Library Lady's Corner

Book Review: Handbook of Research on Waldorf Education — Jost Schieren, Ed. August 25 2023

Here, at long last, is a book which identifies the scientific underpinnings of Waldorf Education!!

Published by Routledge, the internationally acclaimed academic publisher, this book defines the exclusion of Waldorf Education for 100 years from circles on educational science, missing the opportunities for mutual stimulation and collaboration.


Book Review: From Mechanism to Organism: Enlivening the Study of Human Biology August 16 2022

At long last, a resource book for high school teachers, parents, and students that brings to life the experiential approach to the complex subject of human biology!  Michael Holdrege’s decades of experience at the Chicago Waldorf School teaching middle and high school science and math shines on every page of this penetrating book. From Mechanism to Organism contains wonderful illustrations that demonstrate valuable ideas for teachers to use in bringing different aspects of the ninth-and tenth-grade science in a Waldorf curriculum to high school students.

Book Review: The First Waldorf Teachers December 08 2021

Read of them in the NEW Waldorf Publications book: The First Waldorf Teachers: Twelve Biographical Vignettes of Leaders of the First School

The First Waldorf Teachers | Waldorf Publications Tomas Zdrazil has collected twelve biographical sketches of the twelve teachers and Emil Molt, the bold industrialist who started the whole idea of a new school, in one collection, wrapped in a single book by your friends at Waldorf Publications!


Book Review: Form Drawing October 11 2021

Form Drawing is a book about a subject unique to Waldorf schools. This book offers the best introduction to form drawing this Library Lady has ever seen! Form Drawing is full-color and bursting-with-illustrations—it is a must-have for understanding this powerful and engaging artistic subject!

Beginning on the first day of first grade, form drawing helps artistically to develop in children a sense of space, movement, balance, proportion,


Waldorf Grade 7 Book Recommendations February 25 2021

Seventh graders are in the throes of the mighty force of puberty and the birth of the last of the “finer bodies” that some would call the “aura” of the human being. No births are quiet and the chatter in a classroom is the sound that begins in sixth grade and lasts through eighth and signals the arrival of a new birth, new capacities, and new challenges. The growth at this time in a young human being rivals the growth of a newborn and will not be repeated for the rest of life.

Waldorf Grade 6 Book Recommendations February 19 2021

In sixth grade, the 11/12 year-old is usually beginning to experience the onset of puberty. Growth happens at an increasingly rapid rate and the child often goes through a time of alarm, not recognizing who he or she is anymore. Just as a single example, somewhere during the time of puberty a girl’s larynx grows to three times its original size and a boy’s, seven times its original size. This growth rate will never be repeated in the life span of human development.

Now available - A Call to Teach February 14 2021

Among the few books available that address the vocational call to be a teacher, up rises A Call to Teach, like a friendly morning sun.  Torin Finser’s book celebrates the power of the vocation of teaching.  High time!

In the midst of the digital debacle in education caused by the pandemic of 2020, Finser’s timely book reminds us all of the importance teachers hold in the minds and hearts of the young. Films have been made around the transformations that become possible for a youngster from the dedicated heart of a teacher — and also about the damage that can be done by a teacher who deviates from the priceless calling to follow his or her own dislikes against a particular child. The power of the teacher is clear.


Waldorf Grade 5 Book Recommendations December 15 2020

The fifth-grade child is reaching the height of childhood. Capacities have solidified and consolidation runs through the whole fifth grade year. The child begins to realize what he or she knows and can do. Rudolf Steiner said that fifth grade is a year of balance. Though this is true, it can be misleading. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the fifth-grade year is without any problems. This balance is most clearly true for the physical maturing of the child, as a child. For the first time the breath and heartbeat reach adult proportions. Each breath is now accompanied by four heartbeats.

Waldorf Grade 4 Book Recommendations December 01 2020

Youngsters in grade four are now ten years old and have past the nine-year-old shift in consciousness but are still smoothing this out in their understanding of the world. Their new independence means a bit of separation from parents and teachers and some cantankerousness as this adjustment settles. The curriculum brings...

Waldorf Grade 2 Book Recommendations November 02 2020

Following Waldorf Grade 1 recommendations, here comes Waldorf Grade 2! Remember that books for general self-development and foundational work for teaching were offered in a previous writing. Also note that there are too many books in all these lists to presume that anyone should read them all, but knowing what books are available can help in deciding about the one or two or three books (or more!) that might prove useful as a guide both for teachers and students.

Waldorf Grade 1 Book Recommendations October 19 2020

Books for general self-development and foundational work for teaching were offered in a previous writing. Now we will offer grade by grade book recommendations. There are too many books in all these lists, remember, to think that we are advising that anyone read them all.

Book Review: Emil and Berta, The Origins of the Waldorf School Movement August 06 2019

Waldorf Education is named after the cigarette and tobacco company partly owned and completely managed by Emil Molt but named from family names, the Waldorf and Astoria families. The cigarette company was primarily owned by an inheriting family, the Giorgiis, who so trusted Emil that he was given 47% shareholding in the company and free rein in management. The company was remarkably profitable while Emil was the “CEO” and so the owning family was content to allow Emil free rein. (Where does the name Waldorf come from, she may want to know.)

Emil and his wife, Berta, were earnest students of Rudolf Steiner.


