The LifeWays Child Care and Human Development Training is a comprehensive training to give you the understanding and skills you need to transform your living and working with young children. It will help to deepen your parenting; enliven your early childhood center, pre-school or home program; and inspire your work with parents.
Inspired primarily by the works of Rudolf Steiner and contemporary child development experts, the curriculum is designed to engage you as a whole person, not just intellectually. It is a very hands-on approach. Along with the study of child development, there is an emphasis on the student’s personal development.
The curriculum is divided into four categories – Human Growth and Development; Child, Family and Community; Program Curriculum; and Living Arts – and includes, among other things, classes on the following:
In-depth child development from birth to six, with an introduction to other ages and phases of life through biographical studies
Introduction to several developmental theories
A variety of handwork skills
Puppetry and storytelling
Painting
Music and speech training
Introduction to gardening and cooking
Movement exercises
Working with the Living Arts (domestic, nurturing, social and creative arts)
Practical skills for inspired living
Nurturing skills for infants, toddlers and all of early childhood
Exercises for personal development, inner practice, and adult relationships, including a class on cultural diversity
Home health care practices to support healthy children and adults
Tools of the Trade - two introductory classes that deal with the nuts and bolts of establishing child care centers and home programs, as well as parent-child and parent-infant programs.
Designed for people who work or live with young children, it is an at-a-distance program that runs over the course of one year or thirteen months. Typically we meet as a group for 10-12 days in the summer, followed by an intensive weekend in the autumn and another in the spring, and 10-12 days the following summer. Throughout the year the student is supported by a mentor with whom s/he can speak regularly and who will come to visit the student for two days. There is a set of Independent Study Requirements that help to deepen the student’s experience with the content learned during class time.
For a detailed description of the Core Content of the Training click here.
The training is nothing short of extraordinary! What a gift to children and their parents and caregivers that the wisdom of the nurturing and domestic arts is being revived. You are a master at blending deep knowledge of child development with the practical skills of parenting and nurturing, balancing it all with wisdom, sensitivity and humor! It's nothing short of genius that you have created the vision and the actual framework to put it all together into a year-long program. Wow!
Theresa Catlin, 2002 LifeWays Graduate
Training Centers
LifeWays currently offers our certificate training in several locations (download a flyer you can email or post):
Wisconsin at the LifeWays Child Development Center in Milwaukee (contact Cynthia at ck.aldinger@sbcglobal.net or 405-579-0999) Learn more.
Maine at the Merriconeag Waldorf School in Freeport (contact Susan at silverio@tidewater.net or 207-763-4652) Learn more. Download an application.
California at Rudolf Steiner College near Sacramento (contact rsc@steinercollege.edu or 916-061-8727) or in San Francisco for Spanish speakers (contact Rosario at rosariovillasana@hotmail.com or 415-587-0802)