Info

A Delectable Education Charlotte Mason Podcast

Through twice monthly conversations, three moms who have studied the Charlotte Mason method of education and put her ideas into practice in their homes join together to share with one another for the benefit of listeners by giving explanations of Mason's principles and examples of those principles put into practice out of their own teaching experience. These short discussions aim at providing information, support, and encouragement for others by unfolding the myriad aspects.
RSS Feed Subscribe in Apple Podcasts
A Delectable Education Charlotte Mason Podcast
2024
March
February
January


2023
December
November
October
September
August
May
April
March
February
January


2022
December
November
October
September
August
May
April
March
February
January


2021
December
November
October
September
July
June
May
April
March
February
January


2020
December
November
October
September
August
July
May
April
March
February
January


2019
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January


2018
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January


2017
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January


2016
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January


2015
December
November
October


Categories

All Episodes
Archives
Categories
Now displaying: Page 1
Mar 15, 2024

This season, we are interviewing experienced Charlotte Mason moms, inviting them to tell us how they've come to "Trust the Method." In today's episode, as she prepares to graduate her oldest student this spring, Morgan Conner joins us to reflect on her homeschool journey and how she came to trust Charlotte Mason's Method. After jumping from one curriculum to the next, once Morgan discovered Charlotte Mason, she never looked back, but that doesn't mean it has always been easy. You will glean much from Morgan's vulnerability and honesty as she describes overcoming her perfectionistic tendencies and learned to trust the Lord with even the smallest details with her neurodiverse students.

For the Children's Sake, Susan Schaeffer Macaulay

Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen

Q&A about Nature Walks

Podcast Episode on Forecasting

Forecasting Teacher Training Workshop

Morgan's episode on Reading Charlotte Mason's Volumes

Morgan's episode on Planning Physical Geography Lessons

ADE's Patreon Community

Mar 1, 2024

Charlotte Mason firmly believed that novels are our greatest teachers, hence why she included them as a major serving in the feast that nourishes our children's education. This episode was recorded live at the ADE At Home conference, February 2, 2024, with Nicole, Emily, and Liz leading a discussion with attendees who had read the book and come to contribute what they had been taught by William Makepeace Thackeray's classic novel Vanity Fair. If you have read the book, you will revel in the myriad messages this book conveyed to us all, and if you have not, you will be inspired to read it.

 

Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray

Talkbox.mom

Feb 16, 2024

This season, we are interviewing experienced Charlotte Mason moms, inviting them to tell us how they've come to "Trust the Method." In today's episode, Jami Hurt, mom of two homeschool graduates tells us about her experience with Charlotte Mason Homeschooling, and the joys she is witnessing with her boys who have now launched their own lives in young adulthood.

For the Children's Sake, Susan Schaeffer Macaulay

Destiny of the Republic, Candice Millard

ADE's Patreon Community

Feb 2, 2024

As home educators trying to spread the wide feast of a Charlotte Mason education for multiple children, we feel the need to have our students working independently. But how do we get them there? Join Liz, Nicole, and Emily as they discuss the rewards and challenges with practical advice for how to help our children grow in independence--in school lessons and beyond.

 

“As we have already urged, there is but one right way, that is, children must do the work for themselves. They must read the given pages and tell what they have read, they must perform, that is, what we may call the act of knowing." (6/99)

“One of the features, and one of the disastrous features, of modern society, is that, in our laziness, we depend upon prodders and encourage a vast system of prodding.” (3/39)

"...parents who have always satisfied the intellectual craving of their children must needs forego the delight of watching a literary awakening." (3/123)

“The children must know themselves to be let alone, whether to do their own duty or to seek their own pleasure. The constraining power should be present, but passive, so that the child may not feel himself hemmed in without choice. That free-will of man, which has for ages exercised faithful souls who would prefer to be compelled into all righteousness and obedience, is after all a pattern for parents. The child who is good because he must be so, loses in power of initiative more than he gains in seemly behaviour. Every time a child feels that he chooses to obey of his own accord, his power of initiative is strengthened.” (3/31)

"A parent may be willing to undergo any definite labours for his child's sake; but to be always catering for his behoof, always contriving that circumstances shall play upon him for his good, is the part of a god and not of a man!" (1/10)

"Make children happy and they will be good,' is absolutely true, but does it develop that strenuousness, the first condition of virtue, which comes of the contrary axiom-' Be good and you will be happy'?" (3/57)

"Let her distribute her time as she likes, but count her tale of bricks; let her choose books for her own reading, but know what she chooses; let her choose her own companions, but put before her the principles on which to choose..." (5/245)

The Coddling of the American Mind, Haidt and Lukianoff

Awaken: Living Books Conference

2024 ADE @ Home {Virtual Conference}

Episode 108: Masterly Inactivity

ADE's Patreon Community

Jan 19, 2024

At the 2022 ADE at HOME {Virtual} Conference Melissa Petermann of Charlotte Mason PE presented a talk entitled "Mindset, Margin, and Tactics: Homeschooling Through Trials & Chronic Illness." We've invited her onto the podcast this week to discuss some of the practical ways she has found to continue on even on hard days.

