60-day returns • free shipping on USA orders $129+
I remember the first day of school when I was a student. It didn’t matter which grade; pick any grade. They were all pretty much the same. The day was usually filled with finding the classroom, meeting the teacher or teachers for that year, and then getting “the stack.” You know what I mean by “the stack”? Every teacher would hand out the textbook and workbook for the particular subject that he or she was teaching, and you would add it to the stack that was growing either in your little flip-top desk or in your locker. The next period, you would get another textbook and workbook to add to your stack. That’s just how it was.
And those textbooks all read about the same way—like an encyclopedia article. It gave the facts that you were supposed to use to fill in the workbook and to memorize for the test that was coming. But I don’t recall any textbook that touched my emotions or fired my imagination. Rarely did they give me a new idea to mull over and ponder and allow to shape who I was becoming as a person. No, those kinds of things came from the literature books I was reading in my spare time on the side.
Perhaps your experience was like mine. And maybe that’s what has drawn you, as it did me, to wanting to give your children a Charlotte Mason education. Let’s talk about how that background might influence your thinking as you make the transition.
We all come to Charlotte Mason from different backgrounds. Perhaps your homeschool background has been mainly using traditional methods and materials like textbooks and workbooks, study guides and worksheets. If that’s the case, you may find that you have a tendency to think about education in certain ways, and those thoughts might trip you up as you transition to a Charlotte Mason approach.
So let me offer three possible tendencies that might crop up. I’m not saying that you will definitely have to deal with them—you might or you might not. But I think being aware of these different ways of thinking about education can be very helpful.
tendency #1: confusing information with education
The first tendency is confusing information with education. There’s a huge difference between the two. In fact, Charlotte Mason wrote,
It cannot be too often said that information is not education.
School Education, page 169
True education looks at much more than just dumping facts into a child’s brain.
Yet many people today have that mistaken view. Their focus is on “What should the child know?” But true education looks at much more than just dumping facts into a child’s brain. The focus of education should be: “How is my child growing…as a person?” Yes, part of growth is mental growth, and he should be learning new things, but be careful not to get tunnel vision. Education is much, much more than just learning facts. Look at the bigger picture. Look at the whole person.
tendency #2: depending on busywork
The second tendency is, perhaps inadvertently, depending on busywork in order to feel like you’re doing enough. Usually a textbook and workbook approach relies heavily on having a paper trail. So it’s easy to start to think that learning is not happening unless something is put on paper. But that is not the case. A lot of growing happens down deep where we can’t see it. And just because something is going onto a piece of paper does not guarantee that the child is learning. So try to recognize busywork for what it is and let go of it. Turn your focus to two things: First, your emphasis in a Charlotte Mason approach is not on quantity but on quality. Make sure your student is spending time on assignments that are worthwhile, not just filling time, mindlessly coloring or copying something over and over or playing little puzzles. Encourage the habit of best effort by requiring a high standard of quality on short, meaningful assignments.
It seems like one of the hardest places to make that switch away from paper is with oral narration. If the idea of having no record of your child’s narrations is causing you some anxious hours, feel free to record those oral narrations—either with an audio recorder or video. Then you’ll have a record without additional busywork tacked on to “show” that he is learning something.
Then the second thing to try to focus on, if you have this tendency to depend on busywork, is, don’t be afraid of giving your child the gift of time to think. Growth comes from taking in great ideas and having time to process them.
Learning can happen without a paper trail and without busywork.
tendency #3: thinking in terms of grade levels
The third tendency that I see when a person is coming from textbooks to Charlotte Mason is thinking in terms of grade levels for everything. I often hear parents make a blanket statement, “My student is in this grade, but she’s behind.” I would encourage you to stop thinking of your child as being in a certain grade for everything. Start thinking, instead, in terms of topic-based subjects and skill-based subjects. Skill-based subjects are dependent on the student’s learning one particular skill before she can move on to the next. Skill-based subjects can be labeled with grade levels. The skill-based subjects are basically math and language arts.
