EPISODE 1: THE VALUE OF THE MAIN LESSON
Didi Offerman and Spero Patricios
What is a Main Lesson?
At Michael Mount Waldorf School, from Classes 1 to 11, we begin each day with a Main Lesson that lasts for the first 2 hours of the school day. Only one topic or theme is explored during this Main Lesson over a 3-to-4-week period. This gives the class ample opportunity to immerse themselves in the content and cover a great deal of work in a significant amount of detail.
The chosen themes cover a broad range of disciplines and skills, from languages, mathematics, and physical and life sciences to history and geography.
Each day is organised as an integrated and organic whole, and meaningful connections are made across all the subjects. In this way, all the necessary work is covered during the year and often the teacher is able to go beyond the standard requirements, thanks to the bulk allocation of time that the Main Lesson provides to work through each theme.
Considerable care is given to the preparation of these lessons and the teacher frequently adjusts both the work and its delivery in reaction to the response from the class. Each class is unique and brings its own questions and focus and this often results in daily adjustments to the lesson plan. Although all the material is covered each time, no two Main Lesson classes are ever identical.
The whole Main Lesson is permeated with rhythm, structure, and purpose instead of just a chain of events.
How does a typical day start at Michael Mount?
Firstly, each day, the children begin with a morning verse. This is followed by poetry and singing, or mental arithmetic or the recalling of previous material or music. This is used to harness the will in the child and centre them for harmonious learning. The children are then presented with that day’s new material and discussion is encouraged. Finally, the later portion of the Main Lesson time is dedicated to individual working in their Main Lesson books, which includes writing in the relevant content for that day and adding beautiful borders and illustrations to complete the task.
Will, Feeling, and Intellect: A 3-fold system of learning
In the younger grades, the focus is predominantly on the will, which is the ability to meet and overcome resistance. That resistance may come from inside the self, or it may be outside the self. Either way, a strong will is able to meet and overcome resistance.
To develop will, much time is allocated to physical activities and engaging the children in doing. This makes use of their abundance of energy, through rhymes, rhythm, games, and movement. It helps them to settle down and sit still for the intellectual portion of the Main Lesson and, for example, listen intently to a story about the theme they are covering, and create their own drawings and writing to accompany it.
Connecting to the will and the feeling of the children through story telling provides them with food for their souls and allows them to feel a connection with the more intellectual components of the lesson as they start writing and drawing in their books.
As the children get older, less time is spent on developing the will, and imaginative learning gives way to rational, complex, and independent intellect.
Rhythm and balance
The Main Lesson also allows for a natural three-day rhythm in which the children are presented with a concept on the first day, then recall or repeat it the following day, and only on the third day do they write the information into their books. This allows the children time to process the ideas, and for the concepts to settle into their thoughts and become a permanent part of them.
The teachers really experience how ‘sleeping on it’ and recall makes a difference in the quality of the memories that the children form.
Covering a theme intensively over a month instead of working in bits and pieces throughout the year allows children to form a well-rounded understanding of each topic, so that when they need to build on it in later years, their foundation is solid.
Main lesson books
Anything that can be clearly pictured by the child activates an emotional connection, making it effortless and enjoyable to learn and remember the information being taught.
For this reason, Michael Mount children are guided through the process of creating their own workbooks, each of them collecting the knowledge imparted by their teacher themselves. This instils within each child a sense of direct engagement with the material and allows them to comprehend the information in a format that suits them best. In addition, Waldorf students start to feel that they own the knowledge they are acquiring. This creates a sense of purpose, responsibility, and satisfaction.
These Main Lesson books replace textbooks. Creating their own workbooks allows the students to make the connection between the content and themselves that much stronger. Specifically in the primary school, we work with beauty so that the children may learn that the world is beautiful and that they can contribute to its beauty through their own actions.
For this reason, the lesson books need to be beautiful with thought-out spacing, no lines, and creative structure. Creating beautiful, artistic work allows the children to develop a positive emotional connection with their learning. Value is placed on proportion, and the use of proper cursive writing with a fountain pen. The teacher’s board work also needs to be beautiful, to inspire and guide the children in their own work.
Final thoughts
Teaching children in this manner throughout their schooling is a fruitful practice, and truly caters for a holistic, well-rounded education that will equip students for the rest of their lives. If a child has truly worked with and experienced beauty in their earlier years of learning, this transforms into morality later in life. Likewise, developing will in young children cultivates human beings who are motivated, driven, and capable of independence, while intellectual work slowly transforms into clear, conscious thinking.
Please note that this is not a verbatim transcript and has been re-organised for a pleasant reading experience.
