Q. What kind of education do Waldorf schools provide for very young children?
A. Extensive research has shown the value of early childhood programs such as Head Start that give children elementary preparation in math, reading, and other subjects. Such teaching is usually spurned at Waldorf schools, however. Waldorf schools often have nursery and kindergarten classes, and many Waldorf schools offer programs for still younger children. But virtually all Waldorf programs for children younger than age seven center on play, painting, music, and the like, while avoiding academic subjects. Many parents approve of the comforting, pleasant atmosphere of these Waldorf programs, but the result can be that children are deprived of educational advantages they will need later.
Parents should understand that the reason for Waldorf's "slow learning" approach is — as with almost everything else at Waldorf — mystical. In Waldorf belief, young children live in a dreamy consciousness that retains connections to the spirit realm where the children lived before reincarnating on Earth. To maintain these connections, Waldorf teachers try to retard the maturation of their young students.
“Childhood is commonly regarded as a time of steadily expanding consciousness ... Yet in Steiner’s view, the very opposite is the case: childhood is a time of contracting consciousness.... [The child] loses his dream-like perception of the...the world of creative archetypes and spiritual hierarchies [i.e., the ranks of gods] ... [This is] a dream-like yet intensely real awareness of spiritual worlds ... [I]n a Waldorf school, therefore, one of the tasks of the teachers is to keep the children young." — Waldorf educator A. C. Harwood, PORTRAIT OF A WALDORF SCHOOL (The Myrin Institute Inc., 1956), p. 24.
What happens at age seven to change things? According to Waldorf belief, the etheric body incarnates. See "Incarnation - What Is the Relevance at Waldorf?"
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