The Classical Scholar

My three road maps for mastery of reading, thinking, and speaking skills are meant to provide a framework for assessing mastery of the three skills of the classical trivium.  The following checklist represents my personal homeschool curriculum goals for helping my children master writing and speaking skills.  Use this road map to assess your child’s communication abilities as you plan your own personalized strategic plan for the semester.  This road map will really help when it comes to creating your homeschool curriculum!

I believe there are five primary communication abilities, both oral and written, that every literate homeschool child needs to master: (1) how to maintain a conversation, (2) how to write a paragraph, (3) how to take notes, (4) how to write advanced compositions, and (5) how to give a speech.

Under each “how to,” I have listed some basic homeschool curriculum ideas, but the list is certainly not all-inclusive. Homeschooling gives you the freedom to customize the content and methods to your own child’s needs. Here is my complete Home School Curriculum Road Map to Mastery of Speaking Skills:

How to Maintain a Conversation

• Look at people when conversing
• Shake hands firmly and repeat their name
• Listen intently
• Answer the telephone and take a message
• Draft personal, business, and email correspondence
• Follow manners, etiquette, and protocol in social situations

How to Write a Paragraph

• Write a topic sentence
• Support the topic in remaining sentences
• Vary sentence structure
• Add stylistic elements
• Incorporate transitions
• Clinch the title from the final sentence
• Imitate classic authors by substituting words
• Practice using thesaurus

How to Take Notes

• Outline main points of text and lecture
• Annotate in book margins
• Construct an abstract or summary from notes
• Narrate understanding
• Reduce notes to main ideas

How to Write Advanced Compositions

• Develop a hook to gain attention
• Draft introductions and conclusions
• Vary paragraph style
• Learn basic three point essay
• Develop a thesis statement
• Research and gather evidence to support thesis
• Cite authorities via footnotes
• Create bibliography
• Present and defend oral dissertation
• Proofread and edit every composition

How to Give a Speech

• Memorize, recall, and recite stories, scripts, and speeches
• Punctuate points with eye contact and body language
• Gain platform experience (expository, persuasive)
• Gain interpretive experience (dramatic, humorous, duo)
• Gain limited prep experience (impromptu, apologetics, extemporaneous)
• Acquire team policy debate experience
• Analyze famous historical speeches for form and style

Please feel free to tailor my speaking skills road map to the needs of your own homeschool child. Add or subtract according to your personal homeschool curriculum objectives.  Teach out of a position of rest instead of anxiety by keeping your communication goals simple.  Remember your vision for raising excellent communicators!

Transforming the theory of authentic classical homeschooling into reality requires a pragmatic outline or a precise plan of attack.  Navigating any trip requires planning the course to reach the final destination. The following checklist represents my personal homeschool curriculum goals for helping my children master thinking skills.  Curriculum is defined as a program of study, and you can use my road map to assess your child’s abilities as you plan your own personalized course of study.

There are at least seven specific thinking abilities that every literate homeschool child needs to master: (1) how to arrange data according to systems, (2) how to solve problems, (3) how to structure and analyze arguments, (4) how to use the scientific method, (5) how to analyze literature, (6) how to research a topic, and (7) how to listen.

For those of you who want more detail on how I assess mastery of the basic skills, I have listed my minimum requirements under each “how to” skill, but the list is certainly not all-inclusive. The beauty of homeschooling lies in the fact that you get to personalize the content and methods to your own family’s needs. Here is my complete Home School Curriculum Road Map to Mastery of Thinking Skills:

How to Arrange Data According to Systems

• Classify into categories
• Describe attributes
• Recognize similarities and differences
• Recall and relate patterns
• Reorder elements in a set

How to Solve Problems

• Identify and complete sequences
• Explain steps to creation or solution
• Associate and interpret analogies
• Memorize mathematical operations
• Understand and apply mathematical concepts
• Answer puzzles, riddles, and mysteries

How to Structure and Analyze Arguments

• Identify claims and determine validity
• Distinguish difference between fact and opinion
• Build affirmative and negative positions
• Learn the deductive syllogism (if a & b, then c)
• Recognize common fallacies
• Practice inductive reasoning (observe, interpret, apply) with historical texts

How to Use the Scientific Method

• Achieve familiarity with the general laws of science
• Understand difference between theory and fact
• Perform and document experiments
• Verbalize steps to observe, predict, and conclude

