Renate Krämer Østergaard
NORENSE funding: 100.000 NOK in 2015

Background and motivation for the project
In 1997 Waldorf kindergartens got the permission to keep their 6-year olds in age mixed groups when the mandatory age of school entrance was lowered from seven to six years in Norway. Today, however, also in most Waldorf kindergartens the 5-year olds have become the oldest children, while the 6-year olds have become first-graders in separate, age-homogeneous groups. The 5-year olds have thus lost the 6-year olds as playmates and role models. My project deals with the question of what effect this change has on the group dynamics in Waldorf Kindergartens, with special focus on the 5-year olds’ self-instructed play – now as the oldest children of the group. Research question
 How does the absence of 6-year olds affect the group dynamics during playtime in Waldorf kindergartens?

Sources, methods and theoretical perspectives
The project is based on observations of self-instructed play in groups with and without 6-year olds and semi-structured interviews with Waldorf kindergarten teachers. The results will be discussed in the perspective of theories of play, group dynamics, adult roles and learning concepts.

Preliminary findings
Preliminary findings of my pilot project show that Waldorf kindergarten teachers experience the absence of the 6-year olds as a great loss. They feel obliged to replace the role of the 6-year olds personally. For playtime this means that the adults get more directly involved in the children’s play than they would like, basically for providing ideas, giving directions and solving problems and conflicts. This new adult role in Waldorf kindergartens challenges the traditional self-understanding of the ideal role of a Waldorf kindergartener, which is fundamentally based on not directly to intervene in children’s self-directed play but only to arrange the best conditions for it. Nevertheless, Waldorf kindergarten teachers are willing to open up new ways to meet the needs of the 5-year olds without losing sight of their ideals or compromising the original and crucial ideas of Waldorf pedagogy.

Intended form of publication of results
The findings will serve as a foundation for an article that is intended to be presented in an academic journal such as ROSE and in relevant popular journals such as Steinerskolen. 

Publication
Østergaard, Renate. K. (2016). Før skolen begynner. Seks steinerpedagogers syn på pedagogisk arbeid med 5-åringer i steinerbarnehagen. Tidsskriftet FoU i Praksis 10(2), 5-22.Link to article in Norwegian.