Feed Them on Things Worth Caring For

If you are familiar at all with the writings of the 19th Century educator, Charlotte Mason, you will know that one of her signature ways of illustrating a liberal education is to compare it to that of a feast that is spread before the child.

As educators we are responsible for choosing the food for the feast. If we provide a variety of excellent food and allow the child liberty to choose what appeals to their taste, nourishment will take care of itself.

I think the feast metaphor is very apt. A child’s food preference can change over time and they can acquire a taste for things they rejected in the past. One of my sons would have lived on bread alone if I’d let him, but it wouldn’t have been a healthy diet. His tastes in food developed much more diversity as he grew, as did his intellectual tastes and appetite, because he was served nourishing food – literally and metaphorically.

The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton was published in 1922 a year before Charlotte Mason died. I read it recently and was impressed by a couple of passages that touched on education as they shared a close similarity to Mason's educational ideas.

Wharton was American but she spent much of her time in Europe (The Glimpses of the Moon was set mostly in France). During WWI she remained in Europe and established schools for children escaping from Belgium after the German occupation. She had a 'gift for languages and a deep appreciation for beauty - in art, architecture and literature': Edith Wharton | The Mount | Edith Wharton's Home

Merry Family by Jan Steen, 1688

'Take care of five Fulmers for three months! The prospect cowed her.'

The Fulmers were an artistic couple living in a cramped cottage and both Susy and her husband to be, Nick Lansing, had spent time with them and their noisy family before they had considered marriage. They couldn’t understand how the Fulmer’s lived as they did - bad food and general crazy discomfort -  but they had more amusement in their company than they had with any of their rich friends and their opulent house parties.

The Lansings married some time afterwards after hatching a scheme whereby they’d live off their wedding gifts of money and accommodation but with the understanding that if either of them found a way to climb the social ladder, the other would not stand in the way but agree to a divorce. Barely a year later their plans had unravelled and out of desperation Susy agreed to look after this ‘uproarious tribe’ while their parents were in Italy.

'But in these rough young Fulmers she took a positive delight, and for reasons that were increasingly clear to her. It was because, in the first place, they were all intelligent; and because their intelligence had been fed only on things worth caring for. However inadequate Grace Fulmer’s bringing-up of her increasing tribe had been, they had heard in her company nothing trivial or dull: good music, good books and good talk had been their daily food, and if at times they stamped and roared and crashed about like children unblessed by such privileges, at others they shone with the light of poetry and spoke with the voice of wisdom.

That had been Susy’s discovery: for the first time she was among awakening minds which had been wakened only to beauty. From their cramped and uncomfortable household Grace and Nat Fulmer had managed to keep out mean envies, vulgar admirations, shabby discontents; above all the din and confusion the great images of beauty had brooded, like those ancestral figures that stood apart on their shelf in the poorest Roman households.'

Charlotte Mason believed that children should be given the best going on the subject - really good books; that we should try, however imperfectly, to make education a science of relationships. These thoughts from Edith Wharton on education - feed children only on things worth caring for - were an unexpected surprise to me and echoed the ideas that I've been reading in Charlotte Mason's writings.  

The tentacles of the science of relationships are far reaching.

We're using The Glimpses of the Moon instead of The Great Gatsby for Literature in AO Year 11.

A Reading Challenge List for 2020

Well, I wasn't going to join in any challenges this year but I changed my mind. I have a range of books I'd really like to read which includes classics, non-fiction (I've been a bit slack with these in recent years), and unusual for me, I'd like to tackle some modern titles, my 'uncomfortable' reads.

