A Modern Art of Education (Foundations of Waldorf Education)

256 Pages·2004·1.91 MB·german

by  R Steiner

A MODERN ART OF EDUCATION
[XVII]
THE FOUNDATIONS OF WALDORF EDUCATION
RUDOLF STEINER
A MODERN
ART OF EDUCATION
Lectures presented in Ilkley, Yorkshire
August 5–17, 1923
Anthroposophic Press
2004
Published by Anthroposophic Press
400 Main Street
Great Barrington, MA 01230
www.steinerbooks.org
Translated with permission from Rudolf Steiner’s Gegenwärtiges
Geistesleben und Erziehung (GA 307) copyright © 1961
Rudolf Steiner–Nachlassverwaltung.
Translated by Jesse Darrell, except lecture 6 by Robert Lathe & Nancy
Whittaker, and lecture 8 by George Adams. All translations revised.
Revised edition by Anthroposophic Press copyright © 2004
Introduction by Christopher Bamford, copyright © 2004
Publication of this work was made possible by a grant from
THE WALDORF CURRICULUM FUND
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form
without the written permission of the publishers, except for brief
quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Steiner, Rudolf, 1861–1925.
[Gegenwärtiges Geistesleben und Erziehung. English]
A modern art of education : lectures presented in Ilkley, Yorkshire,
August 5–17, 1923 / Rudolf Steiner.
p. cm. — (The foundations of Waldorf education ; 17)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-88010-511-9 (alk. paper)
1. Education—Philosophy. 2. Waldorf method of education. 3.
Anthroposophy. I. Title. II. Series.
LB775.S7G497 2003
370’.1—dc22
2003017769
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION BY CHRISTOPHER BAMFORD . . . . . . . . vii
1. SCIENCE, ART, RELIGION, MORALITY
August 5, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2. THE PRINCIPLES OF GREEK EDUCATION
August 6, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
3. GREEK EDUCATION AND THE MIDDLE AGES
August 7, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34
4. SPIRIT’S RELATIONSHIP TO THE BODY
August 8, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
5. FREEING VOLITION IN THE HUMAN ORGANISM
August 9, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .70
6. WALKING, SPEAKING, THINKING
August 10, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
7. RHYTHM, SLEEP, IMITATION
August 11, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
8. READING, WRITING, NATURE STUDY
August 13, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
9. ARITHMETIC, GEOMETRY, HISTORY
August 14, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
10. PHYSICS, CHEMISTRY, HANDWORK, LANGUAGE, RELIGION
August 15, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
11. MEMORY, TEMPERAMENTS, PHYSICAL EDUCATION, ART
August 16, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
12. EDUCATION TOWARD INNER FREEDOM
August 17, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
THE THREE ERAS OF HUMAN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION
August 12, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
CLOSING ADDRESS
August 17, 1923 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
THE FOUNDATIONS OF WALDORF EDUCATION . . . . . . . . . 225
RUDOLF STEINER’S WORKS ON EDUCATION . . . . . . . . . . 227
FURTHER READING ON EDUCATION & ANTHROPOSOPHY . . . 230
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
INTRODUCTION
Christopher Bamford
Rudolf Steiner’s lectures and lecture courses on Waldorf educa-
tion fill at least twenty volumes. Therefore, it is not surprising
that there is a certain amount of repetition in these works. It is
the differences that are surprising. These often have to do with
who Rudolf Steiner was addressing. He spoke differently, for
example, to anthroposophists in Germany or Swiss public
school teachers than he did to English audiences. The English
lectures are especially interesting and uncannily accessible for
the obvious reason that Anglo-Saxon, English-speaking culture
is closer to us in America than, for instance, German or Dutch
culture. Like The Kingdom of Childhood and The Spiritual
Ground of Education, A Modern Art of Education has an imme-
diacy and intimacy that makes it one of the best introductions
to Waldorf education.
Steiner presented the lectures printed here in England in
1923, his sixth visit. He had first come to London for Theo-
sophical Society congresses in 1902, 1903, and 1905, but did
not return again until May 1913, after the split with Theoso-
phy. When he did so it was at the request of the newly formed
English anthroposophical group. He spoke then on two topics:
“Occult Science and Occult Development” and “Christ at the
Time of the Mystery of Golgotha and Christ in the Twentieth
Century.” These important lectures have exceptional liveliness
viii A MODERN ART OF EDUCATION
and depth, indicative of Steiner’s respect for honest British
“matter-of-factness,” which demanded that topics be broached
head on and without prevarication. He clearly enjoyed the free-
dom this offered. There was no need for long-winded intro-
ductions. The Great War, and its chaotic aftermath, then
intervened to make travel impossible.
As a result, Steiner was not able to cross the Channel again
until 1922, when he gave several lectures and courses, includ-
ing the education lectures published as The Spiritual Ground of
Education, given at Oxford university and hosted by Professor
Millicent MacKenzie of University College, Cardiff. As a con-
sequence of these lectures, Rudolf Steiner was invited to give a
lecture course the following year at Ilkley in Yorkshire under
the auspices of “The Union for the Realization of Spiritual Val-
ues in Education.” A number of experienced Waldorf teachers
(including Hermann von Baravalle, Carolyn von Hildebrand,
and Karl Schubert) accompanied Steiner (they were all on their
way to the International Summer School in Penmaenmawr,
Wales) and gave demonstrations of the practice of Waldorf
education.
We are lucky enough to have Steiner’s own report on the
event.1 His lectures, he says, were designed to show “how Wal-
dorf methods are related to present-day civilization.” He writes:
“On the artistic side, we wanted to show how we have evolved
eurythmy out of the anthroposophical movement. In addition,
six teachers from the Waldorf school were going to show how
they put into practice what was described in the lectures.”
On his way north, Steiner observed the industrial and coal
mining townships—for example, “Leeds, where unbelievably
blackened houses are strung together quite abstractly, where
1. Rudolf Steiner, Rudolf Steiner Speaks to the British: Lectures and Addresses in
England and Wales. London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1998
Introduction ix
everything looks like a condensation of blackest coal dust, con-
centrated into the shapes of houses where people have to live.”
He remarked, “Do you see those thought forms—there you
have hell on earth.” He concludes, “This kind of experience
makes obvious how absolutely necessary it is that spiritual
impulses should enter our present civilization.”
He also remarks how struck he was by the simultaneous evi-
dence of remnants of ancient, Druidic culture:
Ilkley, then, is a place surrounded on the one hand by an
atmosphere created entirely by these industrial towns. On
the other hand, in the remains of dolmens and old Druidic
altars lying around everywhere, it has traces of something
that reminds one of the ancient spirituality that has, how-
ever, no successors. It is most moving to have on the one
hand the impression [of the industrialism] I just described
and then, on the other, to climb a hill in this region so filled
with the effects of those impressions and then find in those
very characteristic places the remains of ancient sacrificial
altars marked with appropriate signs.
He then describes the course itself:
Each morning began with a lecture in which I tried to put
before the audience the kind of education practiced in the
Waldorf school, basing this on the whole historical develop-
ment of education. My starting point was to describe how,
in Greek culture, education had arisen from ordinary Greek
life. This showed, I said, that no special method or practices
should be invented for use in schools, for schools ought to
bring children what is there in the culture around them.
I do not want to be generally critical about, say, Fröbel’s way
of teaching little children, but I have to say that it is not
right to invent special methods for doing things with chil-
dren—methods that are unconnected with general cultural
life and have not evolved from it. The right thing is for