Anatomy the Waldorf-Inspired Way

Anatomy the Waldorf way is comprised of three main topic areas: Health and the Human Body, Nutrition and Physiology and Muscles and Bones, Anatomy. It’s not correct to call this an Anatomy Main Lesson Block, as anatomy is only one aspect of it. And it’s not a Physiology main lesson block either. Anatomy focuses on the structure of the body, muscles and bones, while physiology focuses on how those structures support life. Anatomy is what the body is made of and physiology is how the body works.

This Main lesson block is essentially Nutrition, Anatomy and Physiology, but for the purposes of this post, it will be referred to as Anatomy Main Lesson Block. And while I also share resources for an Anatomy Unit Study, some of those resources may be used for our Waldorf main lesson block, especially the anatomy books which may be used by the teacher/parent as a resource guide in preparation for lessons. Additionally, I have opted to add a workbook to this block that my student may work on as part of daily work. This is my own innovation and is not inline with the Waldorf approach.

The two main resources I am using for this block is the Live Education Waldorf Curriculum for grade 7 Hygeia: Nutrition and Physiology and Live Education Waldorf Curriculum for grade 8 Human Anatomy and Physiology and the Charles Kovacs book on Muscles and Bones. While the Live Education curriculum has an anatomy block in both 7th and 8th grade, I’m starting with the grade 7 block at the moment.

Resources

The following are the resources we are using to put together our Waldorf Anatomy Main Lesson Block. For this block, I will be using a number of additional resources, especially religious texts or wisdoms to enhance the lessons. While you may not share the same spiritual beliefs, I encourage you to include relevant and personal stories, lessons and wisdoms. One notable resource that is missing from the list below is a a solid book on nutrition. While many of the books I found were diet related (either to achieve a health benefit such as weight loss or reduces inflammation), few were neutral nutrition books, as many has clear biases based on author’s view of plant based versus meat based diets for instance. The few books that were nutrition books that would have worked for this unit appeared to be college textbooks and were out of our budget for this block.

Resources (non-affiliate links except Amazon)

Additionally, I have a separate video that shows all the resources we are using to put together an anatomy unit study. You may wonder why the two separate videos and separate set of resources. Anatomy is only one topic area of many that are covered in the Waldorf Main Lesson Block, but if you chose to focus only on anatomy, these resources would be sufficient. While I will use some of the Anatomy resources, I know that a broader resource guide will support the Waldorf approach more holistically.

Resources (non-affiliate links except Amazon)

In case you are wondering how similar the Anatomicum books are (original versus Junior Edition), it turns out they are almost identical. All the illustrations I’ve seen so far are the same and the content is either the same for some sentences, similar or shortened for the junior edition. Because they are essentially the same, I’ll have returned the junior edition. But you may see for yourself in the following pictures.

Lesson 1 | Our Body

For Lesson 1, we read the Charles Kovac’s book Chapter 1 Uprightness and the Spine in the section on Health and the Human Body. While the chapter is short, we included many historical and religious references to add to this lesson which ended up taking over an hour whereas the reading would have taken less than 20 minutes. While I had intended to draw an illustration of the spine and go into detail about the wonders of our vertical upright spine and form, I opted for a simple human form in which we talked about (and later wrote about) the aspects of the human body from a religious (and secular) perspective. The body is composed of the physical, mental, emotional, spirit and soul. The physical makes up our physical body: torso, limbs, head and everything within. Our Mental may be imagined as our intellect. Our emotional is often equated to our heart. Our spirit and soul make up our individual essences and the secret of what makes us alive. If you are interested in the additional religious content we used in identifying the parts of the human and the parts of the soul, you may view my notes here. Here are the notes on “Five Before Five”.

Lesson 2 | Posture & Gait

For Lesson 2 of our Anatomy Main Lesson Block, we continued with Charles Kovacs book on Muscles and Bones chapter 2. In this chapter, Kovacs highlights the importance of posture in sitting and standing emphasising its importance on digestion and overall health. Types of shoes, the structure of the foot and gait were focused on in this chapter as well. For this lesson we did an activity in which we wet our feet on walked on concrete to see our gait and whether we walked straight or whether our feet were angled outward or inward. We also practiced standing on one leg with the other one raised and bent (think the Karate Kid), and practiced balancing with eyes open and closed and compared the difference. We also practiced “Heart to the Horizon” for sitting or standing to ensure correct posture. This is a tip I learned from a practitioner and when we bring your heart up to the horizon, your back and shoulders naturally assume proper posture. We practiced bending from the hips not the waist while sitting to avoiding placing undue pressure on our backs and ensuring correct posture even while sitting.

