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Homeschool parents recognize that there is more to education than academic subjects. Charlotte Mason was careful to ground the teacher’s understanding in the moral responsibility of training children. This episode addresses moral development in the child and how to foster it through authority, habits, and the living ideas children are served in the curriculum.
Listen Now:
School Education (Volume 3), Chapter 12
“…the little fellow writes, in the verses he makes for his grandmother’s birthday; and then, when the verses come to be read, ah! The humiliation of the soul he goes through, and how surely he expects father and grandmother to find him out for a hypocrite. “Why did I write it? She’s not here, and it was not necessary to mention her; I love grandma, it’s true; I reverence her, but still she is not the same. Why did I write it? Why have I lied?” This is the sort of thing there is in children. We recognise it as we read, and remember the dim, childish days when we, too, had an ‘organ of truth’ just so exquisitely delicate; and the recollection should quicken our reverence of the tender consciences of children.” (1/183)
“Facts like this afford a glimpse of the appalling responsibility that lies upon parents. The child comes into the world with a moral faculty, a delicate organ whereby he discerns the flavour of good and evil, and at the same time has a perception of delight in the good––in himself or others,––of loathing and abhorrence of the evil. But, poor little child, he is like a navigator who does not know how to box his compass. He is born to love the good, and to hate the evil, but he has no real knowledge of what is good and what is evil; what intuitions he has, he puts no faith in, but yields himself in simplicity to the steering of others. The wonder that Almighty God can endure so far to leave the very making of an immortal being in the hands of human parents is only matched by the wonder that human parents can accept this divine trust with hardly a thought of its significance.” (1/333)
“‘God does not allow’ us to do thus and thus should be a rarely expressed but often present thought to parents who study the nature of the divine authority where it is most fully revealed, that is, in the Gospels. They see there that authority works by principles and not by rules, and as they themselves are the deputy authorities set over every household, it becomes them to consider the divine method of government.” (3/127)
Our harsh governing always produces revolt. God allows
man to make a free choice of obedience, rather than forcing it. The
law of God, according to his word, is exceeding broad, it “encompasses
us as the air we breathe, only more so, for it reaches to our secret
thoughts, which is not a hardship, but a delight.” Parents love and
see to the best for their children, and the children learn they are
happy when good, and sad when they are not. They must learn that we
are all ruled by the law of God, which ‘is another name for the will
of God.” (3/128)
“Children play with Moral Questions.––There is no part of education more nice and delicate than this, nor any in which grown-up people are more apt to blunder. Everyone knows how tiresome it is to discuss any nice moral question with children; how they quibble, suggest a hundred ingenious explanations or evasions, fail to be shocked or to admire in the right place––in fact, play with the whole question; or, what is more tiresome still, are severe and righteous overmuch, and ‘deal damnation round’ with much heartiness and goodwill. Sensible parents are often distressed at this want of conscience in the children; but they are not greatly in fault; the mature conscience demands to be backed up by the mature intellect, and the children have neither the one nor the other. Discussions of the kind should be put down; the children should not be encouraged to give their opinions on questions of right and wrong, and little books should not be put into their hands.” (1/336)
“First and infinitely the most important, is the habit of obedience. Indeed, obedience is the whole duty of the child, and for this reason––every other duty of the child is fulfilled as a matter of obedience to his parents. Not only so: obedience is the whole duty of man; obedience to conscience, to law, to Divine direction.” (1/161)
“the training of the child in the habit of strict veracity is … one which requires delicate care and scrupulosity on the part of the mother. … The vice of lying causes: carelessness in ascertaining the truth, carelessness in stating the truth, and a deliberate intention to deceive. That all three are vicious” (1/164)
“These departures from strict veracity are on matters of such slight importance that the mother is apt to let them pass as the ‘children’s chatter’; but, indeed, ever such lapse is damaging to the child’s sense of truth––a blade which easily loses its keenness of edge.” (1/164-65)
