Waldorf Curriculum 2
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:
Course Outlines
Waldorf Curriculum 1
Lesson 1: Introduction Lesson 2: Preschool and Kindergarten Lesson 3: Grades 1 - 3 (Part 1) Lesson 4: Grades 1 - 3 (Part 2) Lesson 5: Grades 4 - 6 (Part 1) Waldorf Curriculum 2 Lesson 1: Grades 4 - 6 (Part 2) Lesson 2: Grades 7 and 8 (Part 1) Lesson 3: Grades 7 and 8 (Part 2) Lesson 4: Grades 9 - 12 (Part 1) Lesson 5: Grades 9 - 12 (Part 2) Lesson 6: Evaluations and End of Year Reports |
Tasks and Assignments for Waldorf Curriculum 2.6.Please study and work with the study material provided for this lesson. Then please turn to the following tasks and assignments listed below.
Create a sample End of Year Report Please send your completed assignment via the online form or via email. 
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Study Material for Waldorf Curriculum 2.6.
Evaluations and the End of Year Reports
End-of-Year Reports
End-of-Year Reports should include the following segments:
1. Curriculum Overview
2. Narrative
3. Rubrics
• Curriculum Overviews, written by class teachers and specialty teachers, outline the content of the subjects.
• The Narrative Report, written by the class teacher, strives to give a complete and accurate description of the child personally, academically, and socially.
• The student description includes work habits, ability to listen and to contribute, oral and written work, rhythmic work, etc. It may also describe highlights of the student’s year, areas of challenge, and artistic work.
• The social description includes the student in relationship to adults and to peers, both during structured and unstructured times.
• The rubrics give a succinct picture of the child’s work in language arts, mathematics, and—for the upper grades—all specialty subjects.
• Rubrics have an area for comments by class and specialty teachers
Introduction
During the year, concentrated “blocks” of study might include an end-of-block assessment. A block might be three or four weeks long and concentrate study on one topic. After a botany block in the fifth grade an outdoor “treasure” hunt to find, for example, a monocotyledon, a pistil, a tap root, a deciduous conifer branch, a dicotyledon, and so on, might be the "test.” After a block on physiology in grade seven, an essay entitled, “The Diary of a Sandwich,” might be the means of assessment. In high school, during a block on medieval history, students might be asked to submit a completed craft representative of the time studied: a hand-stitched dress, a blacksmithed hook, a tapestry or embroidered table runner, an illuminated page of a manuscript, as examples. A teacher might actually give a test at the end of a block, as well. This is called in Waldorf schools a “block test.”
Some Waldorf schools have reports sent to parents at the end of every block in high school and some Waldorf schools submit mid-year reports as well as end-of year reports after fifth or sixth grade. Some Waldorf schools might do internal mid-year reports to alert the faculty to the possibility that a child might be doing well in main lesson but could be struggling in another class. But all Waldorf schools give parents the most important assessment of all, “The End of Year Report.”
This most significant summation of the development of each student during each school year is written by the class teacher and by each special subject teacher. In the report the teacher characterizes the child with an expressive picture and describes how the child learns and lives in the social structure of the class. From the picture then flows the teacher’s insight into what and how the student learned, grew and flourished, or languished and withdrew. The teacher might then describe highlights of the successes and struggles in the block studies of the year. Lastly the teacher might describe activities or pictures for the summer that parents can use to support what the teacher might see as necessary to the child’s particular point of growth, in preparation for the coming year.
The end of year report includes shorter reports from all the specialty teachers of the child and also includes a description of the year’s curriculum.
All the year through, Waldorf teachers meditate daily on each student entrusted to them to teach. The meditation is often a vivid picturing of the child in motion, or of the child in a particular moment –– perhaps many moments ––in the preceding day. Meditation is also a form of assessment and is an integral part of preparing to write the year end report. Allowing a gesture, or a movement, or a shining moment in the school year to light up the teacher’s imagination inwardly often helps the love that the teacher has for the child to rise up strongly in the teacher’s heart and inner pondering.
Some teachers and schools give, along with the report, a “report verse”: a short poem written by the teacher for the child, making a picture for the child to ponder to explain artistically to the child how the teacher sees the student. This verse is sometimes given to the child on his or her birthday when it is called a “birthday verse.” In either case, children might stand up and recite the gift of the verse for the whole class. Alternately, a teacher might paint or draw a picture for each child. The effect is the same in that the children experience the healing in the picture and connection with their teacher.
