The Steiner method of teaching reading

Practice at Steiner schools varies depending on the way in which the class teacher interprets Rudolph Steiner’s original teachings and the ability level of the class.

However, there are certain key aspects of literacy instruction that are common to all Steiner classrooms (Bus & Kruizenga, 1986). Principally that reading should be taught in a flexible, non-pressurised manner in which children are allowed to progress at their own pace; ‘at this age it is less important that the children begin to read right away than they become certain that, in time, they will be reading’ (Schwartz, 2009, Class 2, Writing and Reading). Guidance for teachers on how to teach reading at Steiner schools is provided in Steiner’s ‘Practical advice to teachers’ (1919/1976).

Crucially, the Steiner curriculum is based on what Rudolf Steiner indicated would be appropriate for children of each age in accordance with his view of child

development. Up until the age of seven the child’s energy is channelled mainly into physical growth and is therefore not available for academic study. The transition to the next stage is characterised by the loss of milk teeth which typically occurs at this age: ‘if we teach him [reading] before the change of teeth …. then we are giving him things that lie right outside his nature and to which he has not the slightest relationship’ (Steiner, 1924/1982 p.40). The process of teaching reading is experiential and continually related to the emotional and physical world. Pictures and images are used to stimulate the child’s imagination which is considered the main gateway to learning for children of this age.

In Class 1 (6-7 years), the children are first taught how to form the capital of each letter with a crayon. Consonant letter forms are taught as emerging from pictures of animals and objects which begin with the target letter (see Figure 1.1). Such an approach is designed to echo the natural evolution of letter symbols as human expression through pictures (Rawson & Richter, 2000). After each letter is drawn, its corresponding name (and sometimes sound) is taught. Children draw pictures of each letter and surround them with drawings of words which begin with the same sound or name. Vowels are introduced with reference to emotional expressions e.g., the ‘Oh’ sound made when surprised is related to the name of the letter ‘O’ while the form of the letter is related to the shape one makes with their arms when embracing someone.

Figure 1.1. Illustration of the letter B emerging from a picture of a bear climbing a tree

Note. Reproduced from Bus & Kruizenga, 1986.

In Class 2 (7-8 years), books are introduced into the classroom and children are taught to read and write whole words through a mixture of whole sentence and phonic work. Due to the fact that this is the first year in which children were expected to read/spell whole words independently, it was considered the first year of formal reading instruction in the current thesis. A defining feature of the Steiner approach at this time is the ‘recitation method’; children copy complete sentences from the board (which they cannot yet read) and learn to recite them off by heart. Through regular recitation, they learn to recognise the various words, and, in time, identify them in new contexts (Rawson & Richter, 2000; Schwartz, 2009). In order to stimulate this process, the teacher points to words or phrases in a random order, or has the class read the text from the back to front. To avoid embarrassing any child who feels that he/she can’t keep up, these exercises are always carried out as a whole class activity.

Whole sentence work (using the recitation method) is supplemented by phonic work. During Class 2, children begin learning lower case letters and the focus is turned to letter sounds in addition to names (e.g., the difference between long and short vowel sounds). A defining feature of this work is emphasis on the initial phoneme (onset), with

only minimal referral to phonemes in other positions. For example, pantomime-type games are played during which children have to guess which words begin with a certain letter; these words are then written on the board by the teacher (Bus & Kruizenga, 1986). Such an approach is similar to the analytic phonics method formerly practised in mainstream schools in the UK (Rose, 2006). In Class 3 (8-9 years), literacy instruction is extended to include more whole book work. Printed booklets are used, but the method is roughly the same as in Class 2; the teacher first reads the text, after which the children read along together. At this time, parents are invited in to run weekly reading groups. No particular reading scheme is followed; rather, texts are selected by the class teacher on the basis of content and quality of illustrations.

Bus and Kruizenga, (1986) tested children in Classes 1-3 at a Steiner school in the Netherlands. At the end of Class 1, only 5% of children achieved 80% or more correct on a word reading test. This was in contrast to previous work by the first author which found that 85% of children of the same age in a standard primary school achieved this level of accuracy by the end of their first year (Bus, 1984). Additionally, 20% of the Steiner children still could not successfully decode simple CV, VC and CVC words at the end of class 2. Analysis of spelling errors revealed that the majority of errors were made on the middle vowel sound, followed by the end consonant, with the least number of errors made on the initial consonant. This is consistent with the analytic approach to phonics advocated in Steiner schools where initial sounds are emphasised first.

The authors concluded that, as a result of the Steiner method of teaching reading, the children in their study struggled to implement basic decoding strategies in

‘less able’ children (lowest 20% on word reading). The authors claimed that these difficulties were caused by a lack of synthesis skills and poor knowledge of vowel sounds. Consequently, they recommended that Steiner teachers needed to spend more time teaching letter sounds, and that more focus needed to be given to segmenting and blending whole words at the level of the phoneme.