Life After Waldorf ~ A Support Group - Page 55

[ihugtrees]

I am only a few pages in, but I just have to say I had no idea it was a common Waldorf philosophy to not teach reading until all of the baby teeth fell out. **My last baby tooth did not fall out until I was almost 16 years old, and this was after having several other baby teeth extracted to make room for permanent teeth coming in.** I was and still am a voracious reader. I learned at age 4, taught by my grandmother and mother, and can't imagine my childhood any other way. I mean, really?? Who could espouse keeping a child from reading until 10th grade?!

[asberck]

Are there still people here? 

[karne]

Originally Posted by asberck 

Are there still people here? 

Yes, but we're not here frequently.  We're fortunate that our families have been able to move on.  Do you need something?

[LeLeMom]

Hello, I'm new here.  I've spent some time on the other Waldorf blog though.  I am trying to learn everything I can about Waldorf and particularly the schools in Sacramento, California.  No one there has replied that they are from Sacramento or familiar with the schools there.  I thought I would post here to see if anyone might (though it seems there's not much activity at all lately.)  Thanks!

[lauren]

Are you looking to find a Waldorf school or are you looking for the 'con' side?

[karne]

Originally Posted by LeLeMom 

Hello, I'm new here.  I've spent some time on the other Waldorf blog though.  I am trying to learn everything I can about Waldorf and particularly the schools in Sacramento, California.  No one there has replied that they are from Sacramento or familiar with the schools there.  I thought I would post here to see if anyone might (though it seems there's not much activity at all lately.)  Thanks!

For specific schools you might try posting in your tribal area.  In the LAS forum most people seem not to be involved with actual schools or have grade school aged children.  Have you posted on any local message boards?  Might be worth a try.

[LeLeMom]

Thanks to you both for your response.  I'm looking for anything at all that I can find about the schools in the Sacramento area (there are two private Waldorf schools here).  I'm looking for pros, I'm looking for cons.  I'm looking for the unvarnished truth, whatever it may be. 

Karne, I'll take your advice and post on the local board as well.

[lisasign2me]

This really gets me thinking . . . My son was previously in public school and we thought we would fit in better with Waldorf, but now wondering if we fit in anywhere! LOL We have been at a Waldorf school in Oregon this school year. I like the types of classes at Waldorf and the general philosophy of childrearing, but can't relate to many of the parents there. The children seem spoiled and have innacurate perceptions of the outside world. The parents seem too busy to form any relationships with other parents. The few playdates we have been invited on revealed huge differences in income and I feel uncomfortable having these children over at my humble apartment.

[raksmama]

Originally Posted by lisasign2me 

This really gets me thinking . . . My son was previously in public school and we thought we would fit in better with Waldorf, but now wondering if we fit in anywhere! LOL We have been at a Waldorf school in Oregon this school year. I like the types of classes at Waldorf and the general philosophy of childrearing, but can't relate to many of the parents there. The children seem spoiled and have innacurate perceptions of the outside world. The parents seem too busy to form any relationships with other parents. The few playdates we have been invited on revealed huge differences in income and I feel uncomfortable having these children over at my humble apartment.

I know what you mean. When we were at Waldorf we always felt like we were not " waldorfy" enough but at our public catholic school we did not fit in either. Most of the parents are so mainstream. Finally my child's happiness as well as his education is the most important so we stayed at the public catholic school

[herbsmd]

I am a Waldorf teacher and I was hoping to send my apologies to all of those who feel wronged by the pedagogical system.  I think every educational system, however wonderful it can be, in the end is only as good as its teachers.  I know, in all of my striving, that I make mistakes every day and I rue the times when I am less than my best.  

I wish I could speak for all schools as well as I can speak for my own.  My children attend a Waldorf school which participates in a government program by which children in different degrees of poverty are able to attend free-of-charge.  Because of this, our school often has many pressing problems of a social nature that are not always found in schools which are supported entirely by private-pay-tuition.  In so many ways, this has kept our school sane and on the right path through all of its years.  

Private schools, in my opinion (having worked a number of years in non-Waldorf ones), are susceptible to a disease of affluence whereby teachers, parents, and students all become divided.  It is a disconcerting state in a non-Waldorf private school, but in a school where there is an underlying philosophy to be applied (even if just for the sake of convenience), it is a problem that can very-easily become compounded.  