"ln the things of science, in the things of art, in the things of practical everyday life, his God doth instruct him and doth teach him, her God doth instruct her and doth teach her. Let this be the mother's key to the whole of the education of each boy and each girl; not of her children; the divine Spirit does not work with nouns of multitude, but with each single child. Because He is infinite, the whole world is not too great a school for this indefatigable Teacher, and because He is infinite, He is able to give the whole of his infinite attention for the whole time to each one of his multitudinous pupils. We do not sufficiently rejoice in the wealth that the infinite nature of our God brings to each of us." (2/273)

"Let the mother go out to play! If she would only have courage to let everything go when life becomes too tense, and just take a day, or half a day , out in the fields, or with a favourite book, or in a picture gallery looking long and well at just two or three pictures, or in bed, without the children, life would go on far more happily for both children and parents. The mother would be able to hold herself in 'wise passiveness,' and would not fret her children by continual interference, even of hand or eye-she would let them be." (3/33-34)

2024 ADE @ Home {Virtual Conference}

Melissa's Swedish Drill Resource

Melissa's Mindset, Margin, and Tactics: Homeschooling Through Trials & Chronic Illness Workshop from the 2022 Conference

Sabbath Mood Homeschool Science Guides

Liz's Grammar Resource

ADE's Patreon Community

Jan 5, 2024

How do you determine which books are the "right" books for your children? Charlotte Mason said they must LIKE their books, right? Or did she? We explore the nuances of children's taste and how much a role that should play in our choices of their lesson books in this episode.

 


“The children must enjoy their books." (3/178)

"What manner of book will find its way with upheaving effect into the mind of an intelligent boy or girl? We need not ask what the firl or boy likes. She very often likes the twaddle of goody-goody storybooks, he likes condiments, highly-spiced tales of adventure. We are all capable of liking mental food of a poor quality..." (3/168)

"[T]he happiness of the child is the condition of his progress; that his lessons should be joyous, and that occasions of friction in the schoolroom are greatly to be deprecated." (1/178, emphasis added)

"Our conception of a child rules our relations towards him. Pour s'amuser is the rule of child-life proper for the 'oyster' theory, and most of our children's books and many of our theories of child-education are based upon this rule. 'Oh! he's so happy,' we say, and are content, believing that if he is happy he will be good; and it is so to a great extent; but in the older days the theory was, if you are good you will be happy; and this is a principle which strikes the keynote of endeavour, and holds good, not only through the childish 'stage of evolution,' but for the whole of life, here and hereafter. The child who has learned to 'endeavour himself' (as the Prayer Book has it) has learned to live." (2/254)

"Your opinions about books and other things will very likely be wrong, and you will yourself correct them by and by when you have read more, thought more, know more. Indeed, no wise person, however old, is sure of his opinions." (4/I/183-84)

"A child has not begun his education until he has acquired the habit of reading to himself, with interest and pleasure, books fully on a level with his intelligence. I am speaking now of his lesson-books, which are all too apt to be written in a style of insufferable twaddle, probably because they are written by persons who have never chanced to meet a child. All who know children know that they do not talk twaddle and do not like it, and prefer that which appeals to their understanding. Their lesson-books should offer matter for their reading, whether aloud or to themselves; therefore they should be written with literary power. As for the matter of these books, let us remember that children can take in ideas and principles, whether the latter be moral or mechanical, as quickly and clearly as we do ourselves (perhaps more so); but detailed processes, lists and summaries, blunt the edge of a child's delicate mind." (1/229)

"A corollary of the principle that education is the science of relations, is, that no education seems to be worth the name which has not made children at home in the world of books, and so related them, mind to mind, with thinkers who have dealt with knowledge. We reject epitomes, compilations, and their like, and put into children's hands books which, long or short, are living. Thus it becomes a large part of the teacher's work to help children to deal with their books; so that the oral lesson and lecture are but small matters in education, and are used chiefly to summarise or to expand or illustrate." (3/226)

"We are apt to believe that children cannot be interested in the Bible unless its pages be watered down––turned into the slipshod English we prefer to offer them." (1/247-48)

"We are determined that the children shall love books, therefore we do not interpose ourselves between the book and the child. We read him his Tanglewood Tales, and when he is a little older his Plutarch, not trying to break up or water down, but leaving the child's mind to deal with the matter as it can." (2/231-32)

"The teacher's part in this regard is to see and feel for himself, and then to rouse his pupils by an appreciative look or word; but to beware how he deadens the impression by a flood of talk. Intellectual sympathy is very stimulating; but we have all been in the case of the little girl who said, 'Mother, I think I could understand if you did not explain quite so much.'" (3/178)

"The real use of naturalists' books at this stage is to give the child delightful glimpses into the world of wonders he lives in, to reveal the sorts of things to be seen by curious eyes, and fill him with desire to make discoveries for himself." (1/64)

