A simplified home school.... getting settled.

Simple is better. 

It's a lesson found in every aspect of the homemaker's life... from diapering to cooking, from cleaning to raising kids, from laundry to homeschooling.... simple is better.
It's something I always inherently knew, but that I didn't really have a clue how to implement until I began receiving practical advice, first as a protestant from Vision Forum ministries, and then as a Catholic from the families who create and use the Classical Liberal Arts Academy to educate their children.

We have really enjoyed our CLAA experience so far. However, recently,  my family had to stop using CLAA's petty school due to financial challenges. This bothered me because it was the only "pre-packaged curriculum" we would ever consider paying for. We truly enjoyed it, and I was re-assured by the simplicity of the whole thing... not to mention that our home life was exponentially more organized and better because of it.

I have since scrounged together a pretty good working curriculum to finish off the year, which I'm thankful for. I was anxious about having to stop and start over mid-year, but the transition has been good for us and easier than I thought it would be.

I've also been plotting and planning the year ahead with a whole new view, having now experienced the CLAA from the inside and seen the way it works on a practical level.

On the one hand , we want to prepare our kids for the challenges of the CLAA Academy in later years when they are mentally ready and we can afford it. We like the program very much and look forward to that day, should it come. If it doesn't, I feel like we have a "vision" for what will happen-- and it's a good one too. Though we love CLAA, we acknowledge that it just isn't a fit for some people. However, for us, it's a good fit and a great learning process for students AND teachers.

On the other hand, we are enjoying very much the ability to slow down and use our beloved Charlotte Mason ideas about early education, an approach which is gentle and intentional with a little less emphasis on pushing them past their comfort zone and a little more emphasis on building a LOVE of learning through spreading a feast of ideas before them. 

Nevertheless, we have had a terrible time finding materials to use which were as academically challenging as what they would be doing in the CLAA, and that's what attracts us there first-- the academics.

I've prayed and prayed, reflected and thought about it, and mentally worked and re-worked next year's curriculum choices in light of everything I've learned about the Classical Liberal Arts and Charlotte Mason's ideas. I am well pleased with my choices in that department. 

I sent the original curriculum for Year 1 I had put together to the first grade teacher at Santa Catalina School in Monterey, a Dominican boarding school for Catholic girls I really respect which my parents happen to work at. The teacher was impressed, which made me confident that we were making good choices. 

I was excited, but still.... something was still not sitting right with me. 

First, the cost. Even though we are using a majority of library books and buying books used, We were looking at at least 200 bucks per students per year, and the more kids we have, the crazier this idea became, especially because I wanted to buy most of the books so we could re-use them again and again without wasting a day out at the library. 200 bucks might not seem like a lot to some people, but to us, it was huge. We already have four children--- making that about 800 a year so far! WAY less than a private school, of course, but still. I felt like we could do better. 

Some would argue that we should be fine with spending that on our children's education. And I agree , to some degree. But we are resistant because we are very attached to the idea of living simply and off of not very much, and filling our house with expensive living books wasn't meeting that need. I barely spend $150 a week at the grocery store for our family of six, so 800 a year seems... crazy, and I don't have a lot of "stuff" so overpacked bookshelves was stressing us out.

The other thing was that simplicity seemed lacking. In just two years, I'd accumulated enough homeschooling "stuff" to fill a small book case. All of which was "useful" and "thrifty"somehow, but you know.... not. The first thing I did when we joined CLAA was get rid of it all-- and it was marvelously freeing. Of course, now that the kids' lessons are NOT going to be computer-based for now, I need to work out a storage system again. I never want to go back, though, to having shelves full of items we "might" use one day.

The philosophy over at the CLAA has been really simple. The central point is to focus on the "Core"--- Grammar, Arithmetic, and Religion.

Over time, as The Core is mastered, other things are added-- natural history, geography, world chronology, etc. But only as The Core is handled well and only as the student demonstrates mastery in the core, always the core, everything relating back to The Core. The Core is the foundation for higher studies, in philosophy and theology, which will eventually lead to right living and a "true" education and worldview.

How to reproduce that without the CLAA? I didn't feel like I could. In fact, I know I can't. But I could use the next best thing... tried and true materials that have always attracted me for various reasons and in some ways, attract me more because of their format. ( I strongly dislike computer-based lessons.)

You see, if I ask my children what their favorite part of the school day is-- the part they love and would do all the time, it's a tossup between Nature Study (duh) and "when you read to us." 