I am sickened by the stories I read on here--never in my work as a Waldorf teacher (at two separate schools, one of which was private) have I ever witnessed anything like this.  My three children have all had wonderful experiences as Waldorf students and, while I have seen parents leave our school, I have never thought that they left with impressions such as these.  

I am very interested to understand how these children can slip through the cracks, how parents can lose their strong convictions and the sight of the beauty of the education, and how the faculty and staff might be able to prevent the feelings associated with this.  

I have found this education to be remarkable in so many contexts.  We are an urban school serving a culturally, ideologically, and socioeconomically diverse population and I have seen so many children come through our doors with blank stares and apathetic attitudes, only to be turned into children with intense eyes and a thirst for knowledge.  So many of these students would be absolutely lost in a public system because their public systems are so tragically underfunded, fiscally exploited, and linked to a government policy which is failing rapidly from the bottom upward.  Seeing the effects of our Waldorf education in such a drastic and severe environment, and having fulfilled a deep calling toward a population that desperately needs it helps to make my job one that is not full of mindless complaint and self-congratulation.  Perhaps a partial "disease-of-affluence" that Waldorf schools tend toward takes the focus too far off of the children and the pressing social, economical, and environmental issues at hand. 

In any event, I would love to leave myself open to anyone who would like to ask me questions or seek to find answers.  I have nothing to defend--what I see is all that I know and I certainly respect those views on here as equal to my own.  But I would love to find a better solution to this problem than the bifurcation that currently exists in the virtual world--the pro-Waldorf community vs. its dissenters.  I am certain that lives can still be positively effected by the Waldorf method...even those who have been previously harmed under its name.  
 

Honest regards,
Maggie

[PeteK]

Hi Maggie,

Would you be interested in an honest discussion about Waldorf?  I can tell you, I have discovered and documented a lot of problems that are systemic - not at all related to the individual teachers.  Would you be willing to address the problems that run through all Waldorf schools here?

As a start, and if I may be so bold, I'd like to direct you to my website The Waldorf Review... a collection of lots and lots of complaints by ordinary parents.  It's an excellent resource for parents who are investigating a particular Waldorf school, and it also has a search function that can be used to search out criticism by topic.  For example, one can search for "bullying" and find the reviews that contain descriptions of that activity.  I'm sure Waldorf doesn't appreciate my collection of reviews, but there are hundreds of complaints there that demonstrate patterns which cannot be ignored.

You may also want to examine my comments on a different MDC page regarding Steiner and Race - to see if you agree or disagree with my assessment of Waldorf with regard to racism and what they teach Waldorf teachers.  It would be interesting to get your perspective on this very controversial topic.

I'm looking forward to an open, honest and respectful discussion.  

I want to give a shout out to my friends here from many years ago... Especially Beanie...

Pete

[PeteK]

Originally Posted by LeLeMom 

Thanks to you both for your response.  I'm looking for anything at all that I can find about the schools in the Sacramento area (there are two private Waldorf schools here).  I'm looking for pros, I'm looking for cons.  I'm looking for the unvarnished truth, whatever it may be. 

Karne, I'll take your advice and post on the local board as well.

Here's a review of the Sacramento Waldorf school by a former student... I think it's pretty funny.

http://thewaldorfreview.blogspot.com/2012/05/sacramento-waldorf-school-reviews-by.html

[Katielady]

...

Edited by Katielady - 8/22/12 at 11:54pm

[ottomom10]

Hello...I am new to this site. I am hesitant to post too much information here as my experiences with the Waldorf world have made me cautious of sharing too much. My nine year old child is currently a student at a Waldorf school and I am horrified every day that I have to send her here. I say "have to" because it is stated in the court order between her father and I that if we can't agree on a school, she is to remain at the school she's already in. I am hoping and praying that things will change soon for my daughter and that I will be able to pull her out of this horrid school. I am appalled that a school can operate the way they do and get away with it. I too was one of the suckers, lured into the charm of Waldorf education (if you can even call it that). It was sold to me in a way that made it sound very attractive. However, less than a year into her journey at this school, I quickly realized that this was the wrong place for my high-functioning, special needs daughter. I have some concerns and am hoping to get some feedback.

1) How have your children been effected by their transition from Waldorf to Traditional schools?

2) What is the "Waldorf" approach to children with special needs (i.e. Epilepsy, ADHD, Cerebral Palsy, Downs Syndrome, etc.)

3) What's the best way to help my child transition out of the Waldorf cult-like experience to a more traditional educational environment.

