“Our school champions, through creed and curriculum, the interdependency of mind and hand as a way to cultivate human growth.” Mr. Liberman – Woodworking Teacher

The magazine Popular Woodworking is featuring Rudolf Steiner School in its June 2025 issue. They visited our woodworking shop and had a conversation with Mr. Liberman, who has been leading the woodworking curriculum for almost a decade.

Logan Wittmer (PW) opens the article with this remark: “Yoav Liberman has contributed to our website for over a decade and has published numerous books on various topics. With furniture having been displayed in high-end galleries across the US, it’s safe to say that Yoav’s designs are unique and lean heavily upon his formal training as an architect (Israel Institute of Technology). So, what does a nationally recognized, architect-turned woodworker do? Teach young children woodworking, of course.”

The article emphasizes one of Waldorf schools’ principles, that of learning by using our hands (as well as our hearts and our minds), stating the importance and the impact it has on a child’s development.

The Steiner philosophy is simple — teach kids by encouraging and curating their creativity and imagination and allowing them to use their hands to learn. None of this is more evident than in Mr. Liberman’s class. Here, the kids start by simply whittling walking sticks in the earlier grades and slowly go through spoon carving, character carving, stool making, and some simple mechanical toys when they reach high school.