More in depth and nuanced than a simple “grade” or “test score” or “report card,” the end of year report holds the teacher’s deep experience of the child’s striving, struggles, successes and accomplishments. The teacher pours the essence of her relationship to the student into writing the report. These carry the love and insight developed on behalf of each child and calls all the grownups caring for the child to see the child anew. The year is encapsulated in the report and the promise of the child’s next phase of development is affirmed and pictured for the child’s future as a learner, as a striving individual, and as a member of the class and school community.
What is evaluation?
Evaluation means knowing, establishing, making visible, comparing and assessing the value of something. These are quite different activities. Knowing means seeking the essential quality of something in its context. Establishing the value of something requires an analysis that identifies the relevant aspects since not all aspects are equally important even when we try to look at the situation in a holistic way. We set priorities in the form of value-systems. Assessing implies weighing the value of something, comparing it with other similar objects and at the same time valuing it, that is, appreciating its unique qualities. In order to know the essence of something we must approach it with well-intentioned, loving interest. Well-meaning interest is the starting point of any real evaluation. Evaluation also has to do with testing. We are constantly being tested by life. In all social situations we are constantly being tested and questioned. In the past each culture has had its own form of ritual testing. The essential phases of life were marked by various forms of trial. At puberty and later on reaching adult maturity, young people were admitted into their society as full adults by way of ceremonies and initiations trials. Today we have mostly only bourgeois remainders of these rituals. They have been replaced by school exams. Yet the need that young people have to be challenged and tested is not met through forms. Rather they seek their trials through all manner of risk-taking activities.
Waldorf education and exams
Waldorf education has largely distanced itself from the general examination culture (at least in theory). Waldorf schools are usually cited as classic examples of schools without grades and testing. “Waldorf schools counter this culture of selection with that of support,” wrote Christoph Lindenberg in his best seller on Waldorf education (Christoph Lindenberg, Waldorfschulen: angstfrei lernen, selbstbewusst handeln). In public exams the key element is that of selection and this assumes competition. Education becomes competitive. Fear and ambition are effective means of educating but in Waldorf these elements are countered through cooperation and interest. Instead of competition we cultivate cooperation, instead of selection we have inclusiveness.
Is one allowed to evaluate in the Waldorf school?
This inclusive approach has sometimes led to a total ban on evaluation and thus the baby is thrown out with the grubby bathwater. Paradoxically this attitude has often lived side by (uncomfortable) side with an ambivalent attitude to public exams. One would quite like to abolish them or seek alternatives, yet there is considerable willingness to serve this bourgeois symbol (“at least it shows that our pupils are normal”). It is perhaps not as crass as the German magazine Spiegel recently reported, “Already in the first class the parents fear that their children won’t pass their exams,” though this attitude is not unknown. In uncertain times, in which all forms of social security are being progressively withdrawn or undermined, the pressure from parents and pupils too quickly and efficiently gain the security of a passport to the next round of qualifications grows apace. Waldorf principles are one thing but good grades in the exams have to be gained, whatever the pedagogical cost. Pedagogically the worst case scenario is when a Waldorf school has no evaluation culture other than the state exams. These exams generate such insecurity that they work to undermine the education right down into the elementary school, years before any heed need be paid to the actual requirements of the exams. Their psychological effect is much greater than their actual relevance. Where one is used to working with meaningful forms of pedagogical evaluation throughout the school in age appropriate ways, external exams play a much less significant role in the minds of pupils, parents, and even teachers.
Waldorf education has always had many formal and informal forms of evaluation such as written school reports, child studies, diagnostic studies (such school readiness studies, the second grade class study, etc.), many forms of assessment (class tests, evaluation of main lesson books, dictations and vocabulary or mathematics tests within lessons) and many other informal ways in which pupils receive feedback on their work and development.
Evaluation means having aims
When we evaluate we test whether something is right, whether it is ripe and to what extent it meets our expectation. That means we evaluate according to certain criteria. In the process of evaluation a judgment is formed in relation to aims that are set. A central question for Waldorf education is: what are our pedagogical aims for the various ages and subjects? Secondly, we have to ask ourselves continuously, how can we support each child’s development?
