The Association of Classical Christian Schools annual conference was a wonderful feast of insight and wisdom. The conference fulfilled its theme of "Truth, Goodness, and Beauty". As homeschoolers, attending this conference aimed at private school teachers was a good sanity check of our methods and ideals. By and large, our family's approach was confirmed. As with any great conference, a few ideas emerged which we will adopt. Here are several conclusions and ideas I took away from the conference.

1) Confirmed our focus on "readin', ritin', and 'rithmetic". Amid all the talk of Aristotle, Cicero, Epistemology, and the like, the bottom line remains that kids need to read good books, write about what they read, and do math consistently. The Schlect session on the survey results confirmed this.

2) Our family needs to spend more time reading together and discussing what we read. I want to spend about 2 hours together each Wednesday and Friday morning. Start with singing a hymn, then read a poem. The five of us older ones can take turns selecting and reading a favorite poem. It will be clunky and weird at first, but overtime should become beautiful. Then we'll read about 45 minutes in an elementary/middle school level book and then 45 minutes in a high school/adult level book. The books should be of opposite types. For example, if the elementary book is non-fiction narrative, then the adult book should be fiction/literature. Spend about 2-3 weeks on a book. If it's compelling stay with it. If not, drop it and start another. The older kids could be assigned further independent reading/writing in the more difficult books. I don't want to be afraid to start Augustine's City of God just because it's 1200 page and would take 18 months to read. We can read it a couple weeks and move on.

3) Just as Truth, Goodness, and Beauty are used to describe the nature of God, so the triad of Knowledge, Understanding, and Wisdom describe the nature of true education and maturity. Wisdom is the goal, built on a solid foundation of true knowledge and understanding how that knowledge (facts) relates to reality. I've always considered the goal of education to be wisdom. But I see now, it's actually more. The goal is not wisdom, but to love wisdom. The difference is substantial. A wise student may wither and over time lose their wisdom. But a lover of wisdom will pursue it relentlessly. A lover of wisdom is a self-learner, able to resist distraction and deception.

The ancients had it right after all. "Philosophy" is literally the "love of wisdom". So we must all be philosophers.

In 10th grade, we shift our focus from more recent US history (1700-present) back to earlier world history. We'll use Church History in Plain Language as our major source, and add various real books appropriate for each historical period. Here are the real books and the approximate historical periods they cover:

Apostle, a Life of Paul by John Pollock - 1st century

Augustine of Hippo by Peter Brown - 300-400AD

Confessions by St. Augustine - 300-400AD

St. Francis by G. K. Chesterton - 1100AD

St. Thomas by G. K. Chesterton - 1200AD

Inferno by Dante 1300 AD

And reading throughout: History of Art for Young People

Other subjects:
Saxon Advanced Mathematics (pre-calculus)

Bob Jones Geography

and rounding the education out with choir, piano, and a couple hours a day taking care of young baby brother.

Ongoing journal of thoughts and decisions "real time" as our 9th grade homeschool plan is developed and implemented

August 2008 - 9th grade wrap-up
Grace finished the major sections of Democracy in America in May.  Summer has been a light dose of Saxon Algebra 2 - only about a lesson a week.  She has less than 10 lessons left to finish it and then on the Saxon Advanced to start 10th grade.  She's continuing working through Bob Jones Geography.  We'll keep that up into 10th grade, rotating with other subjects as we did in 9th.
This summer our girls we're involved in Austin Christian Theatre's production of "Circle of Heaven".  They loved it immensely.  That's wrapped up now and they're spending time on sewing projects and will attend a week long choir camp later in August.  They also did several longer term projects before the production rehearsals got busy - scrapbooks, photo albums, and other sewing. 
A well-rounded summer for the whole family.

April 11, 2008 - Essays and Poetry
Following The Wealth of Nations, Grace read The Law.  This was during the Presidential primary campaign here in Texas so very relevant to all the promises being made by the statists running for office.  Here's one of the essays. 
She's now in the middle of Democracy in America and has written several essays on her weekly readings.  Here's the first essay.

Grace has posted a recent sonnet on her blog.  This was an assignment from her work in the poetry survey Roar on the Other Side.

April 9, 2008 - Consumer Math
Grace is at lesson 105 in Saxon Algebra 2.  We'll switch back to Abeka Consumer Math for 2 or 3 weeks.  This is simple math compared to the algebra she's been doing.  So she's covering 2 sections a day and working 25% of the exercises in the 2 sections.  Picking up Consumer Math at Unit 6 and expect to complete Units 6, 7, and 8 in about 3 weeks.

