Spiritual Syllabus & Golden Beetle Books: Geneii of Language
Sunday, August 31st, 2003Kytka’s Reviews: Spiritual Syllabus & Golden Beetle Books: Geneii of Language
Geneii of Language (was curriculum/math stories)
From the Prologue, “The miracle of words calls on the ego forces of the writer, speaker/listener, and reader – it calls on the Self. The potential in children for self-expression is enhanced by a comprehensive, consistent, and creative language education – this small manual is directed to these high ends.”
Like most of the Golden Beetles, the Geneii of Language is a small booklet, about 90 pages and about 5″ x 7′. It focuses on the language arts main lessons and middle lessons for the first and second grades. (more…)
QUESTION: I just recently purchase 3 of Alan Whitehead’s SSS: Genii of Lanugage & Numeria (both for class 1&2) and A Steiner Homeschool? My question is this, Mr. Whitehead speaks of 3 lesson streams: mains, middles & blocks. I think most of us are familiar with the idea of a “main lesson” that lasts 3-5 weeks. It seems that at our local schools, other ongoing subjects are then organized for the late morning & afternoon hours (handwork, music, eurthymy, games, etc.) But Mr. Whitehead’s book seems to organize all the other subjects into the ‘middle’ or ‘block’ lesson (late a.m. and afternoon); and they rotate in their emphasis (such as numeracy, literacy, etc.) similarly to the main lessons. Do you know where I can get more info on this method? Is this method specific to Australia? Any feedback on pros/cons of organizing lessons in this manner?
The Spiritual Syllabus Series is by far the most comprehensive catalogue of the Rudolf Steiner teaching program ever produced. There are approximately 50 teaching units detailed in each year – each usually taught in the 3-week ‘block’ system (as opposed to ‘period’ teaching) of from 23 to 30 hours. For instance, in the Class 3 and 4 Language book below, Logios, the ‘12 Points of Punctuation’ refers to a whole 30-hour unit, as does every other annotation. The books cover the four main academic strands of modern schooling. In the spirit of balance, so important in Steiner Education; these are Language; Maths; Social Studies; Science there are 24 books, 6 in each of 4 subject streams. These provide a full Steiner academic curriculum from Class 1 to 12.