How to Analyze Literature

• Discover literary elements in whole works
• Identify literary techniques in portions of the whole work
• Diagram a narrative story chart from exposition to disposition
• Compare and contrast characters
• Identify and interpret themes

How to Research a Topic

• Select debatable idea
• Learn to use the internet and other hard reference works
• Determine credibility of experts

How to Listen

• Focus on the live or recorded speaker with full attention
• Organize thoughts via outline or mental map
• Narrate understanding by asking questions or repetition
• Interpret meaning
• Answer questions precisely

Please adapt my thinking skills checklist to the needs of your own homeschool child. I have tried to condense my thoughts to the basics which may seem overly simple, I believe simple goals allow us as homeschooling parents to teach out of a position of rest instead of anxiety. Keep your eyes on the big picture and be creative in achieving the goals of your homeschool curriculum.  You want to raise a thinker!

Can you describe your Christian testimony (in general or about your homeschool journey) in under 140 words? Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows messages known as tweets, which are posts of up to 140 characters in length.   Robin Sampson, author of the Heart of Wisdom homeschool blog, has this terrific idea:  spark a testimony fire. She’s asking all Christians to add a Twitter Testimony Tweet: (TTT).

The power of this idea has to do with the number of twitter friends you have. For instance, I’ve got over 300 people following me on twitter, so that means that when I posted my TTT, every one of them saw my testimony of Jesus’ goodness!  Not all of my twitter friends are homeschool Christians, so I’m praying that the Lord touches them and draws them to Him.  Here’s my testimony tweet:

TTT B4: Alcoholic dad (I’m wounded); child dies (I’m broken)
AFTER: “Help me, Jesus” (I’m healed) – sweet relief
http://tinyurl.com/tweettt

TTT: B4: Abandoned, rejected, unloved full of anger
AFTER: Joyfully, dwelling in an intimate relationship with Jesus
http://tinyurl.com/tweettt

Will you tweet your Christian testimony on twitter?  When you are finished watching the video:

1. Wipe the tears from your eyes.
2. Write your Christian testimony below in the comments (remember 140 characters max).
3. If you have not joined twitter, you can now. It’s free ( or if you prefer, I can add your tweet for you).
4. Tweet your Twitter Testimony! Start the line with TTT and end with http://tinyurl.com/tweettt
5. Retweet this line: Christians: Tweet Your Twitter Testimony Tweet (TTT).  Please retweet and pray. http://tinyurl.com/tweettt
6. Blog about TTT to get others involved.
7. Email this link to a homeschool Christian friend so that she can also tweet her testimony on twitter.

May our Lord Jesus be exalted through your tweet, and may the Christian testimony idea go viral!  And if you want to follow me on twitter, just click on the little bluebird below.

Inspiring Homeschool Invention

I get so excited when I come across a national contest that homeschool kids can enter, and this competition inspires invention which fits right in with teaching the three skills of the classical trivium in your Christian homeschool:  language, thought, and speech.  Two winners will be selected, one from the k-8 group and one high school student, to receive a huge prize package each.  If you are creative and diligent in recording the work performed, you can incorporate the entire process from start to finish as part of your homeschool curriculum for the high school transcript.  For example, Meredith and Connor are both writing essays for the homeschool speech ISI George Washington essay contest, so I will be including that as part of their composition credit.  This particular contest involves video production and the use of software, so you could incorporate this project in any number of courses for homeschool high school credit:  composition (writing the script), information technology (using the video software and video camcorder), or even art (graphics and photos).  Here are the competition highlights:

The Advertising Council, Sony Creative Software and Discovery Education have announced the “Inspiring Invention” public service advertising (PSA) development contest to engage a new generation of children in innovation. The contest is part of the Ad Council’s “Inspiring Invention” campaign, sponsored by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the National Inventors Hall of Fame Foundation (NIHFF). The contest is open to school groups at the elementary, middle and high school levels nationwide. In addition to prizes including Sony video and audio production software and hardware, the winning entries will be distributed to media outlets throughout the country in spring of 2009.

Entrants to the Inspiring Invention PSA Contest will submit their video in either the elementary and middle school or high school categories by March 15, 2009. Contestants are encouraged, but not required, to download a demo of Sony Creative Software’s leading video editing application, Vegas Pro 8 software or Vegas Movie Studio software. Initial entries will be submitted to Sony Creative Software on DVD accompanied by a backgrounder on the production and theme. If selected as a semi-finalist, participants will then furnish broadcast-ready components for final judging.