Click to see prior entries:
January 25, 2008 - Wealth of Nations; Time Travel
November 20, 2007 - Latest Essay
November 7, 2007 - Symposium adjustment
October 8, 2007 - Sample Essay
September 19, 2007 - Booklist and Skill subjects
September 12, 2007 - Symposium progress report
September 11, 2007 - What to expect from a teenager
September 5, 2007 - Symposium 
August 29, 2007 - History planning

The Visionary Father’s Role in Home Education

Here's an excerpt from a recent Vision Forum email about the CD:

"The Visionary Father’s Role in Home Education tackles these questions and more by laying out seven fundamentals of biblical fatherhood applied to home education: The duty of fathers to lead with love by casting vision; providing distinctively biblical discipleship; spiritually defending the realm of the Christian household from external danger; overseeing the “big picture” direction for household management; enforcing discipline; serving as the resident historian; and leading in family worship."

More on the CD

(This article featured in Carnival of Homeschooling for week of July 28, 2008)

Several of the ACCS Conference speakers remarked that their greatest joy is in seeing some of their former students return to their schools - as teachers.  The movement is maturing and the second generation is emerging.  Teachers who early on were not sure they were making an impact are thrilled to see that many of their students did actually learn and mature and now are returning to teach or to enroll their own children in the school.

Most educators would agree that great education begins with great teachers.  If the teacher has taught well, the students are transformed into great people, well rounded and mature.  Mature, whole people are also able to lead and teach others.  They may not have the gift or desire to teach in a classroom setting, but surely their wisdom and sound living is contagious.  Having been well trained in rhetoric, they're able to impact the lives of others in their speech and their actions confirm their spoken word.

Success for the classical schooling method would mean that most of the graduates are wonderful, well rounded, articulate folks.  Mature, godly, biblically-minded students marry and presumably will follow the wise biblical instruction to multiply greatly.  Their families will have 5, 6, maybe even 10 children.  How will these children be educated?

The parents, successful graduates of a classical school, could send them all to the classical school.  However, financial costs of between $5,000 and $10,000 yearly, per student, make this impossible for all but the very wealthy.  Since the parents are themselves well rounded, intelligent, articulate, mature adults, they could join the faculty of the classical school.  Most schools permit the children of faculty to attend for free.  So the father could teach at the school, to solve the financial problem for the large family.

My guess is that the optimum class size for a teacher/classroom setting is under 10 students.  Many of the elite private schools boast class sizes under 10 and student:teacher ratio of 5 to 7 (see footnote).  So in the optimum classical school, great teachers teach classes of about 5 to 10 students - let's say 8 for this scenario.  So when the classically trained parents return to the faculty of the school, as the only way they can afford classical education for their large family, they find themselves teaching 8 children from other families.  Their children are in turn in classes of 8, taught by other parents, presumably classically trained, presumably with a large family they can't otherwise afford to enroll in the school.  Since the teachers are all intelligent, mature folks, I imagine that about 3 weeks into the school year, while standing around the water cooler after lunch, the conversation goes something like this:

Ted: "Hey Mike, you have my Carl and Cindy in your class - how's it going?"

Mike: "Great, they're a real joy, and you have my Wendy and Sam in yours.  Are they staying out of trouble?"

Ted: "Oh, we're having a ball, drop by anytime.  And Bill, how's my Catherine doing in 4th grade."

Bill: "Excellent, her project for the Science Fair is coming together nicely.  Take care of my Sally, tell her Hi for me."

Ted: "Uhh, yeah, I... I will..   Hey, wait a minute - Mike, you have my Carl and Cindy and I have two of yours.  Bill, you have my Catherine, and I have your Sally.  Joe has my middle schoolers...  and, and... Jeff has my older ones.. and, and.."

Mike:  "Ted, are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

Ted: "I think so - why not get my kids in my class and you take your kids to your class?  Why should I have you keep tabs on my kids when they're just down the hall, and I'm keeping up with your kids?  Makes perfect sense!"

Bill: "But guys, remember we all have our areas of expertise and are not able to teach all these other areas."

Ted: "Wait Bill, I went to a great school and got a complete education, well rounded in all the liberal arts, including math and science.  Didn't you?  Didn't the administrator require us all to demonstrate mastery in all the basic fields of study before we were hired?"

Bill: "Well, that's right, so really I know art well enough to teach it, and I can teach reading and math.  I learned to love history and poetry from my classical education.  I can teach more than just my science class..."

Mike: "But Ted, But what about age differences?  Can the high schoolers really learn with the younger kids?  How can we mix all the ages in a single classroom - it wouldn't work."

