Imagine a traditional classical approach to homeschooling, having eight children, and then discovering the life-giving education of Charlotte Mason. Join Nicole Williams as she interviews Toni Onks, who courageously made a revolutionary switch to Charlotte Mason and rediscovered the joy of learning together as a family.
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For the Children’s Sake, Macaulay
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, William Komkwamba
“Education, said Charlotte Mason, is an “atmosphere, a discipline, and a life.” Habit formation, the discipline, is fundamental to our function as persons. Miss Mason offers descriptions of habit formation as well as counsel on habit training. Emily, Liz, and Nicole discuss the essentials for building those habits that make for “the good life.”
Listen Now:
Home Education (Volume 1): Part III, Habit is Ten Natures and Part IV, Some Mental and Moral Habits
Parents and Children (Volume 2): Chapter XVI: Discipline
“Consideration made the reason of the failure plain: there was a warm glow of goodness at the heart of every one of the children, but they were all incapable of steady effort, because they had no strength of will, no power to make themselves do that which they knew they ought to do. Here, no doubt, come in the functions of parents and teachers; they should be able to make the child do that which he lacks the power to compel himself to.” (1/99-100)
“The problem before the educator is to give the child control over his own nature, to enable him to hold himself in hand as much in regard to the traits we call good, as to those we call evil:––many a man makes shipwreck on the rock of what he grew up to think his characteristic virtue––his open-handedness, for instance.” (1/103-104)
“We are all mere creatures of habit. We think our accustomed thoughts, make our usual small talk, go through the trivial round, the common task, without any self-determining effort of will at all. If it were not so––if we had to think, to deliberate, about each operation of the bath or the table––life would not be worth having; the perpetually repeated effort of decision would wear us out. But, let us be thankful, life is not thus laborious. For a hundred times we act or think, it is not necessary to choose, to will, say, more than once. And the little emergencies, which compel an act of will, will fall in the children’s lives just about as frequently as in our own. These we cannot save them from, nor is it desirable that we should. What we can do for them is to secure that they have habits which shall lead them in ways of order, propriety, and virtue, instead of leaving their wheel of life to make ugly ruts in miry places.” (1/110-111)
“Every day, every hour, the parents are either passively or actively forming those habits in their children upon which, more than upon anything else, future character and conduct depend. ” (1/118)
“[L]et me say that the education of habit is successful in so far as it enables the mother to let her children alone, not teasing them with perpetual commands and directions–a running fire of Do and Don’t; but letting them go their own way and grow, having first secured that they will go the right way, and grow to fruitful purpose.” (1/134)
“…to point out the miseries that must arise from this fault, and the duty of over-coming it…” (1/120)
“The mother devotes herself to the formation of one habit at a time, doing no more than keep watch over those already formed.” (1/136)
“It is evident that to administer rewards and punishments on this principle requires patient consideration and steady determination on the mother’s part. She must consider…what fault of disposition the child’s misbehaviour springs from; she must aim her punishment at that fault, and must brace herself to see her child suffer present loss for his lasting gain.” (1/148)
“Boys and Girls are generally Dutiful-It would be better for boys and girls to suffer the consequences of not doing their work, now and then, than to do it because they are so urged and prodded on all hands that they have no volition in the matter. The more we are prodded the lazier we get, and the less capable of the effort of will which should carry us to, and nearly
carry us through, our tasks. Boys and girls are, on the whole, good, and desirous to do their duty. If we expect the tale of bricks to be delivered at the due moment without urging or entreating, rewarding or punishing, in nine cases out of ten we shall get what we look for. Where many of us err is in leaning too much to our own understanding and our own efforts, and not trusting sufficiently to the dutiful impulse which will carry children through the work they are expected to do.” (3/39-40)
“…the incessant watchfulness and endeavour which go to the forming and preserving of the habits of the good life…” (2/173)
“Knowing that the brain is the physical seat of habit and that conduct and character alike, are the outcome of the habits we allow; knowing, too, that an inspiring idea initiates a new habit of thought, and hence, a new habit of life; we perceive that the great work of education is to inspire children with vitalising ideas as to every relation of life, every department of knowledge, every subject of thought, and to give deliberate care to the formation of those habits of the good life which are the outcome of vitalising ideas. In this great work we seek and assuredly find the co-operation of the Divine Spirit, whom we recognise, in a sense rather new to modern thought, as the supreme Educator of mankind in things that have been called secular, fully as much as in those that have been called sacred.” (3/172-173)
It is not an exaggeration to say that understanding the ideas in this Charlotte Mason podcast is the most important piece of knowledge you can gain as a teacher and parent. Liz, Emily, and Nicole focus on Miss Mason’s use of method rather than system in education. It is a way of seeing the child, his education, and discipleship that brings life rather than fixed results.
