The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Ninth Lecture

[ 1 ] We admit students from a wide range of grade levels to the Waldorf School. As we begin teaching in the various classes, we must take into account the fact that we are admitting students from a wide range of grade levels, and we will also have to consider something else in this regard.

[ 2 ] We cannot—and it is a pity that we cannot—immediately establish the necessary university with all the required faculties for the Waldorf School. Thus, we are also dependent on the students, once they graduate from the Waldorf School, being admitted to other educational institutions, which they must then attend in order to enter adult life. We must therefore ensure that our Waldorf students, upon graduation, have achieved the educational goals required of them so that when they enter an educational institution appropriate for their age out in the world, they will be prepared. With the Waldorf School, we will fulfill a corresponding goal and task if—even though we are initially constrained in these two directions—we can realize something that corresponds to our educational principles, which are drawn from the current cultural epoch of human development. However, we will only be able to achieve this if we apply a golden rule—especially with the older children who will be coming to us and whom we will soon have to send on to other institutions of life—namely, to teach economically.

[ 3 ] From an educational standpoint, we will teach by carefully eliminating—especially for children aged thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen—everything that is actually only a burden on the development of the human soul during these years and cannot bear fruit for life. For example, we will have to include at least Latin in our curriculum, and perhaps Greek as well, should it prove necessary. In general, we will have to address the issue of language instruction, and this will be a truly significant aspect of our pedagogy. Consider this fact: you will have students who have received instruction in French and Latin up to a certain level. This instruction has, of course, been provided in a certain way. You must now devote the first lesson—perhaps even the first week—to thoroughly assessing what your students already know. You will have to repeatedly review what the students have already covered. But you will have to do so efficiently, so that your students, depending on their abilities, can benefit from this review right from the start.

[ 4 ] You will already achieve a great deal if you bear in mind that, in all so-called foreign-language instruction, the most time-consuming aspect is translating from the foreign language and translating from one’s own language into that foreign language. It is an enormous waste of time that, for example, college students spend so much time translating from Latin into German and from German back into Latin. They should be reading much more and expressing their own thoughts in the foreign language much more often, rather than constantly translating back and forth. How, then, will you begin teaching your students a foreign language—such as French—in accordance with this rule?

[ 5 ] First—looking at the oldest students who are eligible for this, the thirteen- and fourteen-year-olds—you will need to carefully select what you want to read with the students in the respective language. You will choose reading passages and then call on the students to read these passages aloud to you. You will save the students time and effort if, for now, you do not have them translate these foreign-language passages into German, but instead focus initially on ensuring that the child reads properly and, if possible, through reading aloud, help them read a French or Latin passage correctly, with proper pronunciation and so on. Then, with those students for whom you wish to interweave review with forward-looking instruction, you would do well not to have them translate, but rather to let them freely recount what is contained in the reading passages. Simply let the child recount in their own words what the reading passages contain; pay close attention to whether they omit anything in their retelling, and try to determine from this whether there is something they have not understood. Of course, it’s easier for you to simply have them translate, because then you can see where the child gets stuck and can’t go any further; it’s more challenging for you not only to see where they get stuck but also where they omit something—but this also helps you identify where they haven’t understood something or where they haven’t been able to reproduce a particular turn of phrase in their own language. Of course, there will be children who reproduce the text quite well—that’s fine. There will be others who paraphrase it differently in their own words—that’s fine, too. But let’s go over it with the children this way first.

[ 6 ] Then we’ll do the opposite. Let’s discuss some topic in our own language—something the child is capable of thinking through and feeling out with us. And then we’ll have the child—depending on how well they already know the language—freely retell us in the foreign language what we’ve just discussed. In this way, we’ll be able to determine to what extent the child, whom we’ve taken from a class, has mastered this foreign language.

