In Three Simple But Significant Steps To A Classical Education, I outlined 3 steps for transitioning to an authentic classical Christian home education. The content that follows is the initial post in an extensive series that explores the components of Step 3, Supervise the Study of Subjects. As each post is published, I’ll add the live link to the master list under the header tab called “Step 3″ so that you can access the entire series. I hope you enjoy this content and gain a fuller understanding of the argument that I am making for adopting a true classical model.

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As the sparkling lights of the symphony hall were dimmed, a hush fell over the crowd. All chattering ceased as the distinguished maestro confidently walked across the stage and silently addressed the musicians with his baton. After many years of diligent practice, the concertmaster was perfectly equipped to escort his audience on a musical journey that would quicken hearts and challenge minds.

Over the years, the maestro had mastered the language of music theory: melody, harmony, and rhythm. The longer he studied music, the more he understood the deeper mysteries of his art. Instruments, movements, and themes became his playground for critical analysis and experimentation. Finally, he learned how to interpret the unique meaning of the music and convey the composer’s intent by coaching the performers in their craft. His mastery of language, thought, and communication within his area of expertise would bless his community tonight during the concert and for many years to come as he continued to influence his culture with his passion for bringing music to life.

The maestro demonstrates four unusual qualities that we want to foster in our rising classical scholars:

• He masters the material.

• He disciplines himself.

• He interprets meaning.

• He influences his culture.

Why call these qualities unusual? Because most of today’s preteens and teenagers are captives of an educational system that breeds opposing characteristics and behaviors. Authentic classical Christian home schooling requires a profound shift in thinking about education. Think about your own public school experience.

Mastery is difficult if you only skim the surface. You went to school for 12 years. You had one textbook for each class. Every textbook had 36 chapters - one chapter for each week of the school year. You read one chapter a week. You were segregated by age into a grade. You studied the same textbook as your peers. That textbook was approved by a committee of certified educators who decided what information every child in your grade needed to know about that particular subject. If you couldn’t keep up with the instruction, you felt like an inadequate failure. If you understood the concepts, you were bored with the repetitive drills. The time restrictions of the calendar dictated the material taught, and there was no leeway for slowing down or accelerating learning.

No time for mastery.

Self-discipline is not necessary if someone tells you what to do. You were assigned a home room, and you had your own desk. You were given a timed schedule. Tardy arrivals and absences were noted on your record. You went where you were told including the bathroom and lunchroom at specific times. You read the chapters, you took the tests, you wrote the essays, and you memorized the material, but for some reason, you can’t remember much of what you learned! You were a good student who did what you were told. Good behavior was dictated not by the heart’s desire, but by the law. As soon as the teacher left the room, chaos broke loose.

No room for learning how to make informed decisions or teach yourself.

Interpretation is impossible when someone else tells you what to think. That committee of certified educators made the important decisions for you about what facts were important in literature, grammar, science, math, social studies, health, home economics, and all the other electives. Surveys, also known as secondary sources, formed the backbone of your education. The highlights of human knowledge were offered. Some might say your education was a mile wide and an inch deep. Education experts decided that you were unable to handle the heavier “classics” (other than a token play by Shakespere or novel by Dickens). Anyway, we all know that the classics are too difficult for teenagers, right? You were required to parrot back the facts that you’d memorized on multiple choice and true-false exams.

No chance for independent thinking or interpretation of meaning.

Influence is negative when your highest goal is self. Public schools no longer teach history; they teach social studies. At the center of all social studies is the individual. Next comes his family then his community then his world. In public school, motivation for action is centered around the individual and his or her vocation. You worked hard to get good grades to get a good job. In our family, we refer to this dilemma as “me is me to me.” If educators dream of shaping kids who will influence their community, these dreams are limited to the creation of “good” citizens although good is defined in a Greek sense and not necessarily a Biblical sense. References to the God of human history are non existent, and as such, young people fail to understand their purpose. Since one of the responses of faith is sacrificial service to others, a major motivation for blessing the community cannot be discussed in public schools. Service to others requires a redirection of focus from the self to the community.

No incentive to influence or share what you have learned with others.