One grand prize winner will be chosen from each of the two categories and awarded a prize package valued at more than $22,000, featuring Sony Creative Software’s professional video and audio production applications, Vegas™ Pro 8, Sound Forge™ 9, Cinescore™ and ACID™ Pro 7 software, as well as Sony Creative Software content including loop libraries, sound effects and Cinescore themes, in addition to having the PSA aired on national television. See full contest rules and regulations including a printable pdf with lots of details for your budding homeschooler videographer.

I am a firm believer in competition even if the homeschool child has little realistic hope of placing in the top finalists.  Why is that?  Well, when you give a homeschool child or teen an attainable goal with a hard deadline, they usually step up to the plate and give their best effort.  They also learn so much in the process about being organized and systematically tackling a task.  Why not incorporate this video contest into your homeschool curriculum after the holidays?  You’ve got plenty of time before the March 15, 2009 deadline, and it will look great on the high school transcript whether your homeschool teen wins or not!

Home education theory is an interesting discussion, but we need precise instructions for turning the idea of an authentic classical Christian home education into reality. Navigating any journey requires planning the course from start to finish. That’s why I have prepared my road maps for mastery of reading, thinking, and speaking skills. These checklists represent my personal goals for my children. You can use them as a springboard for developing your own homeschool curriculum goals.

In my opinion, these are the six specific language abilities that every literate homeschool child needs to master: (1) how to read, (2) how to spell, (3) how to write, (4) how to punctuate and capitalize, (5) how to use proper grammar, and (6) how to decipher unfamiliar vocabulary.

If you are one who needs more detail in achieving and assessing the skill, I have listed some basic abilities that I look for in my own children, but the list is certainly not all-inclusive. The beauty of classical education lies in the fact that you get to customize the content and methods to your own family’s needs.  Here is the complete Home School Curriculum Road Map to Mastery of Reading Skills:

How to Read

• Read aloud (from/to)
• Inflect voice
• Decipher phonetics
• Recognize sight words
• Read independently
• Narrate and predict content

How to Spell

• Apply rules in context
• Find and correct errors
• Divide syllables and hyphenate
• Record dictation and correct errors
• Play spelling games
• Participate in spelling bees

How to Write

• Learn lower and uppercase alphabet
• Create ABC book
• Refine print and cursive handwriting
• Copy classic authors
• Learn to type

How to Punctuate and Capitalize

• Learn rules of usage
• Add missing marks and capitalize
• Find and correct errors
• Learn proofreading marks

How to Use Proper Grammar

• Memorize the eight parts of speech
• Substitute eight parts in context
• Learn gender, case, and declension of nouns
• Learn comparative and superlative rules of modifiers
• Learn conjugation of verbs
• Apply syntax rules
• Diagram sentences
• Familiarize with verbals

How to Decipher Unfamiliar Vocabulary

• Interpret contextual meaning
• Practice dictionary usage

Please feel free to tailor this road map to your own needs. Simple goals allow us to teach out of a position of rest instead of anxiety. Keep your eyes on the big picture and be creative in achieving the goals of your homeschool curriculum.

Homeschool touchdown! Scoring more points than your opponent is the ultimate aim of an American football game. The team with the ball, known as the offense, strategically moves up the field in anticipation of scoring through passing, field goals, or extra points. The defending team, anticipating the offensive strategy, does their best to protect their end zone and prevent the offensive team from scoring. If the defensive team intercepts the ball, the roles are reversed.

Life as a Christian homeschooler is like football in a basic sort of way. Some days you advance at a quick pace with little interference. Other days you spend enormous amounts of time defending your position against aggressive opponents. But whether you find yourself on the offensive or the defensive your immediate call as a follower of Jesus Christ remains the same:  wait on Him to call the home school plays.

Promise

After Jesus was resurrected, He appeared to His followers for a period of forty days.  Right before He was taken up to Heaven, He shared with them two critical pieces of information for living the post-resurrection life:  (1) you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and (2) you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.  (Acts 1:8 NRSV)  This two-fold promise requires nothing of us.  Jesus shows grace to those who follow Him by abiding with us through the constant presence of His Spirit.  Secondly, simply by abiding in His Spirit, our lives will be different, and people will know it from our closest family and friends to our casual acquaintances.  We cannot DO anything to earn His Spirit, and we are not called to DO anything to be His witnesses.  God is the one acting, and all we have to do is wait for His instructions and be obedient under all circumstances whether they are tough or easy.