[ 7 ] It is not possible to teach a foreign language in a school setting without truly teaching linguistics—both general linguistics and syntax. In particular, for children who are already over 12 years old, it is necessary to make them aware of what linguistics entails. But even here, one can proceed in an extremely economical manner. And while I told you in *General Pedagogy* that in everyday life we draw conclusions, which then lead to judgments and concepts, you naturally cannot give the child this kind of logical instruction directly; however, it will be implicit in your language instruction. You would do well to discuss the things of the world with the child in such a way that, with the help of foreign-language instruction, grammatical instruction emerges almost of its own accord. It is simply a matter of shaping such a process in the right way. Start by constructing something with the child that is, in fact, already a complete sentence—and nothing but a sentence. Point out to the child—if the moment were right, you could do this quite well—what is happening outside. You could easily integrate foreign language instruction by, for example, having the child express the phrase “It’s raining” in Latin, French, and German. — Start by asking the child to use the phrase “It’s raining,” and then point out to them—since you’re always dealing with older children—that this is simply an activity they’re describing when they say, “It’s raining.” — Then move from this sentence to the next—and you can now, if you wish, also practice the foreign language with the child, because precisely by incorporating what we’re doing now into foreign-language instruction, you’ll save an enormous amount of time and energy—which you’ll gain by saying: Now, instead of imagining the whole space outside where it’s raining, try to picture the meadow in spring. — Get the child to tell you about the meadow: “It’s green”—and only then move on to having the child translate the sentence “It’s green” into the sentence “The meadow is green.” — Then guide the child to transform this sentence—“The meadow is green”—back into the mental image, the concept: “The green meadow.”

[ 8 ] If you introduce these ideas—which I have just presented to you—one after another in language instruction, then you do not initially teach the child pedantically about syntax and logic; rather, you guide the child’s entire state of mind in such a direction that you teach the child, in a natural way, what the child should already possess within their soul. You present the child with “it” sentences—sentences that actually exist only in active thought, that stand on their own, in which there is neither a subject nor a predicate, that are embedded in the living “life of inference,” and that are abbreviated inferences. You then move on, where possible, to seeking a subject: “The meadow is green”—the meadow that is green. There you proceed to form a judgmental sentence. You will realize that it would be difficult for you to form a judgmental sentence for “It is raining” that is similar to “The meadow is green.” —- For where would you get the subject for “It is raining”? — There is no way to do so. Through practicing with children, one truly enters areas of language about which philosophers have written an immense amount. The Slavic scholar Miklosiö, for example, began writing about subjectless sentences. Then Franz Brentano dealt with the subject, and later Marty in Prague, in particular. They all sought out the rules governing subjectless sentences, such as: “It’s raining,” “It’s snowing,” “There’s lightning,” “There’s thunder,” and so on, because, based on their logic, they could not understand where subjectless sentences come from.

[ 9 ] Subjectless sentences arise precisely because we are very closely connected to the world with regard to certain things, because we exist as a microcosm within the macrocosm, and because our own activity cannot be separated from the activity of the world. When it rains, for example—especially if we don’t have an umbrella—we are very closely connected to the world; we cannot really separate ourselves from it, and we get just as wet as the stones and houses around us. Therefore, in such a case, we do not separate ourselves much from the world; we do not invent a subject, but merely describe the activity. Where we can separate ourselves more from the world—where we can more easily walk away, as in the case of the meadow—that is when we create a subject: “The meadow is green.”

[ 10 ] From this you can see that, in the way we speak to children, we can always take into account how a person interacts with their environment. And by introducing children—especially during lessons devoted to foreign language instruction—to concepts where grammar is linked to the practical logic of everyday life, try to assess how much the child knows about grammar and syntax. However, please avoid, in foreign language instruction, first covering the reading passage and then breaking the language down into its smallest parts or overanalyzing it. Try, as much as possible, to develop grammatical understanding independently. — There was a time when foreign language textbooks contained wonderful sentences because these sentences focused solely on the correct application of grammatical rules. Gradually, this was deemed foolish, and sentences drawn more from real life were incorporated into the books intended to teach foreign languages. But even here, the middle ground is better than veering to one extreme or the other. Similarly, you won’t be able to teach pronunciation well if you use only real-life sentences without being economical in your approach. After all, you’ll have to spend much more time on it if you don’t also use sentences like the ones we discussed yesterday as exercises, such as this one:

[ 11 ] Lalle Lieder lieblich,
Lipplicher Laffe,
Lappiger, lumpiger,
Laichiger Lurch

