Conceptual Background for Our Farm-School
To live, to learn, to love . . . these sentiments are very much at the heart of Kona Biodynamic Farm's experiential learning farm-school program. We look to the great ideals of Rudolf Steiner and Ralph Waldo Emerson for guidance.
Rudolf Steiner
the founder of biodynamic agriculture and Waldorf education (1861-1925), stated the following:
Although it may seem absurd, it must be stated that a person who has not learned to distinguish an ear of rye from an ear of wheat is no complete human being. It can even been said that a person who has learned to distinguish between rye and wheat without having observed them growing in the fields, has not attained the ideal. As teachers we should avoid going on botanical expeditions to collect specimens to be shown in the classroom. The children should be taken out and whenever possible, be brought to understand the plant world in its actual connection with the earth, with the rays of the sun, with life itself. We must try to realize what it means for the evolution of humanity that for a long time past large numbers of people have been drawn into the towns, with the result that generation after generation of young people in the great towns have grown up in such a way that they can no longer distinguish wheat from rye.
He further elaborated:
For the actual fact is: a child who has cut grass with a sickle, mown grass with a scythe, drawn a furrow with a little plough, will be a different person from a child who has not done these things. The soul undergoes a change from doing things. Abstract teaching of manual skill is really no substitute.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
(1803-1883) was a passionate erudite spokesman for the freedom of the individual. He portrayed a profound reverence and deep humility for nature. His essays and lectures on nature and education are stupendous!
From Emerson's Nature
To speak truly, few adult persons can see nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At least they have a very superficial seeing. The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and heart of the child. The lover of nature is he whose inward and outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other; who has retained the spirit of infancy even into the era of adulthood. His intercourse with heaven and earth, becomes part of his daily food . . . The greatest delights which the fields and woods minister, is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable. I am not alone and unacknowledged. They nod to me, and I to them . . . .
To the attentive eye, each moment of the year has its own beauty, and in the same field, it beholds, every hour, a picture which was never given before, and which shall never be seen again. The heavens change every moment, and reflect their glory or gloom on the plains beneath. The state of the crop in the surrounding farms alters the expression of the earth from week to week. The succession of native plants in the pastures and roadsides, which make the silent clock by which time tells the summer hours, will make even the divisions of the day sensible to the keen observer. The tribes of birds and insects, like the plants punctual to time, follow each other, and the year has room for all . . . .
The presence of a higher, namely, of the spiritual element is essential to its perfection. The high and divine which can be loved without effeminacy, is that which is found in combination with the human will. Beauty is the mark God sets upon virtue. Every natural action is graceful. Every heroic act is also decent, and causes the place and the bystanders to shine. We are taught by great actions that the universe is the property of every individual in it. Every rational creature has all nature for his dowry and estate. It is his, if he will. He may divest himself of it; he may creep into a corner, and abdicate his kingdom, as most men do, but he is entitled to the world by his constitution. In proportion to the energy of his thought and will, he takes the world up into himself . . . .
From Emerson's Education
I believe that our own experience instructs us that the secret of Education lies in respecting the pupil. It is not for you to chose what he shall know, what he shall do. It is chosen and foreordained, and he only holds the key to his own secret. By your tempering and thwarting and too much governing he may be hindered from his end and kept out of his own. Respect the child. Wait and see the new product of Nature . . . .
This is the perpetual romance of new life, the invasion of God into the old dead world, when he sends into quiet houses a young soul with a thought which is not met, looking for something which is not there, but which ought to be there: the thought is dim but it is sure . . . .
To whatsoever upright mind, to whatsoever beating heart I speak, to you it is committed to educate men. By simple living, by illimitable soul, you inspire, you correct, you instruct, you raise, you embellish all. By your act you teach the beholder how to do the practicable. According to the depth from which you draw your life, such is the depth not only of your strenuous effort, but of your manners and presence. The beautiful nature of the world has here blended your happiness with your power. Work straight on in absolute duty, and you lend an arm and an encouragement to all the youth of the universe . . . .
We are inspired by the essence of Steiner's and Emerson's concepts. We strive to make the living world available to children (and adults) via a diversified biodynamic community farm. After all, when children are allowed to live their love of learning everything flourishes!