Ms Panya’s* daughter is 17 and received her first smartphone and laptop less than two years ago. Unlike most young people, she complains they now take up too much of her time.
The devices became a necessary tool in completing homework while she was studying at the prestigious Triam Udom Suksa School. Classmates insisted on communicating over the Line application, and teachers asked students to submit assignments by email.
Technology has become a seamless part of life for many, but in Ms Panya’s household they are still adjusting. Apart from delaying her daughter’s exposure to computers, there is no television at home. “I don’t think consuming news is good for my daughter. She doesn’t need to know about violence in the news,” she said.
Before enrolling at Triam Udom, Ms Panya’s daughter attended an alternative private school in Bangkok from the age of nine. Panyotai, which follows the Waldorf philosophy, advises families that technology and news media are to be handled with care.
Ms Panya’s daughter will shortly be moving to Singapore after winning a place to study fine art at university. Her mother believes a Waldorf education equipped her with an independent and inquiring mind, despite not having graduated from high school.
“Students in the Thai education system fail to get to the source of knowledge,” she said. “But my daughter has been able to pursue her individuality without being shaped for academic competition. She never had to study hard in comparison to students at mainstream schools, yet she was able to pass Triam Udom’s tough entrance exam and is about to enrol in art school.”
Touch wood: A group of teenagers are engrossed in a handiwork project. The school views child development in three distinct seven-year stages: the early years, the time before puberty and adolescence.
Old school: Waldorf teachers try to develop ‘wholeness’ in the body, soul and spirit of pupils.
BODY, SOUL, SPIRIT
Panyotai is among a handful of Waldorf schools in Thailand — alongside others in Khon Kaen and Chiang Mai — that base their approach on the century-old philosophy of Anthroposophy.
Anthroposophy was the brainchild of Austrian educator Rudolf Steiner, and claims to be a path of spiritual research that nurtures the soul. It views child development in three distinct seven-year stages — the early years, the time before puberty and adolescence.
Panyotai has been offering its non-traditional curriculum since 1996. Students do not have to arrive in time for the national anthem at 8am. No mass prayers are held in the playground. All that is required is for children to run free and experiment with outdoor activities and manual labour. These pursuits develop “wholeness” in the child’s body, soul and spirit — the three parts of every human, as defined by Anthroposophy.
When Spectrum visited the school on a Wednesday, both primary and secondary students could be seen inside and outside the classroom. A group of pupils aged between eight and 10 were chopping tree branches to make fertilizer. Teenage boys were gathered on an unfinished pavilion, cutting wood as part of their woodwork course.
“My daughter used to ask me questions when she saw other students carrying so many textbooks to school, because she never had to do that,” Ms Panya said.
Panyotai’s primary focus is not on an academic curriculum and the school does not offer formal tests at the end of each semester. Instead, students are evaluated by a teacher who closely watches their development over the years.
Panyotai co-founder Janpen Panosot, 57, said the school covers standard subjects such as Thai, maths, science, English and social studies, but teaching and evaluation processes differ.
Classes do not follow the content of textbooks. A social studies lesson could be spent discussing the Industrial Revolution, or historical figures such as Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela.
“Maths at Matthayom 4 level includes lessons on trigonometry, for example, but students have to apply what they learn in a practical way, such as using it to measure their work outdoors,” she said.
Ms Janpen is dismissive of formal testing: “There are no tests here. What would be the point? The teacher already knows how the student is doing by observing them in lessons.”
Play time: At Panyotai, children are allowed to run free and experiment with outdoor activities and manual labour, such as making fertilizer.
OUTSIDE THE SYSTEM
The school teaches children from kindergarten through to secondary level. It does offer Matthayom 6 students a grade-point average score, based on teacher evaluation, but does not require them to sit the O-net exam — the national prerequisite to university.
Surachai*, a 52-year-old architect whose daughter has just enrolled in an architecture course at university straight from Panyotai, said Waldorf students are free to develop outside the restraints of the “system”.
“My daughter was at Panyotai from kindergarten. I felt public schools were more like army forts, with so many rules,” Mr Surachai said.
“After she graduated from high school, I was able to find a university with a dean who understands Waldorf values and was willing to recruit my daughter through an interview and portfolio inspection, without sitting any formal examination.”
According to Mr Surachai, many Waldorf students take a gap year after graduating from high school.
“A year break offers them a chance to discover themselves and, in some cases, students take up tutor courses to prepare for university,” he said.
Panyotai’s first class of graduates completed their secondary education in 2009.
“There is only one class each year and 25 students at most in each class. My rough estimation is that most of the students in each class — around 15 — take a one-year break. They either attend tutoring school to prepare for university, or try their hands at work.
“Around five go to university straight away. The rest find freelance work in small businesses doing things like photography or design, while studying at the same time.”
The private school is evaluated annually by the Office for National Education Standards and Quality Assessment, based on a unique set of criteria.
Panyotai parents are currently talking to Onesqa about how it can improve its evaluations of the school. Last year it was marked as having failed to organise proper art classes or community service, but the school argues this criticism stems from a lack of understanding of how it operates.