I also have some 'slow cooker' reads that will probably take me all year to get finished. They're either whoppers, need to be read methodically and lingered over, or are books that are designed to be read at certain times of the year or over the course of a year. The books below are what I'm planning to read slowly:

War & Peace by Leo Tolstoy 

Shakespeare for Every Day of the Year, edited by Allie Esiri

At The Still Point, compiled by Sarah Arthur

God in the Dock by C.S. Lewis; compiled in 1970

I decided to go with this new Classic Book Challenge at The Broken Spine:

These are the Challenge Prompts I'd like to use with some ideas of what I might read:

* Read a classic over 500 pages - War & Peace by Leo Tolstoy

* Read a classic that takes place in a country other than where you live - ?

* Read a classic in translation -  The Death of Ivan Ilych by Leo Tolstoy  

* Read a classic by a new to you author - ? Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

* Read a book of poetry - Robert Burns

* Read a classic written between 1800-1860 - ? something by Elizabeth Gaskell

* Read a classic written by a woman - The Making of a Marchioness by Frances Hodgson Burnett   

* Read a classic novella - The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde 

* Read a classic nonfiction - ? something by C.S. Lewis or A.W. Tozer

                                                                 

                                                                               

                     

                                                                     

See Book'd Out for details of this Non-Fiction Challenge. Here are some books I'd like to read:
           

H is For Hawk by Helen Macdonald (2014)

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard (1974)

Atomic Habits by James Clear (2018)

The Body: A Guide for Occupants by Bill Bryson (2019)

Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister by Jung Chang (2019)

The Story of My Boyhood & Youth by John Muir (1913)

A Philosophy of Education by Charlotte Mason (1925)

The Lives of the Artists by Giorgio Vasari (c. 1568)


Modern fiction I'd like to read this year:

Lila by Marilynne Robinson (2014) 


5th February - Updated to add this challenge which I've done for the past five years. I haven't decided on the books yet but I'd like to include some of these:

* The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy

* Gentian Hill by Elizabeth Goudge

* Sense & Sensibility by Jane Austen

* The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie

Thought by Mikhail Nesterov (1900)

Inspiration from Ambleside

Although the main purpose of our overseas trip was for me to return to Scotland, each of us had some specific ideas of what wanted to do and places we wanted to visit while we were in that part of the world. My son was keen to see his favourite football (soccer) team, Chelsea, playing in London and he ended up booking tickets to three different matches, one on Glasgow & two in London. We all went to the Glasgow Celtic game which was on while we were there and it was just how I remembered Scottish football - fanatical & noisy with plenty of police on duty!
The Chelsea game was on at the time we'd planned to be in Ambleside so we dropped him at the station in Carlisle so he could take the train to Stamford Bridge in London for the game and we continued on to the Lakes District.

Obviously, having an interest in Charlotte Mason's ideas and practice was one of my main reasons for wanting to visit the area, but I was also intrigued by a place that appeared to have been a mecca for some very influential, intelligent, and gifted people - Beatrix Potter, William Wordsworth and John Ruskin being notable examples besides Charlotte Mason.

In 1891 Charlotte Mason (1842-1923) started a training institute for governesses, which became the House of Education at Ambleside in 1892. After her death it became known as the Charlotte Mason College and was managed by the county until the 1990’s when it became part of Lancaster University. St. Martin’s College took over its management in the late 1990s (Charlotte Mason/St. Martins College in Ambleside).The site of the Charlotte Mason college in Ambleside is now occupied by the University of Cumbria which was formed in 2007.
In 2017 The University of Cumbria signed an agreement with the Armitt Library and Museum Centre, one of the UK’s rarest small museums. The Armitt is in the same location as the university (to the right of the sign pictured below) and first opened in 1912 as a museum, library and gallery 'devoted to preserving and sharing the cultural heritage of the Lake District.'
Founded in memory of sisters Mary Louisa and Sophia Armitt, Beatrix Potter was one of its early supporters and its greatest benefactor. It is now being established as the national centre for all Charlotte Mason archives.




