Waldorf education, also known as Steiner education, is an educational philosophy based on the teachings of Rudolf Steiner, the founder of anthroposophy. It is a worldwide independent school movement that offers a developmentally appropriate, experiential, and academically rigorous approach to education. The Waldorf educational style is holistic, intended to develop pupils intellectual, artistic, and practical abilities. The Waldorf curriculum emphasizes cultivating childrens emotional life and imagination, and academic instruction is presented through artistic work that includes storytelling, visual arts, drama, movement, music, and crafts. The core curriculum includes language arts, mythology, history, geography, geology, algebra, geometry, mineralogy, biology, astronomy, physics, chemistry, and nutrition. Waldorf education allows for individual variations in the pace of learning, based upon the expectation that a child will grasp a concept or achieve a skill when he or she is ready. Cooperation takes priority over competition, and this approach extends to physical education, where competitive team sports are not introduced until upper grades. Waldorf education is not a pedagogical system but an art - the art of awakening what is actually there within the human being. Waldorf schools are non-sectarian and non-denominational, and they educate all children, regardless of their cultural or religious backgrounds. The Waldorf classroom is a safe space where faculty and staff honor the innocence and imagination of early childhood, support a developing grade school child’s stages of growth, curiosity, and empathy, and inspire the young adult’s capacities and engagement in the world.