Wait

Before Jesus left the disciples, He told them to wait for the promise of the Father.  (Acts 1:4 NRSV)  Wait.  Expect.  Be ready and available when the gift of His Spirit comes.  Initially, every person who is called to follow receives the gift of His Spirit.  After that, we wait on Him to deliver specific directions for living in real time every day.  Our anxiety or impatience is fruitless because He is always faithful and delivers what we need at just the right moment.

Some of my kids’ home school friends like to log on to Google Talk and call each other through the computer.  The funny thing about these calls is that these teens don’t just get to the point of the call and then disconnect  like a busy adult who quickly takes care of business.  They leave the communication line open while they are working on other things so that they can talk whenever they feel led to talk.  To a pragmatic person like me, this phenomenon of open chat seemed strange at first.  Connor would be working away on home school debate research when all of a sudden one of his friends would make some comment.  Connor would respond, then it would get quiet again for a while.  Sometimes the periodic conversations are frivolous, and sometimes  the conversations are very serious, but the fact of the matter is this:  these friends are in relationship, and they are immediately available to each other.

Now I see how live chat is like our relationship with the Lord.  Because of His constantly abiding Spirit, He never disconnects from us, nor do we want to disconnect from Him.  Sometimes the chatter is relatively inconsequential, and sometimes there are urgent messages that require immediate response.  If we listen, we will hear Him leading, advising, suggesting, and requiring.  He calls the plays minute by minute, day by day, in rough times, and in easy times, whether we find ourselves on the offensive, or whether we find ourselves on the defensive.  All we have to do in our Christian homeschool is listen and obey.

Obey

In the promise of Acts, Jesus says we will “be” His witnesses.  The word witness is used as a noun and not as a verb.  We are naturally His witnesses by sheer association with His indwelling Spirit and our response to the guidance of His Spirit.  We are not called “to” witness; we “are” His witnesses.  Of course, being good witnesses requires that we respond in obedience to the daily conversation that He is having with us.  Some days are worse than others.  Some days are chaotic with seemingly endless demands.  Some days  are more relaxed and offer time for rest.  Irregardless of the nature of the day, Jesus’ Spirit is available, and He is ready to lead you.  Don’t deceive yourself into acting without consulting Him…you don’t see the entire picture so your call may not be adequate to advance or defend the play.  He is the one with all the answers.  He has already written a comprehensive playbook for the game.  He knows all the possibilities, and He wants you to succeed.  After all, you are His witness.  You represent Him to your family, your neighbor, your friends, your grocer, your dry cleaner, your hair dresser, and every other individual you encounter whether in person,  on the telephone, or in written correspondence.  Let Jesus be the Coach who calls the home school plays on a minute by minute basis.  All you have to do is wait and obey.

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My sincere apologies to those of you who recently received two strange email from me:  one on Mark Twain and the German language and another long one on several published posts.  I did not intend to send you spam!  My internet service provider was making some technical changes to my  website and Feedburner mistakenly thought that I meant to send you email.  Thankfully, Midphase has corrected the problem.  More  exciting changes are coming soon with a brand new website design and the announcement of my new  book for the Christian homeschool, Trivium Mastery:  The Intersection of Three Roads, but I haven’t planned any more erroneous emails.  Thanks for sticking with me, and happy homeschooling!

Mastery of the three skills of the classical trivium is not achieved on a single day in homeschooling history. You will never be able to look back and pinpoint the day when your homeschool child “graduated”  from the trivium.  Some time during the teen years, you will realize that she has become extremely proficient in the use of language, thought, and speech. There could be some areas of the trivium that she still needs to work on, but by and large, she is ready for more. For what has the classical trivium prepared her?

The Roman Quadrivium

If this were ancient Rome, your rising scholar would progress to the remaining four liberal arts of the the quadrivium taught by a private tutor: arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music theory. The pragmatic Romans took the Greek idea of paideia and decided that every free man should learn seven “arts” in order to be fully educated. Nearly three millennia later, we know that learning the four mathematically-oriented disciplines of the quadrivium is no longer sufficient. Unlike the timeless skills of the trivium, the Roman quadrivium is obsolete.

A staggering amount of discoveries have been made since then in math, science, and technology that preclude any man from being a true expert. The inherited body of knowledge accumulates at a frenzied pace as the record of human history continues. In short, the choices for learning in the 21st Century are limitless. Yet, there still remains a core set of fundamental truths with which every educated homeschool high school student should grapple.  The Roman quadrivium is not enough.

