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We have lost the tools of learning - the axe and the wedge, the hammer and the saw, the chisel and the plane - that were so adaptable to all tasks. Instead of them, we have merely a set of complicated jigs, each of which will do but one task and no more, and in using which eye and hand receive no training, so that no man ever sees the work as a whole or "looks to the end of the work."....For the sole true end of education is simply this: to teach men how to learn for themselves; and whatever instruction fails to do this is effort spent in vain." from The Lost Tools of Learning, an essay by Dorothy L. Sayers Read more! |
The Classical Approach
You are listening to Tchaikovsky's Romance in F, Op. 51.
This question plagued Dorothy Sayers during the late 1940s, is it something you have asked yourself? I know I have. Even as a home educator, I continually review the effort I am making with my children, to ensure that they are gaining a "real" knowledge, a foundation which will follow them throughout their adult lives.
At the core of the question quoted above is the institution we normally call education and specifically, it's definition and purpose. What is education? For the past several decades, the popular educational philosophy has been that a child is like an empty vessel waiting for someone to fill it. But is this true? Personally I have my doubts. Who taught your child to walk? Can anyone teach a child to walk or does the child teach himself through observation and experimentation? Who teaches a child to speak? Can anyone or does the child learn through the imitation of a proper example? I agree with Llewellyn Davis of the Elijah Company who I heard compare a child to a flame which merely needs the proper fuel to fan it into a living fire.
I could certainly see evidences of this when our oldest daughter was a kindergartner in the public school system, and then later during our second year home schooling. She had became fascinated with the history and culture of the Native American tribes of our country at the age of 5. Her grandmother, an avid reader, began to provide books of fiction to encourage her interest. The result? At the end of kindergarten, our daughter could tell you which tribe(s) lived in any American state, who the chief(s)s of those tribes was and what particular lifestyle they had lived. Could we, her parents, take the credit for this acummulation of knowledge? No, we had merely provided the fuel she needed to fan the flame of her interest into a blazing fire of knowledge.
Likewise, a trip to Colonial Williamsburg a year later, certainly humbled us if we thought we were the salvation of our daughter's education. Our family stopped at the silver smith's shop with approximately 25 adults to see a demonstration of that trade. During the visit, the re-enactor asked the group to identify about a dozen items; some were tools used in the shop, others were items made by the smith. Several of the adults knew the more common items such as snuffers and tea canisters, but whose hand was raised for nearly every item? Our daughter. The re-enactor pulled us aside as we left the shop to inquire how she had gained this knowledge. To my embarassment, I had to admit that though I was the party responsible for her education, I did not know. My daughter told the employee that she had learned these things by reading the American Girl stories about Felicity, a colonial girl during her free time.
I share these experiences in an attempt to make the point that every child has within him or her a God-given talent, a particular bent that a parent must do his/her best to discover so that it can be cultivated to bring forth a mature crop of useable knowledge. It's already there. As home educators, our first and foremost duty to our children is to pray that God will reveal to us His purpose for our child. We need His insight to be able to see the interests in our child's life and the path that the interest might lead our child on.
You might say, "But my child is young, too young for me to see what he will become as an adult." To you, I say, take this time to give your child the tools he will need before it is too late. Instill a love for learning, an enthusiasm for new knowledge while he is young. Give him the tools he needs to become a life-long learner.
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Articles that define Classical education. Links Buncha Roots |
Suggested Learning Tools Ludi at the Circus Maximus - This is an out-of-production board game from Aristoplay. Well worth the time to find it online at sites such as eBay The players help Ludi win the chariot race at the Circus Maximus by travelling the board, landing on spaces with a Latin or a Greek root(s), and giving a word derived from the root. Rummy Roots - Begin your study of Latin and Greek roots here with a simple card game! We played Rummy Roots several times a week when our girls were third and fifth graders - what they learned was amazing! Vocabulary from Classical Roots - Continue building an extensive vocabulary throughout the high school years with these workbooks. Jensen's Grammar - Solid grammar gleaned from real passages from literature. Jensen's Greek and Latin - More practice discerning the roots of words. |
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Suggested Reading Materials Classical Education and the Home School All of the above titles are available from Lifetime Books & Gifts |
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