An Exception to my Previous Statement

In my last post I made the statement,

Let me take a step back and ask, "Why hymns?" In my opinion, hymns offer much that most contemporary Christian music can't come close to touching. They are theologically rich, doctrinally sound (generally speaking) and deeply committed to content. They are full of beautiful language and amazing imagery. It seems much of contemporary Christian music is pablum compared to the treasure trove we find in hymns.

I gladly offer a refreshing exception:

"In Christ Alone"

In Christ alone my hope is found;
He is my light, my strength, my song;
This cornerstone, this solid ground,
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
When fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My comforter, my all in all—
Here in the love of Christ I stand.

In Christ alone, Who took on flesh,
Fullness of God in helpless babe!
This gift of love and righteousness,
Scorned by the ones He came to save.
Till on that cross as Jesus died,
The wrath of God was satisfied;
For ev'ry sin on Him was laid—
Here in the death of Christ I live.

There in the ground His body lay,
Light of the world by darkness slain;
Then bursting forth in glorious day,
Up from the grave He rose again!
And as He stands in victory,
Sin's curse has lost its grip on me;
For I am His and He is mine—
Bought with the precious blood of Christ.

No guilt in life, no fear in death—
This is the pow'r of Christ in me;
From life's first cry to final breath,
Jesus commands my destiny.
No pow'r of hell, no scheme of man,
Can ever pluck me from His hand;
Till He returns or calls me home—
Here in the pow'r of Christ I'll stand.

A Great Resource for Hymn Study

Dh brought home a catalog that featured this series of books a few months ago. I filed it away in my, "Oh, that would be so neat, if we could just find time," mental file. How I would love to teach my children the hymns I learned growing up! Then came CM into our school.

One of the first places I was encouraged to visit was Simply Charlotte Mason. I was told it was a great place to find practical ideas for implementing CM ideas into your homeschool. The first thing I started looking at were all the sample schedules posted at their site. I was ready to get started and quick! :) Well, guess what popped up on most of the schedules they had posted.....(drum roll, please)....Hymn Study! You can see a sample schedule here, here, here or even here on their "Light Schedule"!

I asked Dh to put in our order; there are four books in the set. Each book is linked to Crossway, the publisher's site, because you can hear samples of the music there although two volumes are available at Amazon for less.

Hymns for a Kid's Heart, Volume 1
Hymns for a Kid's Heart, Volume 2
Christmas Carols for a Kid's Heart, Volume 3
Passion Hymns for a Kid's Heart, Volume 4

Each hymn is introduced with a vignette of the hymn's author, usually including details about him/her as a child. They are precious, inspiring stories and enough to justify the cost of the books alone! After each story is a page called, "From My Heart to You" which is a one-page devotional that reinforces the main point of the hymn. Last is the hymn itself including sheet music followed by a verse and a prayer that reaffirms the message of the hymn yet again. Each also includes a CD of all the songs in that book book sung by children.

Let me take a step back and ask, "Why hymns?" In my opinion, hymns offer much that most contemporary Christian music can't come close to touching. They are theologically rich, doctrinally sound (generally speaking) and deeply committed to content. They are full of beautiful language and amazing imagery. It seems much of contemporary Christian music is pablum compared to the treasure trove we find in hymns.

Do you need this series (or any other series for that matter) to incorporate hymn study into your school? Most definitely not. Still I am very thankful that this series has found its way onto our shelves and I am certain will be used again and again.

Afterthought...

After re-reading my last few posts I felt I should add something...

I am so thrilled to be shifting to a CM style homeschool BUT that doesn't mean that I don't appreciate all that Classical has to offer. Classial is an excellent educational choice. I honestly think a lot of moms do it so much better than I. The balancing act, I mean. I am such a box checker and WTM became one huge to-do list for me (not the fault of the book, just my personality bent). I got so involved in getting it all done that I think I lost for the forest for the trees.

I forgot why I was homeschooling. I wanted my little boy home because public school can be a very tough place for a guy like him. So impulsive, yet so tender-hearted. So loud and in your face, yet so eager to please. So bright, yet so distracted. I wanted to give him every opportunity to grow in all respects - body, mind and spirit. With severe ADHD and major maturity issues as our daily reality, getting it all done became harder and harder, yet I still pushed.