Thankfully, you have chosen a different path for your children! You have the luxury of time to help your rising classical scholars master the three skills of the trivium. You have the luxury of gradually training them to be independent, self-directed thinkers who are responsible for their own learning. You have the luxury of determining your own content so that your kids can learn to grapple with the great ideas of Western Civilization as they read and discuss the classics, selected surveys, and biographies. Finally, you have the extreme privilege of being able to lead your children into an eternal relationship with the Living God, teach them how to use Scripture as the spectacles through which to view the world, and show them how to serve others in a way that influences and blesses. Adopt a counter-cultural stand, and experience the joy of classical Christian homeschooling today!

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Over the next four posts, I’ll explore these qualities (mastery, self-discipline, interpretation, and influence) in detail. Before you can release your kids to the study of subjects, you need to make sure they have mastered the skills of the trivium. But how do we know when they have substantially mastered language, thought, and communication? When is it time to move on to Step 3, Supervise the Study of Subjects? In my next post, we need to answer two questions about Step 2, Teach the Skills of the Trivium: (1) what is to be learned, and (2) how will it be evaluated?

Pulitzer prize-winning American author, Annie Dillard, is quoted as saying,

“I don’t know what I think until I see myself write.”

Writing down your thought processes is a necessary step to a fuller understanding of the problem, issue, or idea. Simply listening to a news program, a sermon, or a lecture is not enough. Let’s consider a common scenario.

While you’re watching a news program with your husband, the telephone rings, and he leaves to go answer the call. When he returns, he asks you what he missed. You might be able to immediately reconstruct the basics of the story, but would you be able to accurately recount the details a week later? Now let’s assume that the next evening, you decided to take notes during the broadcast. I’ll bet if you compared your recap from both nights, you would clearly see the benefit of writing down your thoughts.

Why is writing a catalyst to intellectual development in your homeschool? The process of writing:

• stimulates the mind

• improves memory

• shapes critical thinking

• enlarges understanding

• provides a permanent record

Writing Stimulates the Mind

You’ve probably heard that you’ll retain information more effectively if you give it to your brain by more than one method. When your child reads a book, she is gathering information and storing it using visual cues. When your daughter then narrates what she learned in the book, she is organizing and storing that information a second time using auditory cues. Finally, when she writes while she is reading or even after she has read a passage, she is storing that info using both touch and sight. This child has now engaged the same information three different ways, and she is very likely to have a better understanding than she would have if all she had done was read the chapter.

Writing Improves Memory

Not only does processing information using multiple methods improve understanding, but it also improves memory. Since the late ’60s, leading memory authorities have documented the fact that organizing information (into categories) makes the info more memorable thus more likely to be retained in long-term memory. Additionally, writing down your thought processes or ideas usually results in a mental picture of the outline, sketch, or notes so that when you need to recall the information, you can readily remember your written notes by calling up your internal “teleprompter.”

Writing Shapes Critical Thinking

In order to write some thought down on paper or to type the thought on the computer keyboard, we need to first organize the information. We are forced to reduce all the incoming data to determine the main problem and identify the solution. (See “Can a Critical Thinker also be Creative, Too?” for more detail on the questions that a critical thinker should ask.) Does your child have trouble with math word problems? My kids used to really struggle with them until I showed them how to circle the important facts in the problem then translate the words into a mathematical equation or formula. As they dissected the word problem, they were able to focus on what the problem was asking and come up with the correct solution.

Writing Enlarges Understanding

When we exclusively confine our learning to reading or hearing someone else’s interpretation, we miss out on greater understanding. When we choose to write down the facts and come to our own conclusions, we inevitably stumble upon concepts that we thought we understood but later realized that we did not really grasp the problem. So, we’ve got to dig a little deeper to clarify our own understanding. Meredith and I watch a DVD on biology, and as we each draw our own “stick and branch” outlines of the lecture, we often pause the DVD to discuss concepts that we don’t understand.

Writing Provides a Permanent Record

As homeschoolers, we need to keep certain records in order to comply with the state. You also might want to keep a written record of your kids’ work in case they decide to homeschool their kids and need to refer back to their own home school work! At the end of the academic year, I ask the kids to pull their favorite examples from each area of study so that I can incorporate those writing samples in their portfolio or scrapbook.

