What do you know about Steiner schools?

[hunkermunker]

Anyone been to one? Sending their children to one? Know children who go?

plummymummy maybe you should try and put it into words? I am really interested to know what is so bewildering.

awww poppet

I don't mean this in a patronising way at all but...it sounds like you are getting really really upset, and I am sorry about that.

I do have a great deal of knowlege about Steiner schools. I went to one (for a few years, not right through) as a child. I experienced eurhythmy, which I cannot for the life of me spell. More importantly, my mother is a teacher and an anthroposophist and although I went on to a highly academic grammer school () , I did have a lot of involement in Steinery education events. I have a lot of Steiner educated friends. I have read a lot of books about it.

I don't agree with you on several points, but I think actually I am coming from a different persepective to many posters. I find it too dogmatic and too restrictive of children. I feel they are trying to give kids a kind of 1920s Germanic childhood. I don't find it very respectful.

I am not one for covering up problems though, and I do find Steiner schools exceptionally guilty of this. Find the problem and solve it, is my philosophy, don't pretend it doesn't exist.

Bullying is a massive and huge problem (among teachers as well as kids, btw), and they urgently need to tackle this, they have no real mechanism for dealing with it.

The teacher clash thing can be a huge problem. If there is no clash, OTOH, it can work exceptionally well. It is not uncommon for parents to pull kids out of Steiner schools because of teacher-child clashes.

Some schools do ban tv/computers during the week. This is because they feel that the images will interfere with the brain taking in images from lessons (bear in mind Steiner lessons are very visual/musical/sensory).

They are JUST as prescriptive about what children should do and when. Just they have a different, perhaps more generous, timescale.

Gender sterotyping is, I feel, a massive problem. Steiner had extremely old fashioned views about race and gender (unsuprising since he was writing in the 1920s). The stuff on race has been toned down, though it is still there, the stuff on gender...well no, not really.

I am coming at this from a different persepctive, really. I am homeschooling my kids. I would not want send them to a Steiner school, but then I would avoid any school really, til they're at least 7 or 8.

Having said ALL of that, if I had tto send them to school, it would probably be a Steiner school, but only because I know so much about them and feel confident about arguing with the teachers on their dogma.

I would urge anyone seriously considering Steiner education to EDUCATE themselves. Its not a fluffy alternative to the mainstream and, to be fair, they don't pretend it is. Its a hardcore system run by occultists. Which does not meant that they don't provide a good education. They are NOT trying to convert kids, not at all.

Check out OpenWaldorf and WaldorfHomeschoolers for more info (the latter has lots of info, you don't need to be HEing)

I can condense that gargantuan post

I have lots of experience of steiner schools and know a lot about the philosophy

I don't think Steiner schools are hugely better than state schools, except they teach knitting and crafts (a good thing). They are more similar than not.

I also don't think they are hugely worse

they have their own, quasi religious philosophy, and anyone interested should check that out, OpenWaldorf is an especially good starting point. Not just to be wary-out of respect for the school.

The End.

Now I will away, having taken up far too much of you good people's time.

Filly, thanks for your post, I'm not wound up anymore as I feel I have said my bit now. (was a bit nieve to the mn funpoking but I get it now)

I think perhaps I could take Steiner a whole lot more seriously than I do but choose not to as I don't feel it nessecary to delve deep into the history, I do read Steiner books, but to take it on I would need to spend years studying.

Like any school, if the parents feel it suits the child at the time then great imo.

I think your experience is very valid but completely different to my family's.

good on you for homeschooling I would love to but my kids wouldn't!

well thats the thing, if you're happy with it, and your kids are happy, great.

I was not really any happier than in a mainstream school, I think. The social side isn't much different. At the child's level
there's still bullying and bitchiness, largely invisable to adults, the Steiner system does little about that, certainly no more than a state school-and I would not expect it to, given its philosophy. Thats what I think is most important to kids, not what they actually learn. Having seen HE'd kids growing up-they'll learn the basics-reading, writing, maths, etc , unless you lock them in a cupboard.

but its still not a worse option, imo. state schools are bloody vile.

as are most private schools

(covers bases)

re the fees-you can get a lot of help with these. I was commuting from a council estate. There are no scholarships as such but they are meant to be open to all

I know somebody who went to aSteiner school andshe is the most peaceful person I know.

Hunker - What about Montessori schooling as an alternative? They have a very caring respectful approach to children and again focus very much on the seasons and natural materials etc but they are not so way out and hippified as steiner iyswim. www.montessori.org.uk

Hmm well, don't have time to read through the posts again but I suppose it's the whole ethos that I find bewildering. I mean in many ways, it sounds charming but why for example is the colour black forbidden? It sounds rather like a cult in some ways. I'm not being judgemental or negative about the schools, I suppose I just can't envisage how it fits in with the rest of life.

Found this on the colour black thing

'Typically, most younger Waldorf students aren't allowed to use the color black. This may have to do with Rudolf Steiner's view on the color black:

Now submerge yourself in black; you are completely surrounded by black--in this black darkness a physical being can do nothing. Life is driven out of the plant when it becomes carbon. Black shows itself alien to life, hostile to life; when plants are carbonized they turn black. Life, then can do nothing in blackness. And the soul? Our soul life deserts us when this awful blackness is within us.
Black represents the spiritual image of the lifeless'

The latter paragraph is, I think a direct quote of steiners.

