Milestones in Waldorf Curriculum Support Ongoing Self-Development

At its core, Waldorf education is a social, human-based education. As humans we are always in a process of self-discovery. Through that self-discovery we can become less fettered by the complexities, isolations, and even addictions of our modern lives, and if we have had the opportunity to meet and overcome challenges, we better strengthen the capacities to freely direct our own self-development. We can become more free in our humanness. Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Waldorf education, shared as our educational mission, "Our highest endeavor must be to develop free human beings, who are able of themselves to impart purpose and direction to their lives."

So how do we strive to bring this highest endeavor to our students? There are several significant milestones in the journey through the grades to support the discovery of the World and Self.

Grade 3: Distinguishing the Self from the World

In the third grade, the children are at a developmental stage in which they can begin to fully understand the concept and feeling of I (ego) and its separation from the world (and family). In order to discover the "real world" we must feel and understand that the self is separate from it. At High Mowing, we meet this emerging self-awareness with activities that give the child the confidence and self-assuredness that they can successfully live in and care for a world separate from themselves.

Every Monday the third grade students begin their week with a Practical Arts Workshop. As this year begins they have been harvesting barley that they planted last spring. They first thresh and winnow the grain, and then they will grind and process the grain into flour to be made into bread. That bread will be baked in the cob oven, which was built by previous High Mowing students and is being repaired by our current third graders. All of this work develops a direct hands-on experience of self-sufficiency that deeply instills the understanding that I stand on this earth, can care for that earth, and in doing so care for others and myself.

Grade 7: Searching for Identity

Another milestone of self-discovery comes in the seventh grade’s first block of the year. The seventh grade begins this year with a study of the Renaissance and Exploration of the Silk Road. Seventh grade students developmentally experience an inner search of self and identity. As the students are discovering their inner identities they also wish to reach outward with an expanding world view.

We help the students meet this exploration with the stories and biographies of the great and impressive explorations of the world. The students write essays from the perspective of those world travelers, imagining the experience first hand. From a student’s essay about the Silk Road:

"I panted as I climbed the sand dune. This was the first day of my 37 day journey from Dunhaung to Kashgar. I had brought a camel, enough food to last me three months (if I rationed it), enough water for ten, and a change of clothes. I had also brought silk to trade…I had left my family’s house on the edge of Dunhuang at dawn. It was probably mid-afternoon and I was getting hungry. I could see palm trees in the distance and could tell we were getting close because the air didn’t feel as dry and I could hear the leaves rusting in the breeze."

Imagining the trials of meeting the world helps to support the emerging adolescent’s understanding of their place in it.

Grade 12: Becoming a Co-Creator In the World

Finally, in the twelfth grade our seniors are met with the leading question of Who? Who am I in this world? Who will I become?

During this year our oldest students will engage in the Capstone Study. At the culmination of the High Mowing educational journey, the students will bring their own curiosity and enthusiasm to an emerging passion. Through the Capstone presentation they become the master and teacher of this individually crafted project for the entire High Mowing community. They become a co-creator in the world, all the while developing a sense of self and understanding of their unique place within the world.

Through these touch points (and many more) our students begin to experience and understand the world in which they discover their developing selves. Through this exploration and discovery they are provided the opportunity to become more firmly grounded in this world and thus more free to impart purpose and direction to their lives.