The Essential Waldorf Conferences
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About The Essential Waldorf Conferences
One hundred fifty years ago, intrepid pioneers ventured beyond the comfort and predictability of their East Coast and Midwestern homes to explore the unknown rugged and beautiful terrain of southwestern Colorado. For the past three summers, a new group of pioneers – Waldorf teachers and home schooling parents striving to strengthen and deepen their work – have left their Coastal and Midwestern homes and joined a group of master teachers -- among them, Eugene Schwartz, Roberto Trostli, Karl Johnson, Monica Lander, and Marilyn Fox -- in southwestern Colorado to take part in the Essential Conferences.
The Essential Conferences provide an opportunity for teachers in Waldorf and Waldorf-methods schools to prepare for the coming year. During the course of a three or four day intensive, teachers explore the developmental changes that children in their grade will be undergoing, as well as the curricular and social tools the teacher will need to meet those changes. Waldorf education is developmentally based, and age appropriateness is a principle central to Waldorf education. With this in mind, every Essential Conference is dedicated to one grade only, so that teachers may immerse themselves in the pedagogical and developmental domain of a particular age group.
All Waldorf education conferences provide teachers with an understanding of what they will teach and how they will teach it. The Essential Conferences encourage teachers to examine the when and the why as well. By going deeply into the developmental changes that affect the child in a given grade, we gain insight into the way in which the life of the classroom and the content of a lesson meet these physiological and psychological milestones. By exploring the anthroposophical foundations of Waldorf education we can develop greater confidence in our own capacity to access the sources of soul and spirit out of which Waldorf education has arisen.
The pristine beauty of southwestern Colorado, where granite peaks have been described as "sunlight turned to stone," forms the backdrop for our conferences. The base camp of Deer Hill Expeditions Center provides us with accommodations, delicious meals, and classroom spaces. The majestic and mysterious ruins of Mesa Verde National Monument seem to hover over our work, while the snow-capped San Juan Mountains to the east and the arid and colorful deserts of Utah and New Mexico are only slightly more distant to the south and the west. The dry, moderate climate, the ever-changing sky and the vivifying breezes create an atmosphere that is ceaselessly refreshing, even after a full day of conference work.
In his lectures on Geographic Medicine, Rudolf Steiner spoke of the powerful electromagnetic currents that surge through the Rocky Mountains, which become tangible in the continual play of nocturnal lightning visible in the mountains around the conference site. He alluded to the presence of strong ahrimanic forces in this area and described that the transformation and redemption of such forces was a central task of our time. What better place could be found to hold Waldorf conferences! And it should not surprise us that there are nine Waldorf schools in and around the Colorado Rockies, including a developing school (in a town whose population is less than 2,000) five minutes away from the Deer Hill base camp.
Click on this link to view a Google satellite map of the Deer Hill base camp:
Sample Schedules More About Our Setting Our Faculty
Conference Evaluations: What Participants Say Hear a Lecture Excerpt by Eugene Schwartz
Deer Hill Expeditions Center millennialchild.com The 2006 Essential Grades Six & Seven Conferences on CDs
