Seventh graders have a rich emotional life which may leave them feeling inwardly chaotic. They are excited one moment, despairing the next; they are confident then miserably insecure; socially they swing from being best friends to sworn enemies. How to find balance? Can teachers ‘teach’ students to find their way to equanimity?
For those of you who don’t know, in a Waldorf school academic subjects are taught in three or four week blocks, for two hours every morning. The subjects are sometimes revisited in the same year and are always built on in the grades that follow. The language arts curriculum in Waldorf education is one of the most dramatically different to other models. We begin in first grade with a pictorial, kinesthetic experience of each letter. The letters are presented as sounds and images that develop into symbols, and then into words that have meaning. This process mirrors our own history of how language and writing developed.
Grammar is introduced in later grades, once syntax and usage is in the bones of the students: they learn the ‘why’ of what they already know, just as we learn to speak. The process of learning to read is like watching seeds in a garden sprouting. A child’s consciousness is changed forever once reading takes place and the joy that corresponds with that ability hopefully is a highlight of childhood.
In seventh grade, the emotional turmoil that the students are experiencing is ideal for a language arts main lesson. This is because by using writing as a means to observe, express, describe, study, and think logically, we’re guiding students towards inner balance. This particular block does this using three specific soul qualities or moods: Wonder, Wish, and Surprise.
I’ll post on each of these three qualities over the course of the three weeks that I’m teaching (starting right after Thanksgiving) and I’d love to hear your thoughts.