"This sort of weak literature for the children, both in any story and lesson books, is the result of a reactionary process. Not so long ago the current impression was that the children had little understanding, but prodigious memory for facts; dates, numbers, rules, catechisms of knowledge, much information in small parcels, was supposed to be the fitting material for a child's education. We have changed all that, and put into the children's hands lesson-books with pretty pictures and easy talk, almost as good as story-books; but we do not see that, after all, we are but giving the same little pills of knowledge in the form of a weak and copious diluent. Teachers, and even parents, who are careful enough about their children's diet, are so reckless as to the sort of mental aliment offered to them, that I am exceedingly anxious to secure consideration for this question, of the lessons and literature proper for the little people." (1/176)

"In their power of giving impulse and stirring emotion is another use of books, the right books; but that is just the question––which are the right books?––a point upon which I should not wish to play Sir Oracle. The 'hundred best books for the schoolroom' may be put down on a list, but not by me. I venture to propose one or two principles in the matter of school-books, and shall leave the far more difficult part, the application of those principles, to the reader." (3/177)

"Children cannot answer questions set on the wrong book; and the difficulty of selection is increased by the fact that what they like in books is no more a guide than what they like in food." (6/248)

Mystery and Manners, Flannery O'Connor

Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray

Moby Dick, Herman Melville

Arabella Buckley's Eyes and No Eyes series

Talkbox.mom

2024 ADE @ Home {Virtual Conference}

Episode 269: Jono Kiser on Good and Dangerous Books

Episode 6: Living Books

Episode 7: Recognizing Living Books

Episode 119: Q&A on the Arabella Buckley Books

ADE's Patreon Community

Dec 15, 2023

This season, we are interviewing experienced Charlotte Mason moms, inviting them to tell us how they've come to "Trust the Method." In today's episode, Melanie Verlage, Canadian mom of four girls tells us about her transition from public school to Charlotte Mason Homeschooling, and the surprising joys she's witnessed over the last six years.

 

The Body, Bill Bryson

Episode 269: Voices from the Conference with Jono Kiser

ADE's Personal Curriculum Consultations

ADE's Patreon Community

Dec 1, 2023

Can you make a child care about their education? Or about anything, let alone the many things that Charlotte Mason commended? We tackle these questions in this episode of the podcast, exploring the reasons for a seeming indifference in our students as well as how we can come alongside them and help them grow in their love for knowledge.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Quotes.png
 
 

“Our aim in Education is to give a Full Life.- We begin to see what we want. Children make large demands upon us. We owe it to them to hast set my feet in a large room,' should be the glad cry of every intelligent soul. Life should be all living, and not merely a tedious passing of time ; not all doing or all feeling or all thinking-the strain would be too great-but, all living; that is to say, we should be in touch wherever we go, whatever we hear, whatever we see, with some manner of vital interest. We cannot give the children these interests; we prefer that they should never say they have learned botany or conchology, geology or astronomy. The question is not,-how much does the youth know? when he has finished his education-but how much does he care? and about how many orders of things does he care? In fact, how large is the room in which he finds his feet set? and, therefore, how full is the life he has before him ? I know you may bring a horse to the water, but you cannot make him drink. What I complain of is that we do not bring our horse to the water. We give him miserable little text-books, mere compendiums of facts, which he is to learn off and say and produce at an examination; or we give him various knowledge in the form of warm diluents, prepared by his teacher with perhaps some grains of living thought to the gallon. And all the time we have books, books teeming with ideas fresh from the minds of thinkers upon every subject to which we can wish to introduce children." (3/171-172)

"I know you may bring a horse to the water, but you cannot make him drink. What I complain of is that we do not bring our horse to the water. We give him miserable little text-books, mere compendiums of facts, which he is to learn off and say and produce at an examination; or we give him various knowledge in the form of warm diluents, prepared by his teacher with perhaps some grains of living thought to the gallon. And all the time we have books, books teeming with ideas fresh from the minds of thinkers upon every subject to which we can wish to introduce children. The fact is, we undervalue children." (3/172)

“In conclusion, the parent must educate himself up to the level of the child, or if he cannot do this, he must never discourage. Children with their natural irresponsibleness and ignorance of what is in them, will take up various subjects with more or less vigor, only to drop them perhaps, before finally lighting upon the one thing of absorbing interest. Be patient with these vagaries and the litter they make if they are wholesome and healthy; above all do not scoff at this inconsequence, and if their particular hobbies are not according to your especial taste remember that— “There are diversities of gifts, but the same spirit.” (PR 22 p. 792)
 
This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Books.png
 
 
 

Spark, John Ratey

Habits of the Household, Justin Whitmel Earley

A Clearing in the Distance: Frederick Law Olmsted and America in the 19th Century, Witold Rybczynski

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Links.png
 
 
 

Talkbox.mom

2024 ADE @ Home {Virtual Conference}

Parents' Educational Course

Episode 113: Service, An Interview with Vanessa Kijewski

Episode 249: Voices from the Conference: Cathy McKay on Teenagers

ADE's Patreon Community

Nov 17, 2023

At the 2023 ADE at HOME {Virtual} Conference Jono Kiser of Living Literature presented a talk entitled "Good and Dangerous Books." We've invited him onto the podcast this week to discuss why Charlotte Mason encouraged students to read literature with objectionable content, and what makes these worthy books.

