Research BulletinResearch Research Bulletin Volume XXII Volume Spring/Summer 2017 Volume XXII • Number 1 • Number 1 Research Institute for Waldorf Education Waldorf for Institute Research RESEARCH INSTITUTE FOR WALDORF PUBLICATIONS at the RESEARCH INSTITUTE FOR WALDORF EDUCATION 38 Main Street Chatham, NY 12037 EDUCATIONWaldorf Table of Contents From the Editor . 3 Elan Leibner Technology and the Consciousness Soul Ideas for Educators of the New Generation. 5 Christof Wiechert Beyond the Virtual Sensorium. 12 Jason Yates Computer Science for Ninth and Tenth Grades. .19 Charles Weems Computers and Intelligence . 25 Harlan Gilbert Technology and the Laws of Thought Part 2 . 33 Gopi Krishna Vijaya Technology and the Celebration of Work as Developed in Waldorf Education. 51 David Mitchell Dyslexia in the Waldorf Classroom Survey of North American Waldorf Schools. 60 Lalla Carini Book Review: Postformal Education: A Philosophy for Complex Futures by Jennifer Gidley. 66 David K. Scott Research Bulletin • Spring/Summer 2017 • Volume 22 • #1 2 • Table of Contents Report from the Online Waldorf Library . 69 Marianne Alsop Report from Waldorf Publications . 70 Patrice Maynard About the Research Institute for Waldorf Education. 71 Research Bulletin • Spring/Summer 2017 • Volume 22 • #1 From the Editor Elan Leibner ear Readers, Charles Weems is another unusual This issue of the Research Bulletin is the second contributor. He has 40 years of college teaching Dconsecutive one devoted almost entirely to the experience in computer science and 28 textbooks theme of technology. Two of the articles are to his credit. For the past 15 years he has taught second installments of longer pieces, while all but at the Hartsbrook School in Massachusetts, one of the others are entirely new contributions. and in his article he describes a curriculum Every author recognizes this topic as one of the he has developed for ninth and tenth grades. essential conundrums of our time. It is clear Weems is intent on bringing his students to a that the development of digital capabilities clear experience of the differences between a has created a void of corresponding moral and human being and a machine, and counts on this ethical capacities for using those capabilities experience to help orient them toward their appropriately, and, in one form or another, all of uniquely human tasks. the articles grapple with this void. Harlan Gilbert meditates on similar themes. Christof Wiechert, former head of the He looks for the tasks that technological develop- Pedagogical Section in Dornach, addresses the ment has placed before modern humanity and need for education to embed technology in the adds to the conversation an important theme: widest human context. Following Alvin Toffler’s the redemption of the very beings to whom our description of the three waves of technological technological devices have given an abode. He innovation, Wiechert connects this sequence challenges us to cultivate the twin attributes to Rudolf Steiner’s evolution of consciousness. of freedom and love and suggests some of the He argues for overcoming the one-sided requisite attitudes that can lead us forward. intellectualization of society and education in The second installment of Gopi Krishna favor of a comprehensive integration of the full Vijaya’s contribution on Technology and the Laws range of human potential. of Thought enters directly into the historical Jason Yates continues his superb treatment evolution of thinking and logic. He shows with of current trends in technological development an abundance of examples and detail how the with the contemplation of artificial intelligence modern attitudes about the nature of thinking and virtual reality. Building on the theme of and consciousness evolved from Greek to modern the digital gesture developed in the first article times. He then points to the inherent flaws and (Research Bulletin 21-2, Autumn/Winter 2016), holes in restricting the possibility for thinking he points at the dangers and assumptions, often to transcend its supposed limits. His essay is indistinguishable from each other, that must not an easy read, but those who persevere be met and challenged if we are to maintain will be rewarded with fruits of a thoroughly a humane and moral environment. Yates is an researched and painstakingly mapped journey unusual “bird”: a therapeutic eurythmist highly of our perception of the mind. It is a significant literate in technology who is a fine explicator of contribution to our theme of technology. digital esoterica in a language that laypeople The final contribution dealing directly with can understand. technology is from the Research Institute’s late Research Bulletin • Spring/Summer 2017 • Volume 22 • #1 4 • From the Editor co-director, David Mitchell. It is an article derived rapid increase of the free resources available from a talk he gave in Norway in 2012 and stands through the Online Waldorf Library. up remarkably well to the changes that have Finally, a personal note: This is my final issue come about since