STEINER WALDORF SCHOOLS AND INSTITUTIONS

[theantignome]

hi everyone, i wanted to start a new thread with a NEW topic heading here, as the active one at the moment with over 700 posts looks like it is all about the Cambridge school. This may confuse newcomers.

Let's continue the debate here !
All newcomers welcome !

I will shortly link our two previous threads on MN for any one new to have a look at.

Davy, could you also give a link to your new yahoo list here please ? Thanks.

'earth who gives to us its food,
sun who makes it ripe and good,
sun above and earth below,
our loving thanks to you we give...'

Oh bugger, Eva's nicked the matches

I love this thread.
It's wild.

Who's Eva?

Eva is a 60 year old man who is very interested in anthroposophy, so much so that he pretends he is a woman called Eva and chases people around the internet who dare to question its very existence.

He also has numerous websites to try and dispel any concerns you may have with steiner/waldorf/anthroposophy

He will be on here soon as Eva/Sune/Bee or under another guise to lead you to the light.....

By the way just so everyone is clear
steiner, waldorf, anthroposophy is a CULT

Thats why Eva will be back, heshe doesn't want you to know this

Barking - I'm getting nasty shivers...
Lots of the mums did all this at home too and I felt freaky that I didn't.

Hi Janni someone sang the dusty gnome song to me a while ago and I absolutely freaked, I couldn't get the bloody song out of my head for days afterwards.

Yes dreamy and quiet was highly regarded. Though the women who ran the nursery were quite elderly, I think they strongly encouraged quite girls as it meant they could do quiet activities. The room was designed towards the feminine. the little handmade cooker, the reams of silk scarves etc.

When one mum asked if they could buy some wheeled items for the boys, the teachers replied they use to have them but they got broken. And that was that.

I used to know this family who went to Steiner school, they were WEIRD. And I mean stark raving.
They were all very quiet when you first met them, and my kids tried to play.
And they didn't know how to play properly.
Then sometimes they'd just completly lose it,really hit the wall, nd hurt themselves an d stuff, and their Mum used to just go on knitting or staring at the sun or something.
I was scared....

Hi PlumandOlive it all sounds very familiar, especially the carrying on knitting. Apparently saying no interrupts their karmic path and makes them a tad self-conscious.

Plumandolive wrote: "They were all very quiet when you first met them..."

Yes, a lot of us parents learned that, in order to fit in at the Waldorf school, it was best to behave as if we were on tranquilizers. That made it all the more disturbing when we occasionally saw or heard about teachers going into rages and yelling at children.

Plumandolive - glad that you are having some fun out of our trauma I was thinking tonight of the absolute CRAP I put up with in the year before we took DS2 out of Steiner. I think I'll post it tomorrow as therapy so I can let it go.

barking

Where is Eva anyway?

Janni, I think it would be very theraputic to post it all, we can give you comfort and support, and you can give us a huge laugh and sigh of relief that we're not there any more...

Power, the trouble was , I never did behave like that, I always spoke, even in those horrid, excrutuiating silences at parents evenings when people were contimplating the Norse myths, I always asked a question...

Is the going into rages and shouting common in all the schools then? I thought it was just ours?

OK, here goes.

-For the first two weeks of class one, the children (aged 6/7) went to school only until 10.30 a.m. We only found out this would be the case with a few days notice. So we got them up and out for school, then had to occupy them for the rest of the day again two hours after drop-off.

-Their teacher was utterly hopeless at controlling them. They would be up on their desks, under their desks, pushing and shoving each other. Anywhere other than on their chairs.

-Parents and fellow teachers got this teacher to resign after one term. It transpired that the teacher had taken 'naughty' children into the toilet to shout at them and that certain children spent ages outside the classroom door.

-Six children left the class that year because their parents were so appalled.

-The children's school day lasted until 1 p.m.
One afternoon was added after Christmas, but when the teacher resigned it was taken away again and we were told this at 9 p.m. the day before the next scheduled long afternoon (when I say 'long' I mean a normal school day for every other school in the land).