However, we are concerned with more than merely assessing or making learning outcomes visible. Our task is at the same time to strengthen the learning process through evaluation. It is part of our education task to value the learning process itself as an outcome. Educational evaluation cannot only make many-sided achievements and the development of abilities visible and if necessary provable, but can also support the learning process itself. It is not just a question of demonstrating subject competence but also a whole raft of personal and interpersonal abilities, as well as problem solving competence, transfer skills, moral abilities and creativity – qualities that can actually only be demonstrated in real life situations.
In summary we can say that evaluation can:
Learning and testing in context
One must not lose sight of the relationship between learning and testing. What does this mean for evaluation? Does it help me to understand the pupils better? It is worth bearing the following basic principles in mind in order to have a basis for our practice. When I examine the child’s learning and development, they reveal certain stages and transitions which the child has to go through in the process of acquiring competencies.
Key competencies, standards and Waldorf education
Today we are aware that the central aim of education is to facilitate the acquisition of competencies the individual needs for life-long learning. Many forms of competence are described from basic skills such as reading and writing and basic mathematical abilities to social skills, inter-cultural competence, the ability to manage situations, dealing with information, learning skills, citizenship and personal competencies include moral and ethical behavior. In Waldorf education we tend to speak of skills and abilities, but no one would deny that all these competencies are irrelevant (even if the terminology is unsympathetic).
A colleague, Klaus-Michael Maurer from Hamburg and I (as part of a research project into new forms of examinations within Waldorf schools) recently compared the Waldorf approach to understanding the learning process and the requirements of the state in terms of key competencies or standards. These standards are usually presented in three basic stages that correspond to certain steps in learning: level A = reproduction, level B = application, level C = transfer (which implies the ability to apply skills acquired in one field to another). Applied to the whole of Waldorf education we can see that level A generally corresponds to the learning mode of the lower school, level B to the middle school (including Class 9) and level C to the upper classes (11 and 12), though it is clear that though the phases are successive, they are integrated. Therefore the upper school approach could be described as A+B+C. The levels of reproduction and application are almost always either explicitly or implicitly present in level C, transfer.
If we recognize the primary learning mode in the lower school as corresponding with level A reproduction (which naturally is not as mechanical as it sounds and includes imitation but also following what the teacher instructs), then it becomes clear that the primary skill required is the ability to perceive, to take in, to be receptive and open and that these qualities depend on the child being able to direct, focus and maintain her attention. In terms of the pedagogical observation, it is interesting to note when a primary ability (or, more likely, abilities) crystallizes into a specific skill (e.g., motor control, hand-eye coordination, balance, ability to form mental pictures, focused listening, etc.), it provides a platform for the acquisition of the skills we know as reading and writing. Equally important is the observation of how and when skills transform into complex abilities or competencies at the next higher level (e.g., basic writing ability leads to the ability to compose original pieces of writing or reading skills enable the learner to work with literature). There are many stages of learning to observe, each one of which can be evaluated and diagnosed and, where necessary, supported.
The following table summarizes the relations between the different concepts described above. We have added to the scheme the concepts used by Dr. Peter Loebell to describe basic learning phenomena (Loebell, P., lch Bin, Der Ich Werde, Stuttgart, Verlag freies Geistesleben, 2004.).
End-of-Year Reports should include the following segments:
1. Curriculum Overview
2. Narrative
3. Rubrics
• Curriculum Overviews, written by class teachers and specialty teachers, outline the content of the subjects.
• The Narrative Report, written by the class teacher, strives to give a complete and accurate description of the child personally, academically, and socially.
• The student description includes work habits, ability to listen and to contribute, oral and written work, rhythmic work, etc. It may also describe highlights of the student’s year, areas of challenge, and artistic work.
• The social description includes the student in relationship to adults and to peers, both during structured and unstructured times.
• The rubrics give a succinct picture of the child’s work in language arts, mathematics, and—for the upper grades—all specialty subjects.
• Rubrics have an area for comments by class and specialty teachers
Introduction
During the year, concentrated “blocks” of study might include an end-of-block assessment. A block might be three or four weeks long and concentrate study on one topic. After a botany block in the fifth grade an outdoor “treasure” hunt to find, for example, a monocotyledon, a pistil, a tap root, a deciduous conifer branch, a dicotyledon, and so on, might be the "test.” After a block on physiology in grade seven, an essay entitled, “The Diary of a Sandwich,” might be the means of assessment. In high school, during a block on medieval history, students might be asked to submit a completed craft representative of the time studied: a hand-stitched dress, a blacksmithed hook, a tapestry or embroidered table runner, an illuminated page of a manuscript, as examples. A teacher might actually give a test at the end of a block, as well. This is called in Waldorf schools a “block test.”