Charlotte Mason's writings have brought me back to why I am homeschooling. I want to provide an excellent education for my boys and I believe I can do that better at home. I really do. Yet I lost my focus. That's what I mean about other moms doing it better. I think there are many, many moms out there who are following the Classical model and who instinctively do the things that Miss Mason talks about - nurturing a child's tender conscience; building in an appreciation of beauty through nature, music, art and the world all around; cultivating a deep love for God; shaping a child's personality by patient, consistent, systematic and diligent training; fostering a strong will that will, "chart the course of their lives" (Volume 1, p. 319, Modern Translation) and I could go on and on.

I just know in my heart that I was not doing those things to the best of my ability. That's what CM has been for me - a Renaissance of sorts for our school and for my heart! I just wanted to clarify that in case anyone was feeling a little slighted. That is not at all my intention. Thanks for letting me get that out. :)

Answering Questions

I've had several readers ask questions recently. I thought I would answer here just in case anyone else was wondering the same thing.

I was wondering how you got through all the CM reading--did you read the revised/modern one on-line? Each time I want to, I start and it is just so much information to consume. Would you mind sharing?

Well, I have not gotten through nearly as much CM reading as I would have liked. I have only read Volume 1 in Miss Mason's six volume Home Education series as well as Catherine Levison's books, A Charlotte Mason Education and More Charlotte Mason Education.

I did read Volume 1 in Modern English and plan on reading Volume 6 next. I have been told those are the most helpful in getting started as they are the most practical. Then I will fill in the gaps reading Volumes 2-5. I plan on reading all six volumes in Modern English because I will be able to proceed through them much more quickly in order to begin applying concepts. I would love to go back someday and re-read her works a second time in her original Victorian style English though!

When I started, I went to the Ambleside site and actually printed off only the first section of Volume 1. I would have been overwhelmed if I had initially printed it in its entirety. As I finished one section I would return to the computer to print the next. I chose to print them rather than read on-line because I need to interact with the text when I read: hold the pages, write thoughts and questions in the margins, and underline important concepts.

I was hesitant to get started but it was Tami at Ambleside Classical who kept encouraging me. She encouraged me not to simply read others interpretations/summaries of CM's writing but to go to them myself. Her gentle encouragement gave me the push I needed to "Just Do It!" (Wouldn't Nike be proud?!) Hopefully this will encourage someone who has been wanting to read for themselves to "Just Do It" too!

Could you share how a WTM-style narration and a CM-style narration have looked different to you? We do WTM-style right now and it seems so...artificial, or forced, or something.

I talked a little about this in my last post comparing CM to Classical, so here I thought I'd share a few quotes from the authors themselves. First Susan Wise-Bauer's ideas on narrations...

Narration is a way to develop the child's understanding and storytelling skills. The process is simple: the child tells you what he's just heard or read. ...In first grade, you begin to ask the child to summarize the plots of short simple stories...Narration lets you know how much a child retains and understands. It also develops vocabulary and powers of expression, and lays the foundation for good writing later on.

The Well Trained Mind, p. 55 (emphasis mine)

Narration removes the need for "comprehension exercises." Instead of learning to complete fill-in-the-blank questions, the child uses all his mental faculties to understand, sort through, reorganize and relate the main points of a story.

The Well Trained Mind, p. 59 (emphasis mine)

This process (of narration) developed the student's comprehension skills and taught him how to tell the difference between irrelevant details and important elements of plots or argument.

The Well Trained Mind, p. 272

And now Charlotte Mason's ideas on narration...

Narrating, like writing poetry or painting, is an art that's inherent in the mind of every child. It's just waiting to be uncovered. The child doesn't need to go through an educational process to develop it because it's already there. The child only needs a reason to narrate and he does--easily, generously, with events in the right order, using appropriate illustrative details, with the right choice of words, without flowery wordiness or redundant phrases, as soon as he's able to speak easily. This amazing ability lies within every child, yet it is rarely tapped into to serve his education. Robert will come home with an exciting story of a fight between Duke and a stray dog down the street. It's wonderful! He saw it all and tells everything with great eagerness in a style that might rival any epic movie. But our scorn for children is so ingrained that we don't appreciate it. All we see is how childish Robert is being. But if we could only see it and use it, his recounting could be the very foundation of his education.

