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Sophia Institute online Art of Teaching Waldorf Program

Art of Teaching Waldorf Grade 8

Lesson 13

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Waldorf Methods/Sciences

Introduction

" ... ancient wisdom contained no contradiction between body and soul or between nature and spirit; because one knew: Spirit is in man in its archetypal form; the soul is none other than the message transmitted by spirit; the body is the image of spirit. Likewise, no contract was felt between man and surrounding nature because one bore an image of spirit in one's own body, and the same was true of every body in external nature. Hence, an inner kinship was experienced between one's own body and those in outer nature, and nature was not felt to be different from oneself. Man felt himself at one with the whole world. He could feel this because he could behold the archetype of spirit and because the cosmic expanses spoke to him. In consequence of the universe speaking to man, science simply could not exist. Just as we today cannot build a science of external nature out of what lives in our memory, ancient man could not develop one because, whether he looked into himself or outward at nature, he beheld the same image of spirit. No contrast existed between man himself and nature, and there was none between soul and body. The correspondence of soul and body was such that, in a manner of speaking, the body was only the vessel, the artistic reproduction, of the spiritual archetype, while the soul was the mediating messenger between the two. Everything as in a state of intimate union. There could be no question of comprehending anything. We grasp and comprehend what is outside our own life. Anything that we carry within ourselves is directly experienced and need not be first comprehended. ... Precisely because man had lost the connection with nature, he now sought a science of nature from outside." - Rudolf Steiner in "The Origins of Natural Science."

In Waldorf education, the science subjects do not start with nor are built from theories and formulas. Rather they start with the phenomena and develop in an experiential way, by first presenting the phenomenon, having the students make detailed observations, then guiding the students to derive the concepts that arise from the phenomena, and finally deriving the scientific formulas and laws behind the phenomena.This methodology reflects the way basic science actually has been developed by scientists and trains the pupils stepwise in basic scientific thinking and reflection on the basis of personal experience and observation of the phenomena of nature and the history of science. In kindergarten and the lower grades, the experience of nature through the seasons is brought to the children through nature walks, nature tables and observation of nature around. In later grades, there are specific main lesson blocks dealing with Man and Animal, and other themes. In grade 5, scientific ideas may be taught historically through the study of the Greeks, for example, Aristotle, Archimedes and Pythagoras. In grades 6-8 the science curriculum becomes more focused with blocks on physics (optics, acoustics, mechanics, magnetism and electricity), botany, chemistry (inorganic and organic), and anatomy. In high school, science is taught by specialists who have received college level training in biology, chemistry and physics and these three subjects are taught in each of the 4 years of high school.

Course Outline

Sophia Institute Waldorf Courses: The Art of Teaching Waldorf Grade 8
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 8 /AoT813

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.

1. Create examples of curriculum that addresses the learning method and content appropriate for grade 8 as follows. Curriculum examples should include outlines and goals, activities, circle/games, stories, and illustrations/drawings. Create 2 examples for grade 8.
2. Additionally submit comments and questions, if any.

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

Study Material for this Lesson

Technology (Including Information and Computer Technology)

Pupils in Steiner-Waldorf schools experience  technology as a subject in its own right. From finger-knitting and other crafts in the early years, through  to electronics and computer logic construction  in the upper school, students are evolving their  technological skills, creatively and in the real  world. Knitting is interesting and significant in that  it is the earliest form of programmed technology  - a knit/pearl sequence is binary code instruction.
Steiner- Waldorf education aims to help pupils  to become ethical and confident users of a range of  technologies, whilst also recognising the historical,  societal and biographical aspects of technology,  e.g. mechanical programming of weaving during  the Industrial revolution, etc.

Waldorf education aims to enable children and  young people to be fully engaged in and to take  ownership of the technology that surrounds them  and of which they make use. In order to achieve  this, pupils are helped to understand technology  in its innermost nature, and they become able  to direct that technology, taking full account of  human agency in this process. What follows is  thus a inter-disciplinary account of the curriculum  pertaining to technology and ICT, and teaching is  likely to take place through integration during the  course of a year of many different subject themes.


Kindergarten to Class 6

In order to negotiate the ethical, cultural and social  issues involved in the use of technology, children  need to be helped to develop a healthy self image  and feeling for the needs of others through real  relationships. This is a task for the curriculum as a  whole. The following aspects in particular support  this:

* Activities that enable children to engage in a  rich story life through imaginative lessons and  whole body learning
* Activities that support the development of  emotional well being and resilience
* Activities that allow children to explore and  value, through story and play, their relationship  to time and place
* Activities that encourage children to think and  act cooperatively, empathetically and sustainably


Understanding and using technology

* Children explore how technology extends  their ability to do things, e.g. making knitting  needles extends what is possible with finger  knitting, scissors cut paper more accurately  than folding and tearing
* Children explore the relationship between  tools and material, e.g. trying to cut felt with  paper scissors
* Children learn to choose appropriate technology for a task, making tools they need to achieve  a task, e.g. the difference between a mallet and a hammer, wooden peg, nail and screw, etc.
* Children reflect on how well a technology they  have selected and used achieved its purpose
* Children learn to use specialist equipment for  specific purposes and compare results with  informal or ad hoc devices, e.g. 'kitchen-sink'  science, hose-pipe rainbows compared to a  prism, etc.
* Children learn to work safely with sharp tools  and manage real-life risks with appropriate  strategies


