Class 4, 5 & 6

The aim of Class 4 is first and foremost to channel the powerful energy which ten year olds bring to the classroom. Pupils need to be challenged and stretched in every possible aspect of their work. The teacher aims to meet, through imaginatively presented lessons, the growing interest of the children in more concrete areas of knowledge and to provide them with opportunities for independence in their work. The children form a sense of where they are in relation to their environment, in both a social and geographical sense.

For the student in Class 5 there is a strengthening of the individual’s relationship to the world. The experience and sense of self grows and the individual will comes from this developing centre. There is a growing awareness of the interrelatedness of the whole. As the children now move to meet the world with confidence out of their individuality, they can choose to connect to the other through empathy. They begin to develop a deeper and more mature sense of morality and personal responsibility.

The child’s inner life becomes more introspective, reflective and self-centred. At this stage of development, the children’s intellectual forces are enable them to understand the causality of the world. The child as yet lacks the capacity for independent judgment, as there is still a strong personal and subjective element in their thinking. During class 6 it is important that the child be brought into elements of deductive thinking, logical thought processes and into their analytical and critical faculties. The children’s questioning, searching attitude should be directed to the world of physical matter and the laws that can be deduced to explain phenomena. They want to know that these laws exist independently from humanity.