Home Education, Volume 1, p. 231

Readings should always be in consecutive order and from a carefully selected book. Before the day's reading, the teacher should talk a little and discuss with the children what happened in the previous lesson. Then she can say a few words about the current lesson, just enough that the children are eager in anticipation. But she should be careful not to explain too much and, especially, she shouldn't take too long to get into the reading itself. Then she can read two or three pages, enough to cover a complete episode. After that, she can call on the children to narrate. If there are several children, they can take turns. The children narrate with enthusiasm and accuracy while still retaining a sense of the author's style. It isn't a good idea to nag them about their mistakes. They may begin with a lot of "ums" or "ands" but they soon stop doing that on their own, and their narrations become good enough in style and composition to publish in a book! This kind of narration lesson shouldn't take more than 15 minutes. The book should always be very interesting. When the narration is over, there should be a little bit of discussion where the moral points are brought out, pictures can be shown to illustrate the lesson, or diagrams drawn on the blackboard.

Home Education, Volume 1, p. 232-233

Essentially, the main difference between a CM narration and a WTM (Classical) narration is that the former asks the child to recall all he heard and the later wants a summary. To me the CM style is much more natural for a young child as many struggle mightily to differentiate between a main idea and a superfluous detail. The poster of the original question states that she feels WTM style narrations seem, "artifical or forced." I would maintain this is because WTM narrations may be trying to accomplish too much, especially for the younger student. If the goal is to determine, "how much a child retains and understands" (SWB quote above) then why summarize? If we really want to know how much they retain then let the children tell all they know! I am not saying summarization is not a valuable skill...oh, but it is. I just don't feel this is necessarily the best place to teach it.

The Awana issue is the same here (although there are other aspects besides the amount of scripture and lack of depth that I don't like). But how will you phase it out being a pastor's wife, just curious.

I am still not 100% certain that we will not continue AWANA but my heart continues to lean that direction - and even more strongly than when I first posted my thoughts on the issue. I believe it is a truly great program for the way it partners with parents; it just simply isn't meeting our needs anymore. AWANA is not offered at our home church so we attend at another church just a few blocks away. That makes it much easier to bow out gracefully!

I will say though, that even if it were at our church, I would not hesitate to step back. My dh is wonderful in this and has taught me so much. Our responsibility is first to God, then to each other and finally to our children. We are not responsible to make the church members happy or feel good about decisions we make. Our goal is to follow Christ and Him alone.

Wow! I am a people-pleaser to a fault. Do you want to know how much it cost me in therapy sessions to be able to say that and really mean it? Phew! :) :) :) No seriously, I haven't been in therapy for my people-pleasing habits but I have been under the sweet leadership of my husband who knows this about me and over the last twelve years of marriage has challenged me to overcome this unhealthy addiction to people's approval (not that I have arrived by any stretch of the imagination)!

Also, it is helpful we are at a large church which eases the "everyone's watching you" factor a tiny bit too. We have six services and two campuses so I interact with only a very small portion of the people at our church. On top of that, the boys and I attend the earliest service which is the smallest. This is to help Thatcher because larger crowds=more noise=one very overstimulated little boy. One other benefit of being at a church our size is that when I do disappoint people, which I am confident I do quite often (though not on purpose I assure you) it's not like a small church where everyone knows about it instantly and it's the talk of the town.

So I'm curious, did you completely ditch all WTM methods?

No, not at all. I still love the Classical Model and what it has to offer. I feel CM has truly enhanced our Classical school; some even say that Miss Mason was one interpreter of Classical education pre-Dorothy Sayers. So far we haven't changed so much what we do but how we do it!

And there are still several parts of our day that are not in line with CM recommendations at all. As one example Miss Mason preferred math programs where "only one difficulty is presented at a time." (Volume 1, Modern Translation, p. 262) In today's terms that would be a mastery program. Currently we are using Horizons which is considered a spiral program. I have no intentions to change from Horizons as it has been a great math program for us so far. As with all things, I reserve the right to change my mind if new information comes my way to so convince me otherwise. ;)

Comparing Charlotte Mason and Classical

Admittedly, I have a long way to go on this new path we have found ourselves on, speaking of Charlotte Mason, yet I wanted to make an attempt to compare these two very popular styles of education. I am no expert and surely will be embarrassed at the simplicity of this post in a few years once I've had time to read all six volumes in Charlotte Mason's Home Education series and have walked a little further down the road. :)

Still I have had so many questions from readers about CM's ideas that I thought it would be a great way for me to synthesize all I've learned so far and possibly help another mom along the way! I do want to say that each time I refer to Classical Education it is Classical as presented in The Well Trained Mind, therefore I will use Classical Education and WTM interchangeably.

First I'll start with the similarities because there are many. Both Classical and CM...

• recommend a chronological study of history.
  
• use narrations.
  
• value the use of excellent literature with children, especially the classics.
  
• encourage the study of foreign languages.
• advocate teaching mostly the same subjects: history, penmanship, math, reading, spelling, foreign language, science...
  