“As for reverence, consideration for others, respect for persons and property, I can only urge the importance of a sedulous cultivation of these moral qualities––the distinguishing marks of a refined nature––until they become the daily habits of the child’s life; and the more, because a self assertive, aggressive, self seeking temper is but too characteristic of the times we live in. (1/166)
“Again, let us keep before the children that it is the manner of thoughts we think which matters; and, in the early days, when a child’s face is an open book to his parents, the habit of sweet thoughts must be kept up, and every selfish, resentful, unamiable movement of children’s minds observed in the countenance must be changed before consciousness sets in.” (3/135-36)
“[The child] learns to read in a way that affords him some moral training. There is no stumbling, no hesitation from the first, but bright attention and perfect achievement. His reading lesson is a delight, of which he is deprived when he comes to his lesson in a lazy and dawdling mood. Perfect enunciation and precision are insisted on…” (1/221-22)
“The book should always be deeply interesting, and when the narration is over, there should be a little talk in which moral points are brought out…” (1/233)
“[In Bible lessons] let the teaching, moral and spiritual, reach them without much personal application.” (1/233)
“We cannot live sanely unless we know that other peoples are as we are with a difference.” (6/179)
“Perhaps the main part of a child’s education should be concerned with the great human relationships, relationships of love and service, of authority and obedience, of reverence and pity and neighborly kindness; relationships to kin and friend and neighbor, to ’cause’ and country and king, to the past and the present. History, literature, archaeology, art, languages, whether ancient or modern, travel and tales of travel; all of these are in one way or other the record or expression of persons, and we who are persons are interested in all persons, for we are all one flesh, and we are all of one spirit, and whatever any of us does or suffers is interesting to the rest.” (3/80-81)
The Naturalist’s Notebook, Nathaniel Wheelwright and Bernd Heinrich
To celebrate Black Friday and Cyber Monday, A Delectable Education will be offering a 20% discount on our Teacher Training Videos, including three new videos!
To take advantage of this sale, use the following discount code on the checkout page from Friday, 11/26 through Monday, 11/30 at 11:59 PM EST:
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Also, check out the Black Friday discounts you can receive from these other Charlotte Mason shops:
Afterthoughts Blog – This shop has study guides, audio downloads, Swedish Drill books, event downloads and beginning Phonics lessons. Head to Brandy’s shop to see her Black Friday discounts.
A Humble Place – offers Charlotte Mason Picture Study Aids, a kindergarten curriculum, and seasonal art devotions for homeschooling families. This year’s Black Friday deals will include discounts on Charlotte Mason quote apparel, mugs, totes, and prints as well as picture study resources!
Commonplace Quarterly – CPQ is a beautiful quarterly print magazine, focused on encouraging homeschool moms with an emphasis on the Charlotte Mason method. Includes articles that appeal to both the new and the seasoned homeschooler in every issue. CPQ will be offering 25% off all shop orders from the 27th-29th.
Meaningful Menus – A fun and simple way to enjoy Charlotte Mason morning time subjects as a family. Open and go Volumes include songs and poems covering hymn study, recitation, folk songs, Bible memory work, and Shakespeare. Use code “GIVETHANKS” and get 20% off all digital products. Valid through 12/1/2020.
Nature Study Hacking – Combining Nature Study lessons with Nature Journal prompts these books help beginners learn how to use a nature journal AND study nature regularly through first hand observation. Save 25% off site-wide from Black Friday-Cyber Monday.
Our Journey Westward Shop – Cindy’s shop has some practical Charlotte Mason Homeschooling resources along with a line of Nature Study guides. Cindy’s entire shop (excluding membership) has been marked down 25-50% from Nov.24-30! No need for a coupon code!
Sabbath Mood Homeschool– Nicole’s website includes a full line of living science curriculum, special study guides, and helpful articles, book lists, and more. Head to her site for 20% off of everything from Black Friday through Cyber Monday.
The Peaceful Press – The Peaceful Press- Charlotte Mason inspired curriculum for a joyful homeschool. Save 25% storewide on Black Friday.
Reshelving Alexandria– Empowering homeschoolers with knowledge to make their own book decisions for their family. Black Friday Lifetime Membership sale for current members.
Isn’t that an amazing list? Happy shopping!!
We are happy to announce that we have three NEW Teacher Training Videos available! These videos were professionally recorded and edited and include reading instruction, geography, and scheduling. See more details below.