I keep reading journals (3 ring binders or spiral notebooks) for all of my own studies. It is especially rewarding to go back through my “Quiet Time” Scripture journals from over the years and see how I am growing in my understanding and relationship with Jesus. I also keep my history, literature, and science notebooks in case I ever want to go back and consult them. They are really a “history” of who I was at that place and time because they reflect those thoughts and questions that I found most important.

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Here’s a quick exercise for you and the kids. Select an article out of the newspaper. Have the oldest child read it and narrate the main points to the rest of the family. Appoint one family member to take notes of what the narrator said. Then have the oldest child read the article again, but this time have him or her write down thoughts before narrating. Have the secretary take notes again. Compare the two accounts of the article. Which account reflected a greater understanding of the topic?

Parents who read aloud to their children contribute more to early language development than any other factor. Quantity and quality of literature plays a significant part in whether you will raise early readers or not. According to reading expert Marilyn Adams (Beginning to Read):

“the most important activity for building the knowledge and skills eventually required for reading is that of reading aloud to children. In this, both the sheer amount of and the choice of reading materials seems to make a difference.”

You want to raise classical scholars. The books your kids will be reading as teenagers and young adults are complex in both content and language: classic histories, classic philosophies, classic political treatises, classic science theories, and classic literature. Pave the way to future reading comprehension and enjoyment with these eight suggestions:

Read as often as possible.

The younger your child is when you begin reading to them the better! Make reading a daily tradition like brushing teeth. Read at bedtime, and read throughout the day whenever the kids ask for a story. Even if the entire day gets sidetracked due to unforeseen obligations or distractions, don’t drop reading from the schedule. Sometimes when I’ve had to take care of emergencies, I’ve just told the kids to read until I can get back to them. Set aside time each day for the kids to read on their own. Young children can “read” story books during naptime (even if all they are doing is looking at pictures and turning the pages), and older kids can read for 30 minutes once they’re in the bed before lights are out. Show them that reading is a priority in your household.

Use real books.

Many homeschool convention vendors sell “readers” which are artificial stories built around phonics lessons. Please don’t use these for your daily reading time! My experience with them is that they are rarely as entertaining and meaningful as “living” books. Use these phonics readers occasionally when you want to reinforce a phonetic sound. When the kids are young, start with colorful hardbound stories then move on to novels. As they get older, have Dad pick a great book to read aloud like a biography of an historical figure or original source documents like The Declaration of Independence. Even if the kids are reading on their own, try to incorporate some oral readings regularly.

Be patient as your child learns the art of listening.

Don’t rush the reading. Take your time so that your child can hear all the sounds and point to all the words. This is an important step in acquiring the language as well as critical thinking. Kids who haven’t developed good listening skills rarely communicate effectively. Answer all their questions, and ask them some questions to train their listening abilities.

Put down a book that is clearly uninteresting.

Only read books that you both enjoy! Nothing is more miserable than slogging through a book that you both find boring. We all like different stories. Sometimes your homeschool friend may recommend a book that just doesn’t appeal to your child. If you find her yawning or unengaged, put that book down and find another one. In fact, let her choose the book that she wants to read.

Vary the length and subject matter.

Don’t be too predictable. If the kids think that every time you sit down to read, they are going to have to endure hours of the same topic, they will begin to dread reading time. Keep them on their toes by doing the unexpected. One day read a story. The next day read a newspaper or magazine article. Then read a longer novel. Once you start the novel, you (and the kids) will likely want to keep going through the chapters until you finish the book, but then vary the content by reading some poems. Read about all of life, not just “academics.

Plan enough time for questions.

If you’ve read my post on Socratic Dialogue, you know that asking questions is the way classical homeschoolers teach. Don’t tell them what the story means until after you’ve asked enough probing questions to determine their level of understanding. Let them try to figure it out. Leave enough time for questions both before and after the reading. Before you get started with the story, look at the book jacket, inside cover, back cover, title page, pictures, and ask the kids to predict what the story is going to be about. Or with an older teen, have them look at the table of contents with you, and let them summarize the author’s thesis. After reading, ask questions, too, about the characters, plot, events, or other meaning.

Express yourself.