But there are in fact multiple differences as well. Following are some of the things that make CM distinct from Classical. CM...

• employs a six year cycle for teaching history and encourages reading first hand accounts as much as possible along with other books that will capture a child's heart as well as his/her mind. Miss Mason maintained that retention is much higher when the heart is engaged! Classical uses a four year cycle and lots of great literature.
  
• uses narrations much more so than classical - in almost every subject area. Miss Mason says that children's narrations should be oral until the age of 11-12, and then they can be required to write them. Also, a CM narration looks different from a Classical narration. CM asks the child to recall in his/her own words using as much detail as he/she is able to remember. WTM focuses more on summarizing the most important points and children start writing their narrations much sooner as well.
  
• encourages systematic habit training, especially no dawdling.
• advocates using short, concentrated lessons until the age of nine - 15 to 20 minutes for most subjects.
  
• advises teaching a modern language to start; CM taught French in her school. WTM recommends starting with Latin.
  
• believes in delaying formal grammar until the age of ten. Classical starts grammar in first grade at the age of six.
  
• allows no abridgements, reading only the original versions of stories to children whom she assured, "are able to understand intelligent ideas told with intelligent language." (Vol. 1, Home Education, Modern Translation, p. 287)
• sees "masterly inactivity" as a priority each and every day. Masterly inactivity is "a purposeful letting alone" of our children each day to allow them leisure, time to explore and time to seek their own interests.
  
• believes that science is best taught through nature for the young child, again up to about eight or nine. Children go on frequent nature walks and are encouraged and taught to be observers of God's natural world. They handle only "real" materials and specimens - textbooks are not used. Classical education encourages a science sequence that corresponds to the history cycles: biology, earth science/astronomy, chemistry and physics to go along with anciencts, medieval, early-modern and modern history.
• sees the study of art, music and poetry as core subjects and not extras.
• does not believe in using textbooks for any subject with children - especially younger ones.
  
• emphasizes teaching children handicrafts that can be enjoyed for a lifetime (sewing, cooking, woodworking...) rather than cute "crafty" type activities.
  
• utilizes highly structured mornings with afternoons free for children to pursue their own interests.
  
• uses copywork and dictation to teach grammar and spelling. Classical uses these methods but not exclusively like CM.

In summary, CM is a philosophy not a curriculum. She is an advocate of educating the "whole child" - mind, body and soul yet still within an academic approach. I mentioned in a previous post how I felt I was doing a great job in educating Thatcher's mind and growing his intellect but felt neglectful of his body and soul/heart. In my opinion, by following a CM style education I don't have to choose A, B, or C; I can choose "D" which is "All of the Above" :)

Education is an atmosphere,
a discipline, a life.
~ Charlotte Mason

Our First Official Nature Hike!

I have been informally attempting to train my boys to be observers of nature for the past year now - in our backyard, on our trips to the ranch, at the beach... I have definitely seen a spark of interest but getting an ADHD kid to stop and really observe, well that's definitely a challenge. ;) It will take extra time and diligence on my part but I am confident the rewards will be worth it. Before all the photos here is yet another quote from Charlotte Mason; this one about the how and why of nature study.

They should be long days spent outside...But suppose we have those long days in the open air, what is to be done with them so that they are pleasant days? There must be a plan, or else it will be all work and no fun for the mother and the children will be bored...They must be left to themselves for a good part of the day to take in their own impressions of nature's beauty. There's nothing worse than children being deprived of every moment to wonder and dream within their own minds because teachers and adults are constantly talking at them, not leaving them a moment's peace. Yet, the mother must not miss this opportunity of being outdoors to train the children to have seeing eyes, hearing ears and seeds of truth deposited into their minds to grow and blossom on their own in the secret chambers of their imaginations.

~Charlotte Mason - Volume 1, Home Education, Modern Translation p. 44

Here are some photos from our first adventure. We went to some trails about four miles from our home. I used to run this gorgeous path when I was training for races but haven't returned in almost a year. It was fun to share this treasure with my boys. We can't wait to go back and collect pictures of all the different wildlife that abound there! On this first trip we didn't see too many birds and critters but it whet our appetite to return soon.

Not a great photo but he's a Common Grackle.

We were glad to finally get a picture of a Northern Cardinal after seeing several that flew away before we could snap a photo!

Took me awhile to figure out this one - a Double-crested Cormorant. Thanks, Amelia! :)

One of a million crawfish/crayfish/crawdaddy holes scattered all over the trails.