These and all of our other Teacher Training Videos will be 20% off from Black Friday through Cyber Monday! Just use the code 2020TTV to get your discount.
Help and Hope for Teaching Reading by Liz Cottrill
Are you afraid to teach your child to read, or frustrated with your lack of success? This hour will address the practical steps to get started in the crucial responsibility of teaching our children to read. No child is alike in his tackling of this skill, no existing curriculum addresses all the variables, but Charlotte Mason’s way is straightforward and steady. Together we will conduct beginning reading lessons and then tackle all the questions you have about your own particular fears or difficulties that time will allow. (1-hour video)
Geography: At Home in the World by Emily Kiser
Often we wonder if a Charlotte Mason curriculum is still relevant for children today, living in a multi-cultural, modern world. Yet, if we look closely at the subject of geography, we see that instead of focusing on our own country as we do when we begin teaching history, young children should be exposed to a wide knowledge of all countries to become acquainted with all cultures and climes–even those very different than his own. “Bet let him be at home in any single region; let him see, with the mind’s eye, the people at their work and at their play, the flowers and fruits in their seasons, sympathetically,” (1/275) Charlotte Mason tells us, and this knowledge widens and deepens throughout her curriculum. In this workshop, we walk through the principles and practices of geography teaching in Forms I through VI. (1-hour video)
Scheduling: A home schoolroom managed on sound principles by Nicole Williams
Charlotte Mason gave us very specific guidelines for how a homeschool family’s daily schedule should run, including morning lessons and afternoon occupations. But for some, the idea of creating and following a schedule can be daunting. Join Nicole as she shows you how Miss Mason’s plan allows for freedom and serenity in your day. (1-hour video)
Charlotte Mason’s short synopsis of the main points of her educational method is useful to homeschool and classroom teachers. This episode continues through this “synopsis,” moving beyond philosophical foundations to determining the curriculum and how implementing it is best accomplished.
Listen Now:
[13] In devising a SYLLABUS for a normal child, of whatever social class, three points must be considered:-
(a) He requires much knowledge, for the mind needs sufficient food as much as does the body.
(b) The knowledge should be various, for sameness in mental diet does not create appetite (i.e., curiosity).
(c) Knowledge should be communicated in well-chosen language, because his attention responds naturally to what is conveyed in literary form.
[14] As knowledge is not assimilated until it is reproduced, children should ‘tell back ‘ after a single reading or hearing: or should write on some part of what they have read.
[15] A single reading is insisted on, because children have naturally great power of attention; but this force is dissipated by the re-reading of passages, and also, by questioning, summarising, and the like.
Acting upon these and some other points in the behaviour of mind, we find that the educability of children is enormously greater than has hitherto been supposed, and is but little dependent on such circumstances as heredity and environment.
Nor is the accuracy of this statement limited to clever children or to children of the educated classes: thousands of children in Elementary Schools respond freely to this method, which is based on the behaviour of mind.
“Under the phrase, ‘Education is a life,’ I have tried to show how necessary it is to sustain the intellectual life upon ideas, and as a corollary, that a school-book should be a medium for ideas and not merely a receptacle for facts. That normal children have a natural desire for, and a right admission to, all fitting knowledge, appears to me to be suggested by the phrase, ‘Education is the Science of Relations.’ These considerations clear the ground towards that of a curriculum.” (3/216)
The children had their opportunity, and they rose to it, as Miss Mason knew they would. Since then a hundred schools have shewn that in the Worker’s child, even in the child of the slums, are latent the powers and tastes of our own children. There is no need of other and simpler books for them. They will understand any book suitable to their age… And what was suitable was to be by no means easy, for Miss Mason asked much of them. It was her way. The books are hard. But the more she asked, the more the children gave. And, though they never saw her, there were thousands who loved her, because she understood them and knew what they wanted. She had treated them as persons. She had respected them. They were in some way conscious of her high and gentle courtesy. Their outraged pride was soothed . They were her children, equal members of her world -wide school . The badge of inferiority had gone. Their ability amazed their teachers, who had been brought up to think that as a class they were of inferior mentality; that they could do nothing without help, and would do nothing without something like compulsion . They were not prepared—we were none of us prepared—for Miss Mason’s epoch-making discovery, the “great avidity for knowledge in children of all ages and of every class ‘ ‘ for knowledge which is presented to them in more or less literary form. (In Memoriam, pp. 188-189)
