Would you like to become a sponsor?

Waldorf News

21 Things To Do In the Morning Before Checking Your Phone

March 21, 2023

71% of people check their phone within 10 minutes of waking up. This is problematic for a number of reasons: More Stress: Checking your phone releases adrenaline, which increases heart rate, pulse, and muscle tension. Rather than a relaxing way to start your day, checking your phone increases stress. Less Intentionality: Checking your phone is the equivalent to giving someone (or something) control over your mind. Whether reading email, scrolling social media, or playing a game, turning on the phone is equivalent to giving permission to someone or something to control your attention. Less Productivity: It is true that our phones and technology, when used correctly, can make us productive, efficient, and impactful. This blog is a testament to the fact. But it is also true, when used incorrectly, our phones can also become a distraction from our most productive selves. And that sets a dangerous precedent for our day. More »

How the Lyre Came Down from Heaven Just in Time

March 14, 2023

Ninety years ago, experimenting with music had its hey-day in Germany. What in 1926 had built up to an ever greater tone density, amplification, and also acoustical electronics getting ever louder, was like sounds from the underworld that had been bidden to the table of seriously minded attempts of advancement in music. Yet far away from this booming world, the unassuming, humble lyre tone – as though sent by a merciful heaven, and that at Michaelmas time – was making its voice heard for the first time. The lyre was created in one night. And like out of the night, when the sound ether is allowed to work in silence, this unheard of instrument has the unique bonus of being brought forth out of stillness, out of night. It was clad with wood connected to the planet Mercury, from the elm tree, (I assume it was the red elm. –CAL) making the top and bottom soundboard, and the cherry wood connected to the Moon served for making the framing. Both pieces were left over bits from wood used for mighty pillars. Mercury relates to movement, the moon to constant change. Is this not reminding one of music therapy? More »

Staying Centered in the Whirlwind of Today’s Adolescents

March 6, 2023

Adolescence is and always has been an extraordinarily complicated period of life. Even in the simplest of times, working with adolescents to help them find themselves and the meaning they so desperately seek is deeply challenging. And these are anything but the simplest of times. Though we may desire to move on from the endless ruins of the recent past, we cannot outrun the physical and psychic wounds and obstacles we have all experienced together and have not yet fully processed. While we in the Waldorf world strive for the equanimity to keep these forces of chaos and dissolution at bay, we know we must meet the needs of adolescents––our vulnerable canaries in the coal mine––in new ways. We cannot simply move on from the recent past. We must come to understand how it has changed us, adolescents, and the classrooms and communities where we serve the future. The world is not the same as it was, and we cannot continue educating our students as if nothing has changed.  More »

My Time at Melbourne Rudolf Steiner Teacher Training

January 9, 2023

Like many people I knew who had succeeded in high grades through school, I felt a disconnect between my school foundations, and the kind of skills and understandings that would enable me to thrive in life outside of the school system. I felt like a “big head” walking around in the world, disconnected from my deeper self, disconnected from tradition, nature, history, and culture. My education had excelled at teaching me to deconstruct the world, to analyse and dissect ideas, and to see things from multiple points of view. Where it left me hanging by late university, was in my real sense of feeling lost. This existential dilemma of feeling displaced from myself, from nature, and from a cohesive ideal to orient my life by, made me question the education I had received through the Victorian State System. I questioned the purpose of education and felt that the role of school was to prepare children for life beyond school, not just to teach them to be good at school. At this time of exploring the possibility of becoming a teacher, I came across the teacher training at Melbourne Rudolf Steiner Seminar. I was exploring alternative models of teaching; seeking to find more holistic practices, and a model that catered to the whole human being growing up integrated, connected, and in a state of flow with the world. More »

The Keys to Literacy Capacities: Online, On-Demand Courses that Unify Best Practices and Steiner’s Indications

December 14, 2022

Waldorf teachers know that they are supposed to educate the soul capacities (i.e., thinking, feeling, and willing). What is less well known is this: Steiner also told teachers to train three capacities that pertain to literacy. The literacy capacities Steiner identified are as follows:  1) Clear Listening; 2) Precise Seeing; and 3) Mental Picturing.  More »

Recent Jobs

View more jobs »

Newsletter Archive

See all newsletters »

Join the Mailing List!

Stay Connected…
Each week receive the Waldorf News Weekly Update, full of news, events, and more. Keep abreast of what's happening with Waldorf education.

Add a Job Listing

Post a job opening Seeking a position?