It is not unusual to hear a homeschooling mother state that she is redeeming her own education while schooling her children. This has been true for me as well. While I would say that I received an adequate secondary education, I credit the lion share of my academic success to an early love of reading, sparked by my mother, and later an appreciation for lifelong learning, kindled by my grandmother. This is one of the key reasons why I chose to homeschool, and specifically why I chose the Classical Model of education.
Lately, my desire to redeem my education has been expressed in a renewed interest in poetry and literature. The art of both storytelling and wordsmithing held an early fascination for me. Like most children, I loved animals, climbing trees and riding bikes, but I rarely let a day pass without spending time in a book, which inspired me to write more as well. The adventures that I couldn’t achieve in real life I could experience in a book.
This morning, I found myself rereading The Rime of the Ancient Mariner—this poem is credited for the figure of speech “wearing an albatross around your neck”—which kicked off some thoughts about our reading choices.
The power of language is evident in every culture and every age, but as a classical educator—a classical Christian educator—I acknowledge this more so: God spoke the world into existence, Jesus was the Word made flesh, and God placed His Word above His own name. Words not only matter, they are key to wisdom. I’ve heard it suggested that any reading is valuable reading. To me this is like saying it doesn’t matter what you eat as long as you are eating something.
If food feeds the body, then words feed the mind & soul. We could, in theory, live on a diet of fast food, but the effects would eventually show up in poor health. So a steady diet of dime store novels will not produce the same benefits as wisdom saturated literature. While I confess to having read every mystery by Sidney Sheldon, I still consider it chips and soda pop, whereas the symbolism of Nathanial Hawthorne I regard as steak and a salad. If the pen really is mightier than the sword, then without a powerful command of our own language, our greatest weapon could become a dull and useless instrument in our hands.
Over the last decade, we have observed an alarming trend where the average conversation includes a generous seasoning of “likes” and “you knows,” and our best communicators’ speeches are riddled with more “ums” than adjectives. It raises the question, “Has the art and beauty of language completely given way to text-speak and you tube video blogs?”
Perhaps a greater emphasis on language would solve this problem, but while great works of poetry and story-telling do build comprehension and vocabulary skills, they are not just about the mastery of text. Good books nurture principle and character, propagate moral appetite, challenge our beliefs and influence our manners. This is because great books are more than stories—the classic stories are inherently moral in their world view. Great works nourish a Godly world view, which is the heartbeat of a classical education.
It is through words on a page—great stories—that we peel the onion of life, those daily pleasures and pains that are common to all men. Writers help us place order to some of the most intricate puzzle pieces of grief, joy, betrayal, bravery, loyalty and a host of other traits of humanness. Together, in these marvelously bound volumes, we can pause to consider how we might react in a similar situation, learn from another’s reaction or dilemma, and dig deeper into the great human experience, while encountering the rich depth and complexity of the English language. In fact, one of the many reasons why I still prefer reading the King James version of the Bible is because of the structure of its poetic speech and its great poetic beauty.
School is back in session at my house, and I am looking forward to uncovering more great works to share with my children. However, discovering these great masterpieces is increasingly difficult in an age where juvenile fiction is dominated by titles like Captain Underpants, a favorite of progressive educators who offer dumbed down books as a solution to reluctant readers. A commitment to quality literature is just that, and we may have to be diligent in our search for the stories that speak to the heart and stretch the imagination of our young people.
Do you recall the stories that shaped your early years? For me it was The Tales of the Fourth Grade Nothing that gave me the nickname Boing-Boing. It was The Lord of the Flies that introduced me to man’s inhumanity to man and the concept that within the natural man dwells no good thing. The good things—like mercy—come from God. This I learned from the Holy Bible. There was A Wrinkle in Time with its classic battle between good and evil. Later, there was To Kill and Mockingbird and its complex viewpoints about dignity, racism, and justice, or The Old Man and the Sea which on the surface seemed to be about the war between man and nature, but just underneath we experienced the power and resilience of the human spirit, along with the notion that death doesn’t necessarily equal defeat.
As educators, the classics offer us not only strong language skills, but they strengthen our imagination while infecting us with an appetite for meaning and significance in this life. It’s never too soon to begin reading these great works—we don’t have to wait until our children are old enough to read—we can share them now through reading-aloud to them. Many excellent discussions have followed our out-loud reading time.
Sitting with an old classic and a cup of coffee will always be one of my favorite intellectual and inspirational endeavors. The difference now is that I get the joy of sharing these classics with my children. Together we can embark on a passage into the ages. I encourage you to do the same: it will be the journey of a lifetime.