“We spread an abundant and delicate feast in the programmes and each small guest assimilates what he can. The child of genius and imagination gets greatly more than his duller comrade but all sit down to the same feast and each one gets according to his needs and powers.” (6/183)
“Knowledge in these several kinds is due to the children; for there seems reason to believe that the limit to human intelligence coincides with the limit to human interest; that is, that a normal person of poor and narrow intelligence is so because the interests proper to him have not been called into play.” (3/324)
“It is a wide programme founded on the educational rights of man; wide, but we may not say it is impossible nor may we pick and choose and educate him in this direction but not in that. We may not even make choice between science and the ‘humanities.’ Our part it seems to me is to give a child a vital hold upon as many as possible of those wide relationships proper to him.” (6/157)
“…it is a mistake to suppose that the greater the number of ‘subjects’ the greater the scholar’s labour; the contrary is the case as the variety in itself affords refreshment.” (6/158)
“We cannot make any hard and fast rule-a big book or a little book, a book at first-hand or at second-hand; either may be right provided we have it in us to discern a living book, quick, and informed with the ideas proper to the subject of which it treats.” (3/178)
“It is not easy to sum up in a few short sentences those principles upon which the mind naturally acts and which I have tried to bring to bear upon a school curriculum. The fundamental idea is, that children are persons and are therefore moved by the same springs of conduct as their elders. Among these is the Desire of Knowledge, knowledge-hunger being natural to everybody…
“In the nature of things then the unspoken demand of children is for a wide and very varied curriculum; it is necessary that they should have some knowledge of the wide range of interests proper to them as human beings, and for no reasons of convenience or time limitations may we curtail their proper curriculum.
“Perceiving the range of knowledge to which children as persons are entitled the questions are, how shall they be induced to take that knowledge, and what can the children of the people learn in the short time they are at school? We have discovered a working answer to these two conundrums. I say discovered, and not invented, for there is only one way of learning, and the intelligent persons who can talk well on many subjects and the expert in one learn in the one way, that is, they read to know. (6/13-14)
“Children no more come into the world without provision for dealing with knowledge than without provision for dealing with food. They bring with them not only that intellectual appetite, the desire of knowledge, but also an enormous, an unlimited power of attention to which the power of retention (memory) seems to be attached, as one digestive process succeeds another, until the final assimilation.” (6/14-15)
“Think of the time you save. You read your book once and you know it and go on to another —and there is no looking up at the end of term before the examinations, indeed this is not allowed.” (PR 33, p. 782-83, THE WORK AND AIMS OF THE P.U.S., By Miss O’Ferrall, ex-HOE)
“it is not a casual matter, a convenient, almost miraculous way of covering the ground, of getting children to know certainly and lastingly a surprising amount; all this is to the good, but it is something more, a root principle vital to education. In this way of learning the child comes to his own; he makes use of the authority which is in him in its highest function as a self-commanding, self-compelling, power. … But to make yourself attend, make yourself know, this indeed is to come into a king––all the more satisfying to children because they are so made that they revel in knowledge.” (6/76-77)
“I dwell on the single reading because,.. it is impossible to fix attention on that which we have heard before and know we shall hear again.” (6/261)
“This is a bad habit to get into; and we should do well to save our children by not giving them the vague expectation of second and third and tenth opportunities to do that which should have been done at first.” (3/179)
“…while we grown-up persons read and forget because we do not take the pains to know as we read, these young students have the powers of perfect recollection and just application because they have read with attention and concentration and have in every case reproduced what they have read in narration, or, the gist of some portion of it, in writing. (6/185)