Activities could include:

* Outdoor and indoor play involving co-  operation, balance, climbing, hoops, balls, etc. 
* Using garden tools, including trowels, spades,  wheelbarrows
* Card weaving, felting, finger-knitting, sewing,  peg loom and use of a variety of media, etc.
* Making simple equipment, e.g. knitting  needles, peg looms, reed or quill pens, etc.
* Story of items used in school, e.g. crayons,  pencils, musical instruments
* Variety of creative work and forms of expression. The technology of communication from writing,  reading, images, diagrams, graphs and tables
* Clear observation, records and exposition -  analysis of results: did I find out what I wanted  to know, what evidence do I have for my  conclusion?
* Designing presentations, experiments and  demonstrations


Classes 7 to 9

By this age, the sense of 'personal space' has  become strong enough for pupils to begin to  recognise and learn to respect the space of others,  including their 'creative space: Drama, eurythmy  and presentations to others also help to develop a  feeling for an audience and ability to see a situation  from more than one viewpoint. Young people at  this age also begin to explore more consciously the  themes and values suggested previously and, in  addition:

* Learn to understand the basis which continues  through to modernism, i.e. Renaissance/  Reformation individualism and the (so-called  western) Enlightenment, the development,  especially in the UK, of materialism (Francis  Bacon, Puritanism and the Civil War, agrarian  & industrial revolution) and banking systems  form Italian city states to German finance  houses etc) alongside mechanisation and the  growth of industrial centres; World War 1 as  the first truly industrial war (this theme to  developed more fully in the upper school)
* The development of personal creativity (from  the studio system to single individual artists,  baroque composers copying and borrowing  from one another to the 'unique individual  voice' of musicians from the Classical Period  onwards)
* Representation through commissioning of  portraits
* Legal questions including 'intellectual property  rights' and plagiarism/piracy. The unique  experience of a concert or other performance;  the differences between this and its recording  (e.g. what is being paid for when someone pays  for downloading, or streaming music and the  idea of 'getting music free')
* Creating plans: intention and implementation  - what is a template? Mind mapping
* Tools and machines related to the human being  and as extended capacities (e.g. limb joints  and levers, why a garden fork usually has four  prongs etc): gun powder; Jethro Tull and the  seed drill; mechanical weaving and spinning;  steam pumps, etc.
* Malthus, Adam Smith and the concept of  natural selection (the story of Baron Gaspard de Prony and the division of labour; Herman  Hollerith and the punched-card; Henry Ford,  etc.)
* Activity and friendship circles - co-operation,  compromise, community - the nature of 'social  networking'; appropriate protection and cyber-bullying
* Creating posters, 'cartoons' designed to persuade (e.g. those of the Civil War period);  editing (including the use and limitations of  spelling and grammar checks , typesetting,  publishing, etc.)
* Utilising online or computer-based reference  sources (e.g. how authoritative is Wikipedia?),  translation and similar applications
* Presentation of data; spreadsheets and all types  of chart
* Computing: from fingers and stones to  numbers; the abacus; Napier's 'bones' (make  and use); Blaise Pascal's 1642 calculator (cogs  and levers); Lord Byron, Lady Lovelace and  William Babbage (the analytical engine/  difference engine); the slide rule, etc.
* Circuits and the on/ off switch; solid  geometry, nets, scale and algebra; binary  logic (e.g computer science unplugged: www.csunplugged.org)
* Introduction to QWERTY (and its history)  and touch-typing

There is an inevitable overlap between the above  and Classes 9 to 12.


Classes 9 to 12

As should be clear from the foregoing, technology  is not a process that can be separated from the  human beings who bring it about; nor is it merely  about producing artefacts. There are several  dimensions and these should to be taken into  account through the curriculum. They are both  an extension and intensification of what has been  covered previously:

* The natural dimension involving scientific,  engineering and ecological perspectives
* The human dimension involving anthropological, physiological, psychological and aesthetic  perspectives
* The social dimension involving economics,  sociology, politics, cultural history, legal and  ethical aspects

Division of labour has become a sine qua non  for modern developed societies and technology  has thus become the concern of specialists and  engineers. However increasing environmental  problems have led to a greater awareness of  the human and social implications and to the realisation that a multi-dimensional, integrated concept of technology is needed. The isolation  of the different specialisms makes it essential  to attempt a reintegration of technology as a  whole. The evolution of technology comes about  through the human being's innate capacity for  development.

Technology lessons build on the whole lower  school involvement with materials, crafts, social,  historical and economic studies. Key subjects  include learning about farming and house building in Class 3, and the geography curriculum from  Class 4 on which explores human economic  relationships to the local environment and its  natural resources and the links between regions  around the world. History lessons show the  significance of technological discoveries for social,  economic and cultural developments in a wide  range of fields (navigation, energy production  and use, weapons, means of communication,  farming, raw materials, trade, etc.). Craft and  handwork lessons throughout the school also form  a practical and experiential basis for understanding  technology.

