Over the last few weeks (and months) we have been attempting to take a close look at education, especially as it pertains to homeschooling. We have been doing this in an attempt to educate ourselves as mommies so we can make better choices for the next year of homeschooling.
We have gone over Charlotte Mason’s ideas, as well as those of Ruth Beechick, Raymond Moore, John Taylor Gatto, and John Holt.
Then we talked about the trend of homeschooling towards Classical Education, and I suggested there is something superior:
American Education as intended by our founding fathers.
As we continue our discussion today, I would like to talk about one of the fundamental aspects of American Education:
the one-room schoolhouse.
As we look at one-room schoolhouses, we can’t forget that when they were the norm we experienced a much higher literacy rate than we do today. However, those who wanted to gain control of the population via compulsory government education were successful at painting them in a dark light. They were described as being backwards and “unscientific.”
Eventually these places of genius were replaced by the factory models we must endure today, with dire results.
(There is actually a modern push to get back to the one-room model.)
So, what made one-room schoolhouses so great? They were the product of a God-fearing, freedom-loving culture.
Our founders were looking to build that city on the hill; one in which everyone was free; not free FROM God, but free to seek God without being hampered by the particulars of specific sects (denominations and inclinations of man).
Now, these founders were not perfect men, as is true of all of us. I like to quote Patsy Clairmont, who said, “God uses cracked pots and I’m the visual aid.”
Biblically speaking, except for Jesus Himself, God never used a perfect person as an example, because there weren’t any perfect people. Abraham lied and put his wife in jeopardy (twice) to save his own skin, yet God called Abraham His friend.
King David committed adultery and murder, but God called him a “man after His own heart.”
Accordingly, our founding fathers were sinful people. If we look closely enough, we are obviously going to find some flaws. But these flaws are miniscule compared to the overall character of these gentlemen (and their wives).
And there is something I would like to clear up before we go any further:
The seeds of the abolishment of slavery were being planted from the beginning of our nation, even before we drafted the Declaration of Independence.
In fact, in the draft of that amazing document, Thomas Jefferson wrote this:
He [King George] has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the Christian King of Great Britain. Determined to keep open a market where Men should be bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce. And that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, by murdering the people on whom he has obtruded them: thus paying off former crimes committed again the Liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another.
The next question is: Why were these words not included?
And here is a gist of the reason:
These men were attempting to secede from one of the most powerful monarchies in the world at that time. They could not afford any show of weakness, and so decided every portion of their declaration had to be ratified unanimously, so that there was no room for division.
It is important to note that 11 out of the 13 colonies supported Jefferson’s original wording. This is huge. Almost all of the people in America were not at all pleased with the slave trade. Only TWO colonies dissented, but two were enough.
There is so much more I could say on this subject, but I want to move on. If you are interested in learning more, be sure and check out:
Wallbuilders.com (especially their book, The Jefferson Lies)
Now, back to the one room schoolhouse idea:
What was the original intent of our founding fathers?
In order to understand this, I think we must compare and contrast.
Today’s schools are about more than academics. They are attempting to become the center of society.
For instance, modern public education includes feeding programs that go far beyond lunch. Children are also fed breakfast, snacks, even given a summer snap benefit to offset the loss of free food during the day at school.
In the school building are psychological counselors and health professionals who can refer students to more invasive health care, often without parental knowledge or consent.
The scope and sequence of the curriculum includes the treatment of the child’s psyche, as well as other cultural and social concerns (including sexual education and orientation counseling). Even when I was in school in the 60’s and 70’s we were using materials that taught us it was OK to be angry with our parents and how to deal with that anger, a movie series from Disney which taught a relative understanding of how to treat people in a group, and Eastern meditation for gym class.
At the beginning of America, schools were much different affairs.
Family and church were the cultural centers. This is where “matters of the heart” were dealt with and charity for the poor and unfortunate were addressed. It was the parents who oversaw the health of their children, not the school.
The school was not responsible to feed the children, either. Each brought a “lunch pail” from home, and these pails were deposited on a shelf in the coat room of the school each morning.
Teachers were hired by the locality to serve the needs and desires of that locality. They were directly answerable to the people who hired them, and as such were not just one more extension of the arm of government. The free people of America would not have tolerated such a violation.
I hope you remember the Four Elements of education success:
- Gaining favor with God and man.
- The tools of learning.
- Content.
- Life application.
Let’s look at them in light of American Education as it was practiced at our inception as a nation:
- Numbers one and four were taken care of outside the walls of the school. Children were taught to live righteous lives and do practical things via their daily existence, their families, and the church. The school was not primarily interested in teaching these things, but it was supportive of the other realms where children learned them.
- Schools were primarily interested in teaching the tools of learning and then giving the children some content to bolster the learning tools and give them context and enjoyment. This is why the school day was shorter and children did not need to spend as many months in schooling each year.
How does this apply to homeschooling?
Let’s look at each element more closely with this information in mind.
For one thing, this frees us from trying to fit everything our children need to know into “school time” each day. It also frees us from having to have a curriculum or program for each facet of our child’s education.
Here is what I mean.
As for number one, gaining favor with God and man, there are many ways to go about it outside of a narrow band of time in the day.
- Family devotions
- Private devotions
- Discussion throughout the day
- Fellowshipping with other believers (Church, Bible study, etc.)