“From this point it was not difficult to go on to the perception that, whether in taking or rejecting, the mind was functioning for its own nourishment; that the mind, in fact, requires sustenance––as does the body, in order that it increase and be strong; but because the mind is not to be measured or weighed but is spiritual, so its sustenance must be spiritual too, must, in fact, be ideas (in the Platonic sense of images). I soon perceived that children were well equipped to deal with ideas, and that explanations, questionings, amplifications, are unnecessary and wearisome. Children have a natural appetite for knowledge which is informed with thought. They bring imagination, judgment, and the various so-called ‘faculties’ to bear upon a new idea pretty much as the gastric juices act upon a food ration. This was illuminating but rather startling; the whole intellectual apparatus of the teacher, his power of vivid presentation, apt illustration, able summing up, subtle questioning, all these were hindrances and intervened between children and the right nutriment duly served; this, on the other hand, they received with the sort of avidity and simplicity with which a healthy child eats his dinner.” (6/10-11)
“The mind can know nothing save what it can produce in the form of an answer to a question put to the mind by itself.” I have failed to trace the saying to its source, but a conviction of its importance has been growing upon me during the last forty years. It tacitly prohibits questioning from without; (this does not, of course, affect the Socratic use of questioning for purposes of moral conviction); and it is necessary to intellectual certainty, to the act of knowing. For example, to secure a conversation or an incident, we ‘go over it in our minds’; that is, the mind puts itself through the process of self-questioning which I have indicated. This is what happens in the narrating of a passage read: each new consecutive incident or statement arrives because the mind asks itself,––”What next?” For this reason it is important that only one reading should be allowed; efforts to memorise weaken the power of attention, the proper activity of the mind; if it is desirable to ask questions in order to emphasize certain points, these should be asked after and not before, or during, the act of narration.” (6/16-17)
“…but what if the devitalisation we notice in so many of our young people, keen about games but dead to things of the mind, is due to the processes carried on in our schools, to our plausible and pleasant ways of picturing, eliciting, demonstrating, illustrating, summarising, doing all those things for children which they are born with the potency to do for themselves? No doubt we do give intellectual food, but too little of it; let us have courage and we shall be surprised, as we are now and then, at the amount of intellectual strong meat almost any child will take at a meal and digest at his leisure.” (6/237)
“…because we were wise enough to see that the mind functions for its own nourishment whether in rejecting or receiving, we changed our tactics, following, so we thought, the lead of the children. We did well, and therefore are prepared; if necessary, to do better. What, then, if our whole educational equipment, our illustrations, elucidations, questionings, our illimitable patience in getting a point into the children, were all based on the false assumption of the immature, which we take to connote the imperfect, incomplete minds of children? “I think I could understand, Mummy, if you did not explain quite so much,”––is this the inarticulate cry of the school child to-day? He really is capable of much more than he gets credit for, but we go the wrong way about getting his capable mind into action.
“But the teacher is not moved by arrogance but by a desire to be serviceable. He believes that children cannot understand well-written books and that he must make of himself a bridge between the pupil and the real teacher, the man who has written the book. Now we have proved that children, even children of the slums, are able to understand any book suitable for their age: that is, children of eight or nine will grasp a chapter in Pilgrim’s Progress at a single reading; children of fourteen, one of Lamb’s Essays or a chapter in Eöthen, boys and girls of seventeen will ‘tell’ Lycidas. Given a book of literary quality suitable to their age and children will know how to deal with it without elucidation. Of course they will not be able to answer questions because questions are an impertinence which we all resent, but they will tell you the whole thing with little touches of individual personality in the narrative.” (6/260)
“Now comes the question of how to teach the lessons. In the P.U.S. the teacher is not there to thrust second-hand knowledge into the heads of the children. It is her duty to open the doors in many different directions through which the children may walk in the pursuit of knowledge whilst she is there to guide and direct as occasion requires. She does as little as possible herself. ‘What a nice easy job.’ I think I hear you say. But when you come to try it you find that after all it is so much easier to do the sum your self than to keep yourself in the background and to give just exactly that right amount of direction which will enable Tommy to do it for himself.” (PR 33, p. 782-83, THE WORK AND AIMS OF THE P.U.S., By Miss O’Ferrall, ex-HOE)
Bestowing the Brush: Foundations in Drawing Video Course
Synopsis Reflection Questions–printable PDF with Reflection Questions to use personally or with a Discussion Group
Episode 201: Short Synopsis Points 1-4
Episode 202: Short Synopsis Points 5-8
Episode 204: Short Synopsis Points 9-12
Episode 6: Why Living Books are Essential
Episode 7: How to Recognize Living Books