Lower School
For ages 6-14
“The question to be asked is not: ‘What does an individual need to know and be capable of doing so as to fit into the existing social order?’ but rather: ‘What potential does an individual have and what can be developed in him or her?’”
Rudolf Steiner
At Elmfield we offer:
- Formal learning that begins at 6, with a teacher who will teach and care for the class for up to eight years
- Learning brought with imaginative and powerful stories, appropriate for the age and learning tasks
- Learning supported by art, rhythmic activities, singing and movement
- Spanish and German taught from age 6, through conversation, games, songs and rhymes
- Academic subjects developed to meet the child’s inner developmental needs and to support their growing awareness of the world around them
- Teaching as an art, not a technique
- Learning as an active process, involving observation and experience
- The international Waldorf Curriculum
Our Main Lessons
- Two hour morning blocks are taught in 3 or 4 week blocks of age appropriate subjects
- Literacy and numeracy teaching are incorporated into these blocks
- Learning is consolidated with recall and artistic work
- Singing, music, painting, movement are used as learning tools not just skills
- Children produce their own main lesson workbooks as they draw, write about and record their learning process
- Science is introduced from observation and experience
This video gives an overview of life in our Lower School (ages 7 to 14). Topics covered include: our age-appropriate curriculum; Class Teachers; our approach to teaching reading and writing; an explanation of Main Lessons; what pupils need at different ages; discipline at Elmfield; our approach to teaching foreign languages; and a pupil’s experience of joining Elmfield aged 10.
More information about the Lower School is also available in our Lower School Curriculum Statement which can be found here.