No matter what age they are, they love all of us sitting together and reading from a book. When it's a book they have already read, they love helping the littler ones understand. And when it 's a new book for them, they love asking questions, narrating back (essential to the Charlotte Mason method) , and generally interacting over the book together. Kinda like how I love book or Bible studies with my girlfriends, I imagine. Sure, they think the abacus is fun and yes, they like the other aspects well enough, but that is their hands-down favorite and the one thing they never fight me on. Charlotte Mason understood this well and that is why her curriculum was based on living books as the key to unlock the "teaching" of ideas to children.

I envision our homeschool a little bit like the old one-room schoolrooms of Anne Shirley's day (yes, we use actual slates instead of reams and reams of paper and yes, we all sit around the dining room table nose deep in a book... and I dream of ink blotters). On the other hand, my husband mentally sees our homeschool eventually looking like the ancient Greek Lyceum or Academy (yes, we spend a great deal of time questioning and challenging each other's ideas and stop for wrestling practice or discus-throwing, learning soldiering and survival techniques, and olive-and-feta-cheese snacks, haha).

Combining these two is actually somewhat seamless, but those are the externals. What we teach will only be as good as the books we use to bring human ideas to life for them. And I, for one, insist on simplicity. When I look at programs, I'm not only overwhelmed but totally put off by flashcards, games, educational "toys" and the like. I like books. Period.

Many of you are familiar with Charlotte Mason's ideas about "twaddle"-- that we should keep our children's minds blissfully free of anything but the BEST ideas, and get rid of everything that amounts to the "junk food" of reading. Sure, lots of kids today are reading Harry Potter and Twilight. But what are they learning?? 

The same rules apply for movies. What is interesting is that my husband feels that most fiction is twaddle.... even some of what I would consider the "great works" of world literature. We have a vast disagreement on this point, but I suspect he's right on some level. With that in mind, we have pared down what we read that is fiction to a very few, very relevant books, ones that point to history or philosophy in ways the kids can grasp but don't immerse them in soap-style dramas and emotional fantasies. Dreaming is good--- indulging the passions is not. Aesop and Ségur good. Disney Bad. Etc.

So, I thought about the core. Grammar, Arithmetic, Religion.

I thought about the core til I was blue in the face. I searched high and low for a "paper" version of what William Michael and the CLAA are doing to some degree (obviously within limits-- we really do believe what they are offering is superior to anything else out there for many reasons). 

And what I came up with is so exciting for us that I can hardly contain myself! Which is why I'm sharing... because somewhere out there they may be someone who thinks about these things too. What's interesting is that these are mostly ideas I've been using all along and seem to always come back to even though they had no "formal" place in my curriculum as it was written. I've simply given them primary importance, removed all the fluff, and shifted our focus to them as our "Core." And it's so beautiful, and simple..... and inexpensive. I'm elated.

So without further ado, I present to you---- the curriculum. Each of these titles are available as a full set for grades 1-8, or individually. We use the same books year after year so there is only one expense and it is relatively small.... grades 1-8 take up just one shelf on our bookcase, leaving the rest for quality "classics" and religious books.

Religion:

There are a lot of expensive books out there that can be used for Catechism. Many of them are wonderful. One that is inexpensive and which we have enjoyed is Ignatius Press' Faith and Life. But upon reflection, I've realized that we always go back to the Baltimore Catechism, and that the best, by far, book I've used so far to teach the kids the Baltimore Catechism is the Our Holy Faith series by Neumann Press.

These books contain beautiful illustrations, Q  & A for rote memorization from the Baltimore Catechism, and interesting reading that engages our kids. While we liked Faith and life, quite honestly what attracted us most to these instead was the format: these books are durable, beautiful, and hardback, which means that ALL our kids can use them (whereas we have had Faith and Life for a few months and already need a new copy!)

Aside from the Catechism, which we conduct exactly like CLAA's Catechism course: We read the lesson, and then learn the Q&A. Once we've done that, we take a test that demonstrates our understanding of the lesson. And move on only when it's been mastered perfectly.

In addition, we use Neumann Press books as read-alouds, one series which is about the lives of the saints and one series which is a set of homilies that are keyed to topics in the Baltimore Catechism (awesome!) so as we do a lesson, we do read-alouds that have to do with that particular lesson. For this, we use Angel Food for Boys and Girls and Catholic Stories for Boys and Girls. Like all other Neumann press titles, these are beautifully bound and hardback, durable, and sturdy books which have withstood lots of reading. 

We have decided we are an RSV Bible family, so each of us has our own RSV, and the youngest has a copy of Fr Lovasik's "New Catholic Picture Bible." My oldest is just now starting to be able to read her bible alone, but she does copywork from it and we work at it together.