Ted: "What if we had our kids all day, not just for a 1 hour class.  We could start the older ones on some reading and math they could do on their own.  Then we could attend to the younger ones.  Let's face it, the little ones really don't need 8 hours of continuous classroom time.... Later we could get back with the older ones to discuss what they read and give them some direction in their writing projects."

Bill: "But what chaos that would be in a single school room!  What you'd need is a couple rooms where the kids could get alone when they needed to concentrate, and some place for the kids to spend their time between subjects - maybe a music room to practice piano or a basketball hoop outside where they could get some exercise while they took a break.  But that's crazy - no school has the budget to provide all those facilities for each teacher.  I mean, it sounds like we're describing somebody's home...."

Ted, Bill, Mike (in unison):  "...EXACTLY!!!"

So Ted, Bill, and Mike withdrew their kids from the school at the Christmas break and resigned from the school staff.  Each day at home they taught their own 8 kids whom they knew and loved, ate lunch with them, played with them, prayed with  them.  The dads started businesses with their kids help.  In short they lived together, learned together, loved together as the family they were intended to be.  Ted's, Bill's, and Mike's families worshipped together at the same church, their kids played on the same sports teams and the older ones enjoyed helping each other at the annual homeschool science fair.

Now, this is what will happen if the classical school movement is successful.  What would prevent it?

-Graduates are not qualified to teach their own kids.  Possible, but this would be a failure of the school, whose goal is to produce just these types of graduates.

-Graduates do not have large families. They have 2 or 3 kids so can afford to send them to the school and work elsewhere.  Possible, but this is a failure to be faithful to the biblical instructions to multiply greatly.

-Graduates are very wealthy and can afford $50,000-100,000 a year tuition.  Possible, but then parents don't need to work outside the home at all.  They can live modestly off of the money they would have spent on tuition.  Wise, mature parents would have saved this money while the children were pre-school age then be able to live on it indefinitely.  If they can't do this, then they aren't mature, selfless Christians - which again they would be if the classical school movement succeeds.

In conclusion, I support the classical Christian schools and wish them complete success.  I suspect there will always be a need for these schools.  However, their students should be first generation classical schoolers.  In this case, the parents may not have had a wonderful education.  They may want their kids to have a glorious education so that they in turn could homeschool their kids.  So the movement remains necessary as a transitional, remedial work.  But the real endgame - given 5 or 6 generations of faithfulness by the churches and by the schools, would be that the need for the schools ends and all live happily ever after, learning in their homes, with their parents.

Footnote: A search of private schools at http://www.petersons.com/pschools/code/psector.asp, using the term "student-teacher ratio".  Results show school profiles listing student-teacher ratios in the range mentioned.

I attended a workshop by Chris Schlect in which he present results of a recent survey of longtime teachers and administrators in the ACCS. As we homeschool, I'm not in the classical school movement directly. It was fascinating to hear the inside scoop on where educators see the movement as succeeding, making progress, or struggling. There were 114 respondents, all of which have been involved in the movement at least 5 years. 43 different schools were represented.

No real suprises were presented. Most interesting to me were the issues of Latin and teaching at the Rhetoric level (a.k.a. High School). Conclusion on Latin was that students knew it well enough to "cipher" or translate original classic texts, but not like a true second language. As homeschoolers, we've never studied Latin. This helped confirm that we really aren't missing much, compared to the Classical Schools. It would be great to have a "classical" mindset that would come from immersion in Latin/Greek studies, but if most of the best schools/teachers/student had not attained it, I don't expect we will. I'll leave the translation to the experts and focus on other areas.

For the high school teaching issues, opinions varied but consensus was a general uneasiness at the results. Many schools seem strong and confident at the Grammar (Elementary) and Logic (Middle School) levels, but that confidence doesn't hold for the final years of schooling. One idea was to move to a more elective approach, narrowing the subjects depending on a student's calling.

George Grant is a classical educator who has great success teaching at the Rhetoric level. He's a brilliant man able to combine knowledge in areas of history, aesthetics, literature, culture, and church history into a coherent 4 year series of lectures. These are the Gileskirk lectures. I've heard most of the 4th year of these and they are very impressive. Dr. Grant also spoke at the conference on how he integrates these various areas so that his Rhetoric level students get the big picture. He said that the typical student is overwhelmed by his approach during the 1st year (9th grade). About 2/3 of the way through their sophomore year "the lights come on" and the student begins to really "get it". This would be about age 16 for most students.

