Spreading the feast of the Charlotte Mason method of education through weekly podcasts. Join us for short discussions that provide information, examples, and encouragement to the homeschool parents putting CM's ideas into practice in their homes.
If you purchased a ticket for the 2025 ADE at HOME Virtual Conference, you are welcome to log into Whova anytime between now and May 7, 2025, to watch all 36 sessions, including demonstration lessons, workshops, plenaries, live panel discussions, and interactive meet-ups — 30 hours of content!
Search your inbox for an email with the subject “Welcome to ADE at HOME! (Important Jump Start Information Inside),” which will give you all the information you need to get logged in.
If you missed us this year, we hope to see you in February 2026! Please know that there are many, many resources available to you outside of the conference. There are over 270 ADE podcasts that cover the range of subjects and related needs when teaching with Miss Mason’s method, as well as many teaching videos (some from past conferences,) curriculum help, and resources on our Teacher Help page.
It goes without saying that life is full of transitions, and a Charlotte Mason Education is no exception. From beginning school lessons with one child to adding subsequent students, moving into higher levels, or bringing older students into the Method for the first time, this episode discusses the multitudinous transitions we, and our students, make over the course of our education and how to avoid pitfalls while seeking balance.
In today’s podcast episode, we bring you a session from the 2024 ADE at HOME {Virtual} Conference. LaShawne Thomas presented a session full of ideas and possibilities for navigating homeschooling when seasons of transition arise (and sometimes hang around) in our lives. A long-time Charlotte Mason educator and former Navy wife, LaShawne has experienced her fair share of upheavals and transitions and has much wisdom to share with us.
This week on the podcast, we are discussing the principles behind Charlotte Mason’s School Schedules. First we look at the whole year’s schedule, why three terms, and options we have for today’s students. Then, we turn our focus to the daily schedule and how we can bring much needed balance to our education. We hope you take away principles, rather than rules, and gain clarity on how our seemingly mundane choices have such a large impact on our students.
Listen Now:
“It is impossible to overstate the importance of this habit of attention. It is, …, ‘within the reach of everyone, and should be made the primary object of all mental discipline’; for whatever the natural gifts of the child, it is only so far as the habit of attention is cultivated in him that he is able to make use of them.” (1/146)
“…if the [student] is to get two or three hours intact [in the afternoon], she will owe it to her mother’s firmness as much as to her good management. In the first place, that the school tasks be done, and done well, in the assigned time, should be a most fixed law. The young people will maintain that it is impossible, but let the mother insist; she will thereby cultivate the habit of attention.” (5/195)
“It is well to make up our mind that there is always a next thing to be done, whether in work or play; and that the next thing, be it ever so trifling, is the right thing; not so much for its own sake, perhaps, as because, each time we insist upon ourselves doing the next thing, we gain power in the management of that unruly filly, Inclination. …
“At first it requires attention and thought. But mind and body get into the way of doing most things; and the person, whose mind has the habit of singling out the important things and doing them first, saves much annoyance to himself and others, and has gained in Integrity. …
“In the end, integrity makes for gaiety, because the person who is honest about his work has time to play, and is not secretly vexed by the remembrance of things left undone or ill done.” (4-1/171-2)
This season, as we explore finding balance in the Charlotte Mason Method, we are interviewing people who have been able to find balance in their various contexts. This episode is an interview with Helen Swaveley, a seasoned home-educating parent, as she offers her perspective on how the Charlotte Mason’s method gives balance to our students in high school and beyond.
