Conferences with the Waldorf Teachers, Volume II

Faculty must address loss of contact with upper-grade students whose behavioral crises—lying, theft, drunkenness, and attempted hypnosis—threaten the school's public reputation and the anthroposophical movement itself. The core problem lies not in individual misconduct but in teachers' failure to maintain living engagement with adolescents, allowing them to slip from faculty authority; expulsion becomes necessary, yet only if coupled with renewed pedagogical will to animate instruction and restore the proper hierarchical relationship between teachers and students.

The faculty must justify expelling three disruptive eleventh-grade students while acknowledging the class's reluctance and the school's pedagogical responsibility to maintain discipline through proper authority rather than peer negotiation. The discussion reveals tensions between compassion for troubled students and the necessity of protecting classroom instruction, ultimately settling on expulsion based on the students' behavior toward faculty and the class's inability to continue working together.

The faculty's loss of contact with students—rooted in indifference, mechanical teaching methods, and the "Stuttgart attitude" of closed ears and eyes—has created a crisis of trust and pedagogical vitality that threatens the Waldorf School's foundational principles. Steiner emphasizes that genuine renewal requires rekindling inner activity, enthusiasm, and authentic engagement with anthroposophical content rather than external reforms, while addressing the expulsion controversy through public clarification and renewed commitment to the movement's true aims.

The class schedule requires radical reorganization to eliminate fragmentation and irrationality; Steiner proposes restructuring the school day with main lesson and languages in the morning (8:00–12:00), reserving afternoons for handwork, music, eurythmy, and electives, while implementing ability-based grouping in languages and limiting handwork hours to create a coherent pedagogical framework. Teachers must cultivate genuine inner participation and enthusiasm in students rather than relying on trivial Socratic questioning or mere lecturing, and the faculty must address the expulsion controversy publicly while rekindling the spiritual fire and individual responsibility that anthroposophical education demands.

The faculty grapples with practical scheduling challenges for language instruction while navigating competing pedagogical principles and examination requirements. Steiner emphasizes that sound pedagogy—particularly the continuity of main lesson followed by language work—must take precedence over bureaucratic convenience, and he advocates for maintaining ancient languages through the eighth grade alongside modern languages before allowing specialization. The meeting also addresses individual student health concerns through dietary and eurythmic interventions, safety protocols in laboratories, and the need for systematic rather than ad-hoc approaches to student welfare.

Faculty discussions address practical scheduling challenges—balancing morning language instruction with afternoon practical work, protecting Wednesday afternoons for faculty meetings, and redistributing excessive teaching loads among overburdened teachers. Pedagogical principles emerge regarding language instruction's compensatory effects (French and English working inversely on head and metabolism), the integration of religious instruction with sacramental practice, and warnings against sectarian tendencies in the religious renewal movement. Steiner emphasizes flexibility in teaching methods, the organic relationship between sense perception and human development, and cautions against ceremonial gestures that might create social divisions among students in temporary versus new buildings.

Practical concerns about the revised class schedule prompt discussion of parental feedback and student dissatisfaction, leading to proposals for parent surveys and schedule adjustments to address evening dismissal times. The faculty examines pedagogical methodology across subjects—from stenography and handwork to literature and languages—with emphasis on cultivating student enthusiasm through the Waldorf method rather than allowing electives or reverting to conventional schooling practices. Guidance on receiving English visitors stresses natural hospitality and demonstrating the distinctive character of Waldorf instruction through authentic engagement rather than artificial preparation, alongside detailed recommendations for teaching *Parzival* through its three spiritual stages and exploring connections to other literary works and cultural history.

Practical curricular and scheduling challenges—gymnastics instruction, eurythmy space allocation, and language coursework—are addressed alongside deeper concerns about faculty cohesion and the Anthroposophical Society's internal divisions since 1919. Steiner emphasizes that the Waldorf School faculty must exemplify harmonious cooperation and genuine anthroposophical activity, warning that clique formation and lack of mutual interest threaten both the school and the broader movement, particularly following recent crises at Dornach.