Some Waldorf schools have reports sent to parents at the end of every block in high school and some Waldorf schools submit mid-year reports as well as end-of year reports after fifth or sixth grade. Some Waldorf schools might do internal mid-year reports to alert the faculty to the possibility that a child might be doing well in main lesson but could be struggling in another class. But all Waldorf schools give parents the most important assessment of all, “The End of Year Report.”
This most significant summation of the development of each student during each school year is written by the class teacher and by each special subject teacher. In the report the teacher characterizes the child with an expressive picture and describes how the child learns and lives in the social structure of the class. From the picture then flows the teacher’s insight into what and how the student learned, grew and flourished, or languished and withdrew. The teacher might then describe highlights of the successes and struggles in the block studies of the year. Lastly the teacher might describe activities or pictures for the summer that parents can use to support what the teacher might see as necessary to the child’s particular point of growth, in preparation for the coming year.
The end of year report includes shorter reports from all the specialty teachers of the child and also includes a description of the year’s curriculum.
All the year through, Waldorf teachers meditate daily on each student entrusted to them to teach. The meditation is often a vivid picturing of the child in motion, or of the child in a particular moment –– perhaps many moments ––in the preceding day. Meditation is also a form of assessment and is an integral part of preparing to write the year end report. Allowing a gesture, or a movement, or a shining moment in the school year to light up the teacher’s imagination inwardly often helps the love that the teacher has for the child to rise up strongly in the teacher’s heart and inner pondering.
Some teachers and schools give, along with the report, a “report verse”: a short poem written by the teacher for the child, making a picture for the child to ponder to explain artistically to the child how the teacher sees the student. This verse is sometimes given to the child on his or her birthday when it is called a “birthday verse.” In either case, children might stand up and recite the gift of the verse for the whole class. Alternately, a teacher might paint or draw a picture for each child. The effect is the same in that the children experience the healing in the picture and connection with their teacher.
More in depth and nuanced than a simple “grade” or “test score” or “report card,” the end of year report holds the teacher’s deep experience of the child’s striving, struggles, successes and accomplishments. The teacher pours the essence of her relationship to the student into writing the report. These carry the love and insight developed on behalf of each child and calls all the grownups caring for the child to see the child anew. The year is encapsulated in the report and the promise of the child’s next phase of development is affirmed and pictured for the child’s future as a learner, as a striving individual, and as a member of the class and school community.
What is evaluation?
Evaluation means knowing, establishing, making visible, comparing and assessing the value of something. These are quite different activities. Knowing means seeking the essential quality of something in its context. Establishing the value of something requires an analysis that identifies the relevant aspects since not all aspects are equally important even when we try to look at the situation in a holistic way. We set priorities in the form of value-systems. Assessing implies weighing the value of something, comparing it with other similar objects and at the same time valuing it, that is, appreciating its unique qualities. In order to know the essence of something we must approach it with well-intentioned, loving interest. Well-meaning interest is the starting point of any real evaluation. Evaluation also has to do with testing. We are constantly being tested by life. In all social situations we are constantly being tested and questioned. In the past each culture has had its own form of ritual testing. The essential phases of life were marked by various forms of trial. At puberty and later on reaching adult maturity, young people were admitted into their society as full adults by way of ceremonies and initiations trials. Today we have mostly only bourgeois remainders of these rituals. They have been replaced by school exams. Yet the need that young people have to be challenged and tested is not met through forms. Rather they seek their trials through all manner of risk-taking activities.
Waldorf education and exams
Waldorf education has largely distanced itself from the general examination culture (at least in theory). Waldorf schools are usually cited as classic examples of schools without grades and testing. “Waldorf schools counter this culture of selection with that of support,” wrote Christoph Lindenberg in his best seller on Waldorf education (Christoph Lindenberg, Waldorfschulen: angstfrei lernen, selbstbewusst handeln). In public exams the key element is that of selection and this assumes competition. Education becomes competitive. Fear and ambition are effective means of educating but in Waldorf these elements are countered through cooperation and interest. Instead of competition we cultivate cooperation, instead of selection we have inclusiveness.
Is one allowed to evaluate in the Waldorf school?