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain

Bleak House, Charles Dickens

Ruth, Elizabeth Gaskell

Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens

Number the Stars, Lois Lowry

Junkyard Wonders, Patricia Polacco

The Hundred Dresses, Eleanor Estes

2024 ADE @ Home {Virtual Conference}

Areopagitica, John Milton

ADE's Patreon Community

Nov 3, 2023

In this episode we return to the topic of Recitation, a distinctive feature of Charlotte Mason's Method. We are focusing on practical ways to help your student develop their skills in Recitation, both the "Mechanical" and the "Sentimental" Branches.


“It will now be seen that I spoke nothing but the truth when I said that reading was an art which had its fixed laws. We have found laws for the emission of the voice, for respiration, for pronunciation, for articulation, and for punctuation ; that is to say, laws for all the material side, the technical part of the art of reading. Let us now pass on to its intellectual aspects.” (Ernest Legouvé. A Short Treatise on Reading Aloud. PR 17, p 436)

Hay said, “the first of these two branches ... can in all cases be taught, and the second beyond hints and suggestions for guidance must be left to the taste and judgment of the speaker.” (p. 33-34)

What Charlotte Mason called “the fine art of beautiful and perfect speaking.” (1/223)

“It will now be seen that I spoke nothing but the truth when I said that reading was an art which had its fixed laws. We have found laws for the emission of the voice, for respiration, for pronunciation, for articulation, and for punctuation ; that is to say, laws for all the material side, the technical part of the art of reading. Let us now pass on to its intellectual aspects.” (Ernest Legouvé. A Short Treatise on Reading Aloud. PR 17, p 436)

Hay said, “the first of these two branches ... can in all cases be taught, and the second beyond hints and suggestions for guidance must be left to the taste and judgment of the speaker.” (p. 33-34)

The Speaking Voice: Its Development and Preservation, Volume 1, Emil Behnke

The Speaking Voice: Its Development and Preservation, Volume 2, Emil Behnke

The Art of Reading and Speaking, Canon Fleming

How You Talk, Paul Showers

Awaken: Living Books Conferences

Episode 69: Recitation

Episode 179: Recitation Immersion

Nicole's Recitation Handout

Episode 266: The Unity of the CM Method

Arthur Burrell's Recitation: The Children's Art

Mrs Tongue Does Her Housework

2024 ADE @ Home {Virtual Conference}

ADE's Patreon Community

Oct 20, 2023

This season, we are interviewing experienced Charlotte Mason moms, inviting them to tell us how they've come to "Trust the Method." In today's episode, Celeste Cruz, mom of eleven children, from infant to seniors in High School, joins us to reflect on her Charlotte Mason Journey.


"Not only confidence in themselves, but confidence in their children, is an element of the masterly inactivity, which I venture to propose to parents as a 'blue teapot' for them 'to live up to.' Believe in the relation of parent and child, and trust the children to believe in it and fulfil it on their part. They will do so if they are not worried." (3/30)

"People are naturally divided into those who read and think and those who do not read or think..." (6/31)

Paddle-to-the-Sea, Holling

Holling's Book of Indians

Awaken: Living Books Conference

Episode 264: The Time-Table

Celeste's blog: Joyous Lessons

ADE's Patreon Community

Oct 6, 2023

Charlotte Mason's Method can seem confusing and difficult to implement, especially if we view it as a list of do's and don'ts. But when we learn to see it as a unified whole, it is revealed as a truly simple and cohesive method of education.


“Time is insufficient for teachers as well as for scholars. How then find room for a new subject ? Where place it ? What would give way for it ? The answer is easy. The art of reading can only benefit education where it adds nothing, eliminates nothing, supersedes nothing, but by assimilation is our aid to all things. It is not a tax but an aid to memory ; it does not fatigue, but relieves and supports the mind. It is to education what the gastric juice is to the nutritive process : it causes and facilitates digestion ; it is not in itself a new factor, but a component part of all the other factors.” (Short Treatise on Reading Aloud. PR 17, p 129)

"The reader will say with truth,-" I knew all this before and have always acted more or less on these principles " ; and I can only point to the unusual results we obtain through adhering not ' more or less,' but strictly to the principles and practices I have indicated. I suppose the difficulties are of the sort that Lister had to contend with ; every surgeon knew that his instruments and appurtenances should be kept clean, but the saving of millions of lives has resulted from the adoption of the great surgeon's antiseptic treatment; that is from the substitution of exact principles scrupulously applied for the rather casual ' more or less ' methods of earlier days." (6/19)

“Therefore we do not feel it is lawful in the early days of a child's life to select certain subjects for his education to the exclusion of others; … but we endeavour that he shall have relations of pleasure and intimacy established with as many as possible of the interests proper to him; not learning a slight or incomplete smattering about this or that subject, but plunging into vital knowledge, with a great field before him which in all his life he will not be able to explore.” (3/223)

