Giles explains the Nine year Change

Giles explains his nine-year change.

The Nine-Year Change

Child development specialists have long recognized that between ages eight and ten children undergo a marked change. Some experts describe this transition as the crossing of the dividing line between early childhood and full childhood. Rudolf Steiner, who developed Waldorf education in the early 1900s in Germany, pioneered the idea of the “Nine-Year Change”. He spoke of it as a “fall from Paradise”. 

Prior to age eight or nine, most children are sunny, smiling, exuberant, joyful beings — little angels for the most part. Around the ninth birthday, however, melancholy and self-consciousness begin to creep in. They also can develop a lot of new fears, anxiety, and frustration. They feel more stress in areas they have never been concerned about before (like going to school). The harmonious resonance between child and world quickly fades, seemingly overnight. The child begins to feel separate from the world and finds herself standing apart and alone. The child also realizes that bad things happen, death occurs and all can be lost. I interviewed my son Jacob when he was struggling with his nine-year change and asked him how it felt. He replied, “It is as if up until now I have been living in a dream, and now I woke up.” When asked how he felt to be awake, he said, “Hard to know the chicken before the egg. But what I do know is that I have to think a lot more.”

“Paradise Lost: The Nine-Year Change”

I love this article called Paradise Lost. https://www.waldorflibrary.org/articles/1384-paradise-lost-the-nine-year-change