This inclusive approach has sometimes led to a total ban on evaluation and thus the baby is thrown out with the grubby bathwater. Paradoxically this attitude has often lived side by (uncomfortable) side with an ambivalent attitude to public exams. One would quite like to abolish them or seek alternatives, yet there is considerable willingness to serve this bourgeois symbol (“at least it shows that our pupils are normal”). It is perhaps not as crass as the German magazine Spiegel recently reported, “Already in the first class the parents fear that their children won’t pass their exams,” though this attitude is not unknown. In uncertain times, in which all forms of social security are being progressively withdrawn or undermined, the pressure from parents and pupils too quickly and efficiently gain the security of a passport to the next round of qualifications grows apace. Waldorf principles are one thing but good grades in the exams have to be gained, whatever the pedagogical cost. Pedagogically the worst case scenario is when a Waldorf school has no evaluation culture other than the state exams. These exams generate such insecurity that they work to undermine the education right down into the elementary school, years before any heed need be paid to the actual requirements of the exams. Their psychological effect is much greater than their actual relevance. Where one is used to working with meaningful forms of pedagogical evaluation throughout the school in age appropriate ways, external exams play a much less significant role in the minds of pupils, parents, and even teachers.
Waldorf education has always had many formal and informal forms of evaluation such as written school reports, child studies, diagnostic studies (such school readiness studies, the second grade class study, etc.), many forms of assessment (class tests, evaluation of main lesson books, dictations and vocabulary or mathematics tests within lessons) and many other informal ways in which pupils receive feedback on their work and development.
Evaluation means having aims
When we evaluate we test whether something is right, whether it is ripe and to what extent it meets our expectation. That means we evaluate according to certain criteria. In the process of evaluation a judgment is formed in relation to aims that are set. A central question for Waldorf education is: what are our pedagogical aims for the various ages and subjects? Secondly, we have to ask ourselves continuously, how can we support each child’s development?
However, we are concerned with more than merely assessing or making learning outcomes visible. Our task is at the same time to strengthen the learning process through evaluation. It is part of our education task to value the learning process itself as an outcome. Educational evaluation cannot only make many-sided achievements and the development of abilities visible and if necessary provable, but can also support the learning process itself. It is not just a question of demonstrating subject competence but also a whole raft of personal and interpersonal abilities, as well as problem solving competence, transfer skills, moral abilities and creativity – qualities that can actually only be demonstrated in real life situations.
In summary we can say that evaluation can:
- compare and assess abilities, competencies, achievements in relation to standards, or self-determined goals.
- be a diagnostic tool in accompanying the learning process.
- in the form of self-evaluation, enable the development of self- knowledge and learning competence.
Learning and testing in context
One must not lose sight of the relationship between learning and testing. What does this mean for evaluation? Does it help me to understand the pupils better? It is worth bearing the following basic principles in mind in order to have a basis for our practice. When I examine the child’s learning and development, they reveal certain stages and transitions which the child has to go through in the process of acquiring competencies.
Key competencies, standards and Waldorf education
Today we are aware that the central aim of education is to facilitate the acquisition of competencies the individual needs for life-long learning. Many forms of competence are described from basic skills such as reading and writing and basic mathematical abilities to social skills, inter-cultural competence, the ability to manage situations, dealing with information, learning skills, citizenship and personal competencies include moral and ethical behavior. In Waldorf education we tend to speak of skills and abilities, but no one would deny that all these competencies are irrelevant (even if the terminology is unsympathetic).
A colleague, Klaus-Michael Maurer from Hamburg and I (as part of a research project into new forms of examinations within Waldorf schools) recently compared the Waldorf approach to understanding the learning process and the requirements of the state in terms of key competencies or standards. These standards are usually presented in three basic stages that correspond to certain steps in learning: level A = reproduction, level B = application, level C = transfer (which implies the ability to apply skills acquired in one field to another). Applied to the whole of Waldorf education we can see that level A generally corresponds to the learning mode of the lower school, level B to the middle school (including Class 9) and level C to the upper classes (11 and 12), though it is clear that though the phases are successive, they are integrated. Therefore the upper school approach could be described as A+B+C. The levels of reproduction and application are almost always either explicitly or implicitly present in level C, transfer.
