Recently in the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star, there have been a series of articles focusing on boys and education. A Grade 6 AHWS parent takes a look at what they are saying and what her son is receiving at AHWS:

Canada’s largest school board recommends “boy-friendly” instruction such as hand-on learning and movement for boys. However, all students need these qualities in education. Alan Howard Waldorf School teachers use an integrated curriculum practised since 1918 and addressing different learning styles and intelligences.

“Wow!” and heartbreak are my responses to plans for “boy-friendly” education in Canada:

• “wow!” for a gesture honouring a wider range of learning styles and intelligences
• heartbreak because students don’t come in two styles only – boy and girl

As Alan Howard Waldorf School teachers understand, each child is a unique combination of learning styles, intelligences, and many other factors.

The October 21, 2009 articles in Canada’s Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star both reported that the Toronto District School Board’s director Chris Spence was encouraging “boy-friendly” instruction in the Board (Canada’s largest). Recommendations and examples from Spence include:

• “environments that are hands-on”
• “opportunity to move around”
• “environments in which there is structure but also where [boys are] empowered to move about the classroom”
• making “a point of shaking each boy’s hand every morning”
• “boy-friendly teaching techniques that recognize their different learning styles”

“Huh?” I thought. “That’s what’s happening at my son’s school – for boys and girls.” At AHWS, Waldorf-trained teachers give all students (boys and girls)

• hands-on learning
• environments (indoors and outdoors) that engage each child
• movement
• both structure and empowerment
• a dedicated teacher shaking the student’s hand each morning
• teaching techniques addressing different learning styles and multiple intelligences

And, when I thought about it further, I concluded that Spence and the TDSB report set out admirable goals – but all students need the qualities in education that he notes… and more.

AHWS teachers address each child as a whole child and work to bring balance to each child. Main lesson teachers and specialist teachers all use one integrated curriculum based in a deep understanding of humanity, practiced since 1918, and used in Waldorf schools around the world.

What does that mean for my child – a Grade 6 boy at AHWS? When I look at my son using the terms of Howard Gardner’s “Multiple Intelligences” (and Gardner notes at least seven intelligences), I can say this: My son is naturally a book-loving kid with “linguistic intelligence”, model builder with “spatial intelligence”, and introspective soul with “intrapersonal intelligence.” He is also developing into a keen and sporting team player, musician, wit, and numbers guy – plus enthusiastic camper, climber, cartoonist, and writer. (We can thank the school for overall balance and many unforeseen strengths.) For the child who bounces out of bed and moves all day long, AHWS means honouring his or her “bodily-kinesthetic intelligence”, maybe channeling some of that energy with drumming (“musical intelligence”), stomping out the times tables (“logical-mathematical intelligence”), and reading up on a rebellion to act it out … you get the picture.

Other schools might focus, for example, on two types of child or two types of intelligence (often linguistic intelligence and logical-mathematical intelligence). AHWS and Waldorf education worldwide mean not stereotyping and not limiting each child but rather bringing the best out in each child to be well-rounded individuals, lifelong learners, and positive members of society. It’s the Waldorf vision of hope for boys and girls, humanity, and our planet.

And for that, and specifically my child’s teachers at Alan Howard Waldorf School, I’m very thankful.