"As we have already urged, there is but one right way, that is, children must do the work for themselves." (6/99)

"The children, not the teachers, are the responsible persons ; they do the work by self-effort." (6/241)

"'The mother is qualified,' says Pestalozzi, 'and qualified by the Creator Himself, to become the principal agent in the development of her child ; . . . and what is demanded of her is a thinking love. • • • God has given to thy child all the faculties of our nature, but the grand point remains undecided-how shall this heart, this head, these hands, be employed? to whose service shall they be dedicated? A question the answer to which involves a futurity of happiness or misery to a life so dear to thee. Maternal love is the first agent in education.'" (1/2)

"What we cannot do with Miss Mason's Ideal is to reduce it to lowest terms, and just in so far as we try to, so far we misrepresent it, and misunderstand it. But some of the secret undoubtedly lies in the Programmes of Work; the longer we work from those wonderful programmes the more we realise how well balanced they are; how satisfying to the hungry mind; how the subjects dovetail; how difficult it is to teach history only in history time, how it will 'flow over' into geography, literature, or even into such unexpected channels as arithmetic or botany." (In Memoriam, p. 151)

"Method implies two things -- a way to an end, and step-by-step progress in that way. Further, the following of a method implies an idea, a mental image, of the end or object to be arrived at." (1/8)

"It would seem a far cry from Undine to a' liberal education ' but there is a point of contact between the two ; a soul awoke within a water-sprite at the touch of love; so, I have to tell of the awakening of a ' general soul ' at the touch of knowledge. Eight years ago the ' soul ' of a class of children in a mining village school awoke simultaneously at this magic touch and has remained awake. We know that religion can awaken souls, that love makes a new man, that the call of a vocation may do it, and in the age of the Renaissance , men's souls, the general soul, awoke to knowledge : but this appeal rarely reaches the modern soul ; and, notwithstanding the pleasantness attending lessons and marks in all our schools, I believe the ardour for knowledge in the children of this mining village is a phenomenon that indicates new possibilities. Already many thousands of the children of the Empire had experienced this intellectual conversion, but they were the children of educated persons. To find that the children of a mining population were equally responsive seemed to open a new hope for the world. It may be that the souls of all children are waiting for the call of knowledge to awaken them to delightful living." (6/Preface)

"It is such a temptation to us ordinary folks to emphasize some part at the expense of the rest and so turn a. strength into a weakness. There is only one way to avoid this danger. That is constantly to read and re-read Miss Mason's books, constantly to remind ourselves of her first principles -- for from now onwards Miss Mason's work is in our hands; we dare not leave un-made and effort to keep the truth." (Wix, p. 153)

“Questions there will always be, but if we continually keep in touch with Miss Mason's thought by constant reading of all her books, we shall have a sheaf of principles at command by which we can test the value of this or that criticism, this or that book.” (Franklin. PR 36 p. 419)

Talkbox.mom

Episode 182: Visualization

Episode 235: When the Feast is Too Much

Miss Wix's Article: Miss Mason's Ideal: Its Breadth and Balance

Episode 167: Method vs. System

ADE's Patreon Community

Sep 15, 2023

This season, we are interviewing experienced Charlotte Mason moms, inviting them to tell us how they've come to "Trust the Method." In today's episode, Bethany Glosser, mom of six children, teenagers to preschoolers, shares her experiences both successes and "failures" and has important words to bring us about our ultimate hope for our children.

Quotes

Mothers owe 'a thinking love ' to their Children.-"The mother is qualified," says Pestalozzi, "and qualified by the Creator Himself, to become the principal agent in the development of her child ; . . . and what is demanded of her is a thinking love. • • • God has given to thy child all the faculties of our nature, but the grand point remains undecided-how shall this heart, this head, these hands, be employed? to whose service shall they be dedicated? A question the answer to which involves a futurity of happiness or misery to a life so dear to thee. Maternal love is the first agent in education.'' (1/2)

"Of the three sorts of knowledge proper to a child,-the knowledge of God, of man, and of the universe,-the knowledge of God ranks first in importance, is indispensable, and most happy-making." (6/158)

Books

For the Children's Sake, Susan Schaeffer Macaulay

Links

INK Newspaper

Morgan Conner's Reading Lessons

Living Literature Courses with Jono Kiser

Beauty and Truth Math

Climbing Higher Math

ADE's Patreon Community

Sep 1, 2023

Charlotte Mason encouraged us to use a time-table to ensure lessons were kept short and varied. Today on the podcast we're talking about this essential tool, why Miss Mason called it the first principle of a well-managed schoolroom, and how we can make one to fit our family today.

