Movement and Eurythmy in a Waldorf-Inspired Co-op: What a Group Can Do, and When to Bring In a Eurythmist

Most co-ops can't offer eurythmy itself. Eurythmy is a movement art taught by eurythmists, who train in it for 4 years or more. The Eurythmy Association of North America (EANA) recommends that schools hire eurythmists with a 4 to 5 year training. What a parent-led co-op can do each week is movement in a ring: a verse walked as a circle or a curve, bean bags passed in time, and circle games everyone joins. If your families want the real thing, a visiting eurythmist can teach a short block.

What's eurythmy?

Kimberton Waldorf School describes eurythmy as "an art form in which speech and music are made visible." A eurythmist speaks a poem or a musician plays, and the class moves. Arms make gestures for the sounds. Feet walk forms on the floor: the circle, the straight line, the curve. Kimberton's kindergartners hop like rabbits and clip-clop like ponies with a visiting eurythmist once a week. Its first graders step to the beat and follow a melody with their arms.

In a Waldorf school, eurythmy is taught to a whole class at once. EANA's guidelines even suggest splitting large classes so each child has room. A group moving together sounds a lot like a co-op, so it's natural for co-op families to ask whether a parent could lead it.

For what eurythmy looks like grade by grade, and what a single family can do at home, read what eurythmy is and whether you can do it at home. This piece is about a group.

Why can't a co-op teach eurythmy itself?

Because the people who teach it train for years, and the eurythmy community is clear that the training matters.

EANA's guidelines for schools recommend "a eurythmist who has completed a 4-5 year artistic eurythmy training and received an accredited diploma recognized by the Section for the Performing Arts from the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland." It calls that "the basis for entering the profession of eurythmy."

Cynthia Hoven runs Eurythmy Online. She writes that a fully trained eurythmist "has studied for well over four years." She says the saying that only eurythmists can teach eurythmy is, "in essence," true. Just as you wouldn't expect a beginner to teach your child ballet or karate, she says, you can't expect someone not well trained in eurythmy to lead a class.

There's also the matter of supply. EANA's guidelines say there are "not enough eurythmists on this continent to serve the needs of every school." Hoven says the same. If Waldorf schools find it hard to hire one, a co-op of six families will too.

EANA's guidelines add an accompanist for every lesson, with a tuned piano, and a room with a suitable floor. That's a lot for a living room or a church hall.

None of this is a reason for guilt, and the movement below is still well worth doing.

What movement can a co-op lead?

Plenty. A parent can lead the movement that sits around eurythmy in a Waldorf morning, and call it movement or circle.

Jean Miller of Art of Homeschooling writes about why ring games matter. She says Steiner encouraged them to help develop "confidence, concentration, balance, control and coordination, a sense of rhythm, direction, and form in space." Mountain Laurel Waldorf School uses bean bag games, clapping games and rhythmical walking with its first graders, both at circle time and in extra math lessons.

A group can do all of that better than one family can. Here's what it looks like with ten children.

Walking forms in a ring

Picture a church hall on a Tuesday morning. Ten children stand in a ring with three parents among them. A parent says the autumn verse, and everyone walks it as a big circle, slowly, in step. On the next line they stop, turn in, and walk to the middle and back. Then the oldest children walk a straight line across the room while the others watch, and the youngest follow with a curve.

Kimberton's first graders work with the straight line and the curve. A co-op can too, without calling it a eurythmy lesson: a verse walked as a shape. One verse, walked the same way each week for a block, is enough.

Bean bags in a ring

Jean Miller's passing game works "with two or more people facing each other or in a circle," with a bean bag each. Everyone passes in time to a verse, and she notes it's also "a wonderful way to memorize a poem." Ten children passing on the same beat is harder, and more fun, than two. The bean bag games article has the passing game step by step, and the counting and times-table versions.

Games everyone plays

Mountain Laurel describes grade 2 class games that strengthen "the social dynamic of the class," and grade 3 games with more teamwork. By grade 4, it says, children need to learn to accept both winning and losing. In a mixed group, keep circle games for everyone, and add a game with a winner for the older children at another time. Co-op games has a list for circle and outdoors.

A 10-minute movement time for a mixed group

This fits inside your circle, or after a long sit at handwork. The co-op circle time guide shows where it goes in the morning.

Minutes	What happens
2	Everyone in a ring. Walk the season's verse as a circle.
2	Walk it again, into the middle and out.
3	Bean bags passed around the ring to a rhyme.
3	A singing game, or the oldest children lead a stepping rhyme.

Say it the same way each week for a block of 3 or 4 weeks, then change the verse with the season. Stocking feet are fine. Hoven suggests stocking feet or soft slippers for simple exercises, and room for everyone to move a few steps each way. With several children, she says, you need a space large enough "to make a little circle."

Bringing in a eurythmist

If your families want eurythmy, you can bring it in rather than imitate it.

1. Ask the nearest Waldorf school. Its eurythmist, or someone the school knows, may be willing to teach a small outside group. The Waldorf Map lists Waldorf schools near you.
2. Ask about a block. EANA's guidelines treat blocks of eurythmy as a stopgap for schools, with regular weekly lessons as the ideal. For a co-op, even a 4 to 6 week block can give the children a taste of it.
3. Ask about the room. EANA's guidelines say hard floors, such as cement under carpet or tile, have proved injurious for regular lessons. Ask the eurythmist what floor they need.
4. Ask about music. EANA recommends an accompanist, and Hoven says eurythmy music should be live, never recorded. Hoven also says eurythmy can be done to spoken poems.
5. Agree on the fee. It varies by teacher and place. Split it between the families who join, and write down who pays what before the first lesson.

If no eurythmist lives near you, Eurythmy Online sells recorded lessons for homeschooling parents, by grade. Hoven asks the parent who leads the exercises to practice them first, long enough to understand how to do them and why. In a co-op, that's a good job for one parent over a term.

Starpath for co-ops is free to run and gives the group a shared Waldorf-inspired program with the verses and the festival year, which gives your movement time something to walk.

What to do this week

1. Choose one verse for the season, one everyone already knows.
2. Walk it in a ring at your next meeting: a circle, then in and out.
3. Add bean bags the week after.
4. If your families want eurythmy, call the nearest Waldorf school and ask whether its eurythmist ever teaches outside groups.