The Class 9 physics main-lesson is oriented  towards primary technology and will have  provided, among other things, a history of  technology by means of a few examples (e.g.  combustion engines, telephone, turbines, etc.).  Technology as such has some quite specific  pedagogical tasks to fulfil, namely to school  accurate observation, practical thought processes  and social awareness. The chemistry curriculum  too provides an understanding of substances,  materials and their production and application  to technology, especially petrochemical and fossil  fuels.

Work experience provides opportunities to see  industrial and agricultural processes at work. A  topic for study in technology lessons might be to  investigate a nearby factory, including discovering  the firm's commercial profile and depicting the  production process including preliminary phases  (purchase of parts and material) and subsequent  tasks (advertising, marketing, selling). In their  social and industrial work-experience projects  the pupils will gain direct experiences of the  social aspects of work and its results. Lessons  can also take the form of excursions to power  stations, recycling plants, water reservoirs, mines, etc. Such visits are best preceded by and followed  up with detailed discussion. The use of modern  media such as film and video is especially suitable  in the high-tech realm. Many industries provide  excellent information on their technology.


Classes 9 and 10

These lessons are intended to provide life  experience rather than exact knowledge.

It is important during this age to introduce to  the students the world outside, so that they  come to grips with and understand life as  such ... Our curriculum should be such that  it allows the children to become practical in  life; it should connect them with the world ...  It is, therefore, necessary to give ... lessons in  mechanics - not only in theory, as in physics,  but practical mechanics, leading to the  making of machines.

An overview of what the pupils have learnt in handwork and craft lessons (woodwork, etc.) combined with theoretical concepts from physics  and mathematics will help students develop in  a holistic way. Technologies throughout human  history should also be discussed.

In information technology there are four prime  aspects which we have touched on previously, and  which now need to be secured throughout the  Upper School:

* Basic computer literacy: word processing,  typing and the use of software to produce,  edit, store and retrieve text; using databases,  spreadsheets, graphics, desktop publishing,  etc. The use of the computer as an instrument  in support of other tasks (including what is the internet and happens when an email is sent?)
* An understanding of the basic principles of  information systems in relation to the history  of information storage (e.g. going back to the  origins of writing and looking at its cultural  significance); understanding how hardware  and software relate; how software programs  are designed and how file systems work; safe  working practices and legal aspects such as  copyright; firewalls, internet security (bugs,  spam and hacking)
* The social, cultural and personal influence of  computers, including both the time-saving,  liberating aspects as well as the possible  negative, obsessional and anti -social aspects. Economic questions such costing and how 'hi-tech' companies are financed (perhaps including why an expensive mobile phone handset might be given away 'free')
* What's inside the box? - the 'race to the  smallest', fundamentals of programme writing  (e.g. using Raspberry-pi or other devices)

Content suggestions include:

* Spinning wool, flax and cotton
* Weaving using various types ofloom 
* The textile industry
* Production of man-made textiles 
* Soap production
* Water wheels and water pumps
* Turbines: high, medium and low-pressure turbines
* The screw and its many applications 
* Henry Morse and the telegraph
* Icons and markers
* Online learning programme, such as INGOTS 
* Evaluation criteria for information sources


Classes 11 and 12

Technology now deals with two very important  realms: power/energy on the one hand (e.g. the  electricity industry) and substance/material on  the other (e.g. paper manufacture). Technology in  earlier classes started with traditional technologies;  in Class 11 and 12 everyday technology needs to  be explored and the principles of how they work  explored. So far as possible, this should include  cutting edge technologies of all kinds, some of which  will be introduced by the students themselves.

* End of course project could include a major  multi-media element utilising skills and  capabilities learned so far
* Power stations and the energy industry (water,  wind, calorific and nuclear)
* From steam to internal combustion the jet engine and rockets
* Automobile mechanics and basic maintenance 
* A study of the qualities of flowing water
* Paper manufacture
* Bookbinding and use of cardboard (see  handwork in Class 11)
* Algorithms, artificial intelligence and John Searle's 'Chinese Room'
* George Boole and Boolean logic
* Alan Turing and the enigma machine
* John von Neuman and 'Neuman architecture' 
* Tim Berners-Lee and the world wide web
* Reproductive media, particularly digital  printing; image and reality (Photoshop, image manipulation and its influence on body image) 
* Using graphics and animations, 'mixing' sounds and combining visual, sound and other  media effects for a specific purpose
* Deconstructing the computer, component  manufacture and implications (e.g. value and  supply of raw materials); recycling parts
* Radio signals and television
* Fossil fuels, what is 'sustainable' energy?
* Chemical technology and artificial fibres including natural fibres and artificial fibres made from natural materials: (celluloid, resins,  etc.)
* Semi-synthetic products (classical resins)
* Fully synthetic materials (polymers, plastics),  e.g. from natural rubber to synthetic rubber
* Environmental and recycling problems: quality  controls (soil, water, air)
* Illustration of cascades and fractals, path  curves and chaos theory
* Technology companies such as Microsoft,  Apple, Google, Facebook
* Mobile devices, microwaves

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