Developmental Profile of an Third Grade Child*

Noticeable physiological, psychological and cognitive changes take place in the child this year. The nine/ten year threshold represents a very significant step in self-awareness. Children realize they are separate from their surroundings and meet the world as individuals, often resulting in increased questions, self-doubt and wonder.

A process begins to unfold through which the child experiences, with increasing strength, a sense of objectivity alongside growing subjectivity. Subjective inner experiences and objective world reality stand at odds within the child’s soul. Questioning, doubt, aloneness and a dawning tendency to criticize are emergent feature in the child’s psychological landscape.

Educational Experience

In this period the child empathizes with ancient Hebrew stories of the Old Testament, the fall from Eden and man’s first struggles to live in social groups on the earth. At this age, children are very interested in the origin of things.

They want to discover new ways of doing things in the world and imagine themselves in very primitive conditions. The practical life is taken up in studies of house building, farming, gardening, cooking and finding out about the jobs people do.

* The Educational Tasks and Content of the Steiner Waldorf Curriculum, Edited by Martyn Rawson and Tobias Ritcher