Library Lady's Corner
Waldorf Learning Support: Books from Audrey McAllen, Joep Eikenboom NOW AVAILABLE! October 22 2024
For decades through the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, in England, Audrey McAllen studied the indications given by Rudolf Steiner about child development, sleep, breathing, children’s drawings, and the circulation of the blood, the system of our nerves, temperaments, and much more. She worked these into specific exercises and specific class exercises to give strength to the therapeutic work made possible by a Waldorf class and classroom.Ingun Schneider worked with Audrey McAllen for fifteen year to merge her own in depth experiences in the classroom with the knowledge of Audrey McAllen. Ingun has founded Waldorf Learning Support (WLS) to help teachers comprehend the power of accomplishing exercises with a whole class that helps all children to master specific capacities to aid in a more complete incarnation and a harmonious blending of therapeutic activities into a whole class experience.
The tendency in the contemporary culture is to isolate children who are struggling with ordinary learning in a classroom setting. While exercises of support for individuals such as these children is also a possibility, work with a whole class to utilize the social intentions of the ideals behind the building of a class community and the cultivation of care, one for another, possible in that class community. What is excellent support for a struggling child become good for the whole class of children.
Waldorf is very excited to be selected by WLS to publish and distribute the books that form the body of the Extra Lesson work, developed over the last fifty years. With help from Steiner Books, Waldorf Publications now can off these books for supporting teachers in remedial care as Waldorf Learning Support develops an all new edition of The Extra Lesson:
This Extra Lesson book is the original edition by Audrey McAllen and will be replaced soon with a new, expanded edition including Ingun Schneider’s edits and additions out of the long-time work done developing ideas. This edition is the last of the original stock remaining.
These books offer a treasure trove of ideas for balancing and supporting difficulties in learning children have. Thoughtful, experientially-based practices are all through these valuable manuscripts with explanations about why as well as how. Ingun is working to revise the books to include her own research and exercises based on her work with Audrey McAllen.
Book Review: Award Winning "Helping Children on Their Way" August 16 2017
Waldorf Publications is proud to be recognized by Mom’s Choice Awards with Helping Children on Their WayElizabeth Auer has assembled a remarkable group of educators to write about many aspects of supporting children in their different and varied “stuck places” along the road to a balanced development for life.
“What’s the Big Deal about Teeth in Waldorf Schools?” June 13 2016
First Grade Readiness and the Waldorf School Plan
A parent of a kindergartner asked a teacher this question one day, “What’s the big deal about teeth in a Waldorf school?” It’s a good question as Waldorf teachers take seriously the changing of teeth, from milk teeth, or “baby teeth,” to the new growth of adult or second teeth.
Deciding whether or not to declare a child ready to move from kindergarten to first grade is a weighty decision to make.
The Waldorf School and the End of Year Report May 27 2016
Assessment is a “hot topic” in the news and in educational debate. In Waldorf schools assessment takes many forms, none of which includes standardized testing.
During the year, concentrated “blocks” of study might include an end-of-block assessment. A block might be three or four weeks long and concentrate study on one topic. After a botany block in the fifth grade an outdoor “treasure” hunt to find, for example, a monocotyledon, a pistil, a tap root, a deciduous conifer branch, a dicotyledon, and so on, might be the "test.” Read More...
Three Timelines in the Education of a Youngster: Three Opportunities for Misunderstanding April 28 2016
Let us think peace and use the understanding of dissimilar timelines to weave collaboration and solutions instead of additional strife in an unsettled and unsettling world. Our children will thrive if we do.Book Review: Solving the Riddle of the Child: the Art of the Child Study by Christof Wiechert January 25 2016
The very essence of Waldorf education lives in the Child Study. Observing the children is primary task of every Waldorf teacher. The entire curriculum should be formed out of this child observation practice and new organs of perception are developed from this practice. This is why Rudolf Steiner was so insistent about administration being done by those who are with the children every day, not by others who have nothing directly to do with teaching the children. The real revolution lives in this open secret of Waldorf education: that the observation of children is the heart of the curriculum… Read More...The End of Year Report in Waldorf Schools May 30 2015
Assessment is a “hot topic” in the news and in educational debate. In Waldorf schools assessment takes many forms, none of which includes standardized testing.
During the year, concentrated “blocks” of study might include an end-of-block assessment. A block might be three or four weeks long and concentrate study on one topic. After a botany block in the fifth grade an outdoor “treasure” hunt to find, for example, a monocotyledon, a pistil, a tap root, a deciduous conifer branch, a dicotyledon, and so on, might be the "test.” After a block on physiology in grade seven, an essay entitled, “The Diary of a Sandwich,” might be the means of assessment..... READ MORE