Book Review: See the Child, Love the Child, Know Yourself: Now Teach June 30 2019

See the Child, Love the Child, Know Yourself: Now Teach
Elan Leibner

For the six years that the Research Institute for Waldorf Education (RIWE) was fortunate enough to have Elan Leibner as the editor of the Research Bulletin, a striking confluence of practices and consciousness from both the Pedagogical Section Council of North America, (PSC) and that of more standard research ideals was possible. Elan was and is the chair of the PSC and has stimulated attention and effective practices in spiritual research out of his own Waldorf teaching experiences, and out of his research.


Interview with Betty Staley, author of "Tending the Spark" May 02 2019

Betty Staley’s new book, Tending the Spark, Lighting the Future for Middle Schools Students, has generated a spark! Clearly, all of us responsible for this vulnerable age need help in understanding. Meg Gorman stepped up to interviewing Betty to find out more about her motives in writing this book.

Book Review: Tending the Spark April 04 2019

Tending the Spark: Lighting the Future for Middle School Students is Betty Staley’s latest contribution to better understanding child development to better educate the child. This is a book every parent and teacher of eleven to fifteen-year-olds must read! Tending the Spark covers a multiplicity of topics related to raising and teaching middle-schoolers. Everything from physical development, brain development, peer pressure, social media, and creativity are covered in this thorough sweep through middle school changes and realities.

Interview with Frederick Amrine, author of Kicking Away the Ladder March 26 2019

We asked Fred Amrine, author of the newest release from Waldorf Publications, Kicking Away the Ladder, the Philosophical Roots of Waldorf Education, why he wrote his book and why its content is so important.

Fred Amrine: It’s very important for people to understand the roots of Waldorf education in German idealism. German idealism was, in fact, Steiner’s first choice as a vehicle and a language in which to put forth Anthroposophy. For a variety of reasons, this didn’t work out....


Book Review: Kicking Away the Ladder March 12 2019

It’s important to investigate the philosophical underpinnings of something as influential as the educational approach for our children. Clues about the image of human development, respect for life on earth, and the reasons for different methods used can be more deeply understood by comprehending the founding principles of educational philosophy.

In addition, following the lines of philosophical thought trains our own thinking and promotes clarity; qualities our children are inevitably going to imitate. Since the crown jewel of all education is thinking (clearly and inventively, lately called “executive function,” or “critical thinking”),


Book Review: Research Bulletin, Special Issue: Technology’s Rightful Place October 15 2018

This new book from Waldorf Publications is a compilation of three consecutive issues of the Research Bulletin all devoted to examination of technology and the results of its use. The Research Institute for Waldorf Education (RIWE) held three international colloquia over as many years, expanded board meetings over several days, with presenters who prepared different aspects of technology, the element of silicon, and research on electronics. The book offers a handy reference to fine essays on the power, miraculous effectiveness, and devastation that result from technology’s defining of our culture.

Book Review: Painting at School April 16 2018

Dick Bruin and Attie Lichthart have devoted their lives to painting and the teaching of painting. In their new book, Painting at School, they express a deep understanding of color and joyful devotion to painting and its value in the lives of individuals, especially in children.

Their original work, now almost twenty years in the world, Painting in Waldorf Schools, is still rich with insights about painting as soul food for children (and adults) and valuable in its suggestions about approaching painting lessons. The original book came with a CD of paintings.


Book Review: Towards the Deepening of Waldorf Education October 19 2017

In the 1980s and early 1990s, The Pedagogical Section Council of North America worked closely with the Pedagogical Section in Dornach, Switzerland, to develop a publication that gathered the esoteric material Rudolf Steiner gave to the Waldorf teachers in the first Waldorf school in his first training lectures and along the way at teachers’ meetings. The book was beautiful and lovingly compiled.  It had a linen hard cover with gold leafing for the title.

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 Way

Elizabeth 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.


Summertime and the Livin’ is Easy — and the Reading is Fantastic July 08 2017

At this time of year being a teacher looks like a good career. After all, teachers “get the summer off!”  Sure, they don’t have to show up at school every day, and sure they can wear shorts and sandals instead of dresses and collared shirts. However, once school ends, once reports are completed and meetings subside, the energetic work of preparation begins.

Through books galore, teachers travel to exotic lands from times gone by — India, Persia, Mesopotamia, Egypt and Greece if you are a rising fifth or tenth grade teacher — back in time to the reformation in Europe and the many wars around the world in the last 150 years if you are a rising eighth or ninth grade teacher — ‘round the world for the first conscious time with Magellan (was it worth it when so many died along the way?) if seventh grade will be you destination in the fall — back to the land of stories from before recorded history if you are starting as a first grade teacher — and lost in a miraculous world of new life in embryology if you are a twelfth grade teacher.

To be ready for classes in autumn, the reading is varied and enormous in volume.


Book Review: Difficult Children – There is No Such Thing May 16 2017

Today "difficult children"—children with attention deficit disorder, high levels of anxiety, restlessness, aggressiveness, and other emotional and behavioral problems — are a major challenge for parents, educators. and therapists. Once the child has been diagnosed and labeled as having ADD or autism or some other condition, the standard approach is to use psychotherapy and/or psychotropic drugs to change behavior. Millions of children today, for example, take the drug Ritalin for attention deficit disorder and hyperactivity.  Continue reading...

 


Coming Soon– Several New Waldorf Publications on the Way! May 05 2017

Check out the new titles arriving just in time for summer reading!