"Time-Table; Definite Work in a Given Time. -- I shall have opportunities to enter into some of these points later; meantime, let us look in at a home schoolroom managed on sound principles. In the first place, there is a time-table, written out fairly, so that the child knows what he has to do and how long each lesson is to last. This idea of definite work to be finished in a given time is valuable to the child, not only as training him in habits of order, but in diligence; he learns that one time is not 'as good as another;' that there is no right time left for what is not done in its own time; and this knowledge alone does a great deal to secure the child's attention to his work." (1/142)

“In the first place, there is a time-table, written out fairly, so that the child knows what he has to do and how long each lesson is to last. This idea of definite work to be finished in a given time is valuable to the child, not only as training him in habits of order, but in diligence; he learns that one time is not 'as good as another'; that there is no right time left for what is not done in its own time; and this knowledge alone does a great deal to secure the child's attention to his work.” (1/142)

“It is impossible to overstate the importance of this habit of attention. It is, ..., ‘within the reach of everyone, and should be made the primary object of all mental discipline’; for whatever the natural gifts of the child, it is only so far as the habit of attention is cultivated in him that he is able to make use of them.” (1/146)

"Miss Kitching's introduction to the discussion of this subject involved the following points:
"1. That the P.U.S. time-table is intended to serve simply as a guide to the teacher in making her own, for it stands to reason that no two schoolrooms are identical as regards the work done, or the time allotted it.
"2. That in making her own time-table the teacher must be careful that no two lessons requiring the same mental effort follow one another in close proximity.
"3. That it is better to leave the term's work unfinished, than to rush the pupils through for sake finishing the work set.
"The general outcome of the discussion was to the effect that some modification of the programme and time-table is absolutely necessary, each teacher using her own discretion in the matter. Somebody very wisely remarked that Miss Mason intends the programme to fit the child, and not as some wildly imagine, the child to fit the programme." (L'Umile Pianta, May 1915, pp. 58-59)

"It is evident that the young lady at home has so much in hand, without taking social claims into consideration, that she can have no time for dawdling, and, indeed will have to make a time-table for herself and map out her day carefully to get as much into it as she wishes." (5/261)

Talkbox.mom 

Beauty & Truth Math

Episode 258: Afternoons

ADE's Schedule Cards

Schedule Cards in Russian, Spanish, French, Portuguese

ADE's Patreon Community

Aug 18, 2023

The theme of this season of A Delectable Education: Charlotte Mason Podcast is "Trust the Method." But what does that mean? Are we just supposed to blindly follow a dead woman's advice from the 19th Century? Emily, Liz, and Nicole discuss these questions and more to help set the stage for the year to come, starting with "Why are you choosing to educate your children in the first place?"

"The object of this organisation is not merely to raise the standard of work in the schoolroom. Our chief wish is that pupils should find knowledge delightful in itself and for its own sake, without thought of marks, places, prizes, or other rewards; and that they should develop an intelligent curiosity about the past and present. Children respond and take to their lessons with keen pleasure if they have even tolerably good teaching; and the want of marks, companionship, or other stimulus is not felt in those home schoolrooms where the interest of knowledge is allowed free play." ("A Liberal Education for All" Pamphlet, 1928, p. 31)

"Those who do not regard education as a vital whole but as a sort of conglomerate of good idea, good plans, traditions and experiences, do well to adopt and adapt any good idea they come across. But our conception of education is of a vital whole, harmonious, living and effective. Therefore, every plan rises out of a principle, and each such principle is a part of a living educational philosophy, and does not very well bear to be broken off and used by itself." ("A Liberal Education for All," p. 33)

“The reader will say with truth,––"I knew all this before and have always acted more or less on these principles"; and I can only point to the unusual results we obtain through adhering not 'more or less,' but strictly to the principles and practices I have indicated. I suppose the difficulties are of the sort that Lister had to contend with; every surgeon knew that his instruments and appurtenances should be kept clean, but the saving of millions of lives has resulted from the adoption of the great surgeon's antiseptic treatment; that is from the substitution of exact principles scrupulously applied for the rather casual 'more or less' methods of earlier days.” (6/19)

“In the matter of education, we are hovering round the truth: that education is not merely a preparation for life, but the work of the lifetime is boldly announced. And, given thus much insight, is it conceivable that the education in question is no more than the cramming of a few text-books? Like religion, education is nothing or it is everything––a consuming fire in the bones. How is it that we do not see, through the hurry of eating and drinking, getting and having, that our prime business here is to raise up a generation better than ourselves?” (5/145-46)

She trusted that parents and teachers do not have to, “develop the person; he is there already, with, possibly, every power that will serve him in his passage through life.” (3/75) 

“Like all the great ventures of life, this that I propose to you is a venture of faith, faith in the saving power of knowledge and in the assimilative power of children. Its efficacy depends upon the fact that it is in the nature of things, in the nature of knowledge and in the nature of children. Bring the two together in ways that are sanctioned by the laws of mind and, to use a figure, a chemical change takes place and a new product appears, a person of character and intelligence, an admirable citizen whose own life is too full and rich for him to be an uneasy member of society.” (A Liberal Education for All, No. I. Theory, by Charlotte Mason, https://charlottemasonpoetry.org/a-liberal-education-for-all/)

For the Children's Sake, Susan Schaeffer Macaulay

Charlotte Mason's Six Volumes

John Taylor Gatto's article

Episode 4: Three Tools of Education

Charlotte Mason's Short Synopsis

Episode 167: Method vs. System

ADE's Patreon Community

Aug 4, 2023

A Delectable Education is back for its NINTH year. We have grown a lot over these past 8 years, and so has the Charlotte Mason Community. We are honored to be here sharing with you all still. In this episode we are sharing some big announcements like our 4th Annual Parents' Educational Course Reading List, our 4th Annual Online Conference (coming February 2024) and new Teacher Helps and Training Videos to help your school year go smoothly. We're glad you're here with us.

Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray 2024 ADE Book Club selection (Find the suggested reading schedule here)

Episodes By Topic: Explore previous episodes grouped by subject

2023-24 Parents' Educational Course: A suggested reading list curated for the modern CM educator

ADE at HOME 2024: Our fourth annual {Virtual} Conference, check back for more details in November. Registration begins November 24, 2023.

Teacher Helps: Products we've created to help you plan, forecast, and implement lessons

Natural History Planner

Form 3-4 Bible Lesson Breakdowns (Revised Form 1-2 Bible Lesson Breakdowns here)

Form 1-2 Literature Breakdowns (Available August 7, 2023)

Upper Forms Geography: If you have previously purchased these, you can re-download the revised copy from your Purchase History

Recitation Planner with optional add-ons for printable Bile Passages

Teacher Training Videos

Sabbath Mood Homeschool Science Curriculum: Nicole has completed her curriculum with High School Ecology

ADE's Patreon Community

 

May 19, 2023

The end of the school year and the end of this podcast season is cause to pause and reflect. The ADE ladies review the past year and encourage you to not just slam the books closed, but pause to remember the good and give thanks. The episode closes with a fitting devotional to help you gain perspective on the value of the past year and inspire you for what lies ahead.

Show Notes:

Seven Days that Divide the World, John Lennox

Episode 241: Seasonal Reflections

Seasonal Reflection Questions

ADE at HOME {Virtual} Conference (First weekend in February each year, access for 3 months following)

Awaken: Living Books Conference July 21-22, 2023

ADE's Patreon Community

Parents' Educational Course

Episode 232: Forecasting Lessons -- How to plan

Beyond the Forum Podcast with John Lennox

May 5, 2023

Charlotte Mason's educational method was worldwide in her day and, thanks to persons like Mariana Mastracchio, this is happening again in our day. This episode closes out the ADE series on Charlotte Mason in Community for this season. It is an inspiring personal account of how one American-Brazilian mother is impacting the country of Brazil to bring Charlotte Mason's method to that Portuguese speaking nation.

Charlotte Mason For All Podcast

Mariana's Podcast and the Mentorship 

- Instagram https://www.instagram.com/descobrindocharlottemason/

- Website: https://descobrindocharlottemason.com.br/

Publishing Company, Editora Ideias Vivas

- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/editoraideiasvivas/

- Website: https://editoraideiasvivas.com.br/

Schedule Cards in Russian, Spanish, French, and Portuguese

Charlotte Mason Colombia

Charlotte Mason Online

Charlotte Mason France

Russian language resources:

-www.uchimdoma.com 

-https://vk.com/mamauitman (NOTE: May not be accessible in all areas of the world)

-Luda's Video Seminars:

Образование - это атмосфера

Образование - это жизнь

Образование - это дисциплина

Как учить не по учебникам

* Contact Luda if you are interested in a Russian translation of the book For the Children's Sake by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay

Apr 21, 2023

Charlotte Mason held big gatherings to continue training educators in her method. Some of our formative learning about Charlotte Mason happened through conferences. This interview in the Charlotte Mason in Community series is with Joy Vanderley who hosts the Awaken conference in Traverse City, Michigan, and who shares about some of the joys and work involved in holding a local conference to make this special environment available to people in your area.

 

A Charlotte Mason Companion, Karen Andreola

Living Literature Courses: Open Registration begins May 1, 2023

Awaken: A Living Books Conference: July 21-22, 2023

Michelle Miller Howard's Children's Preservation Library

TruthQuest History

Apr 7, 2023

Charlotte Mason recommended "afternoon occupations" and instructions about them were included in her programmes. Are there particular occupations, specified times and occurrences, and how much does the parent need to superintend these occupations? These and all questions involving afternoon was the focus of the original episode being re-aired, which includes a preliminary conversation from this year about clarifying particulars and eight years more experience of Nicole, Emily, and Liz.

"Then comes 3:45 when the children have an hour's work before tea—handicrafts, singing, painting, picture study are the type of lessons given at this time. Then comes tea, after which the children read and sew and have some time to amuse themselves." ("The Work and Aims of the P.U.S.")