• There was a serious, written allegation made by one set of parents against a child in the class, who was using explicit, sexual language to his desk partner IN THE CLASSROOM, in the front row in front of the teacher. The teacher did not pick up on it, the boy's mother intimidated the girl's mother and the girl left.

-The other teachers took it in turns to teach the class for one week each until a new teacher was found and that teacher would not commit to stay so the uncertainty continued.

-The original teacher had no idea about safety. At the end of the school morning the door would open and the children would run!

-There were no trips or even walks to the local park because the class was considered too difficult (20 children)

-One boy (who'd been there since he was 3) was excluded, then sent back to kindergarten, then not really allowed back to kindergarten, then allowed to restart the next class one, then kicked out at the end of the first week.

He's now doing really well at a local church school, despite being very messed up by what the Steiner School did to him and his mother.

-Endless phone calls and emergency meetings among parents, trying desperately to work out what to do. I taught my son to read and when we took him out at the end of the year, had to spend the summer holidays teaching him to write properly and do some maths.

-Despite it all, HE was distraught at being taken out. This had been his school since he was 3 and he was really attached to it! He was furious with us, it was very distressing.

Things have worked out great for him, he's doing well and now sees what a 'proper school' is like. He appreciates the fact that he is learning, that there is a headteacher so it's organised and that the kids don't push each other and hurt each other.

THANK GOD WE GOT HIM OUT!

Oh Janni - we were all doing our best with the information we were given when we got involved in steiner schools.

So sad to hear your story - how on earth do these people get away with it??? but good to hear your ds is happy and thriving

PlumandOlives post:

"They were all very quiet when you first met them, and my kids tried to play.
And they didn't know how to play properly.
Then sometimes they'd just completly lose it,really hit the wall, nd hurt themselves an d stuff, and their Mum used to just go on knitting or staring at the sun or something.
I was scared...."

sums it up beautifully

Janni - Love your term 'proper school' I shall use that from now on when new steiner parents ask which school we send our children to. Sounds much more life-affirming instead of 'state school'

Thanks, Barking. I've been careful not to identify the Steiner School in question - don't want to be stalked by vengeful anthros!

Yes, I know what you mean. They've gone quiet for now.
Evaaaa, come out, come out wherever you are.........!

Oh Janni, thanks for going through all that.
And well done for taking the leap to move.
We had a similar situation when taking the plunge, because the school, friends etc is part of your kid's history isn't it? Good or bad, the devil you know kind of thing, and however desperate it gets, it's still such a huge decision.

Everything you say is SO familiar, much of it could have been the school ours were at.
Lack of control, untrained teachers, ignoring things staring them blindly in the face.

Do you not feel a need to expose them? Why are we nervous of repercussions? Apart from cranks like Sune, what do you think the consequences would be?
My heart used to race soon after we left, if I met anyone; it was partly rage, upset a mixture of things.
But now i really know their full agenda, I feel empowered, able to stand up to them, because really, those of us who have read Steiner and found out the big plan , probably know more collectively than most of the staff, don't you think?

Northern - my older son (11) is still there until the end of this term so I don't want to do anything yet. Also, I feel really bad because I was one of the parents who was heavily involved in fundraising for the school, when I still believed in it and thought there was a hope of state funding. I thought state funding might iron out the poor practice, unaccountability and unprofessionalism. How naive! I also, I hate to admit it, had not researched Steiner himself and did not know any of the stuff that these MN threads have exposed.

I do also still have friends with children at the school. I'm gradually talking to them about all this stuff, but, as you say, for many people it's better the devil you know.

I might be able to see it all more clearly once my older son has left and decide then whether or not to take any action. It seems extraordinary to me that you say everything I say is familiar to you. I thought DS2s year was a particular, extraordinarily unlucky case. Some of the classes do seem to work well.