Any information you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

Sigh...it's a bit of a relief to know that there are others out there with similar experiences in regard to the Waldorf experience.

Warmest Regards!
 

[PeteK]

Hi Ottomom10, and welcome.

"2) What is the "Waldorf" approach to children with special needs (i.e. Epilepsy, ADHD, Cerebral Palsy, Downs Syndrome, etc.)"

Unfortunately, Steiner considered these things to be the karmic result of some indiscretion in a previous life.  (See "Manifestations of Karma" - Rudolf Steiner).  

"Now when we are considering karma we must speak of connections of events which came into human life in former times, and how they manifest themselves later in their after-effects on the same human being. If we speak of health and disease from the standpoint of karma we must ask: ‘Can we connect the healthy and diseased condition with the former deeds and experiences of this person, and how will his present condition of health or disease later react upon him?’"

Here Steiner talks directly about what happens:

"I said previously that if a person has done many things under the influence of his passions, he will in the kamaloca period live through actions which have also come about under such an influence. This will arouse in him the tendency in his next incarnation to experience some obstacle in his own body and by overcoming this, he will be in the position to compensate for certain actions in his previous life. Especially is this the case in the form of illness which in these modern times we call diptheric, which in many cases appears when there is a karmic complication due to previous acts which were dominated by the emotions and passions."

If a child has a special need, according to Steiner, this was a "contract" for this incarnation... that the soul chose to suffer in this incarnation in order to balance their karma from a previous incarnation.  Steiner, himself, was very insensitive to children.  At the bottom of this page, Steiner provides an "assessment of a student".  It's rather shocking.

[herbsmd]

Originally Posted by PeteK 

Hi Maggie,

Would you be interested in an honest discussion about Waldorf?  I can tell you, I have discovered and documented a lot of problems that are systemic - not at all related to the individual teachers.  Would you be willing to address the problems that run through all Waldorf schools here?

As a start, and if I may be so bold, I'd like to direct you to my website The Waldorf Review... a collection of lots and lots of complaints by ordinary parents.  It's an excellent resource for parents who are investigating a particular Waldorf school, and it also has a search function that can be used to search out criticism by topic.  For example, one can search for "bullying" and find the reviews that contain descriptions of that activity.  I'm sure Waldorf doesn't appreciate my collection of reviews, but there are hundreds of complaints there that demonstrate patterns which cannot be ignored.

You may also want to examine my comments on a different MDC page regarding Steiner and Race - to see if you agree or disagree with my assessment of Waldorf with regard to racism and what they teach Waldorf teachers.  It would be interesting to get your perspective on this very controversial topic.

I'm looking forward to an open, honest and respectful discussion.  

I want to give a shout out to my friends here from many years ago... Especially Beanie...

Pete

Thank you, Pete!  I have just breezed through both links--not fully, but enough to get an idea.  I'm just starting another school year, so I may not have as much time to discuss in these next few weeks, but I will do my best.  I have a graduate degree in philosophy and another in education, along with a certification through a Waldorf Teacher Training program...and that is where I will start this conversation.  

Though I have read a bit of both of the links, I confess that I didn't read too long on either one because I was more eager to discuss outright with you.  I agree that people have had poor experiences with Waldorf schools--part of that, no doubt is because of the ideological differences.  Having worked at other private schools (I have taught at another very prestigious private school in the same area which espouses no "esoteric science" behind the education itself), I know that one of the problems that private schools face is simply a general management issue--when someone pays a lot of money for something, they expect it to be done their own way.  Often times, when people spend a lot of money on an education, they are looking for something that they have a certain amount of control over.  In an ideas-based education, there is certain to be a butting-of-heads about the ways in which things get done.    We won't know how many of those transgressions on your website would be transgressions that are simply of the typical kind (whether or not they claim not to be about a financial/control issue or not) or which ones are simply unique to Waldorf education, so I would only like to include them insofar as we both agree to label them as entirely ad hominem.  Though they might be true, there are too many factors involved to use them as much more than that for the sake of an argument.  As a whole, however, I think there is something to be said for the "Waldorf-offended" group.  And that is why I am here.

