journeys of exploration in history, the focus on mood and style in English, the areas of combustion  and mechanics in chemistry and physics and the  health, nutrition and hygiene main lesson block. However, Class 8 today continues to represent a  certain 'completion' of a picture of the world and  humanity's place within it.

Aims and objectives

Teachers should provide adolescents with new  perspectives, particularly by directing their  attention into the world. Pupils should be  encouraged to take initiative and to appreciate  ideas which have an abstract and logical character.  They should be encouraged to challenge attitudes  and assumptions which formerly they accepted  on authority and be shown how to formulate their  own points of view as well as accepting that others  may see the world differently. The teacher should  increasingly appeal to the individual judgement  of the children and should lead them gradually  to the exercise of social responsibility within the  context of their class community. At this age it is  important for the class to experience themselves  both as world citizens but also as individuals who  have social responsibilities.


Class 8 (age thirteen to fourteen)

Developmental profile


Class 8, during which the pupils pass their  fourteenth birthday, signals the end of the class  teacher period. Historically, this used to be the  school-leaving age for many pupils and the entry  point for an apprenticeship in a trade or craft. As  such, Class 8 was seen as a 'rounding off' of the  child's schooling. With the establishment of Upper  Schools and the raising of the school-leaving age  throughout Europe over the last fifty years, it is no  longer the case that children leave school at 14. At fourteen, the pupils are in the midst of  adolescence; bodily and psychological changes  are well under way, so that in general, the young  person seems more robust and the tenderness of  the previous two years has lessened somewhat.  Growth in height and sexual development are  clearly established, with the onset of the 'breaking  voice' in boys and the establishing of the menstrual  cycle in girls. At this age, the world of ideas begins  to take on meaning for the young adolescent and  the critical faculties of the fourteen year old are  noticeably sharper. Parts of the accepted framework  - particular rules for example - are subject to  questioning scrutiny. Counter-balancing this  critical tendency is the emergence of a reasoning  or 'reasonable' side in the child.

The emergence of an independent life of  feeling enters the 'labour and delivery' phase and  the emotional turbulence which may attend this  birth presents an important challenge to parents  and teachers - how to accompany this birth or  beginning of the emancipation of an individualised  and independent inner life of thinking, feeling and  intention without either being overwhelmed or  swamped by the waves and tides of emotions, while  being able to recognise that the state of crisis is part  of a development.

While girls may spend much time and energy  discussing and sharing their feelings and the social  and emotional aspects of life in small, cohesive  groups, boys generally tend to respond rather  differently to the hormonal and soul changes.  Seemingly rather behind their female counterparts  in terms of social behaviour and emotional  maturity, boys can appear uncommunicative,  emotionally illiterate and tend towards the brash or the sullen. Regardless of the outer manifestations,  both genders now stand before new and unknown  vistas with sharpening minds, tender hearts and  limbs that struggle to reach an accommodation  with gravity. By the end of this class, the pupils  are already searching for new authorities and role  models.


Aims and objectives

Children should be led to bring together all that  they have learnt into a meaningful world-picture  in which the human being as a striving ethical  individual has central Significance.

Independence of working should be brought  to a certain culmination in the Class 8 projects  in which each pupil chooses a theme, researches  it throughout the year and then makes a public  presentation. The pupils should be prepared for the  different style of teaching they will encounter in the  Upper School.

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