Posts and comments about Charlotte Mason’s thoughts on allowing children freedom within boundaries.
We hope you have enjoyed the past few weeks as we focused on Masterly Inactivity. The articles we shared with you are taken from our new 2008 personal calendar journal, A Year of Masterly Inactivity with Charlotte Mason.
Several more articles are included in the calendar, along with more than fifty Charlotte Mason quotes on parenting. [Continue reading A Year of Masterly Inactivity …]
“What do you try to control instead of allowing God to control?” the small-group leader posed the question. He gave an example, then someone else mentioned an area that hit home. “I try to control everything for my children,” she said. “My natural instinct is to protect them, but I tend to micromanage. For instance, I tell my teenage daughter to text me when she arrives somewhere, text me when she’s leaving, text me when she arrives at the next place. You get the idea.” [Continue reading Faith …]
You’ve seen them — parents who are hoodwinked by their children time and time again. Suzy is a little terror to the other children, pulling hair and pushing the little ones. But when her mom enters the scene just as a small boy is pushing back, Suzy dramatically falls to the ground and cries. Her uninformed mother runs to rescue her poor victim-daughter and declares the boy to be a bully! [Continue reading Don’t Be Hoodwinked …]
When our first two children were still preschoolers, my husband took them to the park without me. I had some work to finish up, so they went ahead and walked the two blocks before me. About twenty minutes later I was done and hurried to join them. As I rounded the corner, I could see our youngest (at the time) climbing the leg of the swing set. She had almost reached the top bar about ten feet off the ground. [Continue reading A Good Deal of Letting Alone …]
Have you ever heard of the game Mother, May I? No, I don’t mean the innocent little game of “baby steps” and “kangaroo hops.” I mean the “game” of pestering and whining, “Mother, may I stay up late tonight? Pleeeeeeze, please, please? All my friends are doing it and . . . .” Perhaps you played this game yourself with your mother. [Continue reading Good Humor …]
A fenced-in backyard can be a wonderful thing when you have small children. Ask any mother who has spent a hot summer day chasing after her adventurous terrier and perpetually active toddler. Fences are good. [Continue reading The Fence of Authority …]
I remember two parties I attended when I was growing up. One was a sleepover at which I saw the parent only once: at breakfast. The rest of the time we girls were left to do anything and everything we pleased. And believe me, we did. [Continue reading Insight and Self-Restraint …]
We love our children. And we have great hopes for them. As Charlotte Mason so aptly put it, “People feel that they can bring up their children to be something more than themselves, that they ought to do so, and that they must” (Vol. 3, p. 26).
That’s why we homeschool. We want to give our children something more.
But because of that desire, we can easily fall into a trap. [Continue reading You Need Both: Masterly Inactivity …]
