Raising kids in a one-world environment
When I grow up, when I grow up…
Oh, what shall I be…?
When I grow up?
A long time ago, I starred in a grade school play that was about what we young boys each wanted to be when we grew up. I sang the verse above as the lead-in to the other boys who then came in and expressed their ambitions in various Pinoy Dream Academy-like numbers (such as the farmer-boy’s “Old McDonald had a farm” song-and-dance extravaganza). My role was that of the confused kid who, amid a confusing world, didn’t know what he wanted to be. I even remember attempting “method acting” and tried to immerse myself in my character by wearing a dirty and torn shirt straight from the hamper. I think I only succeeded in immersing myself in body odor. I cringe when I think of it now, but despite all of our pa-cute efforts, we actually dealt with a pretty mature topic that is even more relevant today. For if it was difficult for my generation then to figure out what to do with our lives, I think that it’s even more complicated for today’s youth who also have to deal with the full impact of globalization.
Yet when some of our policymakers talk nowadays about improving our educational system in order to better prepare the Filipino to face the world, it sometimes feels more like they are trying to re-tool an assembly line in a factory. It sometimes seems more like we are in the business of mass producing an export commodity rather than molding human beings. Thus when problems of Philippine education are cited, what is usually stressed are things like the decline in English and Math proficiencies, the lack of financial resources, backward teaching techniques, etc. These are, of course, all important issues that need to be addressed. But I think that these problems are, as my father would say, more in the realm of effects, not of causes; they pertain to the surface, not the essence, of the main problem.
My father once wrote that it’s a paradox of human cognition that in order to grasp the universal, man must first perceive the individual. Before he can comprehend beauty, he must perceive a beautiful thing. He said that a similar paradox exists in the real order. A thing becomes most universal when it is most individual, for only then can it have something most in common with all things; that is, its individuality. I think that the same can be said of our children and how we should prepare them to live in a global village. Rather than merely trying to make them fit into so-called global standards, we should endeavor to nurture each child’s uniqueness and develop them into independent and free-thinking individuals.
This is not, however, something that can be done part-time or treated separately like an elective subject. It has to be a holistic approach that permeates all the stages and facets of a child’s education. While there may be other valid approaches, one good model is Steiner education (also commonly referred to as Waldorf education). Founded in the 1920s, Steiner/Waldorf education is one of the largest and fastest-growing non-traditional educational movements in the world and is now in over 50 countries. In fact, the Manila Waldorf School, the pioneer school of Steiner education in the Philippines, recently hosted an international teacher conference involving up to 300 Waldorf teachers from around the world. Interestingly, many of the delegates were from China where there has been an explosion of Waldorf kindergartens.
As the accompanying cartoon to this article humorously illustrates, Steiner/Waldorf schools aim to produce unconventional students who have minds of their own. To do this, they seek to educate the child in a way that mirrors his unique development from childhood to adulthood. The curriculum for each stage revolves around a particular theme and is as broad as time will allow, and balances academics subjects with artistic and practical activities. Learning is non-competitive and relatively stress-free. The child is encouraged to ask questions and to develop critical thinking. The child, in fact, actually makes his own “textbooks.” Through this approach, a genuine love of learning is created within each child and an internal motivation to learn is developed. The child’s uniqueness is nurtured as early as kindergarten where the emphasis is on imagination and play; on awakening the child to the wonders of the world and thereby developing a deep reverence for it. There are no formal academics at these very early years although there is a good deal of cultivation of pre-academic skills (Waldorf educators believe, as more and more sectors are now also affirming, that premature intellectualism, coupled with excessive exposure to media, may not only drain and negatively affect the future learning of the younger child; it could also be one of the causes of the increasing incidences of ADHD-type behaviors.). In the lower to middle elementary grades, the focus shifts to the use of artistic elements. The stress on the arts is not just to promote self-expression, but also serves as a vehicle to learn, understand, and relate to the world in the broadest sense of the word. In the upper elementary grades up to high school, this leads in steps to an ever more conscious cultivation of an observing, reflecting, and experimental scientific attitude.
In order to better prepare our children to function in a one-world environment intellectually, professionally, and humanistically, the answer is not to turn them into androids, who may be efficient, but are nevertheless still robots. Rather, we should help them blossom into the unique individuals God made them. This brave new global world of our children is like a banquet. And as my father taught me, each person should bring to the party his own banquet of treasures. The Japanese would bring his own, so would the French, the American, the Indian, and every other nationality. For more truth and beauty is revealed in more varied forms and more varied aspects. And the Filipino must come to the banquet with his own individuality. Only by being individual can he be natural. Only by being natural can he become universal and truly a global citizen.
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Call 374-2922 or visit www.manilawaldorfschool.edu.ph if you are interested to know more about Steiner education and the Manila Waldorf School (MWS). MWS is also interested in partnering with parents or teachers who want to set up Waldorf kindergartens in communities in the areas of Quezon City, Marikina, and San Mateo (Rizal).
Please e-mail your reactions to kindergartendad@yahoo.com.