What was it about this little spot in England? Well, it was obvious as we drove down from the north that the Lakes District is very beautiful and the town of Ambleside itself is very quaint, but there are plenty of delightful little places all over Britain.
Although the second half of the 19th Century was a time of rapid innovation and technological advancement for Britain, Ambleside remained isolated from the general hubbub. It had no electricity until 1930, and it was some distance from the trainline so its comparative tranquillity made it a sought after retreat for intellectuals - artists, writers, and academics. They in turn had ties to numerous other poets, artists & novelists who also spent time in the area.
Surprisingly, there has also always been industry in the Lakes District with quarrying, a gunpowder factory, watermills, and copper mining. Up until the 1970's bobbin mills were operating there also.
We arrived at the end of the peak season and the centre of the town was a busy little place but it was peaceful & quiet in the Armitt. There are lovely little tea shops everywhere and there was a gentle intermittent drizzle of rain - perfect!

The Armitt Library

The Armitt building also hosts a gift shop and sells a wide variety of secondhand books that I thought were very reasonably priced.

The Bridge House, said to have been built on an arch over the Stock (? Stream) Beck so the owner could avoid land tax, was built in the 17th Century:

Moozle pays a visit...

Although samples of Charlotte Mason's students' Nature Notebooks and other material may be viewed online via The Charlotte Mason Digital Collection at Redeemer College, I was so pleased to see and handle some original work at The Armitt. Photographs aren't permitted in the library but I was told I could photograph the samples I looked through so here are some of them. The library has a Charlotte Mason 'sample' box and I looked through this and also a couple of Nature Notebooks (pictured below).

I was asked by a fellow home educator if the nature notebooks looked at all 'like the intensive sort of things we sometimes see in CM curriculum these days' and I would have to say that I thought they were quite simple and seemed to reflect the different personalities and inclinations of the owners. One I looked at was predominantly a journal with more text than actual brush drawing or sketching. Another concentrated more on drawing with less writing but observations were clearly labelled.

Dated 1929

A close up view

Frontispiece of a Nature Notebook

Record of Plants

Moozle expressed her surprise that the notebooks weren't as artistic or professional as she thought they would be. Maybe that's because that's what she often sees when we look at nature notebooks online.
This was a positive aspect for me - seeing what the students of Charlotte Mason's schools actually did rather than 'making them the intensive things we sometimes see.'

Poetry quotations were used as well as diagrams

I think this one was dated ? 1938

These look relaxed and do-able

Amongst the items in the sample box was a  more recent PNEU programme for Years 9 & 10 which was just up my alley as Moozle is finishing year 9 this year. This schedule was included too:

Free or Leisure Reading - this book list reflects a more British audience (except for the O'Dell book):

And so do the novels

Ambleside, United Kingdom

Some websites of interest:

Charlotte Mason College, Ambleside: memories from the 60's

Charlotte Mason Digital Collection (CMDC)

Charlotte Mason - Armitt

Ambleside's History

Images from Ambleside's History

Pictures of Old Ambleside

Bridge House

Life Under Compulsion: Ten Ways to Destroy the Humanity of Your Child by Anthony Esolen (2015)

‘How do you raise a child who can sit with a good book and read? Who is moved by beauty? Who doesn’t have to buy the latest this or that vanity? Who is not bound to the instant urge, wherever it may be found?’

Life Under Compulsion is a follow on from Anthony Esolen’s previous title, Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child, which I read a few years ago.
When one of my sons saw these two books in the bookcase he said: “Mum, you read some weird books! What are you trying to do to us?”
My youngest's reaction was, "No wonder some people think homeschooling's a bad idea...trying to destroy our imagination?!"
If you don’t already know, Dr. Esolen played the devil’s advocate with Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child, which is a little reminiscent of C.S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters, minus the humour.
Life Under Compulsion continues the combatative tone of his previous book but focuses on the ideas of freedom versus compulsion.
Freedom is a buzzword of our times but it is a word that has been mis-used.
Dr Esolen argues that our children are anything but free - they are slaves to compulsions that come either from outside of themselves (e.g. government mandates that control what children are taught in schools) or within (the itches that must be scratched, the passions that master them).
He examines modern culture, explains how our idea of freedom is warped and dangerous, and draws on the great thinkers of the past to help us understand what freedom truly means:

‘To be “free” is not to do as you please but rather to realise the fulfilment of your natural created being, without impediments.’