If we recognize the primary learning mode in the lower school as corresponding with level A reproduction (which naturally is not as mechanical as it sounds and includes imitation but also following what the teacher instructs), then it becomes clear that the primary skill required is the ability to perceive, to take in, to be receptive and open and that these qualities depend on the child being able to direct, focus and maintain her attention. In terms of the pedagogical observation, it is interesting to note when a primary ability (or, more likely, abilities) crystallizes into a specific skill (e.g., motor control, hand-eye coordination, balance, ability to form mental pictures, focused listening, etc.), it provides a platform for the acquisition of the skills we know as reading and writing. Equally important is the observation of how and when skills transform into complex abilities or competencies at the next higher level (e.g., basic writing ability leads to the ability to compose original pieces of writing or reading skills enable the learner to work with literature). There are many stages of learning to observe, each one of which can be evaluated and diagnosed and, where necessary, supported.
The following table summarizes the relations between the different concepts described above. We have added to the scheme the concepts used by Dr. Peter Loebell to describe basic learning phenomena (Loebell, P., lch Bin, Der Ich Werde, Stuttgart, Verlag freies Geistesleben, 2004.).
Evaluation in the various age groups
When looking at the different age groups we need to bear in mind the two primary functions of evaluation:
- Diagnostic monitoring of development
- Evaluation (including self-evaluation) of attainment
To the typical diagnostic evaluations belong:
School admissions study
The study carried out to determine whether a child is ready to make the transition from kindergarten to school is an important evaluation. Here a series of criteria have been identified to determine whether a child is ready for school. Essentially these criteria require the observation and judgment of the extent to which the formative forces have become emancipated from their primary function of forming organic and rhythmic processes and have become available for the forming of mental images and structuring inner experience, which are the preconditions for formal learning.
The term ‘school readiness’ is no longer much in use outside of Waldorf education and has been replaced by the concept of learning competence or willingness. One judges whether a child is willing and able to start formal learning, regardless of whether the inner processes or maturation are complete or not. We know from experience that if we apply the same criteria to judging school readiness today as were used twenty years ago, we would find that most children of school age are not as ready as they were (See the ICRG’s report, Guidelines for School Readiness, published in 2004 by the Pedagogical Section in Dornach, Switzerland).
This recognition has led to many endeavors both within the kindergarten and in the lower school (e.g., the moving classroom or Bochum Model) to restructure the child’s learning experiences to enhance readiness by nurturing the lower senses. Here is not the place to discuss such developments. However it important to note that if there is a marked dissociation of the maturation processes, then we need a detailed diagnostic study of the developmental process and the monitoring of children in the transition from kindergarten to school to know what is really happening and what children’s needs really are. Furthermore, if new concepts of structuring this transition are implemented, we need clear criteria to evaluate their effectiveness in terms of supporting children’s development which can thus provide a basis for evaluation.
The Second Grade Study
Developed by the Dutch Waldorf schools advisory service, this diagnostic test is widely used to monitor and assess children’s development and identify needs for specific learning support. A series of observations are made regarding unresolved reflexes, bodily coordination (including eye-hand-foot dominance), fine and gross motor skills, proprioception (balance, sense of movement, etc.), symmetry, sense of time, language competence, numerical skills, and so forth.
Some schools such as Michael Hall School in the UK carry out class screening throughout the lower school to identify children with learning support needs, and individual education plans are drawn up with strategies and review schedules. That does not mean every problem gets solved, but is does mean that we generally know that the problem has not been solved!
Child studies
Child studies are a frequent activity within the teachers’ meetings for all age groups. Individual children are the focus for closer study and discussion. Such child studies are usually structured around focused observations, for which there are many criteria reflecting various theoretical perspectives, including:
- Character-based typology based on the anthroposophical understanding of the developing human being (e.g., gender, temperament, planetary types, large and small headedness, cosmic and earthly polarities, constitutional types)
- Various aspects of dyslexia
- Developmental phases and thresholds (e.g., Rubicon, puberty) • Learning differences
- Social development and behavior
- Biographical aspects
Often these aspects are more implicit in the characterizations, though child studies can focus specifically on one or other aspects.
The aim of a child study is to gain as comprehensive a picture as possible of the child’s being and development. Often the study goes a step further and identifies strategies to help and support the child. In many countries something along the lines of an individual education plan is drawn up involving teachers, therapists, school doctor and even occasionally parents to include diagnosis, therapy, and a timeframe for monitoring developments.
Monitoring and testing
Monitoring means the regular documentation of observations made of the learning and developmental processes of pupils, for example, in areas such as reading and writing, in artistic work or in the development of social abilities. It may be relevant to record when and how a child achieved a certain level of competence, or when a child did something for the first time or indeed any other significant moments. Monitoring, and the judgment implicit in it – we do not and cannot record every thing – require that we have developmental milestones or thresholds in mind, expectations that tell us that children usually reach this stage of development around this time or in certain sequence.
