Wednesday, October 22, 2014

The Lightbulb Moment!


Today Kathy continues relating her family's story of their journey to a Charlotte Mason approach to education. I'm sure many of you have had similar journeys and would love to hear about them in the comments below! Enjoy!


“First comes thought; then organization of that thought, into ideas and plans; then transformation of those plans into reality.”
                                                                                                                 -Napoleon Hill

While I was pregnant with our daughter, my husband I began to talk about the subject of education. Looking at it from the logical perspective, we had three options: public school, private school or home school. The public schools in our geographical area were teaching topics which were counterculture to our Christian beliefs. The private schools included the Christian faith in their curricula, but were too expensive. The final alternative was the words “home school” sitting on the table before us. As the old saying goes, “Necessity is the mother of invention,” so I began to research the topic of homeschooling. I remember leaving our local public library six months pregnant with a stack of approximately twenty books on the topic of home schooling. After sifting through the stack, I narrowed it down to three: The Well Trained Mind, A Charlotte Mason Companion and Dr. Beechick’s Homeschool Answer Book. I began reading voraciously.

The Well Trained Mind was reminiscent of the way I had been educated. Dr. Beechick’s Homeschool Answer Book provided answers to the questions swirling around in my mind; however it was the last book that truly caught my attention, A Charlotte Mason Companion. Knowing the background of my maternal grandmother’s education helped direct me towards this particular book. I had “seen the proof of the pudding” in her life and this was the educational experience I wanted for our child. Eagerly, I shared my discovery with my husband and began filing away mental notes for the future.

Fast forward three months. Our daughter was born at the end of August and immediately we began implementing Charlotte Mason’s philosophy of education via “living books.” Living books are defined as “books written by authors who have a particular fondness for their subject.” They are books which are well written, make the subject come alive and “get in touch with great ideas from great men”. I perused our book shelves, as well as the public libraries. Goodnight Moon, Blueberries for Sal, Winnie the Pooh, and Little House in the Big Woods are a few examples of the living books I selected to begin reading to our daughter during feeding time.


As the preschool years came and went, we began to think more seriously about homeschooling. My husband and I had defined our goals and objectives for education: 
~Create and foster a lifelong love of learning.
~Provide a solid academic foundation that will last a lifetime.
~Equip and prepare our daughter to be a leader, not a follower, in the 21st Century.

So with these goals in mind, we were faced with the question of how do we go about executing our educational philosophy? Initially, we settled for a pre-packaged curriculum that billed itself as “literature based.” In reality it led our child to information overload and her burning out on education. I retrieved my copy of A Charlotte Mason Home Companion and began to read again. On paper it looked so simple but in reality it seemed to be a daunting task. Where in the world could I find a curriculum that fit the Charlotte Mason philosophy? I remember reaching my wits end and praying for guidance one morning after my devotional time. After I prayed, I remember a friend asking me if I had ever read Susan Schaeffer Macaulay’s book, For the Children’s Sake. Within minutes I was online placing a hold for the book at our local public library. Once I began to read For the Children’s Sake I could not stop. Then one day while I was reading, the light bulb finally went on in my brain. Charlotte Mason isn't about using a particular curriculum it is about implementing the Charlotte Mason philosophy of education using "living books." God spoke to me through Susan's writing and I finally got it! Hooray! No more searching and looking for the perfect curriculum because now I understood what it was all about.


After the "light bulb moment" I got to thinking "How did my great grandmother implement the Charlotte Mason philosophy of education in her homeschool?" I remember my grandmother saying she only had Home Education and Comstock's Book of Nature at the beginning. From there she added books which met Charlotte's standards and ordered them from Sears and Roebuck or J.C. Penney and the Wells Fargo man would deliver them. From what I had gleaned from my grandmother’s experience and readings, Charlotte Mason is all about the implementation of the “philosophy of education" and how we apply it in our homeschools. I am so thankful God led me to Susan's book. I felt like a tremendous burden had been lifted from my shoulders and now our family could truly experience the truth that “the life of the mind is sustained upon ideas.”

Thank you so much for sharing Kathy! If any of you have similar lightbulb moments, we'd love to hear about them! And if you want to know more about the Charlotte Mason educational philosophy, check out the links below. You may also want to invest in a copy of For the Children's Sake. It's an excellent, inspiring resource you will turn to again and again.

Learn more about Charlotte Mason and our philosophy at BFB at the following links:










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