Not exactly positive, is it?

I have no experience af Steiner schools, except that I live next door to one in Austria (birth place of the movement).

Considered their Kindergarten for ds until I realised we would fail the initial interview i.e. question about allowing ds to watch any TV .

Also I have to say I am v unimpressed by the behaviour of the pupils outside of the school (waiting for tram etc) and when I took ds to an Advent Fayre.

Other than that I am totally unqualified to comment....but ds is not going there .

Does that extend to Black children or children who have black in them? Only ds is mixed race.

plummymummy why concentrate on the black paint?-I have never come across this personally.

I am quite bewildered now. Feel free to judge all you want, the op was asking for your opinion/judgement so that is fine but to make such a judgement 'without reading all of the posts' and then commenting so negitively is rather irrisponsible to those who might read your post, be considering Steiner education and take it to be an expeirential opinion.

Of course it fits in with normal life otherwise the school would never survive or grow.

If you read the Waldorf websites you will find information on how the ethos works with families who's children school there in the present day. You really don't have to agree with it at all but it would be sensible to have a bit more of an idea before you claim it to be like a cult.

go on, don't be bewildered - enlighten yourself! It makes fascinating reading.

a quote 'I think' -not really very helpfully and evidently taken completly out of context.

Steiners teachings make bloody hard reading. pluck one thing out, put it into another context and -bam you have a racist comment. therefore completly devalueing anything writen before or after.

Shall I have a go with some education mp who is telling us that this one national curriculum is going to benefit every child in the country? I'm sure it could be pulled apart to create a bit of scaremongery.

It just seems a rather odd stance to take on a natural colour. I found the quote on a steiner site btw.

Re the carbon stuff, carbon dioxide, granded not simply elimental carbon is essential to all life on earth, since without it, no photosynthesis could happen.

I'm sure there are some fine steiner schools and teachers, but the attitude to a colour seem, to me, very odd.

I would be facinated to read a fuller explanation of this view.

and I never said I though his comments were racist, I simply said I didn't think they were positive.

I think you're a bit oversensitive thankyoupoppet. I did say I didn't have time to read all the posts, which is kind of the same as saying I may not be expertly informed. However, this is a discussion board and I'm entitled to say what I want to. The overall vibe I had was one of bewilderment - however that is qualified it doesn't change the sentiment does it?! I don't think my post was negative. I made no claims - but don't want to get into nitpicking. Also, I doubt I am so influential that I can negatively influence others coming onto the thread. Anyone seriously considering the school for their kids would read the whole thread. I'm not irresponsible because it's not my responsibility what others opine about Steiner schools.

yes mb me too, but blimey what a lot of fuss about this colour black thing. It is something that I, my dh his 3 sisters, or anyone else I know simply isn't or hasn't been faced with day to day at school. It must have meant something to Rudolf Steiner for him to have writen it but if you have any idea how much he wrote on philosophy and education you would probably find all sorts off other profound ideas. So many of which simply do not affect the children that are taught at the schools today.
I've said before that to really understand the methods behind the madness you have to study for years but all that really concerns us parents is -does the madness work for us.

Visit the school, it is nothing like the weird and wacky place that you think of it, imo it is such a normal and welcoming place, more reflective of real life and the natural world around us than anyothe school I know.

you were so nitpicking

I'm not oversensitive either, I do have time for a good discussion, and to read all posts properly, clearly the subject interests me.

But to jump in and imply or suggest that it might be some kind of racist cult deserves attention imo.

Steiner's views on race are dodgy IMO and anthroposophists are very keen to pigeonhole people by cultue (eg the Germans are like this...the French are like this) in a way which really makes me wince-gross sterotyping.

They are massively, massively unaware a lot of the time rather than actually actively racist, but IMO negligent racism is not much better than actual racism. Not many black anthroposophist or teachers IME-have spent a summer at various steinery camps-not one black person there, not one.

The reason, however, why kids aren't encouraged to use black (and they aren't, IME) is more to do with the type of painting they do. They do a lot of "wet on wet" which is basically layered watercolours. You can't use black for that. Not sure why black crayons aren't used, think it has to do with Goethe (big man in Steiner circles)

Crikey. I had no idea what I was starting!

Nogoes, Montessori is also an option, esp for DS1 as there are several "outstanding" ones near us (as said by Ofsted - although they all have the waiting lists to match!

Steiner looks less like an option for me now though - I don't think I'd do too well as a parent of a Steiner child

from what I have read on a pro steiner ed website, Steiner himself felt that the colour black was negative. I think that you are right this comes from his interest in Goethe

'the spititual image of lifelessness'

tehy wound like wanky shools

My art teacher used to say black doesn't exist in nature, only very dark green/blue/brown etc. We weren't allowed to use it at times! (And this wasn't Steiner).

It annoyed me, but it wasn't a big deal. I must admit I rarely use black when I paint now.