Bland, dry reading is tortuous! Imitate the voices of actors who have pleasant reading voices (James Earl Jones, Jeremy Irons, and Meryl Streep come to mind) by adjusting your pace, pitch, and volume to fit the narrative. For instance let’s say you are reading a scary scene where the character is worried about what’s in the bedroom closet. Slow down and quietly whisper the words leading up to the climactic moment when the closet door is opened and the mystery revealed. Change your tone to match the content. Effective delivery makes all content more memorable.

Lead by example.

You know that our kids are great imitators. They are watching us all hours of the day, and they will naturally do what we do. So if you are not reading on a daily basis, don’t expect to raise kids who love to read. Make sure that they see how important reading is to you. When we go to the library, I get a stack of books, too. Right now, I have 11 library books stacked up on my table three of which I have opened to passages that I’m comparing. When Meredith walked in a few minutes ago and asked me what I was working on, I was able to read a quick section to her and explain what I was learning. Plan little breaks in your day so that you can read for pleasure or for home school preparation. Share interesting things that you are learning from your reading, or let them hear you chuckling over a good passage.

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In today’s culture, reading is an integral element of gathering knowledge, understanding, and wisdom. Set your children on the road to discovery by reading aloud to them!

Do you know a friend who might enjoy this post? If so, please forward it with my blessings.

How many times have you, as a home school mom, heard these plaintive words when you have given your child a writing or speech assignment?

“But, Mom, I don’t know what to write!”

Consider adding topical, thematic, and quote prompts to your home school writing toolbox to spark creative ideas and increase the frequency of writing and public speaking. Prompts are also beneficial in helping your homeschooler narrow the focus of the topic and organize thoughts before wasting time in undirected meandering. Don’t encourage writing or speaking just for the sake of checking off a “to-do” on your long list of objectives for the kids. You want to raise effective communicators, and prompts can give you control over the process.

Prompts restrict the focus of the broad topic

Even an excellent author needs to restrict the focus of the topic before beginning the writing process. G. A. Henty is a popular author among home schooling young men and is known especially for his historical fiction. Henty likes to write about major events in world history, but he purposefully narrows the focus of the event to a few significant events. For example in one our family favorites, The Young Carthaginian, Henty tackles the monumental military feat of General Hannibal when he led the troops of ancient Carthage across the Alps to engage the Romans. Extensive coverage of a 15 year military campaign would be impossible in a book of a few hundred pages, so Henty restricts the broad topic of Hannibal’s campaign to the first 3 battles of the Second Punic War: Trebia, Trasimene, and Cannae. In restricting his topic to these 3 victories he eliminated other topical possibilities. He could have focused on 3 major people of the engagement: Consul Gaius Flaminius Nepo, Dictator Quintus Fabius Maximus, and General Scipio Africanus. Or he could have restricted the topic to any number of other interesting facts: weapons, animals, and weather.

So, too, topical prompts help your child narrow the focus of the written or speaking assignment. Select a topic from the subjects currently being studied. As in the case of Henty, have your child select a broad topic from the history reading then brainstorm possible subtopics. Here’s an example: Connor is currently reading about the American Civil War. Unlike Hannibal’s war, this war only lasted 4 years; however, there is still a vast wealth of subtopics for consideration. Here are a few ideas for restriction of the topic:

• Battles: Bull Run, Shiloh, and Gettysburg
• Confederate Generals: Lee, Jackson, and Stuart
• Politicians: Polk, Lincoln, and Davis
• Political parties: Whigs, Republicans, and Democrats

He could restrict the writing to the economic conditions before, during, and after the war. He could narrow the focus to any number of subtopics on the Civil War!

Not only do topical prompts restrict the focus for history writing and speaking, but the broad topic can also be restricted for science and geography reading. If your child is studying the animal kingdom (broad topic), let them restrict the focus to mammals, insects, or microscopic life. Once the subtopic of mammals is chosen, the child can then further restrict to cats: tigers, lions, and pumas.

Restriction of topic in writing about their geography studies is equally helpful. Is your child currently mapping the Middle East? Restrict the broad topic to Jordan, Syria, and Israel. Further restrict to politics, topography, or culture. The possibilities are endless.

If you don’t want use a topical prompt from the assigned reading, choose a random prompt from BrainyQuote or Phillips’ Book of Great Thoughts & Funny Sayings.

