Eurythmy as inaugurated by Rudolf Steiner brings rhythm and inner life into the arbitrary, spasmodic movements of the childs limbs and charms the chaotic expressions of the will in the restless little being into an ordered beauty that is full or the quality of soul. Music calms the impulses that make the child scream and shout, even as Orpheus with his lyre tamed the wild animals in the forest to gentleness and obedience. Recitation gives form to the chaotic sounds of childish prattle, brings rhythm and measure into them and awakens an artistic element that is much more akin to the real nature of childhood than the intellectual content of the spoken word. In painting, drawing, modeling the children not only give outlet to the insistent creative urge within them, but they bring form and stability into the prolific activities of the etheric body- the body of formative forces. These forms do not tend to make the childs nature rigid and arid, but keep it flexible and plastic. The chaotic life-forces are restrained and permeated with the forces of consciousness and intelligence. True education largely consists in keeping the forms of the childs life of thought mobile, vital and full of an imaginative quality as befits the nature of childhood, but at the same time in spiritualizing the chaotic love forces, freeing them from the body and making them fresher and gentler. (We can see evidence of an intense attraction to the surrounding world in children when they romp and rush wildly about). And so by true methods of education we can obviate unhealthy metabolic deposits and inflammatory condition that arise in later life. Through the pictorial, plastic element which should also permeate the matter of History and Geography lessons, Nature-study and so forth, we build up healthy forces in the soul, and these in turn counteract the feverish activities or the will. The child feels support and is able to unfold a healthy conscious life. Through the musical, lyrical element we mollify the hardening influences of the intellectual life of concepts and ideas and preserve the freshness of the life-forces.
Posted on: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 17:12:58 +0000
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