Testing on the other hand requires that we construct a specific situation in order to test whether certain skills have been learned, e.g., through a vocabulary test or a written assignment under certain conditions. If monitoring is passive observation of that which unfolds, testing is active. Monitoring belongs to pedagogical support; testing is evaluation in the narrower sense.
Class teachers are well advised to monitor and document the developmental stages through which the children in their care go.
School reports and developmental profiles
In the Waldorf school report, an attempt is made to formulate a picture of the child’s being and to formulate future tasks or emphases. In theory the Waldorf report contains both diagnostic and evaluative elements. On the one hand a picture is given regarding the pupil’s whole development and on the other, the student’s attainments and evaluation in the specific subjects, identifying strengths and weaknesses. The criticisms leveled at Waldorf reports (worst case scenarios) are that it is not clear to whom they are addressed (pupil or parent), to what extent an accurate picture is given, the degree to which indications are given as to how the weaknesses can be overcome, or simply that they contain generalized formulations that year for year indicate no development or change. At best Waldorf reports have the potential to be highly sensitive instruments of evaluation and motivation.
In student or pupil profiles (the Dutch speak of pupil success systems), a series of developmental stages are noted and commented upon by both the teacher and the pupil (usually from the middle school upwards). In the self evaluation the pupils can reflect on their learning, on their strengths and weaknesses, what they enjoy, what goals they set themselves. The pupils can focus on school work, behavior, attitudes and their own competencies.
Forms of learning and appropriate methods of assessment
Different modalities of learning require quite different forms of assessment. The following table, though much over-simplified, makes this clear. It should be noted that good teaching usually involves a blend of various forms of learning and therefore requires differentiated forms of assessment. While these learning stages reveal a vertical and age-determined progression, they can also be found at differentiated levels within a given age range. This table can, of course, be extended.
Forms of examination
Exams naturally have an element of challenge. This is their best quality. It is an opportunity to say to a pupil, show me what you can do. As soon as we comment on a child’s contribution with the words, “You have done that well” (assuming that is a true assessment and not simply a hollow phrase), we are applying criteria for assessment. In Waldorf education we draw these criteria from the subject matter itself. The children learn from the first grade onwards to recognize and value the colors, tones and forms. They learn that a line is either straight or not and whether the form in eurythmy has been moved successfully or not. Activities are judged in their contexts, e.g., whether the bread we have baked tastes good or whether it was in the oven too long or is too salty. Life, with a little help from the teachers, usually makes it apparent whether the qualities are right or not. When not, the questions immediately arise, “Why not?” and “What can we do to make it right?” We are committed in Waldorf education to creating a positive culture of learning from mistakes rather than punishing them. We can learn from mistakes and we want to learn is the basic principle that sometimes gets lost in translation.
It is in the fifth grade that one can first begin to talk openly with the pupils about the learning process itself. One can discuss what helps and what hinders the learning process. From this age onwards the children can begin to reflect on their own feelings and their own learning process. How many new words can I learn in French and how do I do it? They begin to be interested in how different people are and how people learn differently, things they have intuitively known before but can now begin to observe and verbalize. In sixth grade the question of learning gains a new dimension with the awakening of new faculties that make causal thinking possible. (“How do I learn something? What do I have to learn and what have I actually learned?”)
Testing to verify what has been learned is an important element in the learning process from this age onwards. Correcting and learning from mistakes are particularly important from now on, not least because of the awakening critical faculties and the interest in the learning process it generates. (These processes are addressed fully in the existing Waldorf curriculum content.) The pupils can learn at this age how work can be corrected and how one can discuss it. The social processes that are involved are also very important parts of the learning process. Helping each other begins to take on a new character, one that has more consciousness and awareness of individual differences and qualities. Team work is not achieved through authority at this age but rather out of mutual recognition and through the joy of meeting challenges and is closely related to the ability to learn and work independently – the best team player is the one who is also self-reliant. Challenge also involves friendly rivalry and competition between equal groups of mixed ability. The team ethos is, “We will manage it,” with the emphasis on “we.”
Non-academic and informal learning are just as important to evaluate. The task is to awaken an awareness for the relevant criteria: Why are we doing it? How should it be? What is expected from us? What are the limits of our skills? This kind of evaluation can apply to organizing a stand at the Christmas Fair, performing in a school festival, or climbing a mountain. Pupils are quite capable of identifying their own relevant criteria and goals and assessing their own achievements.