"That the claims of the schoolroom should not be allowed to encroach on the child's right to long hours daily for exercise and investigation." (Vol. 1, p. 177)

"Thus, the morning, after breakfast (the digestion of which lighter meal is not a severe task), is much the best time for lessons and every sort of mental work; if the whole afternoon cannot be spared for out-of-door recreation, that is the time for mechanical tasks such as needlework, drawing, practising; the children's wits are bright enough in the evening, but the drawback to evening work is, that the brain, once excited, is inclined to carry on its labours beyond bed-time, and dreams, wakefulness, and uneasy sleep attend the poor child who has been at work until the last minute. If the elder children must work in the evening, they should have at least one or two pleasant social hours before they go to bed; but, indeed, we owe it to the children to abolish evening 'preparation.'" (Vol. 1, p. 23)

"Five of the thirteen waking hours should be at the disposal of the children; three, at least, of these, from two o'clock to five, for example, should be spent out of doors in all but very bad weather. This is the opportunity for out-of-door work, collecting wild flowers, describing walks and views, etc. (see Home Education). Brisk work and ample leisure and freedom should be the rule of the Home School. The Children's Day will, on the whole, run this: Lessons, 1 1/2 to 4 hours; meals, 2 hours; occupations, 1 to 3 hours; leisure, 5 to 7 hours, according to age. The work not done in its own time should be left undone. Children should not be embarrassed with arrears, and they should have dues sense of the importance of time, and that there is no other time for work not done in its own time. Should the children flag at any time, a day's holiday, a little country excursion, should refresh them." (From Suggestions which accompanied the PNEU Programmes)

"[Referring to the afternoon occupations]...at any time of day, in any division of time, to suit family arrangements; when possible, out of doors." (From Suggestions which accompanied the PNEU Programmes)

 

If you would like to study along with us, here are some passages from The Home Education Series and other Parent's Review articles that would be helpful for this episode's topic. You may also read the series online here, or get the free Kindle version from Fisher Academy.

Home Education, Part II: Out of Door Life of Children

The Secret World of Weather, Tristan Gooley


Episode 217: The Work and Aims of the P.U.S.

The Parents' Educational Course Reading List

List of Afternoon Occupations

Mar 17, 2023

What do it look like do use the Charlotte Mason Method with a group of students? Kelsi Rea joins the ADE ladies today to explain how she went about developing her Charlotte Mason school. Her enthusiasm is contagious and has led to her consulting with dozens of others with the desire to open schools, as well as co-ops.

Charlotte Mason In Community

Kelsi Rea's Website

Emily's succinct description of Charlotte Mason's Method (to get you started coming up with yours)

Heritage Christian Academy

Mar 3, 2023

Charlotte Mason firmly believed that novels are our greatest teachers, hence why she included them as a major serving in the feast that nourishes our children's education. This episode was recorded live at the ADE At Home conference, February 3, 2023, with Nicole, Emily, and Liz leading a discussion with attendees who had read the book and come to contribute what they had been taught by Elizabeth Goudge's novel The Scent of Water. If you have read the book, you will revel in the myriad messages this book conveyed to us all, and if you have not, you will be inspired to read it.

The Scent of Water, Elizabeth Goudge

Awaken: Living Books Conference, July 21-22, 2023, Traverse City, MI

Feb 17, 2023

For this installment of our ongoing series, CM in Your Community, we are focusing on all the materials available for CM lessons! Mathematics was not a subject Charlotte Mason spoke about a lot, but it was essential, and she thought it beautiful. If you need help in leading your student through upper level math, today's Charlotte Mason in Community interview with Tabitha Wirges and Julie Ryle will prove to be a tremendous encouragement. Listen to two very experienced homeschool moms walk through the mountainous land of algebra and geometry and their contribution toward making this a less daunting task.

For the Children's Sake, Susan Schaeffer Macaulay

A Charlotte Mason Companion, Karen Andreola

A Charlotte Mason Education, Catherine Levison

Climbing Higher Math

Living Literature Courses

Bestowing the Brush Art Lessons

Swedish Drill Teacher Help

Beauty & Truth Math

Sabbath Mood Homeschool Science Guides

Grammar Lessons from Liz Cottrill

Picture Study Portfolios

Poetry Scansion Lessons

Geography Map Questions for Form I, Form 2, Upper Forms

ADE's Teacher Helps for Lessons

Feb 3, 2023

Charlotte Mason's method is relevant for every kind of child, which this week's episode verifies. Over two years ago, the ADE ladies were interviewed by Beth Corcoran on her Flamingo Feathers podcast, which focuses on education for children with special needs. Beth has graciously allowed us to post that episode for our listeners, of interest not only to parents with special needs children, but will especially inspire anyone by her introduction that describes how the ADE episode of 2020 has subsequently changed her family's life.

Jan 20, 2023

Narration, attention, habits: Charlotte Mason knew they were natural to a child and work together. The ADE ladies welcome Annette Dionisio to the podcast, a mom who has diligently employed the art of narration in all areas of life with her children. Beyond the books, narration is key to our personhood and Annette has found it key to parenting. Enjoy this episode of "Voices from the Conference" as Annette presented two. lessons with her children and caught the attention of our 2022 attendees with her masterful use of a child's natural gift of narration.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next » 12