Spreading a feast vs. becoming intimately acquainted

That’s a good comparison in one sense, Kelly. Yes, the younger years are meant to give the children a broad view so they can see the big picture and look for relations between those whole ideas. They will get to analyzing smaller details after they have a good grasp of the big picture. Another analogy might be if you’re looking to buy a new house, you walk through it and get the big picture of its size and surface aspects and how the rooms are situated in relation to each other. After you have those larger aspects firmly planted in your mind and they have an appeal to you, you move on to more in-depth inspections of details. 

Such an approach is different from the way most of us were educated and the way most other methods approach education. The trend today is to jump to analyzing right away. But Charlotte understood the importance of seeing the big picture so you can analyze from a firm foundation. Analyzing details without having the big picture is like the fable of the blind men and the elephant.

One beautiful factor about CM, though, is that we will continue to plant more and more seeds even as the children grow older. They will be delving into details on things they have a relation with, but we will continue to spread a feast of even more ideas to explore; for learning is a lifelong adventure and our job is largely to show them how attractive that adventure can be so they will keep exploring their entire lives.

Here is a great article in the series 31 Days of Charlotte Mason Myths—“CM’s many subjects directly confict with the classical principle of multum non multa [much not many]”, in which Mason is quoted:

We spread an abundant and delicate feast in the programmes [of the PNEU] and each small guest assimilates what he can.” {Philosophy of Education, p. 183}

The task of the teacher is to spread a generous feast; becoming “initmately acquainted” is something only the student can do. We can make introductions, but not friendships for our children.