Combining Mr. Schlect's findings about the struggles of Rhetoric teachers, with Dr. Grant's observation, with my earlier article on Puritan education, I reach the following insight. What if education for students age 16+ is more appropriately considered "college"? This would more accurately match the historical norm where a student's "secondary" schooling was considered college. Early schooling is the grammar/logic stage of preparation. Grammar is for childhood. Logic is for the short transition between childhood and adulthood. Rhetoric is for students beginning their adult lives. This would be more like today's "college" where a student begins to work on their specific calling. A good student and teacher in a discipleship/mentoring relationship could complete "college" in a couple years so that by age 18 or 19, the student is fully equipped to begin work in their calling.

This fits our experience as homeschoolers, fits the historical norm, and I believe has support from evidence presented at the ACCS conference. No one at the conference proposed such a framework, but as a homeschooler able to think outside the K-12 box, it jumped out at me.

Nathan Wilson spoke on "Story and Rhetoric".  Rhetoric is the final stage of classical education, in which the student learns to present their knowledge and wisdom persuasively and beautifully.  The talk focused on the idea of "proof".  Nathan presented "proof" not as mathematical certainty but as "that which obligates belief".  You may prove your point even if folks don't agree.  The listener is moved to a response by your presentation even if that may not be wholesale agreement - they may feel guilty and stone you to death to silence you.  That they take an action shows they are moved by your argument.

The nature of persuasion - use beauty and style to complement your reasoning.  It's OK to appeal to the credibility of authorities that hold the position ("ethos" type of proof) or to the listener's emotions ("pathos").  Logos (logic), Ethos, and Pathos are the three types of proof Cicero and the ancients held to.

Remember that "mathematical certainty" applies only to mathematics.  All other areas of reasoning involve some measure of faith, even faith that our senses are not deceiving us, etc.  Descartes insisted on mathematical certainty and ended up rejecting much of reality.  The biblical definitions of knowledge exceed mathematical proof.  One example is Solomon's musings in Ecclesiastes.  Another is Jesus' answering His critics in ways that appear to dodge the question.  His answer actually cuts directly to the root of the matter, but our insistence on "proof as pure logic" prevents us from hearing His truth.

Logic is not the "cornerstone" of persuasion.  It's more like a wall - necessary but not the only essential quality.  Rhetoric is about everything.  You are in God's story, look around and learn to read it.

As this site attests, I am interested in education in general and greatly interested in time-proven "classic" methods that have endured through the ages. I would have enjoyed the ACCS conference for this reason alone. But the reason I leapt for the mouse and the online registration form way back in April was to hear Ken Myers, Douglas Wilson, and George Grant a mere 10 minutes from my home. A lifetime opportunity not to be missed!

And these gentlemen did not disappoint. Having listened to and read from each of them for years, I knew what to expect. It's always wonderful to attend in person - an immersion experience that cannot be had simply listening to CD's while waiting in traffic.

I'll start with Ken Myers. Ken spoke 4 times and participated in a panel. 10 minutes into his opening lecture, I was already satisfied I had my money's worth. The other 4 hours and 50 minutes were completely astounding. I've listened to Ken for years through my Mars Hill Audio subscription - a series of 6 interviews with professors, pastors, artists that Ken publishes every 2 months. So I knew much of his perspective. But it was overwhelming to hear him for a solid hour as he eloquently wove together insights and analysis of history, culture, art, the church - all presented brilliantly.

His first message was "Defining Christian Cultural Involvement". This was a definitive analysis of "what's wrong with the world". These days most folks, Christian or not, have an intuitive sense that things, at least in the US and Europe, are in decline. No one seems quite able to put a finger on the fundamental issue - is it economic? too much crime? sleazy politicians? bad schools? Lots of finger pointing these days, but I don't think hardly anyone really understands what's going on. Ken doesn't have all the answers, but his analysis helps me see what a culture is and why our seems increasingly "disordered" to most folks. I've ordered copies of Ken's talks and plan to make them available to several friends - if you're interested please contact me. I can't capture his whole analysis here but will list a few of the insights that struck me.

Many of today's evangelical churches in the US see the problem and want to transform the culture by full participation in it. They wish to "engage the culture" while being ambiguous in defining the term "engagement". The culture is disordered but churches want to fully participate in it. They may not understand that culture is disordered. The church's recent cultural activities have led not to widespread cultural transformation, but to the church's "cultural captivity", as most churches have ignored the significance of cultural forms and plunged head-long into whatever is in vogue. But the church has always been a people for the Lord, having our own distinct, godly culture and bringing others into it by baptism and discipleship.

