Grade School (K-5)
Explore the World
At San Francisco Waldorf School, we encourage our students’ natural curiosity and growing capacities with a well-rounded and interdisciplinary academic program that blends language arts, science, mathematics, social studies, world languages, visual and performing arts, music, field trips, and movement.
In Kindergarten through Grade 5, we emphasize hands-on projects, group work, and creative expression throughout the curriculum, encouraging students to make connections between subject areas, to think creatively, and to connect with each other. Intentionally small class sizes and strong teacher-student relationships ensure that every child is seen and valued.
Learn more about our programs below or sign up for a tour to see our dynamic classrooms in action.
Innovations in Teaching
Main Lesson Blocks: A Multidisciplinary Approach
Every school day begins with Main Lesson, an intensive two-hour class focused on a specific subject in the core Waldorf curriculum. Using a blend of storytelling, instruction, vocabulary and writing exercises, art, movement, group work, field trips, and hands-on activities, teachers support diverse learning styles and encourage children to approach every topic from multiple angles and experiences.
The Class Teacher: Meaningful Relationships
Strong teacher-student relationships are essential to effective learning. To foster these relationships, our Class Teachers stay with the same group of students through several grades (and in some cases, all the way from First through Eighth Grades). Teaching the same class for multiple years allows our teachers to develop an understanding of each student's strengths and unique learning style, while promoting unity within the classroom community.
Learn more about our curriculum, year by year
TK/Kindergarten
San Francisco Waldorf School’s joyful mixed-age Kindergarten is a bridge between early childhood and elementary school. Through a balanced, child-centered, and play-based program, Kindergartners develop essential cognitive, physical, and social skills while building a positive relationship to learning and school.
First Grade
First Grade is a year of many firsts! Through creative, multi-sensory lessons that blend instruction, group work, games, stories, rhythmical movement, and art, First Graders build strong foundational skills in reading, writing, numeracy, and math, in addition to beginning their formal study of world languages (Spanish and Mandarin), applied arts, music, and movement.
Second Grade
Second Graders deepen their skills in language, reading, writing, math, music, nature, and art through vibrant interdisciplinary lessons. The Second Grade curriculum includes diverse stories of heroes, leaders, and noble people from across the world and throughout history, connecting with the Second Grader’s growing understanding of morality and justice while also fostering a broad interest in and exposure to world cultures.
Third Grade
Practical arts and hands-on projects are the cornerstone of the Third Grade curriculum, connecting with the 8- and 9-year-old’s growing understanding of themselves and their place in the world around them. Students learn through engaging in real-world projects, like planting and harvesting vegetables in the school garden, building model shelters from diverse parts of the world to better understand global cultures and how humans adapt to their environment, and learning to take measurements and use money in math class.
Fourth Grade
Capable and increasingly independent, Fourth Graders are ready to take on more challenges and complexity in language arts, history, math, music, theater, art, and movement. Fourth Grade students explore California geography and history, get to know the animal kingdom through zoology, work with fractions in math class, and hear stories of heroes and tricksters from Norse mythology.
Fifth Grade
Fifth Grade is a year of new challenges and broadening horizons, laying the groundwork for our interdisciplinary and experiential middle school program with more independent work, critical and creative thinking, and multicultural perspectives throughout the curriculum. Students travel across the globe and through history in their study of ancient civilizations in India, Persia, Egypt, and Greece, learning about the history, art, culture, and belief systems of ancient civilizations.
Beyond the Textbook
San Francisco Waldorf School is a vibrant and welcoming place, where children are inspired, nurtured, and challenged to reach their highest potential.
Teaching Through Experience
At San Francisco Waldorf School, we observe, we do, we make, we listen, we create, and we experience the world around us. Starting with the earliest ages, students are guided to uncover universal truths through rich hands-on experiences, which help them connect with and retain the material they are studying. In Third Grade, for example, students might build a sand timer or sundial before learning to read an analog clock, supporting their understanding of telling time and its history. For Fifth Graders, time working in the campus garden brings their study of botany to life.
Integrated Social-Emotional Learning
Social-emotional learning and respect for others is woven into everything we do at San Francisco Waldorf School. Our teachers support students in cultivating individual responsibility for their daily tasks, actions, and emotions while promoting empathy and awareness of others. Through group work, cooperative games, musical ensembles, and other inherently social activities, we nurture our students’ compassion, kindness, self-confidence, and cooperation. These values that lay the foundation for a healthy school community and a meaningful life.
Time in Nature Every Day
Our students responsibly explore the relationship between the natural world and the city through our active biodynamic gardening program, frequent trips to Alta Plaza Park and the wooded forests of the Presidio, and a robust program of day trips and overnights across California. Spending time in nature fosters a connection and sense of responsibility to the Earth while also promoting emotional well-being, social harmony, scientific observation, and creative problem-solving skills in our students.
World Languages
All students begin formal instruction in both Mandarin and Spanish starting in First Grade. Our language programs begin with listening; through singing, art, and recitation, students develop their vocabulary, an ear for language, and a broader understanding of diverse world cultures. Through folk tales and stories, traditional music and songs, and artistic projects, students develop a practical understanding of the commonalities and contrasts in languages across the world, while also building powerful cognitive and linguistic capacities and cultural competency.
Holistic Learning Support
Specially trained in child development, our faculty engage students with a wide range of learning styles through a vibrant classroom environment that blends hands-on projects, group work, drama, movement, music, and more. Extra lesson support, skills classes, and therapeutic movement are offered to all students at different points in the curriculum. For students with identified learning differences, our Learning Support team ensures that they receive developmentally appropriate services and accommodations as needed.