The Greek Paideia

You may recall that the Greek paideia is the foundation of a true classical education. According to Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, paideia is the:

Training of the physical and mental facilities in such a way as to produce a broad enlightened mature outlook harmoniously combined with maximum cultural development

Learning was the path to a higher nature through the exploration of abstract concepts such as truth, goodness, and beauty with the expectation that such examination would lead to noble character, gracious behavior, enlightened minds, and enriched society. Exploration of ideas between pupil and teacher usually occurred through a two-way dialogue made famous by the philosopher, Socrates.  However, the early Greek culture from which classical education arose was pagan, and as Emperor Charlemagne realized hundreds of years later, classical education would never accomplish its true objectives unless informed by relationship with the Living God. Man is limited in his knowledge. He needs inspiration. The Greek paideia is not enough.

The Christian Paideia

Most contemporary Christians cannot read Koine Greek, the language of the New Testament, unless they have been to seminary, so you might be surprised to discover that the Apostle Paul uses the word paideia at least seven times in the New Testament in his letters to the Hebrews, the Ephesians, and to his disciple Timothy. Upon reflection, this isn’t really surprising because as I discussed in the posts on rhetoric, there is quite a bit of textual evidence that Paul received a classical education with a concentration in Jewish theology.

I believe we can take the Greek idea of paideia (the search for knowledge) and look at Paul’s use of the word paideia (discipline or instruction in righteousness) to understand the next homeschooling journey for our high school age kids. Paul knew that the Greeks had a good idea, but their educational philosophy lacked one critical component:  the inspiration of the indwelling Spirit of God.  True education is a transformational process of growing in knowledge, understanding, and wisdom.

In the early section of the first letter to the Corinthians, Paul spends a lot of time developing the thought that God’s foolishness is wiser than man’s wisdom. God reveals His knowledge to those who love Him so that they can worship and serve Him in spirit and truth. Unlike the unrealized dreams of the ancient Greeks, our search for knowledge is exquisitely fulfilling as the Lord of Glory reveals little bits of truth in our daily walk with His abiding Spirit. Faithful followers use what they have learned in service to others. Enlightenment for the sake of worship and service is our final objective. In this way, we reclaim our classical inheritance and join the long line of ancestors who realized the wealth of a true classical education.

Jesus gives us the perfect example of what the this looks like in the Gospels.  He lives with his disciples (by the way, disciple is a derivative of the word discipline which is the English translation of paideia) and in the course of every day life, he conducts an ongoing dialogue about ideas:

• ideas about God
• ideas about man
• ideas about man’s relationship to God
• ideas about man’s relationship to man
• ideas about life
• ideas about death

In short, Jesus instructs his disciples by asking them questions about the fundamental realities of life.  Sometimes he provides immediate answers, but more often than not, he allows them to wrestle with the questions through life experiences, parables, and more dialogue.  Like Socrates before him, Jesus knew the value of dialogue or conversation in learning.  He has always been after relationship with us, and in that relationship, we learn more and more.

So what do the post-trivium years look like in authentic classical homeschooling?  They look like the socratic model that Jesus followed with his disciples.  As parents, we supervise the dialogue that our teens are having with the classics and with other authorities like university professors.  We narrate.  We write.  We disagree.  We agree.  We listen.  We discuss the big ideas on a daily basis.  We allow the dialogue to drive the instruction, so sometimes we end up going off on tangents, but that’s okay because we are wrestling with knowledge.  Despite the apparent sanctity of the public school formula, knowledge cannot be perfectly squeezed into discrete subjects.  Every home school minute is an opportunity for learning as parent and high school age teen engage in an ongoing dialogue about the fundamental realities of life.

father and daughter photo © Mikhail Lavrenov - Fotolia.com

Boys! Have you ever wondered why sometimes your son doesn’t seem to hear you or why he doesn’t describe nouns like your daughter? LeeAnn Smith, mother of two boys and author of the homeschool blog “3 for school,” recently attended a virtual home school conference hosted by Heart of the Matter. Not surprisingly, one of her favorite speakers was home school giant Andrew Pudewa whose talk was titled “Teaching Boys Who Would Rather Be Building Forts.” LeeAnn has graciously given me permission to reprint her thoughts on the differences between boys and girls. Enjoy!

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Did you know that boys and girls are wired differently? Literally neurologically differently. Read Why Gender Matters by Leonard Sax.

