X. Physics, Chemistry, Handwork, Language, Religion

So far as the mother-tongue is concerned, of course, the teaching is adapted to the age of the child; it is given in the form I have already described in connection with other lessons. An outstanding feature of the Waldorf School, however, is that we begin to teach the child two foreign languages, French and English, directly he comes to school, at the age of six or seven. By this means we endeavour to give our children something that will be more and more necessary in the future for the purposes of practical life. To understand the purely human aspect of the teaching of languages we must remember that the faculty of speech is rooted in the very depths of man's being. The mother-tongue is so deeply rooted in the breathing system, the blood circulation, and in the configuration of the vascular system, that the child is affected not only in spirit and soul, but in spirit, soul and body by the way in which this mother-tongue comes to expression within him. We must realize however that the forces of languages in the world permeate man and bring the human element to expression in quite different ways. In the case of primitive languages this is quite obvious; that it is also true of the more civilized languages often escapes recognition.