As for number four, life application, it could look like this:
- Practical, everyday living, such as doing chores around the house, growing food for the family, shopping, going on errands, taking care of family pets, and helping maintain and repair home systems and machines.
- Pursuing interests and hobbies, such as playing a musical instrument, enjoying handicrafts (such as knitting, woodworking, etc.) or doing some collecting of rocks, antique books and the like.
Then that leaves us with numbers two and three. These are the areas we can then concentrate on when we have the attention of our children to “do school.” Instead of trying to cram everything into a few hours a day (and then making those few hours into a bunch of hours), we can concentrate on the basics and then allow the rest of the day to be in pursuit of the other portions of education.
And we can even narrow things down more. In times when time and energy are short (such as when there is illness, moving and the like), we can concentrate on number two, the tools of learning, each day and allow content to be added in when possible.
What this does is keeps our children grounded and gives them the tools so they can then go on to teach themselves the rest.
(My favorite term for this is “autodidact” or, “self-teach.”)
Of course, in practice all these areas overlap each other. You have to practice godly character in school, while doing work, or when you are enjoying a hobby, and content is filled in just about all of the time, with the basic tools of learning being used and honed in just about every area of the Four elements.
But our job is to come up with a plan for elements two and three. This is where American Education materials, along with the ideas of Charlotte Mason, Ruth Beechick and the others come into play.
And here is another thing to keep in mind: Originally, American education was not meant to take nine months, five days a week, eight hours a day. Often, school started at nine and let out at two or three in the afternoon. This often only lasted during the coldest parts of winter, just before the spring.
In fact, the first compulsory schooling laws only required a short time of schooling each year, otherwise they would not have passed at all. Parents at that time did not appreciate the government telling families what to do with their children. It was an attempt to sneak in a total takeover of education. As time went on, the months required were increased, until we have the nine month school year of today.
When you think of it, conventional schooling wastes so much time. This is due to many factors, none of them according to nature or common sense. So much of the day is spent doing non-education things; so much brain space is taken up by empty information. This is why we think learning basic math takes 72 months (that’s over eight years, nine months each year). To illustrate, let me give you a visual example.
If you can’t see what I am holding, it is Wentworth’s Complete Arithmetic. This book is about the size of a half sheet of paper, and it is less than an inch thick. It is not impressive or colorful—you could even say it is a bit drab.
Believe it or not, this little book covers everything a person would need to know to move from counting and basic addition all the way through business math—or, from kindergarten through sixth grade.
Crazy, right?
What if I told you there was a modern experiment in which children were taken from barely counting through the entire book in only 20 hours of teacher contact? This didn’t happen in the distant past, it happened in the modern present at Sudbury School.
And here is something else to consider: My children who used the McGuffey readers with copywork, narration, and dictation all became excellent writers and communicators with very little extra help.
And, except for those I was teaching to read, each child completed the lessons without constant help or supervision. The results were so gradual they seemed effortless, and so amazing they were almost miraculous.
Of course, I did add in some grammar, handwriting, etc., but even these were gradual and almost effortless. I also gave them some modern input concerning money, measurement, science, etc.
We also had some read-aloud and discussion time daily, which actually comprised a lot of their education. These times whet their appetites so that they went on to read and explore on their own, meaning they self-taught a great portion of their understanding of the world and its politics.
Yes, there are probably lists upon lists of all the things children “should” know about history, geography, and the like, but these things are so fascinating that they become more recreation than “schooling.”
Oh, and there are so many ways to plan and schedule everything.
For instance, you could spend a few weeks concentrating wholly on the tools of learning, then spend a few weeks concentrating on content (via unit studies), or handicraft, or traveling…
(I would recommend you keep math going steadily through it all, though.)
Or, you could take a short stint where you turn your kids loose and practice “autodidacting.” This is where you have a routine of personal hygiene, chores and meals, but the learning is up to the children. Then you can get back to the basics, but this gives everyone a breather and time to put elements two and three into practice (which really sinks them in).
During these times we met daily for Bible and a read aloud, then the children went bike riding, rock-hounding, frog-catching, Lego-building, dress-making, muffin-baking, and on and on…and this was not only in the summer months, but the winter months as well.
I hope I am helping you see that you really can find a way to spend the afternoon in a field of daisies sipping on tea and reading aloud to your children.
One thing to keep in mind:
Bible and basics are your priority.
Don’t be tempted to go off into the weeds of making everything “special.” Schools and school-like programs have to put “sugar” on top of everything because factory learning is as bland as mayo on white bread, but this is because all the nutrition has been stripped from it.
But the Bible and the basics, when kept as close as possible to their original forms, are so rich and delicious they need no embellishment.
I hope you are not disappointed that I have not shared the particulars of how to find American Education materials, but I thought it was important to paint a picture of how everything works before we start accumulating more stuff.
Meanwhile, I will point you to a few resources so you can begin to familiarize yourself:
- Mott Media. This is the company that has reproduced the original McGuffey readers and the Ray’s Arithmetics, along with Spencerian penmanship and the like.
- Wallbuilders.com is a wonderful place to find out about the founders of the United States in their own words.
- DIY Homeschooler is a great site to start mining for ideas.
- Freedom Homeschooling includes links to vintage readers of all sorts.
Of course, my own website, MomDelights.com, is where I have deposited a lot of these ideas and links over the years. I hope you take advantage of the host of freebies and helps I have over there as well.
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