The 6th Asian Waldorf Teachers' Conference 2015
Introduction

* We completed all the programs *

Founded by the Austrian philosopher Rudolph Steiner early 20th century, Anthroposophy is known as a new movement that engages in humane approaches to society and culture.

Extensive efforts have been made in fields including healthcare, medicine, agriculture, expressive arts, cultural science, social science, and natural sciences, all of which have been appraised throughout Europe.

Particularly in the field of education, 1,039 Waldorf schools throughout 60 countries worldwide have been established (2014 present). In Japan too, Waldorf education has been introduced extensively, and currently there are 8 schools, of which 2 are officially recognized educational institutions, as well as over 50 kindergartens throughout the country. This steady increase of Waldorf schools and kindergartens over the years is visible throughout Asia as a whole. It is with this background that the AWTC was begun in 2005, as a platform for Waldorf educators across Asia to gather together to create dialogue and exchange ideas about how to move through the challenges presented within the specific cultural contexts of Asia. Through this conference, clarity may be gained regarding the challenges that await Waldorf educators in Asia.

Through Waldorf education, educators in Asia encounter many different cultural contexts, and are faced with a great challenge: how, through Waldorf education, to nurture and give encouragement to children who hold the future of Asia in their hands. There are many problems to be worked through. One current example is the different approaches, opinions and interpretations regarding history.

In this conference, practitioners of Waldorf education from Korea, China, Taiwan, Thailand, India, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Nepal, and all across Asia will gather to attend lectures and performances, divide into groups for practical field-specific meetings, and take part in workshops to deepen cultural awareness.

As educators from Asia gather to work through many challenges together, it is our belief that a great surge of impulse will be created, which will act as a catalyst for changing the direction of Asia’s future. With this belief at its core, this conference is being held in Japan.

Main Theme

"Building a conscious bridge to the future for Asia"

We continue to build bridges between ourselves and the world around us from the moment we come into this world as a newborn baby. We first learn to glance at the immediate surroundings, then begin to extend our arms to touch the world around us. We eventually encounter people and objects further away from us, and finally, we build the bridges from our hearts to the hearts of others to connect our thoughts and feelings. As our world expands outwards, our ability turn inward strengthens.

We must continue to build bridges. Otherwise, we stop growing and transforming ourselves and will end up putting up the barriers of loneliness and prejudice. Similar situations happen in education.

When we use our will to listen attentively and understand others, with the full awareness of its difficulty, we breathe in life. Through this action, we find the renewed target and we transform ourselves into a new being. This is when we build the bridge of the higher awareness between ourselves and the world around beyond the illusion and isolation.

The Asian Waldorf Teachers' Conference has been held biennially since 2005, and this conference in Japan marks the 10th year of AWTC and the 6th conference. Within this 10 years, we are given the opportunity to meet each other within the growing circle of the Waldorf movement to re-discover each country in relation to the rest of the world and Asia. We learned the difference of each country, became aware of the distances and contemplated our ethnic challenges. We learned the universal and fundamental educational essence that connect each of us.

May this conference where Waldorf teachers around Asia gather together outside our normal life help further advance this tide. May it inspire each of us who teach the future generations to awaken our courage to continue building the shining bridges.

Rieko Hata
Representative of Japan Waldorf Schools Association

Greetings

Dear colleagues and friends of Waldorf Education,

We welcome you most cordially and are pleased that we can again come together with the AWTC, now in Japan. Let us work together intensively towards a broader understanding of Rudolf Steiner’s Waldorf Education. As we deepen our insight, it makes us able to apply this artistic pedagogy further in the classroom.

What is the aim of Waldorf Education? It wishes to lead young people to a life that does not arise from weakness but from strength. Conventional education systems seem to consistently deprive young people of this strength, which is essential to overcome the challenges that they face. It is as if life itself consumes most of the vital energy out of young people. Through the art of education, we strive to replenish this strength. This can be accomplished by the development of the formative and musical qualities that we gain from human understanding.

Here, we have this conference and the chance to work together to examine how this formative, artistic quality manifests itself in daily educational practice and how we can generate the interaction of the 'upper' and ‘lower' parts of a person so that the true integration of humanity can awaken the life force.

We want to dedicate ourselves to these themes during the meeting in Japan in order to enrich and inspire our work in the classrooms for the sake of students. The question of education is a matter of awakening the life forces; of students and that of teachers.

Christof Wiechert
Former Head of the Pedagogical Section
School of Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum

Dear Friends, dear Colleagues,

It is with great pleasure to live towards another Asian Waldorf Teacher Conference, 2015 in Japan.

Since the first Asian Waldorf Teacher Conference in the year 2005 in Taiwan we saw ten years of speedy development in Asia, ten years, in which the number of Waldorfkindergartens and –schools grew immensely and also the challenges coming along with such a rapid growth.

The bi-annual working together in the AWTC’s not only helped to develop a supportive net-work within the Asian Waldorf movement, but also developed confidence in the impulse, an impulse, which can only be put into practice with full and concentrated seriousness on the one side, and with all the humor and interest in the growing children and their gifts for the future on the other side.

May the work, which we will do together in Japan, unfold its fruits in all the Asian countries, may the knowledge we will get and the experiences we will have form a good basis for the everyday work in the next years and may we develop a social understanding and net-working between people of the Waldorfkindergartens and –schools in Asia in order to responsible call it a real Waldorf movement.

I wish all of us an interesting, deep and awakening working experience.

Nana Göbel
Executive Board Member
The Friends of Waldorf Education

Program

Sponsors

Murayama Architect & Associates

Agrisystem Inc.

WELEDA JAPAN Co.,Ltd.

Sonne Garten

APU - Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University

Agetsuma Clinic

主催

日本シュタイナー学校協会（代表：秦 理絵子）
〒252-0187神奈川県相模原市緑区名倉2805-1

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