Art and Music Throughout Waldorf Education
Most of us are familiar with the story of the Wizard of Oz and the characters of the scarecrow, the tinman, and the lion. Each represents a one-sided picture of the human being. They all want to travel to meet the wizard in order to acquire something they believe they are missing.
The scarecrow feels he is lacking in his thinking, so he wants a brain. His strength lies in his will, the determination to get off his garden pole and the tendency towards physical movement.
The tinman believes he lacks a heart or the ability to feel. He is able to think logically but devoid of emotion.
The lion seeks courage and the ability to act. This is the element of the will: the drive to act on our impulses, thoughts, and feelings. The lion is overwhelmed by emotion, to the extent that he can neither think nor act.
The scarecrow, tinman, and the lion want to feel more full, more well rounded, more balanced. Our goal, in Waldorf education, is to help our students become well-rounded, balanced, fully human beings!
We can see these three aspects - thinking, feeling, and willing - in ourselves and where our strengths and weaknesses may be. For example, perhaps you are prone to acting before thinking something all the way through. Or, maybe you are a strong thinker, but that diminishes your emotional life. Or, like the lion, your feelings may be so strong that they cloud your thinking and keep you from following through with action.
In the early years, we work primarily on building the will of the student.
If the will is strengthened early, the important qualities of intelligence, a feeling for beauty, and respect for others and the natural world will come out of the child’s own desires.
Waldorf graduates often exhibit a tendency toward self-learning and an eye for the artistic. These abilities grow out of a foundation of strength of will.
Art, music, and movement engage the will of a student. This is an overlooked aspect of education in general.
Teachers, in all educational settings, speak of the importance of hands-on lessons and experiential learning. In Waldorf education, we strive to provide not just a hands-on lesson here or there, but an overall school experience that fully engages the whole being of a child.
That is why our students begin the day with singing and movement.
That is why art is not a separate subject but integral to everything students learn, be it math, history, or grammar.
When we draw, paint, or model with clay, all aspects of our being are met simultaneously. Thoughts and feelings about what we are learning are put right into action, strengthening our will and increasing our interest in the subject.
We constantly pair academic learning with the creativity of art, music, or movement. We may begin a lesson with an image or story that elicits a strong feeling for what we are learning. Then, we move our bodies to create something which, in turn, strengthens our understanding of the subject.
What a beautiful cycle! Feeling leads to action which leads to thinking. Learning involves every aspect of the person.
Thinking, feeling, and willing are intricately entwined. As adults, we are able to think logically through a situation, balance the emotions that arise alongside these thoughts, and then, hopefully, act in an appropriate manner.
Of course, things don’t always work out this way, but we can imagine this delicate balance. We are not born with this ability. In children, the force of will lives at the forefront of their being. Developmentally, their whole bodies must be engaged for them to truly immerse in a lesson. Art, music, and movement are a direct way to do this.
You can walk into any classroom and tell if the students are engaged in the lesson because they will be enjoying it.
Most students enjoy art and music, and when we incorporate these activities into academic learning, children come away with a feeling that learning is fun and school is a good place to be.
Humans are intrinsically artistic and musical. Some of us may be more talented in one regard or another, but we all seek to create.
An engineer is an artist, a writer is an artist, a dancer is an artist. Some people paint or draw or sketch. Others weave, knit, or sculpt clay on a pottery wheel.
We add art and music to lesson plans, interweaving seemingly disparate subjects. When we teach geometry, we start with it as an artistic form, rather than an abstract mathematical idea.
It begins with the image and the creation of a form through drawing. In a eurythmy lesson the next day, the students might move the form with their whole bodies. All of these activities build academic learning about geometry.
Meshing art and music with academics begins in first grade and becomes a regular part of every day in the classroom. Students develop confidence in their creative abilities. In Waldorf Education, students create their own textbooks, which chart their academic journey in word and illustration, in measurement and thought.
In the Early Childhood Center, the teacher sings to the class to line up, and the children hear the melody more easily than they might hear words urging them to follow directions. From early ages, children have natural tendencies toward rhythm and melody.
Music can increase engagement in every subject. In fourth grade mathematics, when we study fractions, students might work with percussion to understand how half, quarter, and eighth notes relate to the whole note.
Every year, starting in first grade, classes produce a play, which often relates to the main lesson focus of that year. The very act of putting on the play is another example of art and music aligning with academic learning.
The children design sets, sing and perform songs, and recount lines that tie to history. They become characters they have studied. What an amazing way to make the curriculum come to life!
Justin Trombly teaches fourth grade at Detroit Waldorf School.
At Detroit Waldorf School, learning comes alive. In our classrooms, a child’s entire being delves deeply into a subject. They hear it, they see it, they create it, they hold it in their hands.
Years later, they remember it because it was a part of them. And learning becomes an experiential, soulful endeavor that our students carry with them throughout their lives.