Here are some practical differences including reasons boys and girls don’t do well in the same classroom. Now I finally know why I chose to homeschool my boys and am more ambivalent about my daughter. In words not just feelings.

For example, boys don’t hear quiet sounds. They don’t ignore me. They just don’t hear me. Pudewa suggested that if both boys and girls are in a classroom, the teacher should seat the boys on one side and the girls on the other and then stand in front of the boys so they can hear. He said many boys don’t do well in school because they cannot hear the teacher. I thought of the wiggly boys in Primary trying to hear quiet women’s voices. He also suggested that if our sons cannot sit still to do math, have them stand up to do it. See further down for more reasons.

Boys optimum learning temperature is 68 - 69 degrees. Girls is 74-75 degrees. Note to self: keep heat low this winter and have dear daughter and me bundle up.

Boys eyes have more m-cells which are connected to rods. They tend to track speed and motion. Girls have more p-cells connected to cones which track color and texture. Do you know a boy that draws with black and attempts to draw action? I do! Boys draw verbs in black; girls draw nouns in full color.

That sums up boys in language arts: they recognize verbs. Girls see nouns and descriptors. So when a boy writes a story with info left out, I can’t instruct him on adjectives and adverbs. He suggested something like, “Great story. Let’s add some action.”

How they handle emotions like being upset: Boys stomp around and make lots of noise. They need to stand up if they are upset because they think better on their feet, moving around. So don’t make them sit down to talk about it. They can’t if you want them to work through it. If a girl is upset, you have to go find her first. He suggested that you can usually find her on the couch with a blanket pulled over her head. Her bedroom in our case. No need to search for a boy unless he took off on his bike.

Related info: Boys react to pain with an increase of blood flow to the cortex. He suggested letting them hurt each other or they will hurt themselves. He recommended explaining to them that girls do not do well with pain so they need to take it out on each other, not on girls! I realized that in our society of today with so many women in positions of responsibility, we don’t allow our boys the freedom to do this. How many times have I told my boys to stop wrestling before they get hurt? Shame on me! I’ll clear valuables next time (what few I have left.) They have never been badly hurt. (Fight or flight very clear here!)

Related to this info, he told us that boys have to learn interesting, relevant, and applicable information. They see no reason for anything else. Pudewa said the most important motivator was to teach things that were intrinsically relevant. Those things are naturally interesting. He commented that knives and swords are universally interesting to boys. “They will invent them if the never see them.” How many moms can attest to that? Keep swords and guns out of the house, and a boy will invent them out of a stick!

If we try to teach our boys something that is not that intrinsically relevant but must be learned, he noted that creative teachers will invent games. But he noted that they must have positive and negative results, otherwise the boys might decide it’s not worthwhile and decide to opt out. For example, a teacher might give him a penny for every right answer, but he must pay the teacher $1.00 if he does not play. The rewards must be physical, not mental or emotional. Girls need those, not boys.

No wonder the few all-boys schools in this country have exceptional records. We need more!

Oh yeah, Pudewa suggested martial arts training for teaching boys discipline and focus. Boys have inherently short attention spans, and it helps them develop longer ones. It helps all the way around! I know boys whose parents enrolled them in tae-kwon-do to help them with dyslexia, and it does. He also suggested reading the book, The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman.

As I listened to the speaker, I realized anew that those people who have spent the last who-knows-how-long trying to change boys have failed. They have only weakened and shamed boys. When we consciously understand and value boys again, we will change our world.

LeeAnn Smith
3forschool.blogspot.com

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Thank you, LeeAnn! This sure makes me think twice about the homeschooling methods that I use to teach my son and my daughter. Should we be treating our sons differently from our daughters in our home schools?

If you haven’t listened to my interview with Andrew Pudewa, hear what he has to say about how his homeschooling philosophy has changed over the years. He moved to Idaho to enroll his kids in Douglas Wilson’s classical school (based on the 12 year public school paradigm that I want you to toss!) and has gradually moved more towards the leadership model of Oliver DeMille. I know you’ll enjoy it!

“Mom, could you please take me to the craft store? I want to make a gift for my friend’s birthday.”

Remember the simple homeschooling question: “what does it mean?” In this case, the message is clear. My daughter wants to make a gift for her friend and she needs supplies. Since she is not driving yet, I am the chauffeur, and she needs my help. A cheerful countenance, bright eyes, and petitioning hands all tell me that she is (1) excited to surprise her friend with an unexpected, homemade present and (2) hopeful that I will assist.