Some of what I read on your website undoubtedly gave me the shivers.  This, in the greater context of all of the abhorrent things that unfortunately happen in schools (Five minutes before I came on here, I just finished reading an article of a teacher in California who has been spoon-feeding semen to students) we have to keep in mind that people who are not right in their own mind should never be teaching students.  Some of the things that have happened on your website can only be explained (in my own mind) by the teacher being deficient in one or more faculties.  Unfortunately, in Waldorf Schools and other private schools (Catholic Schools come directly to my mind as having this same nepotistic problem) there is a smaller inner community from which hiring takes place.  That community, in my mind, is far too small and inherently nepotistic.  This is certainly a problem of Waldorf education (and, as I said, other brands of private education).  

So...that is all I really have time to say now............... but it is a start!  

Thank you, Pete (and others) for agreeing to open up what could be a painful discussion for some people.  I am very open-minded and I have no allegiance to anything but the truth...I obviously believe that Steiner is on the right track--I couldn't teach Waldorf education without that.  But I have a very woven knowledge of the history of philosophy, from which most of Steiner's ideas have come from (in one way or another), and I think that perhaps that makes his ideas easier for me to inculcate.  Or maybe I'm crazy too...

Either way...I am excited to discuss it further!
Maggie

Edited by herbsmd - 8/20/12 at 8:22am

[herbsmd]

Katielady,

I think having a rhythm to your day--hectic or not--that gives you moments to stop and accept the world as it is, and perhaps imagine it a little better than we are able to see it is important. One of the things that Waldorf schools do (and people find this cult-like, but I see the importance of it too) is say verses for transitions.  In regular life, we transition to breakfast by shouting "Hurry up, your eggs are getting cold!!!  Why haven't you brushed your teeth yet???" or some other variation.  At least that is how it seems in my own home.  As a teacher, I am in a rush to get out the door and that always complicates things.  But for a while I was able to sustain coming to breakfast at the same time each morning and having the family say a verse together.  It was a poem of my husband's (my husband is an amateur poet, and felt very proud to hear his verse at the breakfast table--he would probably not have said it otherwise!) and the children were excited to learn it.  It was a very special moment in our day and after a few weeks, it brought out an interesting change in our family dynamic and our family life.  Our schedules changed the following school year and so did breakfasts so out we grew to a different pattern.  But the few months where we were able to all come together in the morning and stop for a moment--all at the same time--was a good exercise.  I still see the effects of it a number of years later.  Incorporating ritual and imagination into any mundane tasks of life enriches them.......  That is a very Waldorf-conscious thing which I noticed.  Write a poem yourself or pick one from one of your favorite poets.  It is an honor to bring back words from the past!

Also, there is a good book by a woman named Sharifa Oppenheimer about the rhythm of the home for young children.  Also, any book about Lifeways early childhood might have good suggestions!!  I believe that the best changes are the ones you can make in the home--school is secondary to home life and should augment it......not supplant it!!  

Good luck!!

Maggie

Edited by herbsmd - 8/25/12 at 11:24am

[herbsmd]

Originally Posted by ottomom10 

Hello...I am new to this site. I am hesitant to post too much information here as my experiences with the Waldorf world have made me cautious of sharing too much. My nine year old child is currently a student at a Waldorf school and I am horrified every day that I have to send her here. I say "have to" because it is stated in the court order between her father and I that if we can't agree on a school, she is to remain at the school she's already in. I am hoping and praying that things will change soon for my daughter and that I will be able to pull her out of this horrid school. I am appalled that a school can operate the way they do and get away with it. I too was one of the suckers, lured into the charm of Waldorf education (if you can even call it that). It was sold to me in a way that made it sound very attractive. However, less than a year into her journey at this school, I quickly realized that this was the wrong place for my high-functioning, special needs daughter. I have some concerns and am hoping to get some feedback.

1) How have your children been effected by their transition from Waldorf to Traditional schools?

2) What is the "Waldorf" approach to children with special needs (i.e. Epilepsy, ADHD, Cerebral Palsy, Downs Syndrome, etc.)

3) What's the best way to help my child transition out of the Waldorf cult-like experience to a more traditional educational environment.

Any information you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

Sigh...it's a bit of a relief to know that there are others out there with similar experiences in regard to the Waldorf experience.

Warmest Regards!
 

Is there some way that you can negotiate with your daughter's father about changing schools?  If your daughter is having a bad experience in school, do not let her suffer because of a negotiable contract!  Whatever school your daughter is in--whether it be a Waldorf school or not--if she is suffering and her needs are not being met, she should be taken out.  If there is some way that you can negotiate a better situation for your daughter, I would put that first and foremost on your list of things to do for your child.  

