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An Alternative to Tradition

© Heike Boehnke

My daughter just turned TWO(!!) and we are choosing her future, aka a PRE-SCHOOL! As I want to encourage her European roots, I am looking for a education concept that is familiar to me and that I feel will foster her talents in the future. Let me introduce you to two of my “runner-ups.” This should be interesting for those looking for an alternative to public school or traditional private schools. If you are contemplating home-schooling, there is a great topic on the Suite that you should visit at http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/home....

An intriguing form of education is the world renowned “Waldorf School.” I grew up with this concept in Germany, and when I started researching schools and curricula for my daughter, this was certainly one of my first picks. Dr. Rudolf Steiner founded the first Waldorf School in Stuttgart, Germany during the early 1900s. It was one of the first schools that shunned the segregation of girls and boys, giving both the chance of an equal education.

In his article, Waldorf Education…an Introduction, Henry Barnes describes this form of schooling to a tee. He writes “When children relate what they learn to their own experience, they are interested and alive, and what they learn becomes their own. Waldorf schools are designed to foster this kind of learning. Waldorf education has its roots in the spiritual-scientific research of the Austrian scientist and thinker Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). According to Steiner's philosophy, man is a threefold being of spirit, soul, and body whose capacities unfold in three developmental stages on the path to adulthood: early childhood, middle childhood, and adolescence.” This very informative article will tell you about the history and philosophy of Waldorf education, as well as direct interested candidates in the right direction.

Similar in the fact that Montessori education also foster the individual child and their needs, but still very much its own form of education are the Montessori Schools. An excerpt from the website http://www.montessori.com:

“One of the basic philosophies in Montessori education is to develop your child’s physical, intellectual and spiritual potential to the fullest. To accomplish this, each child must be provided choices. These choices are given to children in what Dr. Montessori called the "prepared environment." The Montessori classroom provides order and structure through a safe and enriching environment which allows children to learn at their own speed, according to their own capabilities, in a way that they enjoy, in a non-competitive environment.

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