Lesson 3 | The Spine

While doing our lesson on Posture and Gait, we decided to add a lesson on The Spine. For this lesson, I used the book The Human Body by Five Mile Press for information on the spine, but more importantly as drawing inspiration for this lesson. For this lesson, I wanted to have an illustration that was anatomically accurate so I opted to do something we haven’t done before and trace it. For this to work, you need thin or somewhat translucent paper. Tracing paper or even light weight printer paper would work. I found that the main lesson book paper was too thick, but the onion skin separating the pages was just right. So I slipped the book between the pages and traced the spine with a pencil. I came back in with our Lyra Colored Pencils and choose a light tan, yellow and blue to color in the spine. I was so pleased with the outcome, I plan to use this technique moving forward for this Main Lesson Block whenever we need to draw bone or muscular structures we wish to have accurate. My 13-year-old daughter used the same technique and hers turned out beautifully. For the written content, I used the following resources: Anatomicum Junior (Welcome To The Museum) Hardcover – by Jennifer Z Paxton, The Human Body Atlas: How the human body works Hardcover – by National Geographic, Uncover the Human Body: An Uncover It Book Board book – by Luann Colombo (Author), Jennifer Fairman (Author), The Human Body by Five Mile Press, and Discoveries: The Human Body Hardcover – January 1, 2003 by Steve Rose [Consulting Editor]; Parker (Author).

Lesson 4 | Head, Trunk and Limbs

For lesson 4 we read from Charles Kovacs book on Muscles and Bones chapter 3 on the Head, Trunk and Limbs. This lesson remarks on the uprightness of the human being. Whereas animals have a horizontal spine and must use all their limbs for movement and to hold their bodies, humans have an upright vertical spine in which only our legs are needed to support our body and carry us from place to place. Our heads sit upon our trunk with our spinal column connecting the two, and this leaves our hands and arms free to do other things. We may use our hands in charity, in good works and for the betterment of ourselves, others and the world. Our uprightness frees some of our limbs that would otherwise be necessary for movement and stability.

For our lesson on the Head, Trunk and Limbs, I opted to draw an imaginative drawing depicting the spherical head as a representation of the cosmos. I am using this image which is is beautiful but not anatomically accurate. I love the colors and imaginative quality and felt that adding some color and beauty to this unit was a nice balance to the drawings we have done so far which are less colorful and more scientific.

Lesson 5 | The Manners of Sleep

In this lesson, we continue with Charles Kovacs book on Muscles and Bones chapter 4 on Sleep to explore when our vertical spine is horizontal. When we sleep our spine is at rest, and so are our limbs and so is our brain. All our body needs rest to recover or heal or grow. If we don’t get rest, we cannot function well and disrupt the healing and growing process. We explored the Islamic manner of sleep and sleep hygiene. If you would like to see my notes on the Adab of Sleep, you may see them here.

Lesson 6 | The Skin | Hand Self Portrait

Our lesson on Skin based on Chapter 5 and 6 in Charles Kovacs book on Muscles and Bones titled Skin and Care of Skin was expected to be a single page on written work with a small illustration. Instead these chapters turned into three lesson with detailed illustrations taking up three pages including the onion skin page between the two sheets. For this lesson we did a detailed hand self portrait of the back on our hands so we could include the nails as the nails were discussed in the chapter on Skin. We used our Lyra Color Pencils for this illustration using a few from our 72 piece set and a few from the Skin Tones Lyra Set. This has been my favorite lesson in anatomy so far and maybe my favorite lesson of all. The process was meditative yet called on our powers of observation and attention to detail. In the end, both our self portraits looked characteristically personal and accurate.

Lesson 7 | The Skin | Epidermis and Dermis

Did you know that our dead skin, the outermost layer called the epidermis, not only acts as a first defense against germs, but protects our sensitive dermis, the middle layer of skin, which is more sensitive and tender than our epidermis. Did you know that if you walk barefoot or work with your hands with heavy work you will grow an extra layer of skin for protect. Sounds like superhero skills to me! In fact, if almost anywhere on your body is subject to increase friction or work, overtime, more skin will form in that spot. Even more intriguing to me is something I learned when my children were in Kung Fu. The instructor taught the class that a technique for increasing your strength is to spar with others, or yourself by striking body parts of your body like the forearms. The striking toughens the skin and bone and helps protect the bone from fracture or breaking when actual fighting occurs (which by the way, wasn’t part of this dojo, as only sparing and forms were encouraged while the students were young). We used the book Anatomicum: Welcome to the Museum Hardcover by Jennifer Z. Paxton as illustration inspiration for this lesson as we copied the illustration on the layers of my slipping the book between the page and onion skin in the main lesson book. We traced and colored in the drawing, then labeled the drawing and wrote a short narration to accompany the lesson.