The homeschooling challenge of understanding texts is more difficult than understanding face-to-face conversations, live action, or recorded action. In face-to-face conversations, we are able to take the actual words that are being spoken and factor in the facial expressions, vocal modulations, and body language to accurately determine meaning. Live speeches, movies, and documentaries all allow the spectator to watch the speaker as if they were talking in person. Recorded audio lectures are a bit more difficult to interpret because the listener cannot see the speaker; however, the speaker’s intent can be generally gauged from the rising or falling voice, the pauses, the speed of delivery, the repetition of key phrases, and the emphasis on certain points. Although sometimes other issues are simmering under the surface, most homeschool parents sitting across the breakfast table from their children will be able to accurately interpret the speaking child’s requests and concerns.

The Message is More than Information

In some respects, reading homeschool texts is like all other forms of communication. There is an addresser, a message, and an addressee. In both oral and written communication, the addresser assumes that he will be understood. The message is more than information. The addresser has presumably structured the message to achieve a certain goal: influencing the addressee to respond in some manner.

In the scenario with my daughter, she wanted me to make time during the daily to take her to the store. She wanted to influence me. The Lord of the Rings movies are not just entertainment; the producer structured the message so that the ring reminds me of my own temptations. He wanted to influence me. The professor who delivers the mp3 lecture on “American Political Thought” is not just passing on facts; he communicates his interpretation of facts and either persuades me to adopt or reject his position. He might even convict me to find a few books at the library for further understanding of the issues. He wanted to influence me.

Ambiguities Get in the Way

So, too, the author of a text, whether as antiquated as the Dead Sea Scrolls or as recent as yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, wanted to communicate in such as way that his message was understood. He called his reader to action. He influenced. But the problem with written communication is that we can’t stop the conversation and ask for clarification. If there were several craft stores in my town, and my daughter didn’t specify which one she wanted to go to, I could interrupt the dialogue to ask her whether she meant Joann Fabrics, Michael’s Crafts, or Hobby Lobby. I cannot interrupt a written conversation to clarify ambiguities. I can’t say, “You’ve got to be kidding!?” or “I just don’t get it…what are you talking about?”

Time Gets in the Way

Another issue that makes interpreting homeschool texts more difficult than interpreting face-to-face conversations is the problem of time. In almost every case of literary communication, the sender (addresser) is distant in space and time from the receiver (the addressee). I might be able to leave a question or comment on the Wall Street Journal blog and receive timely feedback, but I certainly cannot write the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls to clarify a misunderstanding. Does the text stand alone, or do I have other means of interpreting what the author meant? I do have other options for understanding. These three methods for interpreting textual meaning will help me answer the simple homeschooling question, “what does it mean?”

Get Behind the Text

The primary question of this interpretation method is “what did the author mean then?” The text itself is not the focus…the text is a window into the intention of the author and into the historical events at the time. Behind-the-text readings generally ask questions like:

• What did the author intend to accomplish by writing this text?
• Did the events in the book really happen?
• What did those events mean historically?

Get in the Text

“What does the text actually say?” is the primary question of this method of interpretation. Unconcerned with historical events or concerned about errors that might arise from trying to figure out the author’s intent back then, this approach takes more of a literary view of the text. The text is viewed as a cultural artifact. In-the-text questions include:

• What did the author say?
• Do the literary tools that the author used support his point?
• What is the effect of the author’s message on me today?

Get in Front of the Text

Finally, a reader can get “in front of” the text to determine meaning. In this method, the reader is not focused on the intent of the author or the impact on the particular reader, but the one who uses this method looks at the variations in interpretations. He recognizes that every homeschool reader can potentially interpret the text differently simply because readers are situated in different cultures and different times. Under this method, the Gentiles in 3rd Century A.D. Corinth might interpret chapters 15-17 of the Gospel of John quite differently than the readers of evangelical 21st Century America. The content alone is not important. People in different cultures bring different presuppositions to the text which impacts how they answer the simple homeschooling question, “what does it mean?” Questions of this method might be:

• What did medieval knights on Crusade think this text meant?
• What was the culture like during the Crusades in Europe?
• What presuppositions do Christian knights bring to the text?