Thomas Aquinas

Esolen is scathing about the education system and their ‘courses in compulsion.’ When he was Professor of English at a Catholic University he wrote an article for Crisis Magazine on the university’s ‘diversity’ stance:

…a vision that pretends to be “multicultural,” but that is actually anti-cultural, and is characterized by all the totalitarian impulses to use the massive power of government to bring to heel those who decline to go along...

His incisive comments and criticism of the politically correct practices of  radical university professors resulted in student protests and faculty members calling for his dismissal in 2016. No wonder he sounds grumpy when he writes.

In Life Under Compulsion, the author examines the school system and its courses in compulsion where children must be segregated by age and must move to the next classroom at the ringing of the bell. Education is based on a utilitarian foundation and is reduced to a tool; students have to adapt themselves to the 'factory' or Teaching Machine, which is not for teaching children but for ‘socialising them.’ It doesn’t impart virtue because virtues set a people free but the system wants a ‘managed’ people.

Freedom is the movement of the heart to embrace what is good, or beautiful, or noble. 

A man who cannot admire is a slave.

Dr Esolen refers to a wide variety of literature in both books I’ve read which I really appreciate: works by Sigrid Undset, Dostoevsky, Shakespeare, Pieper, Bradbury, Kipling, Dickens, Hugo, Orwell, and Chesterton, for example, but he doesn’t always provide references so if you don’t recognize the characters he’s referring to you’ll have to do some Google Searching.

Systems of Compulsion breed the unnatural, just as the unnatural requires systems of compulsion to confirm it. Consider communism, a system so insane that it could survive only by compulsion - through show trials and executions and the Gulag.

We must not think that these acts of compulsion were merely imposed upon a defenceless people, from without. They also rose from within.

Here he references Alexandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago (which I’m in the very slow process of re-reading) where the author cites the Soviet criminal code that dealt with any failure to make a denunciation of certain actions. The powers that be demanded enthusiasm for their revolution and not just a passive acceptance.

Life Under Compulsion is an important book for parents, anyone who is involved in education, those concerned about the outrage trend in society or the attempt to subject curriculum to the demands of a current political aim.
Considering the reaction to Dr. Esolen’s 2016 article, the book is even more relevant now than when it was when it was first published.

‘How do you get people en masse to submit to madness? By compulsion.’

This is a book I've chosen for the Christian Greats 2019 Challenge: No. 5)  A Philosophical Book by a Christian Author

Christian Greats Challenge 2019 Book List

These are the books I'm considering for the Christian Greats Challenge in 2019. Some of them are re-reads that I'd like to re-visit after a long separation. For details of the challenge see my original post here.


1)  A Book on Early Church History: 

On the Incarnation by Athanasius


2)  A Book About a Prominent Christian Who Was Born Between 500 A.D & 1900

Not shown in the picture above as I haven't decided yet :)


3)  A Christian Allegory

Hinds' Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard (a re-read because I just found a beautiful copy with watercolour illustrations) or Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis


4)  A Book on Apologetics 

Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis


5)  A Philosophical Book by a Christian Author

Tending the Heart of Virtue by Vigen Guroian


6)   A Missionary Biography 

L'Abri by Edith Schaeffer (re-read) or Chasing the Dragon by Jackie Pullinger


7)  A Seasonal Book 

Marian @ Classics Considered linked to some ideas on Lenten reads which sparked my interest so there are a few ideas running through my head which I'll mull over for awhile.


8)  A Novel with a Christian Theme

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo


9) A Good Old Detective or Mystery Novel

Unnatural Death by Dorothy Sayers. I would really like to re-read her books that include Harriet Vane who becomes Lord Peter Wimsey's wife but I can't find them & think my older children must have taken them when they left home. Looks like I might have to buy my own copies.


