Failed our steiner toddler group

[Orangeflower7]

I was looking for a smaller more relaxed kind of toddler group for my ds (2.5). Got a bit fed up with the big busy groups lots of ride ons etc..so tried the steiner group. Just met one of the mums from it today who is 'sad it didn't work out for me' and am feeling a bit of a failure.

I'll explain a bit. It went on for ages and we all had to sit round the table and make a woolen spider which to be honest the children were to young to do- ds got frustrated and threw it away. It seemed that it was for the mums really, (craft) I found it stressful as I had to help make the activity so much whereas ds wanted to go play, and there was no choice of activity, all the mums were sat doing the craft activity so the children who were playing didn't have much input really.

The routine was like this (over 2 hrs) Craft-then (adults make snack which children couldn't eat just yet) -singing-then wash hands (line up) then-sit up and eat snack- then story.

I just found it too much direction and sitting down stuff for a 2 year old..although the (mostly little girls) other children seemed very obedient

It is a shame as it would have been a nice change...didn't find it very child centred though. Please tell me it's not just my ds is it, I do know a little about early years and the emphasis is a lot on play, (adult led and child initiated, choice and independence, how does that sit then with steiner?

So back to the big groups we go.

Since transubstantiation is being discussed isn't this more or less the Catholic take:

Everything has both Substance (what it is really made of) and Accidences.

The normal way of life is that Accidences change: my hair will grow grey, I may grow fatter or thinner, or get spotty if I eat too much chocolate. On the outside I am likely to end up pretty unrecognisable from the cute little baby I once was. But my Substance still remains the same: I am still Cory.

In the Mass what happens is the opposite: the Host still retains the Accidences of wine and bread, it looks like wine and bread, it tastes like wine and bread. But the Substance has changed and is now actually the body of Jesus Christ.

Sorry, digressed.

What I really wanted to ask is:

What is the view of Steiner schools/adherents regarding children with disabilities and Special Needs?

To me, the bonkersness of a faith wouldn't be too shocking: there is plenty in my own faith that is totally bonkers when seen from outside

But certain posters have hinted at an unpleasant way of regarding children with SN and that would be a complete no-no to me.

Could anyone with inside experience enlighten us on this one.

Cory, sadly I can't tell you Steiner's view of children with disabilities as the information will get reported by the movement and deleted.

What I can say is that Anthroposophy has its own brand of special needs education called Camphill.

Coleg Elidyr Camphill training prospectus includes the following modules:

The Temperaments
Karma and Reincarnation
Personal Development
Life between death and rebirth
The Zodiac
Life before Birth ? Our Journey through the Planets
The Twelve Senses
The Order of Birth
The Threefold Human Being
The Fourfold Human Being
Understanding the Human Being out of Anthroposophy:
The Seven Life Processes
An Introduction to Curative Education
An Introduction to Diagnostics

Coleg Elidyr Camphill training prospectus year 1

Coleg Elidyr Camphill training prospectus year 2

OTheHugeManatee, Dr Peter Staudenmaier is worth reading .

Alicia Hamberg (zooey) writes on her blog today about anthroposophical beliefs related to disease and vaccination. You can quite clearly see how a belief in the anthroposophical concept of karma could have a bearing on dcs with SN:

"Another anthroposophical aspect worth noting in this context is the belief in karma. As already noted, Anthroposophy holds that the spiritual core of the human being is immortal and goes through repeated lives on earth. Before we?re born, we choose which circumstances to incarnate into ? with the aim of furthering our spiritual progression. This means, we also choose our diseases because we ?need? them, for reasons which may be inconceivable to us during our earthly existence but which appear clearly to us during the time we spend in the spiritual realm after death and before rebirth. Consequently, we can place ourselves in a setting where we will be confronted with a disease we need to live through (or, in some cases, even die from), either because of something ? for instance, a personality flaw ? from a past life which needs to be rectified or as a preparation for lives to come."

Fascinating. I suppose it is not so different from what a lot of Hindus believe.

Wonder how it works with genetic disorders then? Does the soul waiting to be reincarnated look around for a family with the right setup of autosomal dominant genes then?

Cory - this poster had some horrific things to say about Steiner and special needs. If you search for all her posts you'll get a picture of what teachers are meant to believe.

Tizian-I think people here know that Wikepidia is just the ideas of the person that puts the page together for example my husband put his biography page together and put it on Wiki.It would be almost impossible for someone to change it.You can get different views for example on the Vietnamese war and some facts.
My hubby could have put things that were untrue re who he managed,record sales etc If he was a wife batterer he would have left that info off ,if loads of the artists he managed left his firm because he abused them he would have left that of too -see what I mean,Wiki can be about opinion not fact.
By the way my husband is none of the above things and is a lovely man who is Black and saw the white kids at Steiner would be in trouble when they left school because they were so out of touch with Black culture as there was none present in the curiculum.They even thought describing someone as black was an insult-our daughter had to teach them a lot !
Do you honestly think having a Black CEO or Black pupils and making sure those Black pupils are on as much publicity material as possible means that Anthroposophy isn't racist ? P-leeeaasee ...

I am personally aware of a Wiki page related to a summer Irish language camp that I went to as a teenager that reads like something issued by the Communist Party of the USSR, c. 1948. Lots of missing people, lots of gaps where there should be photos, a history that bears no resemblance to what I know of the first twenty years of the school's existence. It is not possible to change this particular page and mention the name of the man who founded the organisation. (People have tried). There is a party line and that is the only one Wikipedia will accept.