All Three Methods are Viable

Each of these methods has validity. You can combine the methods, or use one method for a particular  homeschool text and another for a different text. My personal preference is to get behind the text because I enjoy history, but I could get behind-the-text to examine ancient Greece as it impacted Homer’s Odyssey as well as front-of-the-text to try to understand how my Western Civilization forbears like the Puritans understood Homer’s Odyssey. The choice is yours. Allow your homeschool teens to experiment by trying each of the methods in interpreting the texts that they read. Just make sure that you are also involved in discussing their understanding and offering possible counterpoints as you help them discover the not-so-simple answers to the simple homeschooling question, “what does it mean?“

How do you evaluate your homeschool child’s progress towards mastery of the three skills of the classical trivium?  Consider the race car analogy.

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The Pit Stop

Indy Cars enter the pit for one reason: maintenance. Periodically throughout the race, the driver pulls into the pit for fuel, tire changes, and for other engine or body work. The experienced pit crew member assesses the situation and prescribes a solution. Personally, in the “Lockman Racing League,” we like regular pits! I probably reassess the kids’ progress about every 12-18 weeks. I use my “road maps to mastery” as a gauge and adjust the homeschool schedule and curriculum content accordingly. Weaker areas get more time. Sometimes I’ll even table all other work and do a quick intensive to make sure they are getting the concept. We’ve been known to stop everything and do a “grammar camp” or nothing but algebra until I was satisfied that they “got it.” Feel free to use my mastery road maps as a guide to help you develop your next semester curriculum plan.

The Score

Indy Car drivers accumulate points over the racing season as they compete in multiple races around the country. You need criteria for judging mastery, too.

How will you evaluate the learning?

In our home school, we have one performance philosophy: do it well or do it over. We don’t accept mediocrity. Once Connor was performing poorly on his math lessons averaging about a 60-70%. My husband took control of the situation and started grading his work. Instead of circling the errors, he simply told Connor how many he missed and told him he had to find them. Basically, he had to do every problem again to find the errors. Although it was a painful lesson that took a couple of weeks of endurance, Connor learned to take his time, check his work, and master the material.

Although I do use letter grades for recording high school level work for the transcript, I prefer to evaluate mastery using a scale that I found in John Milton Gregory’s The Seven Laws of Teaching. Basically, you pick a skill and answer the following question. For instance, how much do you know about analogies? punctuation? bibliographies?

• I know nothing about…

• I am somewhat familiar with…

• I can generally describe the steps to…

• I can illustrate and explain how to…

• I am beginning to understand the deeper truths of…

• I am changing my behavior because of…

When they reach the changing behavior status, you know that they have mastered the material. Additionally, I really like to have them teach others the concept. You cannot teach what you do not know, and there is nothing like having to prepare a home school lesson that clarifies your misunderstandings or weaknesses. By the way, the word “master” is defined as “one who has such extensive knowledge and comprehensive skill that he is able to teach others his specialty.

The Training

Alas, mastery is hard work for both parent and child. Home school parents who may not remember (or maybe never learned) the “rules” of the race need refueling to restore long-forgotten knowledge. Thankfully, a rusty parent can come up to speed rather quickly with a little review. The child, however, begins each of the three skills of the trivium as a novice, and consequently, his or her journey towards mastery will take years of learning and practice before language, thought, and communication skills are finally conquered. To continue with the race analogy, the parent runs a sprint while the child runs a marathon!

Mastery of the three skills is not consecutive; the skills are usually built concurrently over time. In other words, your child doesn’t master language then master critical thinking then master writing then master public speaking. In fact, your child can work on mastering all three skills of the trivium at the same time. Consider the child who is learning about multiplication. As he learns the vocabulary like factor and product (language), he makes ordered stacks with the colored tile manipulatives (critical thinking) and sings the multiplication songs to his little brother (speech).

Additionally, you may find that your home school child has substantially mastered one skill (like the spelling component of language) but is still working on another skill set (the grammar component of language). Instead of drilling the spelling rules, devote that time to diagramming sentences.

The good news is this: if you have dropped the 12 year public school paradigm, then you are free to spend as many years as it takes teaching only three major skills: reading, thinking, and speaking. In some families, mastery of these three skills takes six years; in others, it takes eight years. Even if you spent the first  eight years guiding your child toward full command, that still leaves four years for your teenager to dive deep into the Socratic Paideia where dialogue drives instruction  during the high school years of home school.  In the process, he will compile a very impressive transcript. Don’t worry about how long it takes; teach your child language, thought, and speech until he is able to teach others and become a master of the three skills of the classical trivium just like Indy Car racers.  With your customized homeschool curriculum, you have the luxury of doing everything well!