29 Facts About Waldorf Education

Many Waldorf Education schools have faced controversy due to Steiner's connections to racist ideology and magical thinking.

Waldorf Education schools have been linked to the outbreak of infectious diseases due to the vaccine hesitancy of many Waldorf Education parents.

Structure of Waldorf education follows a theory of childhood development devised by Rudolf Steiner, utilizing distinct learning strategies for each of three developmental stages or "epochs": early childhood, elementary, and secondary education.

Waldorf Education pedagogues consider that readiness for learning to read depends upon increased independence of character, temperament, habits, and memory, one of the markers of which is the loss of the baby teeth.

When students in a Waldorf Education school are grouped, it is generally not by a focus on academic abilities.

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The Waldorf Education approach is said to cultivate students with "high motivation" but "average achievement" in the sciences.

Contradictory notions found in Waldorf Education textbooks are distinct from factual inaccuracies occasionally found in modern public school textbooks, as the inaccuracies in the latter are of a specific and minute nature that results from the progress of science.

The inaccuracies present in Waldorf Education textbooks are the result of a mode of thinking that has no valid basis in reason or logic.

Waldorf Education schools have been popular with some parents working in the technology sector in the United States, including those from some of the most advanced technology firms.

Waldorf Education schools were historically "Christian based and theistically oriented", as they expand into different cultural settings they are adapting to "a truly pluralistic spirituality".

Waldorf teacher education programs offer courses in child development, the methodology of Waldorf teaching, academic subjects appropriate to the future teachers' chosen specialty, and the study of pedagogical texts and other works by Steiner.

Waldorf Education-inspired home schools typically obtain their program information through informal parent groups, online, or by purchasing a curriculum.

The first Waldorf Education-inspired high school was launched in 2008 with assistance from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Studies of standardized test scores suggest that students at Waldorf Education-inspired schools tend to score below their peers in the earliest grades and catch up or surpass their peers by middle school.

One study found that students at Waldorf Education-inspired schools watch less television and spend more time engaging in creative activities or spending time with friends.

Legal challenge alleging that California school districts' Waldorf Education-inspired schools violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution and Article IX of the California Constitution was dismissed on its merits in 2005 and on appeal in 2007 and 2012.

In December 2018, The Office for Standards in Waldorf Education judged the Steiner Academy Exeter as inadequate and ordered it to be transferred to a multi-academy trust; it was temporarily closed in October 2018 because of concerns, including significant lapses in safeguarding of students' wellbeing, mistreatment of children with special educational needs and disabilities, and misspending of funds.

In November 2012, BBC News broadcast a segment about accusations that the establishment of a state-funded Waldorf Education School in Frome was a misguided use of public money.

Anthroposophy, upon which Waldorf education is founded, stands firmly against all forms of racism and nationalism.

The Association of Russian Waldorf Education Schools was founded in 1995 and now has 21 members.

Studies suggest that this is successful; Waldorf Education pupils have been found to be more interested in and engaged with social and moral questions and to have more positive attitudes than students from mainstream schools, demonstrating activism and self-confidence and feeling empowered to forge their own futures.

Waldorf Education schools build close learning communities, founded on the shared values of its members, in ways that can lead to transformative learning experiences that allow all participants, including parents, to become more aware of their own individual path, but which at times risk becoming exclusive.

Waldorf Education schools have linked polarized communities in a variety of settings.

The Friends of Waldorf Education is an organization whose purpose is to support, finance and advise the Waldorf movement worldwide, particularly in disadvantaged settings.

Some observers have noted that Waldorf Education educators tend to be more concerned to address the needs of weaker students who need support than they are to meet the needs of talented students who could benefit from advanced work.

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Thomas Nielsen, assistant professor at the University of Canberra's education department, said that imaginative teaching approaches used in Waldorf education are effective stimulators of spiritual-aesthetic, intellectual and physical development, expanding "the concept of holistic and imaginative education" and recommends these to mainstream educators.

Andreas Schleicher, international coordinator of the PISA studies, commented on what he saw as the "high degree of congruence between what the world demands of people, and what Waldorf Education schools develop in their pupils", placing a high value on creatively and productively applying knowledge to new realms.

Professor of Education Elliot Eisner sees Waldorf education exemplifying embodied learning and fostering a more balanced educational approach than American public schools achieve.

Many elements of Waldorf Education pedagogy have been used in all Finnish schools for many years.