Colourful: Anthroposophy claims to be a path of spiritual research that nurtures the soul. As such, Waldorf schools use art to teach a range of subjects.
SLOWLY DOES IT
Panyotai teacher Kingporn Praphanphog, 52, was a Waldorf parent before deciding to join the school’s staff 15 years ago.
“I moved my oldest son here while he was in Prathom 4 because he refused to go to school. He was completely opposed to the idea,” she said.
That child is now an engineering student in the Netherlands, while her youngest daughter is a primary pupil at Panyotai.
“I looked at many different schools for my children before I found Panyotai,” she said. “I wanted them to know they are valuable whether or not they pass a university entrance exam.”
Ms Kingporn said the Waldorf curriculum respects a child’s stages of growth. “Anthroposophy divides learning ages into three. From zero to seven the focus is ‘will’ and for the seven to 14 age group ‘feeling’ is key. ‘Thinking’ is central for those aged 14 to 21,” she said.
Children at Waldorf schools do not usually learn to read or write until they enter the second stage of development.
“Academic knowledge is not forced, but slowly fed from the age of seven onwards,” Ms Kingporn said.
Parents are told to prevent their child from using a mobile phone or computer unless necessary, and to limit exposure to the media. Panyotai offers a computer course, but not until the first year of high school and only after the students learn how to assemble and disassemble the hardware.
“Since the first two learning stages deal with the will and the feelings of a child, his or her environment has a big impact during those years,” Ms Kingporn said. “We do not discourage the use of technology entirely, but we are concerned as to when technology becomes integrated into a child’s life.”
LEARNING BY EXAMPLE
Wednesday is the weekly Panyotai parents’ meeting, so vehicles belonging to the families of the school’s 300 students are lined up outside the front gate.
Mr Surachai said the parents are a close-knit community. However, they have differing levels of understanding of the Waldorf concept.
“Some parents enrol their kids here because they believe in the Waldorf approach. Others might not have much understanding of it, but were fed up with the [mainstream] system.”
For those parents interested, the school offers a weekly course on Anthroposophy. Its tri-monthly newsletter also includes translated articles on the Waldorf philosophy.
In June, the Sunday Times featured an article about a trend among the “rich and the powerful families of Silicon Valley” who choose to “give their children a Waldorf education that outlaws computers, tablets and smartphones”.
Mr Surachai said the article generated heated conversation. One parent said Waldorf education works both ways, in that parents also change their own lifestyle after their children enrol.
“Over the past few years, parents have also become so addicted to social media,” he said. “Waldorf education focuses on learning from example, so many of them have tried to adjust.”
For many families, the Waldorf concept has become a way of life, since the school requires a strong commitment from parents. But the degree of commitment varies. For example, Mr Surachai said some Waldorf students must take a university entrance exam to fulfil their aspirations.
“Some parents of Waldorf students send their children to a tutor school prior to university admissions, but they keep it a secret,” he said.
SHUTTING OUT THE WORLD
Ms Panya earned a degree in film from a college in the United States and now works in marketing. But she had a feeling her daughter should follow a different path.
“When my daughter was nine, I sensed she was off-balance. There was a change in her behaviour. She refused to go to bed or do certain things,” she said.
“After my daughter moved to the Waldorf school, we decided to comply with its requirements. Now when we’re in the car together, we don’t listen to the radio.”
She does not believe limiting her daughter’s media consumption will damage her social awareness: “I think news has an emotional effect on a child. It is better for them to read books, engage in class discussion and talk to their parents, without the help of the media.”
Ms Kingporn said newspaper headlines are sometimes selected for class discussion, though general news consumption is little to none, since families are asked to stop children accessing television, newspaper, radio and online news media.
“Parents need to be conscious about contemporary media,” she said. “I don’t recommend students read newspapers or magazines, though Prathom 6 students have in-class news discussion on select topics, such as the drought issue at the moment.”
SYSTEM FAILURE
To Waldorf parents and teachers, the school is a way to opt out of a cycle that sees Thai students locked in competition for university entrance.
“University admissions are like a bottle neck,” Ms Kingporn said. “Thai students struggle to squeeze themselves in. Many of them are going to be let down, so why don’t we offer them another kind of opportunity from the start of their lives?”
Private tutor Nutthanut Leawpiroj, 34, agreed Waldorf education bypasses the competition-focused education system, but he warned the approach is overly idealistic and unresponsive to an ever-changing world.
Mr Nutthanut has taught social studies for almost 20 years. He admitted the competitive nature of the Thai education system is too much, but believes the best education lies somewhere between the two extremes.
“Education is not there to create an ideal world around the student. Education should be a bridge between reality and life,” he said. “I understand that parents want to somehow purify their children, but human nature is not only about being pure.”
In Mr Nutthanut’s view, the entire system needs rethinking. “Education reform will be impossible in Thailand as long as we have a centralised education policy,” he said.
“Students should be encouraged to uncover their own potential. The world is constantly moving, but schools in Thailand are going backwards — both in the system and at alternative schools. Education should be about immunising children to cope with the real world.”
Mr Surachai agreed that schooling in Thailand is disconnected from reality: “In the system, if you have a good memory, you can pass the test. That says nothing about who you are as a person.” n