Ambleside Blog

I came to our school room this Sunday evening to make sure that I have all the materials ready for this week of school.  When I walked into the room, I felt some of my energy drain just thinking of the character shaping that will happen here tomorrow (of my students and of me).  As I sat down to collect my thoughts, I felt uninspired.  I already have my lessons planned and the material is no longer new to me.  My thoughts revealed a mindset that will limit my growth and that of my students if I do not replace it.  

I began reflecting on the many times I have admonished my students to "finish well."  To finish an arithmetic problem correctly, not just to begin the attempt.  To complete a passage of transcription with beautiful and accurate handwriting.  To reproduce an artist's masterpiece down to the last detail.  

I am finding that I need to hear my own admonition tonight.  We are in the home stretch of this school year (although the finish line is not quite in site).  We are starting to make plans for summer even (ok, a little early, but we are).  I am even starting to enthusiastically anticipate what the scope of school work will be for next year.  My mind seems to be on times other than now.  Is it because we are coming to the end of the biography of Abigail Adams and I think I know the end already (uh, America)?  Is it because we just found out what happened with the Pepper family for read-aloud and are moving on to Shakespeare (plays to which I have been exposed)?  I suspect that I have a bit of a sense of coasting, "been there, done that" in my mind tonight.  My lessons are planned, the end of the year is in sight, let's move on.  

But WAIT!  Checking a box (finishing a book or a lesson) does not mean that growth has taken place.  It does not mean I have finished well.  The year-end is in sight, but the ideas yet to come have not been assimilated.  Not to mention that my students haven't "been there, done that" - it is all totally new to them.  And I may know the outcomes and have my lessons planned, but have I taken the ideas that are still to be revealed in each subject to a level of deep knowing (assimilation) where it has changed my thinking or beliefs or actions (Charlotte Mason's true test of education)?  Have my students? Am I really finished with growing in our home school (Charlotte Mason's definition of education)?  Are my students?  The questions are laughable.  Of course not!

What I really need to do in our school room tonight is to pray for my students, for me as their intrepid (though needing to be admonished) guide and to plead with the Holy Spirit one more time to teach us, to inhabit this space in a conscious way, to speak peace over our hearts enabling us to serve and to defer to one another, to open up the mysteries of arithmetic, nature, grammar, and all of His beautiful world, to enable us to have teachable, inspired hearts...to enable us to finish well.

Just as the body needs physical nourishment, so the mind needs its nutriment.  It is hungry not only on special “feast days,” but every day of our lives. Charlotte Mason exhorted us to “eat” ideas so we might live everyday.

Many questions come to mind: What does my everyday living look like? What nutriment did I take in throughout the day? What was the nature of this food?  Was it hearty and plentiful, or processed and meager?

A friend of mine noticed a change in her teenage daughter’s behavior. The daughter had not been “living everyday.” She was passing time, irritable and distant. Upon reflection, the mother asked, “What have you been reading lately?”

The daughter first explained why and then answered vaguely she was reading “some books a friend gave” her. She brought the books out; they consisted of the usual tabloid books for young people—sensational plots and self-absorbed characters. After a healthy exchange of questions and discussion between mother and daughter, they decided that the classic literature, not just any book, would be her daily sustenance. And, is it a surprise to note, the vitality of the young woman changed in no time at all.

Are we what we eat, intellectually? Does it make a difference in the life of our minds if we spend the evening surfing the Internet, browsing Facebook, scanning tabloids of the famous and infamous or sitting with a rich text on history or theology, reading on art or nature, or enjoying a well-written novel?

Next, we perceive that knowledge and the mind of man are to each other as are air and the lungs. The mind lives by knowledge; stagnates, faints, perishes, deprived of this necessary atmosphere.

A Philosophy of Education, 324.

Charlotte Mason speaks about knowledge in a personal way. It is not mere information; nor is it to be confused with learning. It is conveyed by Spirit to minds prepared to receive it. It is mysterious, but it is the way one grows and becomes more of a person. Growth is what God intends for us. Yet, growth does not occur if mind does not encounter, and receive, knowledge.

Some weeks past, I was reading with fourth graders about description. Working through a paragraph by George Eliot, we came across the phrase happy irregularity, describing the growth of lichen on a brick wall. Eliot personified what she saw and these young readers received knowledge of lichen, description, and the beauty (and proper use) of language.

This encounter conveyed meaning to the students and was added to their lives in the form of knowledge. What do they have to show for the time spent with this paragraph, for their minds encounter with knowledge? They give attention to words, to meaning, to lichen. They have become more of what it means to be a person; they have grown.

Ideas to Ponder was written by an Ambleside Teacher

At Ambleside we often discuss our “paradigm shift’: from textbooks, grades, and stickers to “living books,” “narrations,” and “habits.” It’s difficult, for many of us. We’re not just learning about a method of education; we’re learning again how to learn. Often I hear a parent say, “I’m glad my kids are getting this kind of education.” You ought to be glad. I would know. I was one of them.

Before I was sixteen years old, I had never received a formal grade. I wrote my first formal essay when I was fourteen. We used a science textbook once for about two weeks before my mother threw it out. In our home there were no workbooks, stickers, rewards, or detentions. We were expected to do as we ought, because we ought.

You see, I was blessed to grow up in a Charlotte Mason homeschool. My mother read For the Children’s Sake while my sister and I played pioneers in the woods or drew the solar system on the sidewalk. Our school day was full of books and more books. Queen Elizabeth, Bilbo Baggins, the planet Saturn, Purple Coneflowers, and Leonardo Da Vinci were among our daily acquaintances. We told back in the car, in the kitchen, in copybooks that are still stacked in the backs of our closets. Education in our home meant the direct confrontation with real things – real books, real nature, real ideas – and the struggle that follows as your mind digests new knowledge.

“The mind feeds on ideas,” Charlotte Mason wrote, “and therefore children should have a generous curriculum.” From a young age I was privileged to feed deeply and widely at a banquet of knowledge. We learned about ideas, not just facts. And we cared about what we learned. We cried when Beth dies in Little Women and became outraged at Benedict Arnold’s treachery. Everything we read took root inside us, and we lived it. This is a joy that I still get to experience alongside my students each day, in my Ambleside classroom. I see the excitement on their faces, and I recognize it, because I have felt it, too.

At times, I think our method of education seemed frivolous to outsiders – as though my parents weren’t concerned enough about our preparation for college or the workplace, as though they were gambling with our future.

But a Charlotte Mason education is an inheritance within. Jesus said, “The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good” (Luke 6:45). On the outside this education may seem impractical, but on the inside a child has amassed a treasure beyond rubies – and certainly beyond any career goal or college award. I have never wished that my parents had given me more tests or grades, that they had replaced our family love affair with learning with a staid set of workbooks and drills. But I daily feel thankful for the riches of my education.

As we partner in this great work of education, let us remember that we are feeding the souls of persons, who deserve to feast on the riches of God’s creation. One day, they will thank you for it.  

                                                                                                                      An Ambleside Teacher