Lesson 8 | The Skin | The Skin’s Sensory Receptors

After our first hand self portrait was such a hit, we were sadly disappointed and humored and humbled by these efforts to draw the palm of our hand. We both found it challenging and un-enjoyable. We worked through this illustrated portion of this lesson quickly and worked on the content which I found intriguing. When covering the skin as a sense organ, we often overlook it for our eyesight and hearing. However our sense of touch extended beyond our fingertips. Our skin is the largest by area and weight and covers our whole body. It takes in information about temperature, pressure and pain. We may not realized how my sensory input our skin is taking in consistently until we suddenly don’t have access to those receptors in the case of spinal cord injury. This lesson concludes our three-part lesson on skin covering chapters 5 and 6 from Charles Kovacs book on Muscles and Bones and Anatomicum: Welcome to the Museum Hardcover by Jennifer Z. Paxton which provided the content on the various sense receptors and their specializations.

Lesson 9 | Our Body, Our World

Did you know that the composition of our bodies mirrors the composition of the planet? The planet is roughly 2/3 water, 71% to be exact and our bodies are also roughly 2/3 water though the exact percent is a little more complicated as babies have a higher percentage of water versus adults. And whereas roughly 60% of our bodies are water, of the 40% that’s solid, approximately 50-60% of that is water, so our actual percent water is closer to 70%. What a beautiful relationship our bodies have to the world. What’s more is that our body is also made of salt water like most of the water on the planet which is vastly abundant in ocean water but practically unusable for drinking (except for desalination plants) for humans and animals. If we taste our tears, we can taste the salt.

The water in our body must be renewed and every month or so, all the water in our body has been renewed and revitalized. The air we breathe must be renewed too, and far sooner. Every few seconds we take a breath in which moves from our lungs to our blood and to every cell of our body in one form or another. And if we don’t breathe for even a few minutes, we may start to damage our bodies, and if we don’t breathe for even a few minutes more, our bodies will cease to function. And what of the food we eat? We eat every day, and the energy we get from our food keeps our body warm and fuels our brain. Every few hours the warmth in our body has been renewed and revitalized by the food we eat. And the solid parts of our body…our bones, those are replenished every few months with minerals and nutrients. And in the course of seven years, all of our body has been replaced, renewed and exchanged! But we are still the same person. Our spirit is unchanged. Even if we change our preferences, we are still ourselves.

Lesson 10 | Digestion, The Mouth and Teeth

We all know we need to chew our food before we swallow it. But why? In this lesson we cover the role of teeth, chewing, and saliva in the role of digestion. We learn how important it for our mouth to ‘water’ in anticipation of food and how we literally would not be able to swallow if it were not for our saliva. Saliva plays an important role in teeth hygiene as well. But saliva isn’t just moisture. In our saliva are digestive enzymes which help break down our food before it is formed into a ball called a bolus by our tongue and swallowed down our esophagus where muscles squeeze our food into our stomach. Our epiglottis ensures that food travels down our esophagus and not trachea or windpipe or we could choke on our food or cause an infection.

The New Food Pyramid

The one book I didn’t find to add to our main lesson block was a book on nutrition. They are out there! But the ones I found in abundance were either lifestyle nutrition books like going vegan, keto or carnivore, or ones related to weight-loss or anti-inflammatory diets or books that were similar. The nutrition books I did find seemed to be college textbooks and were outside our budget. So when these lessons came about which focused on food, bread, food quality and drugs, alcohol and caffeine, I didn’t have a suitable additional resource to supplement our lesson. However, Food Anatomy: The Curious Parts & Pieces of Our Edible World by Julia Rothman turned out to be an amazing late addition to our unit. We used this book for nearly all the illustration inspiration for this lesson and I’m so pleased with how the illustration turned out. One thing though…I wanted this lesson to be quick and easy and it wasn’t! The illustration took over 2 hours and that was not my intention at all. To simplify it for my daughter, I asked to draw just 2-3 items per food group. When it comes to main lesson book illustrations, they should not exceed about 30 minutes. Any longer than that and you can expect that the illustration will be too detailed or involved which in some cases diminishes the effectiveness of an artistic lesson expression.

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Anatomy the Waldorf-Inspired Way