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The inner question of the eighteen and nineteen-year-old Class 12 student differs from the seventeen-year-old student: “How can I, as an individual human being, make an impact on social, economic, technical, or political affairs? What is my place in the world?” These are questions of self-realisation, with each Class 12 student developing ideals and values and then acting upon them.

Class 12 is a synthesis; a bringing together, and it is intended to integrate what has formed over time, and for some this may be over twelve or more years of Waldorf Education. There are three distinct activities in the year that make it different from other years in Waldorf Education; they are the Class 12 Plays, the final Class 12 Eurythmy Performance and the Class 12 Project Presentations.

Through the Class 12 Plays each student “demonstrates their responsibility for the whole, and shows how efforts towards a common goal” bring about creative, powerful and memorable performances. At CWS these plays are student directed and managed alongside the Drama teachers assistance.

We complete our Waldorf cirriculum with the Class 12 Projects in August. Each student takes on a project, of some magnitude, consisting of a practical and a theoretical component and spends all year, together with mentors (internal and external) developing their ideas and components. These are presented at exhibition evenings where the school community meets to listen to each student’s journey through their formal spoken presentation. During the Class 12 year each student, in addition to the plays, Eurythmy performance and projects, continues with all their running and Main Lessons that are unique to this final year, for example World History, Philosophy, Architecture, Biology, Biochemistry and Physics. Daily lessons in Mathematics and Languages continue.

The Class 12 Projects mark the completion of the Waldorf curriculum. Thereafter the Class 12s launch into full preparation of the NSC matric syllabus and examinations which is concluded at the end of the 13th year.

Rudolf Steiner asks teachers to “Respect the freedom of the child – a freedom we must not endanger; for it is to this freedom that we educate the child, that that child may stand in freedom in the world, at our side.” It is this freedom that we cherish in the education of the Class 12 student.

“Class 12 trains powers of synthesis with the question: Who? Who is this being called human? Who stands behind the outer play of global events and natural phenomena, pulling them together into a synthesizing whole? Class 12 not only recapitulates the themes of the four years of High School but also returns to the place where the Waldorf curriculum began in Class 1, with the image of the whole.” – Douglas Gerwin (Douglas Gerwin is co-director of the Research Institute for Waldorf Education in the USA).

The 2025 Project Presentations will be recorded, and after editorial work, will be published on our YouTube channel. We will keep you posted.

Further Reading
https://www.michaeloak.org.za/more-about-our-approach/why-the-13th-year-caroline-marquardt/

Article References

 “The Tasks and Content of the Steiner Waldorf Curriculum” Avison, Rawson and Richter
“ibid”

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