OMG- I was interested in the SEN thing and just had a quick glance at a nearby city steiner school- have a look at the 'new admissions policy' and sen policy thing, also note how in the main website they go on about not being selective and how fab their results are...but they ARE selective, look at the stuff they need before your child can start, reports, oh and a 'visit with an anthro doctor"

Also note the dearth of info actually on the site until you get into the small print. Hmm.

Sorry- the link-

www.bristolsteinerschool.org/policies.html

Also the bit on exclusions is fascinating- jumping over the walls and into the tunnels sounds fun! (maybe they might be trying to escape! (or get in, of course!)

Right, that's actually quite misleading. Scary to think I considered this for ds1 a few years ago! On the bit actually titled "what's different' it doesn't mention much about the background, just the results (hardly suprising considering the selection process). Then later, you find your child needs an appointment with an 'anthroposophical doctor' ! Scary! I wonder that that would involve. I can't help but think to put a child through all that procedure at the age of 4/5 is a bit much!

AnthroMed Library here -- knock yourself out. 'Life Processes: an Attempt to Understand a Child with Special Needs'.

Mathanxiety, just read the link, incredible. I doubt Amanda gave her consent to being treated with homeopathy:

'The anthroposophical medication she received was directed to help her ego to incarnate. PlumbumAurum D15 at lunch and Argentum D6 in the evening in blocks of 6 weeks. Other medication used during different times: Myrrh comp D20 to address her individuality. Cuprum Aceticum D4:/Zincum Valerianicum D4 to help her relax. Argentiet D6 to nourish the ether body. Ferri cinis per urticum D3 to address her obsessional nature. D30 in the morning'.

UK anthro training here click on 'new' then 'programme archive'.

Found this thread whilst googling Steiner and just joined mumsnet. Hope it's okay to resurrect this thread? Are zombie threads welcome?

My 4 year old is starting at a Steiner kindi next month. Over the past year, my hubs and I have done masses of research into the future of our children's education, we decided on Steiner for their early education (possibly up till 7 or 11 depending on how it works out in reality). We have visited several Steiner schools (including one in New Zealand) and all of them were open about the spiritual aspects of their schools, many commented that they had some anthroposophists, some buddhists, some atheists etc. We had an open dialogue about it. My hubs and I were up front about what our spiritual beliefs were (not anthroposophical) and they were up front about theirs. We've not been asked to send our daughter to an anthropo doctor and if we were, we'd decline.

My mum is a raving, bat shit new ager, incapable of any discernment whatsoever in terms of biology/medicine or "healing" and personally, having rigorously researched homeopathy, find it the most disgraceful, sham form of quackery around. I'd much rather people donated money to researching the placebo effect and the interplay of psychological belief and biology than throw their money away on sodding sugar pills.

Be that as it may, i find the spiritual undertone of Steiner less jarring than any form of Christianity or secularism, so Steiner feels right at this stage for our family.

I don't like the current National Curriculum and how early our children are graded and monitored now. I don't like how prescriptive state education has become in that respect and i am happy for my kids to spend the first few years of their education, learning through doing in a Steiner environment.

However, the Steiner school that our daughter is enrolled in, really isn't maniacal about their beliefs, if they were, i doubt i'd feel comfortable with my child being educated there. Actually, they might not have even accepted us. They don't out and out ban plastic toys or TV (although they discourage lots of TV which we do anyway) either so perhaps this particular school is more moderate in their beliefs and practices?

My ex is also a trained Steiner teacher and we've had many discussions about his training (which was at a very well known and long standing school in the London commuter belt). he didn't have anthroposophy rammed down his throat either (he's Jewish) and describes the staff at that school as being generally just lovely hippy types but with a couple of hardcore anthropo-fundies (including the eurythmy teacher obviously ).

I don't think we'd ever want our children to be at Steiner for their entire education because academic and intellectual learning is is also important and a fundamental part of our culture. My daughter has already started to learn to read and i will continue to encourage that. I'm hoping to have the best of both worlds essentially.

copperhedge You're probably better off starting a new thread simply because people will read the OP and then reply to her, rather than noticing your new post at the bottom :)

Hello everyone. I haven't frequented these forums for a while but I've been drawn to this thread because it contains a discussions about Steiner free schools in the UK - apart of course for the very interesting stuff unearthed from the francophone governments - highly enlightening :)

To get back to free schools and Steiner, my wife and I made a short series of films about this very subject which I thought you might be interested in:

www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1D4AB9CE90203F0F&feature=view_all

For some comments on what Steve Paris writes, see thebee.se/articles/NewZealand/

A steiner toddler group, if run properly, is a calm and nourishing experience for mum and toddler/baby.
Children who attend are usually calm and settled so can actually sit and focus. They aren't the type of children who are stuck in front of the tv to calm them down.
Go to a playgroup in the church hall with your sugar high toddler and watch a pile of out of control toddlers running round with plastic toys while the mums sit gossiping and drinking coffee.
But who am I to judge!

But who am I to judge!

I don't know...Mrs Steiner?

Zombie thread alert!

Zombie Thread...

Are you so calm and settled that you decided to resurrect a 4 year old thread?

I can't think of anything more yawnsome for a 2 year old than to sit and watch his mum make a fucking doll out of wool

Would you say you express the views of the average mother who sends their child to a Steiner group with that comment Autumn?

Does anyone else follow Sanctimommy on Facebook..? >cough

Oh I love sanctimommy! autumn you should check it out.

What's wrong with running?
What's wrong with TV?
What's wrong with toys?
What's wrong with coffee?
What's wrong with Gossip?

Also are autumn sunshine and bliss the name of your kids?

Why has this been revived?