Thatcher wanted me to include a photo of this sign on our report! They were so disappointed they didn't get to see an alligator, but me, I've seen plenty (behind fences, thank you very much!) and I was just fine to have not seen one this day. ;) On these very trails, just after Hurricane Rita three years ago my friend, Justin, and I were running and almost stepped on one of these....

A cottonmouth (water moccasin) - the only poisonous water snake in North America. Nice.





Not. ;)

Footprints of an unknown bird in the mud. It will be neat the day we can look and say, "Hey, footprints from a (fill in the blank)!"

Almost at the end of our walk...In the summer we'll be able to jump off the bridge that crosses this area and catch crabs - and NO I will not be cooking them for any of you wondering! ;)

At the end of the trails you come to Galveston Bay. Breathtaking with the morning sun sparkling on the water!

And just to the right of that photo of the bay this is what you see...devastation from Hurricane Ike that struck our area just four months ago. There has been so much progress but there is much rebuilding still to do.

Seagulls feasting on a new beach Hurricane Ike created.

"The three most handsome boys you ever did see playing on the aforementioned beach," said a proud mommy (and just moments before her youngest realized his shoes were dirty and had a complete screaming meltdown when she refused to remove them due to all the sharp shells. Sigh.)

Behind the boys this is what you see...millions of seashells that used to be hidden underwater. They covered an area about 20 feet x 60 feet and were several inches deep. A treasure trove for a kid, to be sure! ;)

At the end of the path, there is a park that overlooks the bay where we stopped to play and read this sign. Beckett doing one of his very favorite things!

And Thatcher behind him searching the bay with binoculars.

"Hey, Mom! Will you take a photo of this oil tanker to put on your blog?"

And then screaming excitedly, "MOM! MOM! Hurry, I've found the Eiffel Tower!!!" To which I responded (trying hard to suppress a giggle) "No sweetie, that would be across the Atlantic Ocean, not the Gulf of Mexico, and it's so far away you couldn't even see it even with binoculars. That's part of an offshore oil rig I believe." Lol! :) :) :) How precious.

And on our way out, evidence of all the unseen deer in the area.

Alas, boys will be boys! They were more excited about seeing this Apache helicopter flying low than any other thing we saw on our hike!

If you made it this far, thanks for sharing our first outdoor adventure. Hopefully many more to come!

Our New Spanish Learning Games

Awhile back I did my first post on all the Spanish games we had acquired. You can read it here. Of all those mentioned in the original post we use the Learning Resources Spanish bean bags and the Leap Frog Bilingual Memory Mate the most. We also get quite a bit of use out of the puzzle cards also from Learning Resources.

Oh, oh, oh...I just checked to the Learning Resources site to see if these products are still available. It looks like they have the Spanish bean bags on clearance (look towards the bottom of the page). They are cheap, cheap, cheap! This set of the Spanish puzzle cards is on clearance as well. Actually, if you just look on this page (I just typed "Spanish" in their search box) you can see lots of their Spanish products for 50% off and more! I hope someone gets a good deal on some new goodies for their school. :)

Okay, that ended up being a huge (but fun) digression! For Christmas this year we added to our collection and I thought I'd share these new resources. Thatcher got Magnetic Poetry Kids "Kids' Spanish Kit". It includes over 200 double-sided word magnets printed with Spanish on one side and English on the other. This is a set Thatcher will be able to play with for a very long time; it includes lots of verbs which we have hardly gotten to yet. I pulled 50 words (about 35 he already knew) and have been letting him play with them on a metal cookie sheet. He has also played with them on our magnetic dry erase board, sticking a magnet in place and then drawing a picture to describe that word. Once he knows all those words then we'll choose 50 more.


We also got this fun set of jumbo English-Spanish dominoes. They are perfect because we can play together. Even Beckett can join in the fun simply matching the pictures. This is my favorite of the three we added to the Spanish shelf!



Last, we got Usborne's First Fun with Spanish DVD. It is not a riveting, action-packed video that many kiddos are used to but it is a good (albeit slow) introduction to lots and lots of Spanish vocabulary. One fun extra is that there is a little yellow duck in each scene to find. That helped keep my kiddo's attention! You walk though a day with Isabel and her family as they go about their normal activities. Isabel's family does not speak Spanish so she translates for you. I like how the vocabulary is introduced in context and several simple phrases and sentences are taught as well. This is certainly not the pinacle of our Spanish collection but sometimes when I just have to pop in a video, they will be learning lots! ;)