[ 12 ] where the focus is solely on the nature of language itself. Therefore, try to teach grammar and sentence structure to the children in such a way that you construct sentences specifically designed to illustrate this or that rule. However, you must arrange it so that when you use sentences from one foreign language or another to illustrate grammatical rules, you do not have the children write them down—so that these examples do not end up in their copybooks—but rather that they are practiced; in this way, they are internalized without being preserved in writing. Such an approach contributes immensely to efficiency, particularly in foreign language instruction, because it leads to the children intuitively internalizing the rule and gradually letting go of the examples. If you let the children write down the examples, they become too fixated on the form of the examples. But for grammar instruction, the examples should be omitted; above all, they should not be carefully copied into the textbook—rather, the rule itself should remain. Therefore, you would do well to use exercises and reading passages for the living language—for speaking—as I described earlier, and to cultivate the translation of one’s own thoughts into the foreign language—whereby one’s own thoughts are drawn more from everyday life. For grammar instruction, however, use sentences where you actually assume from the outset that the child will forget them, and that the child will therefore not do what always aids memory: writing them down. For all these activities that you carry out when teaching the child grammar or syntax through sentences—all of this takes place in lively conclusions, and this should not sink into habitual, dreamlike states; it should always take place within fully conscious life.

[ 13 ] Of course, this introduces an element into the classroom that makes the lesson a bit demanding. But you cannot avoid the fact that, in particular, the lessons you teach—especially those aimed at the students you will be taking on in later grades—will require a certain amount of effort on your part. You will have to proceed very efficiently. But this efficiency actually benefits the students. You will need a lot of time to figure out what will make your lessons most efficient. Therefore, grammar and syntax instruction should preferably take place through conversation. For this reason, it is also not advisable to directly hand the children books on grammar and syntax, as these books are currently structured; for while they do contain examples, those examples should really only be discussed. The workbook from which the child is to study grammar and syntax on an ongoing basis should contain only the rules. Therefore, this approach is very, very economical, and you will do the child an immense amount of good if, today, you develop any rule necessary for mastering the language with the child using an example you have invented, and then return to that rule tomorrow or the day after in the same foreign language lesson and encourage the child to come up with an example for it from their own imagination. From a pedagogical and didactic standpoint, do not underestimate the importance of such things. In teaching, subtleties matter immensely. There is a huge difference between simply asking the child about a grammar rule and having them repeat examples from their notebook—where you dictated the example to them—and having you deliberately set up the example you gave so that it is forgotten, and then prompting the child to find an example on their own. This activity—in which the child invents examples on their own—is immensely educational. And you’ll see: even if you have the most unruly students—who are usually inattentive—and you encourage them—which you can do very well simply by being lively and engaged during class—to find examples related to sentence structure, the children will take pleasure in these examples and, in particular, in the activity of finding such examples themselves. And when you bring the children back into the classroom after the long summer break—after they’ve been playing and romping around outside for weeks—you must be aware that, following such weeks, the children have little inclination to switch from playing and romping to sitting quietly in class and listening attentively to the material that is supposed to stick in their memory. But even if this bothers you quite a bit in the first week—and perhaps even in the second week—if you proceed in this way, especially in foreign language classes, by letting the child participate wholeheartedly through the invention of examples, then after three or four weeks in the classroom you will have children who enjoy inventing such examples just as much as they previously enjoyed romping around outside. But you, too, must take care to come up with such examples and not hesitate to make the child aware of this as well. It is very good for the child if, once they have become engaged in this activity, they constantly want to do something like this, so that it might happen that while one child offers an example, another says: “I’ve got one, too”—and then they’ll all want to chime in and share their examples; it’s very good if, at the end of the lesson, you say: “I’m especially pleased that you’re now enjoying this just as much as you enjoyed romping around outside!”—Something like that resonates with the children; they carry it with them all the way home, bring it home, and tell their parents about it during dinner. But you really must say things that the children will be happy to tell their parents later at dinner. And if you even manage to get the child to ask their father or mother during dinner, “Can you think of an example for this rule, too?”—then you’ve really hit the jackpot. These things are achievable, but you have to be fully present in your teaching with your whole heart.