Classroom walls should display artistically rendered images aligned with developmental stages—fairy tales for grades 1-2, still life for grade 3, animals for grade 4, human groups for grade 5, individual portraits for grade 6, and masterworks by Raphael, Leonardo, Giotto, Holbein, Dürer, and Rembrandt for upper grades—countering modern intellectualism with artistic comprehension. Teachers should prepare using older texts alongside contemporary sources to avoid narrow systematization, and employ the Socratic method judiciously while developing tactful discernment about what children can genuinely answer. Faculty harmony requires rejecting cliques and first/second-class divisions; a six-member rotating administrative committee should handle external school representation with full faculty trust.

Aesthetic principles for school spaces require differentiation by function: music rooms should feature harmonious colors and sculpture rather than figurative paintings; eurythmy rooms need dynamic representations of the human soul; gymnasiums should depict humanity's relationship to the world; handwork rooms require interiors expressing feeling; and practical spaces like shops should display themes of craft and daily life. The faculty establishes an administrative committee of three rotating members (serving two-month terms) to handle internal school operations, faculty coordination, and external representation while the school administrator retains financial and custodial responsibilities. Discussion emphasizes the necessity of honest, serious deliberation in governance, warns against compromising Waldorf pedagogy through involvement in mundane political questions, and advocates instead for positive public presentation of the school's educational work and spiritual foundations.

Waldorf pedagogy itself possesses a therapeutic character, requiring teachers to recognize how the three human systems—nerve-sense, rhythmic, and metabolic-limb—manifest in children's behavior and learning capacities, and to apply specific dietary and material interventions (salt, sugar, lead, silver, phosphorus) alongside pedagogical methods to restore organic balance. Teaching must alternate between humor that draws children toward their body's periphery and serious, inward-moving content to maintain healthy rhythmic functioning, while teachers themselves must overcome personal heaviness and teach without preconceptions to transmit enlivening presence to students. Faculty relationships require genuine warmth and anthroposophical intentionality rather than coldness or indifference, and language instruction demands living engagement with grammar's spiritual essence rather than superficial terminology that deadens children's natural interest in expression.

The French language represents a decadent, surface-oriented force that hollows the human soul through rigid formalism, yet the Waldorf School cannot unilaterally remove it from curriculum without compromising its accreditation obligations—genuine cultural transformation requires broader societal movements rather than isolated institutional action. Addressing widespread malnutrition among students demands strategic use of calcium carbonate and calcium phosphate as dietary supplements to enliven the centrifugal and centripetal forces governing the organism's vital functions.

Gymnastics and eurythmy represent distinct but complementary physiological processes—gymnastics works through blood-to-muscle dynamics and develops will through spatial awareness and gravity, while eurythmy sculpts the organism through breath and inner feeling. The gymnastics teacher must cultivate an ideal human form through statics and dynamics, emphasizing proper posture and the child's instinctive perception of weight and movement, while equipment exercises gain vitality through whole-body engagement rather than routine repetition. Practical pedagogical concerns—nutrition for fatigued students, meaningful play during breaks that engages thought and feeling, and the integration of art into group activities—require conscious attention to prevent gymnastics from becoming merely mechanical or softening to the will.

Faculty discussions address practical scheduling challenges for the coming year, including teacher assignments and subject distribution across grades. Key pedagogical concerns emerge: excessive lecturing in upper grades undermines student retention and examination readiness, requiring greater student participation; questions about student attendance at anthroposophical lectures and religious instruction reveal tensions between school autonomy and parental choice. Individual student cases are reviewed with emphasis on patience, remedial support, and understanding each child's developmental needs.

Faculty members address practical challenges of staffing upper grades, opening ceremonies, and curriculum implementation while grappling with insufficient teaching resources and inadequate facilities. Key discussions include designing a warm reception for returning students through class teacher greetings and music, reassigning teachers to cover eighth through tenth grade subjects, and establishing separate religious instruction by grade level. Steiner emphasizes the need for greater liveliness in instruction, warns against overly abstract teaching, and advocates for building genuine relationships with students through attentiveness and occasional informal moments.