To answer your questions the best way I can:

1.  People leave Waldorf schools for many reasons.  If they are looking for something that is not what the school provided, I think the family ultimately transitions well.  If this is a bone-of-contention between you and your daughter's father, I cannot help with that except to say that it should not be discussed with your daughter around.  That will sabotage the experience for her and she will use it as a way to reach both of you and engage you.  Whatever you do, keep what you say of the school private and between adults only, if possible.  If she has high needs or learning challenges that are not being met, if you find a place that can address her individually and directly and care for those needs, she will very likely transition well.  If she is transitioning to a public school system, it will take at least a year to get used to testing and the "accountability" system...so be patient with her and with her new school.  Best of luck!

2.  What Pete said is a snippet of a much larger body of understanding a child in a holistic way--it sounds nutty when taken out of context (or maybe even in context), but it is a way to picture a child not merely as a biological organism that just plopped into being, but as an evolutionary being that came out of a long process of cellular division and spiritual development  and is continuing to evolve.   If you don't believe in anything "spiritual" at all--if you are an absolute materialist, for instance, and believe only in what you see--then this would be silly for you to even think about and all explanations would sound ridiculous.  Stick simply to scientific research and see if you can negotiate some kind of care program that works for both you and your daughter.  Do your own research if you have to, and bring suggestions to the school and see if they are open to hearing and advocating those things.  I have worked in mainstream special needs and there is great research (our Waldorf special needs person is trained outside of her Waldorf training too) and, as she should, uses a variety of labeled approaches (although truly listening to the child should be enough for all of us, right?)...  But, for lack of time and ability, there are some great resources out there and, if it works, it should be used!!!

3.  I think the best way to transition her is to work with her teachers and to be as present as you can.  At 9 years old, the Waldorf curriculum is just getting into the more mainstream subjects like official science and the ideas of observation and navigation, and rather than being simply told stories all the time, she is beginning to really understand things in a new way, an the curriculum ideally strives to meet those needs.  Because most schools teach things like scientific reasoning from early on, many of the students will have a vocabulary of all of these things--first graders, for example, can name a graduated cylinder or a hypothesis, but they really have no deep understanding of these concepts.  Your daughter will need to learn a new vocabulary, for sure--as well as a testing mentality--but barring those few limitations, she should be amply challenged!!  You can find out what curriculum the transitioning school uses and you can look up their vocabulary that they use for things (especially in math or language arts) because they are different with each brand.  (There is a whole problem with testing and which curriculum company gets the contract for the standardized tests, so each curriculum maker uses their own vocabulary for certain things.)  For instance, they may say "counting on" which essentially means counting upward from a given starting point, or they might use "fact families" to describe number relationships in a general way.  These vocabulary will help with her transition.  Prepare her, also, for homework each night.  If you can make that a fun time--I went to a traditional school (although I felt it was very much like the Waldorf School I now teach at), and we had homework almost every night by the time we were in 3rd or 4th grade.  If you can make that experience fun--my mother made a cup of tea or coffee for herself and some snacks for us, and we would all sit at a table and do our homework together with our homework basket full of scissors, pencils, pens, markers, glue, etc.--you will get miles from making it a pleasurable experience!!

Best of luck with you and with everything you're going through!

Maggie

[PeteK]

Originally Posted by herbsmd 

I agree that people have had poor experiences with Waldorf schools--part of that, no doubt is because of the ideological differences.  Having worked at other private schools (I have taught at another very prestigious private school in the same area which espouses no "esoteric science" behind the education itself), I know that one of the problems that private schools face is simply a general management issue--when someone pays a lot of money for something, they expect it to be done their own way.  Often times, when people spend a lot of money on an education, they are looking for something that they have a certain amount of control over.

I don't disagree here, but I blame WALDORF for those ideological differences.  Absolutely, we hear of many, many parents who believed they were getting something completely different when they signed up for Waldorf.  Whose job is it to make it clear what they teach and more importantly, WHY?  Waldorf schools claim to be something they are not, and refuse to acknowledge what they are - and that's where the problems come from.  Over and over in the parent reviews, parents describe being duped.  Often, they claim their school wasn't a "real" Waldorf school - still believing that there exists, somewhere, a school that actually fulfills the claims of Waldorf - producing bright, independent-thinking graduates, 94% or which go on to college.  Can you please point me to the Waldorf school which has a college acceptance rate of 94% - as is advertised on AWSNA's website?  Do the people who run Waldorf understand the meaning of FRAUD?