10)  A Substitute

Every Good Endeavor by Timothy Keller

Christian Classics: The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis (1942)

The Screwtape Letters is a satirical work of fiction that gives the reader a window into the spiritual world using the vantage point of a demon named Screwtape. In a series of letters to his young nephew, Wormwood, Screwtape instructs him in how to bring about the downfall of the young man he has been assigned to plague.
There are so many memorable passages and wise insights in this book. Often when we look at something from an opposing stance we are forced to see things we would not have seen from a position of agreement. This is the device C. S. Lewis uses in The Screwtape Letters and he does it exceptionally well.
He warns us that there are two equal and opposite errors we believe about devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence and the other is to believe and have an unhealthy and excessive interest in them. He reminds us that the devil is a liar and that Screwtape is not always seeing things truly, himself.
Lewis said of this book that he’d never written anything more easily or with less enjoyment; that it was easy to twist his mind into a diabolical attitude but it was spiritually stifling. The world he had to enter ‘was all dust, grit, thirst and itch. Every trace of beauty, freshness and geniality had to be excluded.’

Some highlights of this book:

Men are killed in places where they knew they might be killed and to which they go, if they are at all of the Enemy’s party, prepared. How much better for us if all humans died in costly nursing homes amid doctors who lie, nurses who lie, friends who lie, as we have trained them, promising life to the dying, encouraging the belief that sickness excuses every indulgence, and, even, if our workers know their job, withholding all suggestion of a priest lest it should betray to the sick man his true condition!

Wormwood's 'patient' is a young unmarried man and the setting is at the start of WW2. Screwtape encourages him to turn the man's gaze on himself. He also advises him on ways to inculcate pride, selfishness, lust and fear in his patient and to exploit him during his dry spells:

Now it may surprise you to learn that in His effort to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else...
He cannot ravish. He can only woo...
He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs - to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish. It is during such trough periods, much more than through the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be. Hence the prayers offered in the state of dryness are those which please Him best...He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our Enemy’s will, looks around upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.

Whatever their bodies do affect their souls. Whenever there is prayer, there is the danger of His own immediate action.

In the last generation we promoted the construction of...'a historical Jesus' on liberal and humanitarian lines; now we are putting forward a new 'historical Jesus' on Marxian, catastrophic, and revolutionary lines.

Martin Luther said that 'the best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn.' Lewis uses his sharp wit and inspired imagination to open our eyes to the true nature of the spiritual world & to help us understand that there are spiritual beings whose purpose is to undermine our faith and prevent the formation of virtues.

I've used this book with students around the age of about 14 or 15 years and up.




Linking this to the Official 2018 TBR Challenge

A Reading Plan for 2017

My tentative plans, subject to change, but set down here with a sincere desire to execute said plans and to participate in the Challenges described below.

A Year Long Read - Norms & Nobility by David Hicks. The Ambleside Online (AO) Forum is reading through this book over the year. It's short but dense and I've wanted to read it ever since I read that the creators of the AO curriculum drew from his work and ideas in the planning of their curriculum (which I use and highly recommend) in the upper years. I probably won't be joining in the online converstion but will use the study notes that Karen Glass will be posting as we progress through the book. I've been listening to the Classical Homeschool Podcasts which discuss David Hick's definition of classical education and they have a good mix of philosophy and practice.

Back to the Classics 2017 - hosted by Karen at Books and Chocolate, this will be my third year for this and I've thoroughly enjoyed finding books to fit into each category as it made me read some books I probably wouldn't have read otherwise. I'll post a more definite plan after Christmas but I'm going to try to choose books that will fit with the next two challenges:

Russian Literature Reading Challenge 2017 - hosted by Keely @ we went outside and saw the stars   (What a great name for a blog!). Keely has a comprehensive list of Russian literature to help you choose. I'd like to read:

The Gulag Archipelago by Alexander Solzenitsyn - I read this when I was about 18 and the USSR was in its prime. Solzenitsyn impressed me then and when I found a secondhand copy of the book earlier this week I decided it was time to read it again.