(Now, let me insert here, that even though skill-based subjects can be labeled with grade levels, please don’t allow those labels to handcuff you. It is not uncommon for a child to be at one grade level in math and a different grade level in reading or writing. Every child is an individual, and it’s not realistic to expect every child to grow at the same rate—in every area of education—as all the other children his age. Show respect for the persons living in your home by allowing each one to grow as an individual at his own pace in the skill-based subjects.)
But all the other subjects are topic-based: history, geography, picture study, music study, and poetry, for example. Those subjects don’t have to be covered in a particular order or at a particular age. Topic-based subjects are not grade dependent. They just present topics that you can choose to cover whenever. If you can make that distinction in your mind, you will have more freedom to teach each child as an individual. In fact, that’s how the Simply Charlotte Mason curriculum is designed. You’ll be able to combine your students for those topic-based subjects, which will also help you save a lot of time and money. Then you can pick and choose the exact resources that will fit each child best in the skill-based subjects, regardless of grade level. When you loosen your mental hold on grade levels, you can customize each student’s education.
So keep an eye out for those three tendencies. Now let me also offer you three practical tips to help make the transition from a traditional-textbook approach to a Charlotte Mason approach smoother.
tip #1: set your own schedule
Many people that I talk to, who use the traditional approach of textbooks and workbooks, also follow a traditional school-year calendar. Many follow the same calendar as their local school system. It’s what they’re used to. And that’s fine IF that is what works best for your family. My first tip is just a reminder that you can set your own school-year calendar. Think through what would work best for your family during this season of life. Perhaps a year-round school year would give you more flexibility. Some families I know do schoolwork for 3 months, then take 1 month off all year round; or you might do 3 weeks on, 1 week off. You might even do four days a week, all year round. Or maybe a traditional school year does work best for your family. I’ve done an episode on different ways you can schedule your school year. I’ll leave a link in the Description. The purpose of this tip is mainly to encourage you to consider all the options and make an intentional decision. It’s nice to know that we have the freedom to approach our yearly calendar in whatever way fits best.
tip #2: get familiar with living books
I encourage you to spend some time getting familiar and comfortable with living books. If textbooks are all that you’ve known up to this point (and that could have been many years, if you include your own education and your children’s), you may feel a bit uncertain when it comes to these very different “living” books. So spend some time educating yourself. Make sure you can tell the difference between a textbook-style of writing and a living book-style of writing. Remember that a living book is usually written by one author who has a passion for the subject. A living book will touch the emotions and fire the imagination. You’ll be able to see in your mind’s eye what is being described in the book. It will contain ideas, not just bare facts. The facts will be there, but they will be clothed in living ideas. Educate yourself on the difference between a textbook and a living book. I’ll leave links to some episodes with examples for you.
It’s important to know the difference, because it is very difficult to narrate a textbook—almost impossible. So if you don’t know the difference, you might be making the transition to narration harder for your student.
tip #3: ease into narration
And speaking of narration, that brings us to Tip #3: Remember that fill-in-the-blank and multiple choice is easier than narration. Narration requires a much higher level of thinking. You are asking your child to give you an oral composition. After a single reading. That’s a tall order, and it might take a little getting-used-to on the part of your student. So give her lots of encouragement and give her the gift of time to make that transition. Don’t expect perfection from the very first day. The motto of “much grace” will help you both, as your student begins to use the tool of narration for self-education.
And don’t forget that you can ease into the Charlotte Mason approach if that would work better for you. You might want to review these posts that will help you make the switch in smaller stages:
- Stage 1: Using Living Books
- Stage 2: Once-a-Week Enrichment Subjects
- Stage 3: Two Things to Do Every Day
- Stage 4: The Check-Up
- Stage 5: Adding Variety
Making the switch from textbooks to Charlotte Mason has its challenges, just like all of the other scenarios. But rest assured that you are not the first one, nor the only one, to do so; homeschoolers make that switch successfully all the time. I hope these ideas reassure your heart and smooth the way as you take the first steps of this transition.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Podcast (podcastv): Play in new window | Download