The real shame is that for every child who graduates Waldorf, a dozen or more have had their education interrupted by Waldorf's false promises.  If Waldorf sold itself honestly, they would attract people who actually WANT "esoteric science" instead of fact-based science.

We won't know how many of those transgressions on your website would be transgressions that are simply of the typical kind (whether or not they claim not to be about a financial/control issue or not) or which ones are simply unique to Waldorf education, so I would only like to include them insofar as we both agree to label them as entirely ad hominem.  Though they might be true, there are too many factors involved to use them as much more than that for the sake of an argument.  As a whole, however, I think there is something to be said for the "Waldorf-offended" group.  And that is why I am here.

No, sorry, we're not going to brush off the experiences of hundreds of parents just like that... Waldorf has already done this - that's why this thread is here.  Great way to try to invalidate people's experiences though.  How about invalidating the 55 pages of comments on this thread while we're at it? 

EVERY ONE of the complaints relates to Waldorf education - they are ALL about what happened in Waldorf schools.  Sure, there are going to be many factors involved... again, they will relate to Waldorf, whether those factors are lack of accountability, poor governance, crazy teachers, elitism, child abuse and bullying, inattentive to special needs, poor reading/academics, and so forth.  The reasons people cite are Waldorf problems.  I didn't harvest reviews of people who were simply upset at the costs of the education.  The reviews on my blog are valid and damaging to Waldorf  and Waldorf needs to take them seriously.

Even if something like bullying is common in other schools, if there's a SPECIAL REASON for allowing it in Waldorf schools, we can't say - "look, bullying is everywhere".

Some of what I read on your website undoubtedly gave me the shivers.  This, in the greater context of all of the abhorrent things that unfortunately happen in schools (Five minutes before I came on here, I just finished reading an article of a teacher in California who has been spoon-feeding semen to students) we have to keep in mind that people who are not right in their own mind should never be teaching students. 

This is a shameful tactic.  Do they teach you this in Waldorf teacher training?  In my day, it wasn't "spoon-feeding semen" - it was "girls giving blow-jobs in the hallway".  Please... remember the thread you're on.  Most of the readers here, I'm certain, have seen these types of Waldorf fear tactics used before.  Waldorf should be SCREENING their teachers more carefully... instead, they pass problematic teachers from school to school.  Since Waldorf teachers don't actually have a "revokable" credential, they just move between Waldorf schools.

Some of the things that have happened on your website can only be explained (in my own mind) by the teacher being deficient in one or more faculties.  Unfortunately, in Waldorf Schools and other private schools (Catholic Schools come directly to my mind as having this same nepotistic problem) there is a smaller inner community from which hiring takes place.  That community, in my mind, is far too small and inherently nepotistic.  This is certainly a problem of Waldorf education (and, as I said, other brands of private education).

It's sad that Waldorf needs to snuggle up to Catholic schools to find problems on the magnitude of their own.  I agree, however, Waldorf's way of hiding problematic teachers within their system is indeed just like the Catholic church.  Many of the priests in the Catholic church have been prosecuted.  As I said, Waldorf can't even yank their teaching credential.  More importantly, Waldorf EXCUSES this type of behavior... often publicly.  Then they wonder why they have so many critics.

[PeteK]

Maggie, I hope this discussion doesn't become painful... I realize I'm asking you not to invalidate the criticisms of parents while asking you to validate Waldorf's problems.  

What Pete said is a snippet of a much larger body of understanding a child in a holistic way--it sounds nutty when taken out of context (or maybe even in context), but it is a way to picture a child not merely as a biological organism that just plopped into being, but as an evolutionary being that came out of a long process of cellular division and spiritual development  and is continuing to evolve.   If you don't believe in anything "spiritual" at all--if you are an absolute materialist, for instance, and believe only in what you see--then this would be silly for you to even think about and all explanations would sound ridiculous.

Yes, this "larger body of understanding a child" is also what permits racism in Waldorf education.  The child is "continuing to evolve" through the races, among other things, with the white race being the highest evolutionary form.  This represents Steiner's view of human evolution to the letter.  In Waldorf schools, the child is a spirit occupying a human body.  Waldorf teachers are there to help guide the child through the incarnation process, regardless of what body (race) they have incarnated into.  Each child is assessed and evaluated in accordance with their race.  And yes, this would sound very silly, if it wasn't damaging.