[ 14 ] Just consider what a difference it makes when you engage the child in a thoughtful discussion of the transition from: “it’s raining,” “it’s green,” “the meadow is green,” “the green meadow”—or when you teach grammar and syntax in the way that is so commonly done, by breaking down: “This is an adjective, this is a verb; if a verb stands all by itself, there is not yet a sentence”—if you do not merely string things together, as is often done in grammar books, but develop them in a lively classroom setting. And compare this approach—teaching grammar as it should be done in a lively classroom—with the other approach that is so common: The Latin or French teacher enters the classroom; now the children must take out their Latin or French books or workbooks; they must be prepared; now they are to translate, then they are to read. Now everything is already starting to hurt for them because they can feel the benches. For one would not have had to devote so much care to the benches and desks if the children had been properly educated and taught. It is merely proof that they have not been raised and taught sensibly—that so much care had to be devoted to the design of the desks and tables—because when the children are truly engaged in class, so much vitality enters the classroom that, even when they are sitting, they are not really sitting still at all. And one takes pleasure in the fact that they do not sit still only when one is comfortable oneself; one wants a class that sits as still as possible, a class that then goes home with aching limbs after class is over. These things must also be taken into account especially in grammar and syntax lessons. And now imagine this: the children are supposed to translate—and it is precisely through the very things they should be enjoying that grammar and syntax are developed! Then the child certainly won’t go home and say to his father, “I’m having so much fun with my book; let’s try translating it together.” — This is where it’s important to keep the principle of economy in mind, and this perspective will be particularly useful to you in foreign language instruction.

[ 15 ] We must, of course, ensure that the instruction in grammar and syntax is quite comprehensive. Therefore, we will need to assess the students we are now receiving from the various classes to identify where they have gaps in their knowledge. We will first have to set out to fill these gaps specifically in our grammar and syntax instruction, so that after a few weeks with a class, we can ensure that the previous gaps have been filled and we can then move on. But if we teach as I have described—and as we can if we are fully engaged in the lesson, if we ourselves are interested in the material—then we will properly impart what the children need to learn so that they can later pass any entrance exams for standard secondary schools. And we introduce the children to many other things that ordinary elementary schools simply do not cover—things that give the children vitality and equip them with something that will serve them throughout their entire lives. Now, it would be particularly beneficial if, for foreign language instruction, the organization could ensure that the various languages the children must learn for whatever reason are taught in parallel. An enormous amount of time is wasted when thirteen-, fourteen-, and fifteen-year-old boys and girls are taught Latin by one teacher, French by another, and English by a third. Much, much would be gained if the same idea—developed by one teacher with a student in one language—could also be developed by another student in a different language and by a third student in yet another language. One language would then support the other to a great extent. Of course, such practices can only be pursued to the extent that the necessary resources—in this case, teachers—are available. But what one has should be put to use. The support that one language can provide for the other should be taken into account. This makes it possible, when teaching grammar and sentence structure, to constantly make cross-references from one language to the other, and in doing so, one takes into consideration something that is immensely important for the student.

[ 16 ] As a student, you learn something much better when you have a sense of how to apply it in various ways. So you’ll be able to say to the student: Look, you’ve just said a German sentence and a Latin sentence; in a German sentence, when it refers to oneself, we can almost never omit the “I,” whereas in a Latin sentence, the “I” is already contained within the verb.” — You don’t need to go any further; in fact, it’s not even good to go further, but it is good to emphasize this fact so that the student develops a certain feel for it; then something emanates from this sense that acts as a living ability to grasp other aspects of grammar. And I ask you to take this to heart and think it through thoroughly: that when you conduct lively, active lessons, you are able to generate the very skills you need in the classroom as you teach. It is indeed true. If, for example, you merely touch on something like this—without being pedantic—by telling the child: “The Latin language does not yet have the ‘I’; it is still contained within the verb; the German language does have it”—then, for a moment, an ability awakens in the child that is not otherwise present. That ability has just been awakened, and afterward you can teach grammatical rules to the children more easily once such things have been awakened than if you were to try to draw them out of the children’s usual states of mind. You must reflect on how to develop the necessary abilities for a lesson. The children do not need to possess the abilities you use to their full extent; rather, you must also possess the skill to evoke such abilities, which can then subside again once the child is back in the ordinary state of mind.

[ 17 ] This is particularly relevant in language instruction. And it will be relevant if you structure language instruction around reading—reading correctly and with proper pronunciation; not so much by teaching pronunciation rules, but by having students read aloud and read along, then having them recount what they’ve read, reflect on it, and express those thoughts in the various languages—and, separately from that, teaching grammar and syntax with rules to be memorized and examples to be forgotten. This forms the framework of language instruction.