We pray the liturgy of the hours each day as a family and read the daily mass readings in our bibles. We also have two little hardback books called "Lives of the Saints" which we use to read the Saint of the Day's life each morning. 

This is "religion."

Grammar.

Grammar is supposed to contain Latin, English, Greek (and in our Homeschool, Hebrew and French!) That's a tall order. And I haven't figured out how we're going to do all that. But I'm trusting that Charlotte Mason is right when she says that at the younger ages, they need to hear and speak the language and read and write it when they are a little older.

There are ZERO programs out there besides the CLAA for teaching children Latin right off the bat. So left without a choice, we are working only on reading and verbally teaching Latin and French. The rest we will figure out when they hit third or fourth grade and there are more options. In the meantime we are giving Latin, French, and English Copywork and memorization.

Charlotte advocated GENTLE, if any, grammar lessons prior to 4th grade, and then hitting it hard. the CLAA is similar since prior to 3rd grade the kids are usually not enrolled in the Academy, and thus not studying grammar, unless they are clearly ready. Until that time they are working on reading and writing, which is the foundation for Grammar study. 

I painstakingly studied the available selections of Readers out there. I knew I didn't want to do the Bob Books and stuff like that because it just seemed "twaddly" to me. As does the usual suspects-- Dr Seuss, etc. Not that we DONT read  those, but I don't want those to be the focus.

There are two sets of Catholic readers out there. The American Cardinal Readers, from Neumann Press, are quite good. So are the Catholic National Readers although those are harder to find.

I have a soft spot for McGuffeys Eclectic Readers, as I was raised on them, however, and I'm sure they have a lot to do with my love of reading. 

And I was pleasantly surprised to discover that there is a huge surge in reprinting the ORIGINAL McGuffey's series... which I seriously thought about using since they contain more "biblical" reading. However, the Original McGuffey's are Calvinist in taste and if there is one thing our household cannot stand, it's Calvinism. So as much I like the other aspects, I couldn't stand the idea of exposing my kids to Calvinism at such a young age. We decided on the revised, eclectic McGuffey's, which were revised to make them not Calvinist and thus acceptable for Catholics to use in public school in America without losing their moral value and literary brilliance,  because it contains many secular historical items whereas we found that some of the Catholic readers tried a little tooo hard to make everything "uber- Catholic."

McGuffey's also has a speller, which I have not yet used, but plan to check out. From what I've read, Charlotte Mason didn't bother with spellers, as her reading lessons and writing lessons build vocabulary and spelling skills innately. However, I'm open to the idea, should I like it once I get my hands on it. What I love about McGuffey's is that it uses quality literature and poetry and the Bible to teach the children moral lessons. This is critical to the Charlotte Mason method, except instead of having nine million books around from which I select only two or three pages each, it's all in a compact, beautiful, sturdy hardcover set of eight books. Perfect!

For actual, organized grammar lessons, we purchased Harvey's Elementary and Harvey's English Grammar, both of which are filled to the brim with fascinating and wonderful facts about our language. As the grammarian of the family, I can't get enough of these and have been pleasantly surprised to learn many new things in them! I love them.

I have had a LOT of people tell me they didn't like McGuffey's and Harvey's because the examples and stories are unrealistic for our day and the language is slightly archaic. And that is a VERY good point which will really concern some parents! 

But that's exactly why our family DOES like them very much-- because to us, there is nothing more astonishing than watching the delight with which children react to and comprehend even challenging, traditional English phrases.

 Just as Charlotte Mason suggested the reading aloud to children of the King James Bible and not some modern rendition which loses the subtlety of language, we enjoy teaching our children using examples of older English. We read the RSV to our kids, with all the "Thees and Thous." We pray the Liturgy of the Hours with our kids, not the "Now I lay me down to sleep." Etc. That's us. And these, for us, are PERFECT. 

Between the McGuffey's and Harvey's we have English covered and covered well. We are missing only Latin, Greek, Hebrew and French, which will come in time as inspiration strikes... quite probably through the CLAA. Grammar? Done. 

Arithmetic.

At first, I was kind of frustrated with my system because I had such cool, easy, simple, inexpensive hardback books for the other two elements of the Core, and I was missing something that would be similar since we have been using Singapore Math, which has lots of huge paperback workbooks, colors, and pictures.

I really like Singapore Math, but it definitely doesn't match my ""traditional, classical" homeschooling philosophy in the externals. It basically accomplishes what it should in the internals... it makes great, logical thinkers.