Portfolios
Students choose examples of their work (in a range of different media and not just on paper) which they document and provide commentary. This allows for a much more individual presentation of attainment in which the strengths and weaknesses of the individual in a varied and focussed form are far more concrete in its quality of expression than with formal marking or grades. A portfolio tells us far more about the learning process and development of the individual than tests or other forms of traditional exams.
Many Waldorf schools around the world are now working with portfolios because they offer many more opportunities to present the values that Waldorf education hold important within the learning process. In many cases these portfolios are accredited as contributions to public exam systems (and not only in art, where portfolios have long been used).
Working with portfolios assumes that certain basic competencies have already been acquired by the pupils and therefore if the work is to be fruitful, there need to be many preparatory stages of introduction, particularly in regard to pupils working independently and in groups. The limitations of portfolio work become apparent in schools where these preconditions have not been met or where the teachers are not aware of the extent to which their teaching approach has to change to allow more creativity and self-determination on the part of the pupils.
One of the key factors in portfolio work is reflection and self-evaluation. These skills have to be cultivated in stages from the middle school upwards if pupils in the upper school are to be able to use them meaningfully in relation to portfolio work that demands a high level of personal involvement and self-awareness on their part. The pitfall is that without adequate self awareness of criteria, the portfolio can become nothing more than a random accumulation of disconnected material.
Accreditation of learning
The international educational landscape has changed much in recent years and now provides many ways of accrediting pupil achievements other than through traditional exams. In some countries Waldorf schools already have external accreditation for various forms of learning attainments. The main advantage of such systems of accreditation is that no curriculum content is prescribed but rather learning levels.
If one takes the aspect of independence as a criterion to assess levels of learning, which is often done, then one can identify, for example, four levels of learning:
- An entry level at which the learner makes a first acquaintance with the subject. Here the criteria have to do essentially with being receptive.
- At the next level a degree of practicing that which has been taught is evident. Little self-initiative is required and the pupils essentially follow instructions within a clearly defined structure. Assessment concerns checking that basic skills are practiced and mastered adequately.
- At the third level a portion, approximately a third in terms of time, of the learning is self-directed or with minimal input from the teacher, who remains on hand to check, support and guide. The remainder of the time is teacher-led. This is the level of most normal school teaching.
- At the highest level (within this framework) the learner is primarily responsible for the process, with a small degree of input from third parties in the form of advice or training (at the request of the learner and only as a result of the learner’s initiative). This is the level of independent learning achieved by good twelfth grade projects.
Such a distinction of learning levels can run concurrently in upper school classes. One could have pupils working at different levels of independent learning on projects (practical, artistic, or academic) or even in a main lesson. According to the criteria chosen, one can then determine the extent to which each learner has fulfilled them, in effect whether they have “passed” or “failed.” However such a system is geared to all learners passing, at their appropriate levels because the task of the teacher is to ensure that the pupils have the appropriate techniques and materials and are working at the right level. With more or less guidance every individual, with good will and effort, can fulfill the criteria. This is the antithesis of the selective principle used in conventional exams, where sometimes even the quota of grades is pre determined and a percentage is preprogrammed for failure.
Student journals
Often included with a portfolio is a student journal in which the learning process itself is described and commented on by the student. These are particularly valuable in documenting experiences during work experience or other practical projects, including class plays. The techniques of journal writing need to be introduced and the pupils allowed considerable scope for individual creativity. As a learning competence, journal writing is an extremely useful technique to master for many professions and obviously also for university studies. Such journals can also be included in the assessment for the accreditation of informal learning.
Conclusions
What could a Waldorf Graduation Certificate look like to also meet the requirements of access to higher education? The short answer is what the Norwegian Waldorf schools have: a certificate that demonstrates the fulfillment of the main educational aims of Waldorf education by a specific individual. A more complete answer would include that it would show how this individual expressed those competencies. It would show a high degree of independence on the part of the individual learner and would give answers to the questions: Who is this person? What can he or she do? What does he or she want to do? And after all that, what an employer or the admissions officer of a college or university needs to know. If we manage to achieve a deepened understanding of our pupils, if we manage to improve the quality of our educational provision through evaluation and quality development, then it will be possible in future to meet the requirements which the state and indeed the times make on education. Evaluation has a role to play in making those undoubted values that Waldorf education nurtures not only more visible but more impactful.