The Rudolf Steiner Archive

21. Speech at the Ceremony Marking the Start of the Sixth School Year

[ 1 ] My dear children, students! First of all, you’ll need to sit quietly and pay attention for a moment, because the first people I’d like to address are the parents—the parents we are fortunate to have here with us at our great celebration, those who have brought very young children to us, and the parents who have sent their older children to the Waldorf School.

[ 2 ] Dear parents of our students! We can certainly appreciate and honor the state of mind in which you find yourselves today. Those who have already traveled a considerable distance through life—as is the case with parents—know that life brings many trials, both painful and joyful; trials that bring suffering, but also joy; and they have the most precious thing life has given them: their children. We here—who seek to lead and guide the Waldorf School—know very well indeed what it means to make the decision: Where should I send my child? For one makes this decision based on the experiences one has had in one’s own life, and one wants the child to be able to navigate this life—which one knows so well—in the best possible way.

[ 3 ] It cannot be my task today to speak about the way in which we intend to prepare children for life by drawing them out of all the depths of existence through proper and humane instruction and a proper and humane upbringing. But you can rest assured that what emerges from our pedagogy, from our art of education, is that we know how to appreciate what it means for parents to send their children to school and thereby set them on a lasting path in life. With this sense of truly comprehensive responsibility, we want to receive the children from the hands with which you bring them to us today, and assure you that we truly understand what that means.

[ 4 ] But let us also come together in this spirit: may today’s moment be repeated often. We at the Waldorf School—a school not yet widely recognized—need the support we can gain through strong collaboration with parents. That is why I ask you to visit the school often—whether to consult with us or for other reasons. What we and you want for the children will be achieved in the best possible way if we can work together with the parents’ home in a powerful way. From the school’s side, we want to try to carry this out to the fullest extent.

[ 5 ] Now I’d like to speak to the children who are at school for the first time today. You don’t really need to understand all that much yet. Today you’ve been introduced to something that you’re already partly familiar with, and which you’ll now have to start learning. You’ve loved your parents so far—you know how to do that. You’ll also have to learn to love your teachers very much. If you love your teachers, you’ll learn all sorts of things, even as other things are added. But that will happen very gradually. You’ll have to learn to sit quietly for a while sometimes; but when the class is over, you can run around outside again—but not too fast, so you don’t bump your head. You must also always be very kind to one another. Above all, you must learn to sit quietly, to love your teachers, and to make sure that you stay healthy and that the others stay healthy too.

[ 6 ] As you sit here, from the lowest to the highest grade, you heard some very true words today from our dear first-grade teacher: The little ones have become something completely different from what they used to be; they have become schoolchildren. That was just said. One can become a schoolchild, but I would like to say this now, linking the lowest grades with the highest: Once you enter school, you never leave it. You will leave the Waldorf School—some after completing the eighth grade, others after higher grades. We have, after all, had to send out into the world for the first time those who have completed the highest grade. But once all that is behind you, that is when you truly enter school. For the most important and significant school is the school of life, and when you leave school, you are only just entering the school of life. And our task is to be the preparatory school for the school of life.

[ 7 ] Then there are those I must turn to last. So now I turn to your dear teachers. I have to say, when I look at the school this way: The most important people among the schoolchildren are the teachers! The fact that they ever came to the school in the first place is what matters most to the school, because they are always learning. And do you know who they want to learn from most of all? More than anything, they want to learn from you! How you best cope with suffering and joy, how you are when you’re healthy and when you’re sick—they want to learn all of that. They have so much to learn from you so that, out of their deep love for you, they can help you become people who can stand firmly in life.

[ 8 ] Above all, one thing is necessary here—something I always say, but which I would like to say once more, because it cannot be said often enough. In a Waldorf school, what the teachers do, they do with the deepest joy. We know that we are working on the great life out there with what is most important in that great life: we are working with the beginnings of life. When I see those beaming faces on the first day—and those of our dear students who have been here longer and who have always answered me when I asked, “Do you love your teachers?”—when I see all of you like this, I would like to say something today as well. You spent the vacation without your teachers. Now, everything at school will go well only if you can once again answer a certain question for me. After all, people tend to forget some things. But there’s one thing you must not forget. You have planted love for your teachers deep in your hearts. You’ve assured me of that time and again. Now that you’ve been away for a while, I ask you: Did you forget your love for your teachers during the break? If you haven’t forgotten it, answer with a clear “No.” [The children shout: “No!”] That is what will set you on the right path for the new school year. Then you’ll be attentive and hardworking, and everything will go quite well.

[ 9 ] My students in the highest grade—that is, dear teachers! Let us work courageously and with enthusiasm to embrace our lessons and education, and to prepare for the school of life in this new school year as well. May it be so, and then the school will be guided by the highest Leader, by Christ Himself. May this be the way of things in this school. Let us move forward out of enthusiasm for the cause and also out of love for the children, in whom the teachers find such joy and with whom they can work so well. Let us continue our work with love and enthusiasm in the children’s hearts, and with love and enthusiasm in the teachers’ hearts.

[ 10 ] Onward, my dear children and my dear teachers, onward!