Understanding what cultures are and how they work should inform the church's participation. Ken lists:
6 things that define culture as an "ecosystem"
1) artifacts - literary forms, novels, etc.; anything material - car, buildings, etc
2) institutions - examples: The New York Times, schools, sports leagues, government
3) practices - holidays, proms, weddings, vacations, funerals, half-time shows
4) beliefs - *this is what many evangelicals consider to be the sum total of culture - important but only a part*
5) moods, styles, 'ethos' - Texan Confidence, Yankee Ingenuity, Rugged Individualism, "Fast Paced" vs. "Strolling"
6) meta-beliefs - intuitive sense of purpose; "gut instinct"; "a posture toward creation"

Dominant patterns define the culture but there are deviations. A particular belief or practice can have a "poetic resonance" with these 6 elements. Practices/belief lacking resonance with the elements is "counter cultural".

Form and content are symbiotic - they sustain each other. Can't separate content from forms and structures. Church tries to fit its message in context of structures that are incompatible with this type of message. This is how cultures work - we must understand ours to engage it faithfully.

James Davidson Hunter - "True character requires moral communities that enforce limits and establish boundaries" .."but modern culture desires liberty over limits - we want what we can't possibly have in the way we want it"

Significance of "culture" in light of the work of the church:
Romans 1 - God's character evident from material creation- form/message linkage
Daniel Bell defines Modern culture as "open to newness" - a meta-belief that disagrees with biblical Christianity

Post-Modern? Ken says we're really hyper-modern - "plowing on" through mistakes Modernity has made.

Role of Christian Education
- orientation of the soul; not just information transfer but consciousness reoriented
- not a "worldview" only; reality is less "Powerpoint" and more like "counterpoint"
- goal is "reordered affections", not just "edited ideas"
Psalm 1 is a good example - trees and righteousness mysteriously linked somehow

Proper engagement - through a well ordered life, we can recognize disorder and seek to transform it.

Well this is a pitiful attempt to reduce a masterful oration to a few key points - I hope it gives you a taste for it. I'm looking forward to the CD arriving so I can hear it again 2 or 3 times. Ken's lectures should really be delivered in 1 minute segments, followed by 20 minutes of silence to allow reflection. So his 4 hours of speaking would have lasted over a week. That'd be just fine with me....

Typically, a college interview pertains to the prospective student answering questions of the college staff or faculty.  The student is eager to be accepted and wishes to excel in the interview.  However, a more important interview would actually be a series of interviews between the student's parents and each professor that will teach the student.  If the college is effective, as professors teach the student, "the student becomes like the teacher".  So parents should want to know what type of person their child will become, should the education be successful.  Of course, if the education is not successful, the student doesn't become like the professor and the parents have wasted precious time and money. 

Here's a wise and ancient perspective on higher education from St. Augustine, a man whose brilliance is generally uncontested.  He realized his education did nothing to change his character and behavior, as he had his "back to God's light".  Make sure your professors are facing fully into the light, or their great learning and eloquence will only lead you astray.

From Confessions book 4, chapter 16: 
And what did it profit me that I, the base slave of vile affections, read unaided, and understood, all the books that I could get of the so-called liberal arts? And I took delight in them, but knew not whence came whatever in them was true and certain. For my back then was to the light, and my face towards the things enlightened; whence my face, with which I discerned the things enlightened, was not itself enlightened. Whatever was written either on rhetoric or logic, geometry, music, or arithmetic, did I, without any great difficulty, and without the teaching of any man, understand, as Thou knowest, O Lord my God, because both quickness of comprehension and acuteness of perception are Thy gifts. Yet did I not thereupon sacrifice to Thee. So, then, it served not to my use, but rather to my destruction, since I went about to get so good a portion of my substance into my own power; and I kept not my strength for Thee, but went away from Thee into a far country, to waste it upon harlotries. For what did good abilities profit me, if I did not employ them to good uses?

Here's one of Grace's essays from her reading of The Law by Frederic Bastiat.

Bastiat here exposes the motive of all promoters of the State. This motive too often lies hidden, undiscovered, perhaps, even by the promoter himself, but here it is revealed. The true purpose of the State is to mold and shape men into a machine, thereby exalting and promoting itself and its legislators. For to whose whims are we subject? The wielder of the law is all-powerful and resistance of a minority is futile. Man is viewed by the State as a raw material to shape something great. It divides humans into two catagories: one contains the human race in general, the other holds the legislator. A dictator supposes himself so superior to his fellow man that he never considers that he himself may need re-shaping, not his country. Never does he suspect that men may get along very well if left alone with their resources and their senses. He supposes that he must be like a god to them, teaching them, enslaving them, turning them into little mirror-images of himself, yet always weaker. Never does he wonder if they have an omnipitent God who cares for His creation.