Cancer Ward by Alexander Solzenitsyn - I wanted to read this last year but didn't get to it.

We by Yevgeny Zamyatin

Some short stories - eg. Gogol, Tolstoy.



Cloud of Witnesses Reading Challenge - hosted by Becky

 For an author to qualify for this reading challenge, they must be among "the cloud of witnesses".... in other words, they must be dead. (They must also be Christian.)

The Weight of Glory by C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) is one book I'd like to read this year. I'll add in some others when I have had a good look at my bookshelves.

Reading the Histories - hosted by Ruth at A Great Book Study - this is a three year reading challenge and I'd like to read a couple of books over that time eg. Plato, Bede, Machiavelli. Ruth has a list of study questions to help with your reading.

Once a year, Brona @ Brona's Books has a month long Australian reading challenge in November. This will be the fourth year for me. Hope to see some of you there and if you need some suggestions just ask.

I forgot to mention my ongoing Classics Club Challenge:

A Week in Review

We're winding down prior to Christmas and holidays. Benj has finished his Liberal Arts course and has his graduation ceremony tomorrow.
Last weekend he was involved in a performance of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night as part of this course. He got to choose a role and decided to play Valentine, Duke Orsino's servant, mostly because there weren't too many lines! Acting isn't something he enjoys too much so it was a bit out of his comfort zone but he performed his part well.
He spent half the day yesterday trying out keyboards at the music shop. He finished 8th grade piano and passed the exam with Honours so he gets to choose an instrument. We've done that for all our children although our violinist daughter ended up with her choice of a violin before she finished her studies because she needed a good quality violin for the higher grades.

Moozle is finishing up part way through her term of work and we'll just pick up where we left off in January. She had her orchestra audition last week and was given the choice to either move up to the Symphony - she's just old enough, or stay in the Strings & Sinfonia and have the role of lead cellist. She chose the latter, which surprised me, as she tends to want to grow up too quickly being the youngest of seven.

Last week my sister-in-law and I went to a live performance of Handel's Messiah which was excellent. We had a huge storm come over and in the middle of one of the tenor's solos, a great crash of thunder overhead caused us all to gasp and jump - not the tenor. He didn't miss a beat. We were impressed with both him and the storm. It was a very fitting accompaniment to such majestic music.

About a year ago I read The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis and it was one of the hardest books I've tackled. This week I found this and thought it would be a good way to 'read' the book again. It's one of those books that needs to be read and re-read to appreciate its depths:





We'll be visiting family in Northern NSW and Queensland during the Christmas break and finding this book was timely as it's set in the Tweed Valley are where we will be spending some time.

Pastures of the Blue Crane by H. F. Brinsmead (1964) is an enjoyable 'coming of age' story which is suitable for around ages 15 and up. Ryl is a 16 year old girl whose mother had died years before and  has had virtually no contact with her father, except for one letter a year. From a very young age she was put into a variety of homes for children and then into boarding school. When her father dies suddenly she is called into his solictor's office where she meets her grandfather for the first time. He and his son had had a disagreement when Ryl was an infant and had not spoken to each other since. Ryl had no idea that he existed. The two had been left a run down old farm and ended up moving from Melbourne to the Northern NSW coast. Now they had to get to know each othe which was not an easy task as both of them are hostile and stubborn.
The descriptions of the area and the journey of the two as they learn to care and rely on each other makes for an interesting read. There is an unlikely twist to the story but I appreciated the way the author explored the growth of two misanthropic characters in their relationship with each other and the issue of race relationships. The author touches on the 'Kanakas' or 'Blackbirds' and the White Australia Policy.

Linking up at Weekly Wrap-up