Truth

Kiernan asked if I would write down my top 5 favorite things about Charlotte Mason and Classical education. As you can see, I had trouble keeping it at 5. :-) I do hope these quickly jotted down thoughts are useful.

Favorite things about Charlotte Mason:

1. Sacredness of Personality - Charlotte Mason’s views of the child were very realistic, and genuinely Christian. She knew children had faults that must be honestly dealt with, but she also knew that their personalities had to be respected as designed by God. It is absolutely wrong to not accept the personalities of our children. The challenge is knowing the difference between real faults and personality traits. 
2. Masterly Inactivity - the cure for “helicopter moms.” :-) She believed also that children needed to spend *many* hours outdoors to grow in the freedom of the creation.
3. Her teachings on ‘will’ were very helpful to me when I had a beautiful, strong-willed little girl. :-) CM taught me that a strong-will is really a weak-will that needs to be strengthened. A truly strong will causes the person to make themselves to do what is right no matter what.
4. CM taught me how to be a mother. Being a good mother was a pre-requisite for being able to teach my children at home. CM taught that we mothers owe our children a “thinking love.”
5. CM’s methods included the whole child. She talked about sleeping, eating, what kind of clothes to wear, etc. This advice may seem out of date, and I didn’t follow all of it exactly, but they illustrate the point that what your child is eating and wearing often does have an impact on their learning. Too many methods only think of the intellectual life of the child. 
6. Her emphasis on habits is invaluable. A lack of discipline can have a devastating impact on an adult life. Teaching good habits to your child while they are young will save them a lifetime of trouble. 
7. She highly respected the child’s mind. I do not believe that most educational methods or curriculums respect the child’s mind the way that she did. She taught and believed that the child’s mind is like their stomach -- *fully capable* of “digesting” the food that you give them. 

Just as the stomach does not need to be taught how to digest its food, the mind does not need to be taught “thinking skills” or “tools of learning.” Charlotte Mason said knowledge is food for the mind. Give them that food...not just ‘tools’ - akin to forks and other utensils. 

His mind IS the tool. Give it something to work upon. The knowledge he gains will expand his mind, give him illumination, will enlarge his soul. When Kiernan was a little girl I became very aware of the fact that her mind was like a grist mill. If I didn’t keep giving it “grain” to grind, she would grind in upon herself, and everyone was miserable! :-)

However there are some other considerations. Just as the stomach needs healthy ordering of meals, the mind needs a healthy ordering of knowledge. The mind does need to be taught other skills: math, reading, how to play the piano, but it does not need to be taught how to think any more than eyes need to be taught how to physically see something.  If not interfered with (and that is a very important factor), it will think on things, ruminate, compare and contrast, draw conclusions. Contrary to what schools make you believe, the child’s mind does not need to be taught how to do these things. Another important, and sometimes sad, consideration is that it may have been trained out of a child. If someone interferes with the natural process of the child’s mind, the child may need help remembering how to do it. Like a person that has been starved has trouble digesting normal foods when it first begins to be fed again. Compassionately allow for this remembering. Give your child the time for that while they are young.

A child’s mind is just like his/her body, beautiful and complete. It just needs to be fed and to grow. Think of education in this way. CM said “...his mind is the instrument of his education...his education does not produce his mind.”

8. Motives for learning. We are designed to want to know about our world. The only proper motivation for learning is for the    *love* of the things themselves. It is the way God made us. God made the things in the world, everything, and He made us. It is right and natural for us to want to know about them. This is clearly seen in infants. Any child who does not, has had some kind of interference. If other incentives are introduced to the child besides the sheer love of learning, it is very difficult (but not impossible) for the child to regain that simple natural love again. And it is a shame on any adult in a child’s life who cheapens the motivations for learning through manipulation, bribes, stickers, stars, grades. Again, your child is a person, not an animal on whom to use behavior modification.

9. And, of course, her educational methods: Short Lessons. Don’t weary or provoke your child by making times of learning in one area at a time too long. In this way you can know without doubt that when you do ask your child to sit down and read or do some other task, you know that you are being reasonable in expecting full attention, and dedication to their work. The use of Real Books. This is particularly important with the humanities. The study of all things concerning humanity should be studied in a humane way. Real Things. Nature. This also includes the things we buy. Don’t buy fake, plastic stuff. Buy real science kits, useful handicrafts like sewing or woodworking (whatever you can find for your child to really put their hand to), camping gear, real art supplies (when you buy really cheap stuff children get the message that it’s not important), etc. 

10. One of my favorite things about Charlotte Mason was that she believed in a liberal education for all. Because she valued each child she knew that each child deserved a banquet set before them - spiritually, intellectually, physically. She didn’t think it belonged only to the “landed gentry” -- she advocated for a full life for all children. Don’t fall for the trap of believing that some children are “academic” and some are not. Every child can and should know history, math, literature. These are human things, not specialized things that only some will want or need to know. 

Reading: Try your hardest to read through the Charlotte Mason series. Start with Volume 1 no matter what age your child is. The ideas in each of the books build and culminate, but you can’t just jump to the end, or you will lose something along the way. There will no doubt be things you will disagree with. This is good. You are developing your own ideas in the process. I found that when I read, and then re-read, the books, I sometimes disagreed with things, and then later agreed. That is the nature of being human. We grow and change. Allow that of yourself and your children. We are too used to the idea of getting the right answer first off “for the test” that we know is coming later!