Thematic prompts and quote prompts are just like topical prompts in that you start with a broad topic then restrict. Thematic prompts usually come from literature or history. Are you listening to the audio version of Treasure Island with your children? Assign the theme, “going on a quest,” and let the kids narrow the topic from there. They could discuss Jim Hawkins adventures in terms of the journey, the dangers, and the valuable treasure. Quote prompts are really just topics or themes rolled into a complete statement. Can you find a broad topic or theme in the following quote prompt?

“But friendship is precious, not only in the shade, but in the sunshine of life, and thanks to a benevolent arrangement the greater part of life is sunshine.” - Thomas Jefferson

When using a quote prompt, look for the nouns to determine broad topics or themes then restrict. In this example, the homeschooler could examine the broad topic of friendship and write about 3 friends in real life, literature, or history. Or an older teen might want to speak about theme of old age (the shade of life) and youth (the sunshine of life) with restrictions from his own personal observations, Scripture, or culture.

Prompts of all kinds, whether taken from assigned studies or randomly chosen, can spark ideas, increase the frequency of writing, and narrow the focus of the broad topic.

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Give them prompts and restrict the writing time. Topical, thematic, and quote prompts can spark ideas for writing essays and speeches in your home school. In addition to getting those creative juices flowing, timed prompts can increase the frequency of writing and public speaking. The more practice your homeschooling kids gather in writing and speaking…the more effective they will be at communicating.

Prompts Encourage More Frequent Writing and Speaking

If you like an efficient home schooling schedule, prompts will allow your kids to squeeze the most out of their writing time. When given the topic of the essay or speech, time is maximized. Valuable brainstorming time is spent examining one topic instead of sifting through multiple topic possibilities.

In our home school, we have also limited the amount of time spent developing the essay or speech. For instance, I find that the kids really enjoy using prompts because I set a time limit. They like racing against the clock, and they also like knowing that when the timer buzzer goes off, writing or speech is done for the day. Consider that first piece of writing a “draft” then have them edit and print the final copy the following day.

How much time to allocate to writing an essay or speech from a prompt really depends on the ages and abilities of your kids. My kids are both teens, and they will eventually be taking the SAT which has a 25 minute essay, so that is our time limit for a written essay. Here is how I do it:

1. Select a unique topical, thematic, or quote prompt for each child (or give them 3 to choose from)
2. Get the timer ready (I use a swimmers or runners stopwatch, but you could use a kitchen timer or the microwave timer)
3. Tell the kids to pull out some clean paper
4. Give them the prompt or let them choose their favorite of 3
5. Say “ready, set, go!”
6. When the buzzer goes off after 25 minutes, I say “time.”

Since they are preparing for the real SAT exam, they follow the same restrictions which include outlining the essay during the 25 minute time limit, but if your kids are younger, you could help them brainstorm and create a key word outline before you start the timer. You don’t want to create frustration because they don’t have enough time to write, so use your judgment for what is best for your family.

I follow the same format for impromptu speeches except the time limit is different. Meredith and Connor both compete in National Christian Forensics Communication Association (NCFCA) Speech and Debate Tournaments, so we follow the NCFCA rules which state that a student has 2 minutes of prep time once they get the topic to give a 5 minute impromptu speech. Expository speeches cannot be longer than 10 minutes, so I give them 4 minutes to get ready.

The great thing about selecting the topic (through prompts) and restricting the time on writing the essay and giving the speech is that you can do more of them! When you only have to commit less than 30 minutes a day, you can give them a prompt more than once a week. Frequent writing and public speaking improve technical skills as well as reduce anxiety and fear.

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In my next post, I’ll examine how topical, thematic, and quote prompts can narrow the focus when your home school children write a paper or give a speech. Do you need a resource for topical, thematic, and famous quote prompts? Easily locate quotes for free Scripture or BrainyQuote or purchase an inexpensive resource for homeschool prompts at Amazon.

As a parent who likes to follow the news of successful home schooling students, you’ve probably heard about the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee and how homeschoolers like 2007 champion, Evan O’Dorney, continue to surprise the public by winning! But you probably haven’t heard about a new scholarship opportunity for homeschoolers: the Princeton Review National Vocabulary Championship.