it was written. Mitchell was as editor of the Research Bulletin. I came onboard prescient in seeing the challenges, opportunities, for Volume 16 back in 2011 and have enjoyed and pedagogical implications of computer this task very much. The opportunity to sift technology. He convened the first Waldorf high through the research and the contributions has school teachers’ colloquium addressing this topic given me additional appreciation for the striving in the late 1980s and was immediately concerned and integrity that people all over the world are with incorporating and balancing, rather than bringing to their tasks as Waldorf teachers. avoiding or attacking, the emerging technological As editor, I have tried to shift the focus of reality. the Bulletin from having been a publication Lalla Carini reports on a survey she that aimed to present Waldorf education to the conducted regarding the way dyslexia is academic community toward the needs of those diagnosed and treated in Waldorf schools. She who are our actual readers, namely practicing points out that schools differ greatly in the way Waldorf educators. My guiding question has they approach this important issue and that been: Is there a new thought in this piece, there is a need for teachers, therapists, and something that an experienced Waldorf teacher parents to work together in order to support will find quickening for his or her work? With students. We decided to include this report Douglas Gerwin, my late wife Tertia Gale, and me, in an issue dedicated to technology because we had three seasoned Waldorf folks who had to there is no question that the natural follow-up find something intriguing and worthwhile if an to a discussion of technology in a pedagogical article was to appear in these pages. I hope that context is therapeutic considerations. Though you, the readers, have indeed found the articles dyslexia is not directly attributable to the stimulating and supportive. influence of technology, Carini’s report can point Douglas, Tertia, and Ann Erwin (layout) have the way towards a collaborative approach to all been a terrific team with whom to work. The therapeutic questions. commitment they have for making sure that David Scott, former Chancellor of the the T’s are crossed and the I’s dotted goes well University of Massachusetts, reviews Jennifer beyond what my skill and patience could have Gidley’s new book, Postformal Education: managed. I also want to express my gratitude to A Philosophy for Complex Futures. Gidley began John Wulsin, who took over as a guest editor for her career as a Waldorf teacher and incorporates the previous issue while I was coping with Tertia’s a deep appreciation of Steiner’s insights into her passing and left several pieces in the hopper for discussion. She is a highly regarded academic this issue. in her native Australia and elsewhere. We are Happy readings! thankful that Arthur Zajonc, Board President of the Research Institute, suggested our publication to Dr. Scott. Reports on the activities of the Research Authors who wish to have articles considered Institute for Waldorf Education close out the for publication in the Research Bulletin issue. Patrice Maynard reports on the many should submit them directly to the Editor at: projects she is spearheading at Waldorf [email protected]. Publications, and Marianne Alsop reports on the Research Bulletin • Spring/Summer 2017 • Volume 22 • #1 Technology and the Consciousness Soul Ideas for Educators of the New Generation Christof Wiechert n this article I look at the development of the influence of the railway tracks that, like long technology and the Consciousness Soul in relation spindly fingers, stretched across the American Ito the question of freedom and the future. I have continent toward the West, following the fleeing chosen certain images, not for their own purpose buffalo and Native Americans. A few years later but as illustrations of symptoms that point to came the internal combustion engine (the “Otto transcendent realities working in and through motor”) and the Diesel engine, two inventions them. that dramatically changed the landscape of In his book The Third Wave,1 written towards Europe and America. the end of the twentieth century, the futurologist Toffler names these industrial changes the Alvin Toffler describes how, for five thousand “first wave,” in which physical energy, the power years and more, technology had no widespread of human muscles and human work, is replaced impact on human life. Of course, there were by machines. Soon thereafter comes essentially technical inventions, but they did not significantly a second Industrial Revolution, but we do not change our lifestyle and culture. To be sure, we use that name. With the harnessing of electric know that during times of war, energy, we soon enter the age the ancient Greeks employed With the advent of the of the telegraph and later the technical inventions such as Industrial Revolution, telephone, telex, radio, and burning projectiles that they technological inventions finally television.