Dangers of some of the teachings of CM followers:

That it is a “gentle” or “soft” approach - it actually is a very disciplined approach.

That it is only about reading - you develop all senses - sight, sound, touch, smell, taste with this approach. Reading is absolutely vital to an education, and we don’t read enough in our society, but there is more to an education.

That it is only for Victorians, or old-fashioned people; Charlotte Mason’s educational principles are timeless.

Ideas on Classical to follow.

"I don't know. I work with bright children."

So I asked the question, are the seven liberal arts the way God has designed children to learn? Or at least, is this the way they learn best?

The first three of the seven liberal arts are word-oriented arts. Not all children are word-oriented. I believe in the theory of multiple intelligences. I believe it because I've seen it in children.

Again, not all children are word-oriented. My son has always thought in pictures and colors. Does that mean I neglect developing his linguistic abilities. Oh, my, no. It does mean, however, that I must provide an education that includes things outside word-centered education.

The title of my post comes from a teacher I heard speaking at a conference not long ago. He works at a Classical school, and during the Q&A after his talk he was asked what to do about children who have reading difficulties. The above title was his response.

I was outraged, but it didn't appear that anyone else even noticed.

This is a problem, folks. The arrogance and ignorance must be addressed.

I don't like being lied to, and I think there has been some stretching of the truth going on in regards to the seven liberal arts. More has been made of these arts than should be. I'm so tired of them being treated as a panacea for our times. Our educational problems are much bigger than this, and they won't be solved by convincing parents (through sophistry?) that the solution is in having our children study through the seven liberal arts.  

I'm also not going to go so far as to say that those seven liberal arts aren't wonderful. They are. I think it was a huge mistake to scrap them altogether. As education began to be provided for "all" in our societies, however, word-oriented folks had to move over and make room for those otherwise oriented.

This is one reason why I love Charlotte Mason. She did not teach her student teachers to teach their students through the Trivium. :-)

She, on the other hand, believed in a liberal education for all.

Children Don't Raise Themselves

This is an idea that I have often repeated to myself as I raised my own children.

The pull to walk away from them is very strong. We adults are very selfish people. We don't want to take the time to show them the way, and then take the time to walk the way with them.

To freshen the colors of the picture.

The above is a quotation from The Roots of American Order taken from Cicero's The Republic. Cindy is doing a book study, and I thought I would join in, anonymously. I'm not sure my thoughts would be on target enough to be of much use in the discussion.

Having gone to the American schools of the 60's and 70's, I grew up with the belief that one ought to be suspicious of order. I was taught in a disorderly fashion in school, and, despite homeschooling remedying much of it, I think I still suffer somewhat from the effects of that. I learned to think of order as a type of control. I'm happy now to know that I was wrong; I actually love order - even if I have trouble maintaining it in my own life. Order isn't a control; it is a strength.

I love the quotation of Cicero: "Long before our time, the customs of our ancestors molded admirable men, and in turn those eminent men upheld the ways and institutions of their forbears. Our age, however, inherited the Republic as if it were some beautiful painting of bygone ages, its colors already fading through great antiquity; and not only has our time neglected to freshen the colors of the picture, but we have failed to preserve its form and outlines."

I just loved that. Admirable men, eminent men. *Upholding* the ways and institutions of their forbears. Not forging new trails. Upholding.

As I read this chapter one of the things my thoughts kept wandering to was church life and the order that is Divine Liturgy. I kept thinking of the Orthodox Church and its assertion that they have preserved the faith for 2,000 years handed down from the Apostles.

Cindy mentioned that she likes the four cities: Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, and London. I do too. I especially love London, and my love for it is different from the others. I love the others because of what they gave us. I love London because I think of it as my city, having been there many times, and gotten to know it personally.

Kirk: "...we need to renew our understanding of the beliefs and the laws which give form to American society."

Kirk mentions fifth century Greece and first century Rome before Christ. What popped into my mind was that both of those times were pre-Christian. It seems this has to make a difference somehow. But we definitely "grope for order" in our day.

I feel sorry for young parents that have extra money, and plenty of insurance, because then they can take their child for lots of medical tests and not have to face their faults as parents. If you search for a problem in your child, the medical community is sure to help you find it. But will you find the problem in yourself?

Are the seven liberal arts the way God has designed children to learn? This is a claim made by many in the Classical movement.

Several things happened in my life to make me question this assertion. One is the information I learned from my daughter. She was a student at Hillsdale and took a class called Artes Liberales. In it, she read about Maritanus Capella. I read the papers and booklets she received in this class and was surprised to find out that, essentially, we got the specific seven liberal arts in Western education from Martianus Capella. He can be read about: here, here, and here. He seems to be drawing from many previous Roman writers, but his book appears to be the one that was used extensively and became the authoritative word on the subject. Gregory of Tours called it a school manual.

This is less than thrilling news to me.

As an Orthodox Christian, I would like to know more about the education that was practiced in the Eastern Roman Empire, in Byzantium. Here is one article. (Yes, I know it's just a wiki article, but the prejudice against wikipedia is just intellectual snobbery.)