Curricular planning for the ninth and tenth grades addresses staffing needs, German literature instruction emphasizing meter and medieval texts, comprehensive tenth-grade history from earliest Indian civilization through classical Greece, and integrated science teaching that connects chemistry to physiological processes through observable phenomena like bee physiology. The discussion establishes pedagogical principles across mathematics, physics, natural history, and modern languages while emphasizing artistic development, practical skills in drafting and surveying, and the cultivation of aesthetic feeling rather than technical mastery alone.

Faculty assignments are reorganized for the new school year, with Dr. Schubert moving to remedial instruction and Dr. Kolisko taking upper-grade history. Steiner emphasizes pedagogical principles across subjects—homework should emerge from children's genuine interest rather than external demand, aesthetics instruction requires concrete examples from art history and practice in recitation versus declamation, and mathematics teaching should culminate in wonder at the correspondence between reality and equations. The discussion highlights the importance of faculty members engaging deeply with colleagues' original work, as this collective inner engagement spiritually sustains the school community.

Pedagogical wisdom addresses difficult cases—troubled children require remedial support rather than exclusion, behavioral issues demand tactful indirectness rather than prohibition, and concentrated instruction proves essential for crafts and main lessons. Faculty coordination, thoughtful curriculum balance, and the challenges of establishing esoteric community practices within the school emerge as central concerns requiring careful discernment and unified will.

Administrative dealings with school inspectors require brevity and factual reporting without pedagogical elaboration, while curricular decisions—from remedial placement to literature selection—demand artistic integration and individual student consideration. The faculty must balance institutional pressures with the Waldorf School's distinctive educational mission, particularly in cultivating youth engagement and grounding practical subjects like gymnastics in anthroposophical understanding of human development.

Official school inspection reveals fundamental misunderstandings of Waldorf pedagogy, prompting urgent discussion of how to defend the school's methods publicly through strategic publications on reading age, grammar instruction, and questioning techniques. The faculty must work cohesively to publicize anthroposophical educational principles while addressing individual student cases and strengthening the movement's cultural credibility against external criticism.

Faculty discussions address practical school administration, curriculum depth, and literary pedagogy. The meeting emphasizes teaching subjects thoroughly rather than superficially, critiques modern pedagogical trends like Cizek's method, and provides detailed guidance on age-appropriate literature—particularly Shakespeare's unique capacity to remain alive in the astral plane compared to other dramatists. Steiner stresses that effective teaching requires careful preparation, vivid imagery, and concentration on genuine understanding rather than mere factual accumulation.

Art education should emphasize comprehension of art itself rather than intellectual abstraction, while religious teaching must cultivate genuine religious attitude distinct from doctrinal instruction. Practical curricular matters—including piano pedagogy adapted to temperament types, correction of left-handedness, and financial constraints on expanding kindergarten and language instruction—require careful balance between pedagogical ideals and institutional resources.

The eleventh grade requires fundamental pedagogical restructuring due to students' lack of inner connection to instruction and absence of genuine engagement with learning material. Faculty must address this through careful curriculum reorganization, teacher reassignment based on subject expertise and enthusiasm, and pedagogical methods emphasizing dialogue and questioning rather than lecturing, while maintaining the Waldorf School's reputation as a model anthroposophical institution amid external scrutiny.

Literary history for eleventh grade should bridge medieval epics (*Parzival*, *Armer Heinrich*) with historical context, developing aesthetic judgment through comparative study of literary, musical, and sculptural styles. Physics instruction benefits from presenting modern discoveries (wireless telegraphy, x-rays) historically, while chemistry must develop foundational concepts (acid, salt, base) through process-oriented teaching that reveals matter as "petrified process." Natural history requires cosmological treatment of cell theory and plant morphology, with all subjects interconnected toward understanding the human being, while foreign language instruction demands genuine dialogue and individual student speech rather than chorus recitation, supported by selective homework and the cultivation of humor as essential pedagogical breathing space.

Religious instruction must cultivate prayerful attitudes and divine experience in children from the lowest grades, while the school must maintain genuine respect for different religious confessions without creating internal divisions or making children feel unwelcome based on their faith. Teachers should embrace pictorial, living learning—avoiding deadening maps and pedantic grammar—and cultivate openness to the wider world rather than defensive insularity, welcoming new people and collaborating naturally with other anthroposophical initiatives without bureaucratic rigidity.