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Home Education (Volume 1), pp. 6-10
“In the first place, we have no system of education. We hold that great things, such as nature, life, education, are ‘cabined, cribbed, confined,’ in proportion as they are systematised. We have a method of education, it is true, but method is no more than a way to an end, and is free, yielding, adaptive as Nature herself. Method has a few comprehensive laws according to which details shape themselves, as one naturally shapes one’s behaviour to the acknowledged law that fire burns. System, on the contrary, has an infinity of rules and instructions as to what you are to do and how you are to do it. Method in education follows Nature humbly; stands aside and gives her fair play.” (2/168)
“At any rate, it is not too much to say that a parent who does not follow reasonably a method of education, fully thought out, fails––now, more than ever before––to fulfil the claims his children have upon him.” (1/8)
“[T]herefore, the knowledge of God is the principal knowledge, and the chief end of education.” (Preface to the Home Education Series)
““We labour to produce a human being at his best physically, mentally, morally, and spiritually, with the enthusiasms of religion, of the good life, of nature, knowledge, art, and manual work; and we do not labour in the dark. Our aim in Education is to give a Full Life. ‘Thou hast set my feet in a large room;’ should be the glad cry of every intelligent soul.” (3/170)
“[T]he preparation of the child to take his place in the world at his best.” (1/9)
“The parent who sees his way––that is, the exact force of method––to educate his child, will make use of every circumstance of the child’s life almost without intention on his own part, so easy and spontaneous is a method of education based upon Natural Law.” (1/8)
“Though system is highly useful as an instrument of education, a ‘system of education’ is mischievous, as producing only mechanical action instead of the vital growth and movement of a living being.” (1/9-10)
“As the true educationalist works from within outwards…” (2/102)
“A person is not built up from without but from within, that is, he is living, and all external educational appliances and activities which are intended to mould his character are decorative and not vital…no external application is capable of nourishing life or promoting growth; …life is sustained on that which is taken in by the organism, not by that which is applied from without.” (6/23-24)
“System leads Nature: assists, supplements, rushes in to undertake those very tasks which Nature has made her own since the world was. Does Nature endow every young thing, child or kitten, with a wonderful capacity for inventive play? Nay, but, says System, I can help here; I will invent games for the child and help his plays, and make more use of this power of his than unaided Nature knows how. So Dame System teaches the child to play, and he enjoys it; but, alas, there is no play in him, no initiative, when he is left to himself; and so on, all along the lines. System is fussy and zealous and produces enormous results––in the teacher!” (2/168-9)
“There is always the danger that a method, a bona fide method, should degenerate into a mere system…but what a miserable wooden system does it become in the hands of ignorant practitioners!” (1/9)
“[T]he fact is, that a few broad essential principles cover the whole field, and these once fully laid hold of, it is as easy and natural to act upon them as it is to act upon our knowledge of such facts as that fire burns and water flows.” (1/10)
“Four Tests which should be applied to Children’s Lessons.––We see, then, that the children’s lessons should provide material for their mental growth, should exercise the several powers of their minds, should furnish them with fruitful ideas, and should afford them knowledge, really valuable for its own sake, accurate, and interesting, of the kind that the child may recall as a man with profit and pleasure.” (1/177)
“System––the observing of rules until the habit of doing certain things, of behaving in certain ways, is confirmed, and, therefore, the art is acquired––is so successful in achieving precise results, that it is no wonder there should be endless attempts to straiten the whole field of education to the limits of a system.” (1/9)
“But the educator has to deal with a self-acting, self-developing being, and his business is to guide, and assist in, the production of the latent good in that being, the dissipation of the latent evil, the preparation of the child to take his place in the world at his best, with every capacity for good that is in him developed into a power.’ (1/9)
“It is worth while to point out the differing characters of a system and a method, because parents let themselves be run away with often enough by some plausible ‘system,’ the object of which is to produce development in one direction…” (1/10)
“A parent may be willing to undergo any definite labours for his child’s sake; but to be always catering for his behoof, always contriving that circumstances shall play upon him for his good, is the part of a god and not of a man!” (1/10)
“It is only as we recognise our limitations that our work becomes effective: when we see definitely what we are to do, what we can do, and what we cannot do, we set to work with confidence and courage; we have an end in view, and we make our way intelligently towards that end, and a way to an end is method. It rests with parents not only to give their children birth into the life of intelligence and moral power, but to sustain the higher life which they have borne.” (2/33)
Charlotte Mason was convinced that children–all children–are born persons and advocated for “a liberal education for all.” This interview is with Nicolle Hutchinson who founded and administrates Gillingham Charter School in Pottsville, PA. Once Mrs. Hutchinson, a public school teacher, discovered Charlotte Mason, she knew there was a way to make public education life-giving. In this interview, she shares about her journey to Charlotte Mason’s method, her growing dream to bring her principles and practices to publicly educated children, and the formation and continuation of her charter school.
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A Whole New Mind, Daniel H. Pink
Little House on the Prairie, Laura Ingalls Wilder
To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
Gillingham Charter School, Pottsville, PA
Charlotte Mason Community School, Detroit, MI
This month’s Charlotte Mason Q&A episode addresses common challenges most families face: how much should the child’s preferences contribute to book selection, how can we most effectively combine various age and ability levels, and that precarious balance of the day-to-day routine–specifically, how do the ADE ladies personally budget and manage their daily schedules.
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“In home schoolrooms where there are children in A as well as in B, both Forms may work together, doing the work of A or B as they are able, but more work must be expected from IA.” (N.B. 1 on the Form 1 Programmes)
“This habit should be begun early; so soon as the child can read at all, he should read for himself, and to himself, history, legends, fairy tales, and other suitable matter.” (1/227)