I'm also finding it hard to understand how much the teachers, some of whom I like, are involved in this anthroposohical master plan - or are they victims as much as we are? I'm still working it all out.

Janni, I keep forgetting how very much involved you still are.

I really can't say enough how much i sympathise with what you're going through at the moment, it brings it all back- we left last may finally, although we pulled daughter the previous Summer to go to secondary at the same time as other new starters, so the same as your ds. It does get easier! She fitted in really well, but needs still, much help with maths.

And I agree about the teachers too. Several i still see, meet locally, and it's frced cordiality now, wondering what I know. I can't get to grips with their anthro ness atall.
I know one of them is a serious anthro, I've discovered since, although I knew she leant that way; she is the kind of senior figure who everyone looks to and reveres. She gets a lookm of panic if she meets me!
But the others, some I think are still,very much "on the path" still, and haven't got a big idea.Some just say they take what they want, but talking with other people like Zooey and Diana, it really seems either you're in or you're out, or on the path....No half measures.
But they really believe they're doing a great thing for humanity, and themselves of course.
But yes, that is really curious.

And all the class room lack of control, etc, mirror of the school we were at- one or two boys seemed to spend most of the day standing outside, and often had to be dragged or carried with the help of other teachers.
Sometimes , they just ran away. it was in the middle of nowhere, in a camphill village, so unless they ran to the middle of nowhere they weren't in immediate danger of roads or things like the city.
And on one occasion there was an incredible situation of two male teachers chasing one boy around unable to catch him, with all the class laughing- totally farcical.
And the shouting, God- you could hear it a mile off.

OOh- this is on my threads I'm on, tho I'm not really on it.. and I've been quoted!

Wow!

I think it all sounds unhinged.

Schools are for kids,to learn, about the world they live in, how it works, skills, and how to relate to other people, not religious instutions where adults can practise their beliefs on unsuspecting innocents.

Janni,

Thanks for telling us, I hope it was cathartic.

The shocking thing is that I am thousands of miles away from you, but what you describe is VERY familiar to me from our personal Steiner experience and from many other testimonials I have heard online now. The overall chaos and incompetence in some of these classrooms is near indescribable, and the sort of bipolar atmosphere of swinging from gentle loving "We live in a bubble" spirituality to out-of-control screaming (kids and teachers), the teachers coming unhinged and leaving in the middle of the year, the seeming complete lack of familiarity with even safety and hygiene when dealing with small children!

The problem is that they have no use for academics, classroom management, how to deal with children, how to run an organization, how to relate to parents, or other daily realities. They float a little above the ground the rest of us walk on. Their spiritual philosophy is what they are all about and many of the teachers start out very idealistic and actually believing this crap is going to work in a classroom. They have no idea what dealing with children will be all about.

I do think, in response to questions you and Northern have been discussing, that a good proportion of at least the junior faculty are victims in a way as well. It's simple, this is the training they've had and they haven't had other training. (There are teachers in Steiner classrooms who HAVE had other training, and they tend to be much more effective, and to run safe and happy classrooms.) The newbies/Steiner-indoctrinated think anthroposophy is going to work, they think they're doing something noble for humanity, they think a spiritual vision is basically going to work in a school, it's not a bad notion till you see it in practice.

I know of many (and I do mean many - both from "real life" and from several years now of discussing this online) Steiner teachers who think the details of Steinerism are ridiculous, who scoff at the esoteric mumbo-jumbo and are just trying to get by in the classroom, ignoring Steiner where possible while still fitting into the system. It's older or more fervent anthroposophists who are generally running things, however, and they can make life very difficult for these teachers. They'll often be driven out, I think, to be replaced by fanatics. We used to call these grim fanatical anthroposophists in charge of everything the "Grand Dragons."

"Evaaaa, come out, come out wherever you are.........! "

Yes, "Eva." Weren't you busy tracking down the many unsourced quotes from famous people on your web site endorsing Steiner/Waldorf? We haven't heard back from you on this?