The first Steiner Waldorf School was opened in Stuttgart, Germany in 1919 for the children of workers at the Waldorf Astoria cigarette factory. It is from this origin and the naming of the school that the term Waldorf arises and is used interchangeably, or together with, Steiner to describe the education movement be founded.

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Caroline von Heydebrand, one of the original teachers of that school, created the first comprehensive curriculum for Steiner Waldorf Schools from the many suggestions Steiner made to teachers during meetings and lectures. Her comments below remain as pertinent today as they were in the 1920s:

 

The ideal curriculum must be modelled on the changing image of the human being passing through different phases while growing up. But like any ideal it is confronted by the reality of life and must accommodate itself accordingly. This reality comprises many things: the individuality of the teacher, the class itself with all the peculiarities of everypupil in it, the moment in history, the education authorities and education laws prevailing at the place where the school that is wanting to implement the curriculum is located. All these factors modify the ideal curriculum and call for transformation and discussion. The educational task with which the growing human being confronts us can only be achieved if the curriculum remains mobile and pliable.

( Heydebrand, in Rawson and Richter, 2000, p. 16)

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In the two weeks leading up to the opening of the first Waldorf School in Stuttgart on 7 September 1919 Rudolf Steiner gave a preparatory seminar for the group of candidates from which 12 would be chosen to be the first teachers.  

“Every day during this time Rudolf Steiner gave three courses of fourteen lectures each, and these three courses, together, constitute the initial cornerstone upon which the new educational venture was to be built.”

(Steiner, The Foundations of Human Experience, 1996, pp. 16-17)  

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The three courses were documented in “The Foundations of Human Experience” (also known as “The Study of Man”; GA293), “Practical Advice to Teachers” (GA294) and “Discussions with Teachers” (GA295), and became the foundational indications for Waldorf education. 

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While Rudolf Steiner continued to work with the teachers in the first Waldorf school until his death in 1925, his indications and advice were predominantly given in discussions and lectures, and he was unable to develop them systematically. 

 

It fell to Dr Caroline von Heydebrand, one of the foundation teachers, to collect Steiner’s curriculum indications and publish an overview in 1925.  

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In 1955 E. A. Karl Stockmeyer, who had also been one of the founding teachers, published a more comprehensive collection of source texts. Its title, Rudolf Steiners Lehrplan für die Waldorfschulen (Rudolf Steiner’s Curriculum for Waldorf Schools) was therefore somewhat misleading.  

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Neither C. von Heydebrand nor Karl Stockmeyer intended their publications to become programmatic or dogmatic curriculum documents, yet they did contribute to the establishment of a teaching canon, or curriculum of sorts. 

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C. von Heydebrand was very clear that the Waldorf curriculum needed to be continually responsive: 

“The ideal curriculum must be modelled on the changing image of the human being passing through different phases while growing up. But like any ideal it is confronted by the reality of life and must accommodate itself accordingly. This reality comprises many things: the individuality of the teacher, the class itself with all the peculiarities of every pupil in it, the moment in history, the education authorities and education laws prevailing at the place where the school that is wanting to implement the curriculum is located. All these factors modify the ideal curriculum and call for transformation and discussion. The educational task with which the growing human being confronts us can only be achieved if the curriculum remains mobile and pliable.”

(v. Heydebrand, in Rawson & Richter, 2000, p. 16) 

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In 1992 the Hague Circle (now the International Forum for Steiner/Waldorf Education) initiated the development of a general framework curriculum. Tobias Richter led an international working group which published a first draft for review in 1995. The revised first edition was published in 2003 in German under the title Pädagogischer Auftrag und Unterrichtsziele – vom Lehrplan der Waldorfschule (Educational Task and Teaching Goals – About the Waldorf School Curriculum).  

 

Martyn Rawson took on this work in England and published The Educational Tasks and Content of the Steiner Waldorf Curriculum in 2000. 

 

The SEANZ Steiner Waldorf curriculum takes up this framework and makes it relevant for schools in Aotearoa New Zealand. ​​​