The Game Show Network and the Princeton Review teamed up last year to host the 1st annual National Vocabulary Championship which is “an initiative that aims to inspire students to expand their vocabularies” by offering free educational resources and awarding over $100,000 annually in college tuition scholarships. The contest is open to public and home school students. Eligible home school students are in grades 9-12 and between the ages of 13 and 19. Each day during the month of November 2007, the timed National Qualifying Exam which consists of 45 multiple choice questions is available for home school students to take online. The top scorers will be invited to take the regional in-person exam on January 12, 2008 which is like the qualifying exam except it also includes an essay. Fifty finalists will then advance to Los Angeles, California in the spring 2008 to compete for the top scholarship of $40,000.

Now before you dismiss this idea, you’ve got to go see the best part of this offer which, in my opinion, is the extensive list of study modules! There are 10 modules which help build vocabulary:

1. Mnemonic Madness

2. Compliment or Criticism?

3. What’s the Link?

4. Using Context

5. Using Context, part 2

6. Dictionaries, Etymologies, and Thessauri…Oh My!

7. Vocabulary Journaling

8. Secondary Meanings

9. The Perfect Roommate

10. Analogies

Each ~20 page module begins with a lesson, then a couple of independent activities to reinforce the teaching, a quiz, and flashcards to help them retain the vocabulary words that they studied! The modules are all in adobe pdf format which means you can save them to your computer for later use (think siblings!) or print them out now for your high school student. Additionally, there are 5 documents which list the 250 most frequently tested SAT vocabulary words. Here’s a screenshot:

Princeton Review Hit Parade 1

Princeton Review Hit Parade 2

Princeton Review Hit Parade 3

Princeton Review Hit Parade 4

Princeton Review Hit Parade 5

Now, I don’t know about you, but even if you do not want to have your teen take the National Vocabulary Qualifying Exam before the end of November, you will agree with me that the free study aids are invaluable and could really supplement your home school English curriculum! As I mentioned, the exam is ONLY given in November which means you only have about 2 weeks left to take it (sorry, i just learned about it this week). One of the things that I love about homeschooling is the flexibility…in fact, I’ve decided to put the 10 vocabulary modules and the SAT Vocabulary Hit Parade lists on the schedule next week for both Meredith and Connor, then they can take the online National Vocabulary Qualifying Exam the week of November 26, 2007. I look forward to hearing the announcement on the national news next spring that your home school teen has won a big college scholarship!

Is your high school homeschooler ready for the PSAT exam? Usually this national exam (preliminary to the SAT - Scholastic Aptitude Test administered by the College Board) is taken during the sophomore year for practice and the junior year for the National Merit Scholarship qualifier. But your home school student can take it earlier than that if you think he or she would benefit from some advance practice.

One of my home school friends told me about a free PSAT practice exam and the amazing results her son achieved on the real PSAT as a result: he scored 20 points higher! This could be due to the fact that he had more learning experience under his belt or maybe he was just more familiar with the exam format so he felt less threatened. Or it could be that the questions on the real PSAT exam were easier, but I doubt it!

I decided to investigate and enrolled Meredith (almost 15 - freshman) in the free Princeton Review practice test this past fall. A local hotel hosted the test (they also did free practice SAT exams) in a conference room. You’d think that there would be pre-selling of their review course, but they didn’t even ask talk to the parents! Within 2 weeks, she had her complete exam results with line by line answers so she could see what she missed. (For those of you who are interested, click on the link above, enter your zip code, and see if your local rep is hosting any free events or call them if they are not and get on their email distribution for the next test.)

Meredith did really well in the language portion, but her math needs some shoring up. She’s about 1/3 of the way through Algebra 1, and she’s really insecure when it comes to closed book math exams, so that didn’t surprise me. The great thing about the free Princeton exam is that she can see exactly what areas she needs to work on. We have a great book, 100 Math Tips for the SAT, and How to Master Them Now! that she is using to systematically work through her weak areas.

One of the benefits of taking the PSAT and SAT practice exams is the time factor. Once you get your results back, you can work through the problems that you’ve missed over time instead of cramming at the last minute. What PSAT homeschooling tips or other free practice exams do you know about?