Estellea,
The reason I dislike "woo" is because it doesn't actually work.
Homeopathy doesn't work.
Prayer for healing doesn't work.
Dowsing doesn't work.
But when something works for my purposes, I don't care what the people who made it think.
Trappist monks driven by a belief in a God make jam.
While their background is silly, their product works very well as a tasty thing to put on toast.
Dr. Bronner makes soap based on a number of insane theories.
It works very well as soap, it smells nice and leaves me feeling tingly clean.
So it doesn't matter that instructors are indoctrinated with the belief that blacks are sub-human, Aryans are the epitome of human existence and special needs children are not even human? Not to mention the obsession with woolies and discouraging of vaccinations because it makes you a better human and if you die or become permanently damaged as a result of disease, well, that's supposed to happen:
http://www.openwaldorf.com/health.html Are you aware that EU Steiner Schools are hotbeds for diseases that spread to other communities, particularly measles?
Waldorf schools, in every independent test, do work much better than public schools. Single programs with the same kids and parents show marked improvement when switching to Waldorf methods.
So can you say that once parental socio-economic status, educational levels and involvement are controlled for, that Waldorf schooling is significantly better than other private school options? Is that true for all public schools in a comparison?
You could say there's a secondary concern, that since children are involved, there's a danger of indoctrination into non-critical thinking and woo-ish ideas, but even the critics maintain that the background philosophy is not taught to the students.
Oh, so again, instructors aren't treating children any differently even though they are being instructed with racist propaganda? You know that the children are also not being indoctrinated to woo by being treated with homeopathy and herbal remedies? Oh, of course, one can opt out of that part, sometimes.
Here one of the pioneering organizations in South Africa for adult education in disadvantaged communities.
http://www.novalis.org.za/about/mission
Wonder how this is based on racist Steiner
I'm not sure what this has to do with Waldorf.
Yeah, check out the racist Waldorf schools in South Africa
http://www.maxstibbe.co.za/gallery.htm
Are you that naive? Just because they have some black children in their classes, Steiner-educated instructors are magically not taught heinous racism? He does allow for the possibility that blacks can 'evolve' into 'higher beings' such as Aryans though.
thanks, that was an interesting read.
And hardly an independent source. Let's take a look at some of
Steiner's beliefs that are still being used today.
Those decadent, icky French are race-mixing and it's going to make them even more decadent and WEAK:
"No doubt about it, the soul becomes corrupted through using the French language...It is also possible at the present time that the French will even ruin their own blood, the very element which has kept their language going as a corpse. That is a terrible thing the French people are doing to other people, the frightful cultural brutality of transplanting black people to Europe. It affects France itself worst of all. This has an incredibly strong effect on the blood, the race. This will substantially add to French decadence. The French nation will be weakened as a race." (Steiner, 1923, CT-3 pp. 87-88)
Special Needs Children? Why they're just little demons masquerading as humans:
"The girl L.K. in class 1...is one of those cases that are occurring more and more frequently where children are born and human forms exist which actually, with regard to the highest member the ego, are not human at all but are inhabited by beings who do not belong to the human race...They are very different from human beings where spiritual matters are concerned. For instance they can never memorise sentences, only words. I do not like speaking about these things, as there is considerable opposition about this. Just imagine what people would say if they heard that we are talking about human beings who are not human beings. Nevertheless these are facts. Furthermore, there would not be such a decline of culture if there were a strong enough feeling for the fact that some people, the ones who are particularly ruthless, are not human beings at all but demons in human form.
"But do not let us broadcast this. There is enough opposition already. Things like this give people a terrible shock. People were frightfully shocked when I had to say that a quite famous university professor with a great reputation had had a very short period between death and re-birth and was a re-incarnated negro scientist.
"But don"t let us publicise these things." (Steiner, 1923, CT-4 pp. 36-37)
But
shhhhh, let's not say these things out loud lest people think we're weird or something.
The Steiner apartheid values are still being taught in Europe and could be in the U.S. so in spite of his nifty childhood development and educational ideas, his core ideals are deeply rooted in racism against all but Aryans and these instructors are teaching children in Waldorf schools. Until Waldorf openly rejects Steiner's core beliefs and moves to distance themselves from that, I will never support their educational philosophy.
Este