Enter Ray's Arithmetic. Again, like the McGuffey's these are hardback, eight volume sets of books meant to be read aloud to the student which go from basic to higher arithmetic using classical English and traditional weights, prices, measurements--- so not great for those concerned about modern language or situations.

However, the quality of the instruction (and I'm not a "math person" so I could be wrong here) seems to be very similar to the Classical Arithmetic course at CLAA from what I can tell.... and therefore, we love it.

Combining Ray's and Singapore together seem to be a good fit for my kids-- they like doing the workbooks and really enjoy the "quiet thinking" time it requires of them. On the other hand, Ray's requires exactly what they love-- interaction with mom, reading time together, and LOTS of mental math and word problems... all the things they need to build a great thinking process. Ray's is inexpensive as a set and will last and last and is TOTALLY sufficient for kids to learn what they need to in arithmetic all by itself.

One note if you like them is that the company, Mott's, who publishes these is transitioning them to paperbacks to keep costs down. This makes me sad, because I HATE paperbacks. So get em while you can! I've already got our set. And let them know, if you think of it, how much you enjoy having the hardbacks.

I may eventually drop Singapore in later years, but right now I'm really enjoying using them both together and so are the kids, and I got the go- ahead to do so from several math teachers I respect. Since Dr. Arcara, who writes the CLAA Arithmetic Courses, has his kids in both CLAA Classical Arithmetic AND Singapore, I figure I'm on the right track with this one. Singapore is the only "every year" purchase I'm making, at about 10 bucks a workbook. And we use the abacus to teach them, just as the Chinese, Japanese, Greeks, Romans have done before us.

The "Other Core"--or framework: the Non-Cores.

In the non-core realm we have history, geography, science, art, art history, and music. My kids do nature study (which is free) a-la Charlotte Mason for their science and it is wonderful. When they are older they will study physics, astronomy, and maybe chemistry, but for now, it's Biology, Botany, Geology and all forms of life science which they glean from the study of their natural surroundings and the classifying of these things. I don't drop nature study because it's also a way for them to get exercise and fresh air. One hour, every day. Outside. Observing creation.

For History and Geography (and everything else, to some degree) we are going to be using Connecting With History. Volume one arrived yesterday and it's going to make my life a lot easier-- essentially it does what I was trying to do on my own and makes it easy. The program breaks down History into four sections broken down into units, teaches a Catholic worldview, uses living books and the classical method, and does the planning for you to some degree. It costs very little, and can form the "Core" of the externals. With Connecting with History, for example, my kids are studying Ancient History the first year. They will do history, geography, literature, art, picture study, home economics, science, natural history, physical education, and music study, -- even Bible study and Catechism-- relating directly to the period in history they are studying, which makes planning anything else really easy and fun. And SIMPLE. No more trying to fit it ALL in. They will cycle through these once every stage of their classical education, deepening their understanding as they go.

The core texts of the program are worth owning because they are amazing, and the rest can be found at the library. True to Charlotte Mason's methods, the program incorporates narration, living books from original sources as much as possible, the Book of Centuries and Book of Mottoes in itself. It's wonderful.

So that's it! When they hit 8 or 9th grade, we will add philosophy and theology, and a couple higher science courses as we had planned. This isn't a deviation from our plan at all but a simplification of what we were doing-- we are still getting rid of books instead of buying new ones (other than the cores, many of which we already owned) and still focused intensely on a life of quiet, hard work, study and prayer. Next year will be a lot easier to implement, a lot easier to organize, and a lot easier to work through. In the core subjects, the kids will spend the majority of their time and will work to perfection, moving to the next lesson only when the previous lesson has been mastered. In the non-core subjects, the kids will build attention and observation skills, read amazing books and ideas, and a solidly Catholic worldview. 

For the first time my husband is NOT having visions (nightmares??) of overpacked bookshelves and kids lounging around reading fiction all day, and I'm NOT having visions (nightmares??) of kids bent over their desks sullen and miserable and hating school. 

We have been doing this for a week now and it's JUST like we are back in the CLAA again, except we are really missing the help with Latin. I'm convinced this is the best possible preparation I can give them to study the Classical Liberal Arts under someone else far more knowledgeable than ourselves, and we are both equally convinced that we've found the combination of Charlotte Mason/Classical ideology that really suits our family (simple, affordable, VERY flexible, and academically rigorous and twaddle-free) for the first time. 

Fall can't come soon enough! I'm shocked and amazed at how seamless the Appian Way Academy is coming along now that we've got this all sorted out.
How's your planning coming? Hope sharing this helps someone out there. I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have about these specific materials or our experience with the CLAA.