The primary years offer a caring environment, with learning occurring through experiences of beauty, truth and healthy authority. The teacher introduces each part of the curriculum at the right stage in the children’s development to meet and satisfy their inner needs. The primary teacher’s task is to present all the subjects in a living way, involving the whole child in the learning process. This approach is unique to Steiner education.
Reaching their full potential
Our integrated curriculum enables students to engage the full range of their faculties at every stage of development. The arts and practical skills play an essential part in the educational process throughout the classes. They are not considered luxuries, but fundamental to human growth and development.
Across the primary school years, a caring relationship and understanding is fostered between the child, the teacher and the class as a whole. Each class teacher leads the child and class through the challenges and joys of six years of growing up. Whilst the children may not have the same class teacher for the full six years, the task and approach of the class teacher is based on the same principles.
Academic outcomes
In terms of the children’s academic progress, it should be noted that at Aurora Steiner, we fulfil on all the requirements and outcomes of the standard NSW curriculum. We do this however within the much broader and richer context of the Steiner curriculum, and with some approved variations in the order in which we bring the content. Formal instruction in literacy and numeracy begins in Class 1, in the year that the children generally turn 7, and builds on play-based foundational work that is brought in the early years. Skill-building moves quickly in the lower grades of the primary school, and our intention is that by the end of Class 3, the children’s academic standards are on par with their counterparts in non-Steiner schools.
When the connection to nature and the love of learning combine, creative moments are born that inspire the imagination and feed the soul.
Halina, Year 1 class teacher
