A Delectable Education Charlotte Mason Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Episode 50: Writing: Grammar and Composition Oct 19, 2016

Show notes

What are Charlotte Mason's thoughts on grammar and composition? Listen to this podcast to hear some of her rationale for these subjects, to dispel myths about the Charlotte Mason method and the subject of writing, as well as these moms' experience with teaching these technical and creative written skills. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "[G]rammar, being a study of words and not things, is by no means attractive to the child, nor should he be hurried into it." (Vol. 1, p. 295) "Children will probably be slow to receive this first lesson in abstract knowledge, and we must remember that knowledge in this sort is difficult and uncongenial. Their minds deal with the concrete and they have the singular faculty of being able to make concrete images out of the merest gossamer of a fairy tale." (Vol. 6, p. 210) "But a child cannot dream parts of speech, and any grown-up twaddle attempting to personify such abstractions offends a small person who with all his love of play and nonsense has a serious mind." (Vol. 6, p. 210) "Our business is to provide children with material in thier lessons, and leave the handling of such material to themselves...They should narrate in the first place, and they will compose, later, readily enough; but they should not be taught 'composition.'" (Vol. 1, p. 247) "It is not enough that a child should learn how to write, he must know what to write." (Vol. 6, p. 234) "In fact, lessons on 'composition' should follow the model of that famous essay on "Snakes in Ireland"––"There are none."" (Vol. 1, p. 247) "If we would believe it, composition is as natural as jumping and running to children who have been allowed due use of books." (Vol. 1, p. 247)

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 (Volume 1), Part V, XIII An Essay Towards a Philosophy of Education (Volume 6), Book I, Chapter 10, Section II: Knowledge of Man: Composition & Knowledge of Man: Grammar The Bedford Handbook The Elements of Style (Contains affiliate links)

Episode 49: Listener Q & A #9 Oct 14, 2016

Show notes

This episode marks the one year anniversary of this Charlotte Mason podcast. Over the past year, we have received dozens of questions from our listeners and this Q&A is exemplary of the requests we receive and our attempt to address widely varying topics, namely this week: where to find out-of-print living books, the relevance of Charlotte Mason today and the practice of "scaffolding" lessons.

Episode 48: Writing: Copywork, Dictation, and Written Narration Sep 30, 2016

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This podcast explores what Charlotte Mason had to say about the skill of writing. Why do the children need to write? What writing must they do? How can they be taught penmanship, spelling, punctuation, and style? Join us in working through this incremental and crucial school subject. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "I can only offer a few hints on the teaching of writing, though much might be said. First, let the child accomplish something perfectly in every lesson--a stroke, a pothook, a letter. Let the writing lesson be short; it should not last more than five or ten minutes. Ease in writing comes by practice; but that must be secured later. In the meantime, the thing to be avoided is the habit of careless work." (Vol. 1, pp. 233-34) "[T]here is no part of a child's work at school which some philosophic principle does not underlie." (Vol. 1, p. 240) "The gift of spelling depends upon the power the eye possesses to 'take' (in a photographic sense) a detailed picture of a word; and this is a power and habit which must be cultivated in children from the first." (Vol. 1, p. 241) 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 (Volume 1), Part V, Chapters X-XII Writing to Learn (Contains affiliate links) The New Handwriting

Episode 47: Interview with Leah Boden Sep 23, 2016

Show notes

This week's podcast illuminates the Charlotte Mason method as it is being practiced in its country of origin: The United Kingdom. Emily interviews, Leah Boden, who discovered Mason and has been implementing her method in her own life and, like us, is working to support and encourage home educators in the knowledge and practice of Charlotte Mason. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome Handbook of Nature Study Our Island Story Trial and Triumph (Contains affiliate links) Leah's Instagram Leah's Blog The Charlotte Mason Show Leah's Facebook Page Leah's Periscope Channel http://www.charlottemasonhelp.com/ Join the HomeschoolLibrary Yahoo Group if you'd like to learn more about starting a lending library!

Episode 46: Reading Sep 16, 2016

Show notes

This week's Charlotte Mason podcast focuses on the all-important task of teaching our children to read. No other subject holds such promise and so many anxieties for the teacher who embarks on teaching this fundamental skill. The ladies share their own experiences and what Mason had to say to help us in the reading lesson. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "But, as a matter of fact, few of us can recollect how or when we learned to read: for all we know it came by nature." (Vol. 1, p. 200) "Probably that vague whole which we call 'Education' offers no more difficult and repellent task than that to which every little child is set down--the task of learning to read. We realize the labor of it when some grown man makes a heroic effort to remedy shameful ignorance, but we forget how contrary to nature it is for a little child to occupy himself with dreary hieroglyphics--all so dreadfully alike!--when the world is teeming with interesting objects which he is agog to know." (Vol. 1, p. 214) "'What a snail's progress!' you are inclined to say. Not so slow, after all: a child will thus learn, without appreciable labour, from 2-3,000 words in the course of a year; in other words, he will learn to read, for the mastery of this number of words will carry him with comfort through most of the books that fall in his way. Now, compare this steady progress and constant interest and liveliness of such lessons with the deadly weariness of the ordinary reading lesson. The child blunders through a page or two in the dreary monotone without expression, with imperfect enunciation. He comes to a word he does not know, and he spells it; that throws no light on the subject, and he is told the word; he repeats it, but as he has made no mental effort to secure the word, the next time he meets with it the same process is gone through. The reading lesson for that day comes to an end. The pupil has been miserably bored, and has not acquired one new word. Eventually, he learns to read, somehow, by mere dint of repetition; but consider what an abuse of his intelligence is a system of teaching which makes him undergo daily labour with little or no result, and gives him a distaste for books before he has learned to use them." (Vol. 1, pp. 206-207) "We must remember the natural inertness of a child's mind; give him the habit of being read to, and he will steadily shirk the labour of reading for himself; indeed, we all like to be spoon-fed with our intellectual meat, or we should read and think more for ourselves and be less eager to run after lectures." (Vol. 1, p. 228) "He should have practice, too, in reading aloud [from the books] he is using for his term's work. These should include a good deal of poetry, to accustom him to the delicate rendering of shades of meaning, and especially to make him aware that words are beautiful in themselves, that they are a source of pleasure, and are worthy of our honour; and that a beautiful word deserves to be beautifully said, with a certain roundness of tone and precision of utterance." (Vol. 1, p. 227) "The attention of his teachers should be fixed on two points--that he acquires the habit of reading, and that he does not fall into slipshod habits of reading." (Vol. 1, p. 226) 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, pp. 199-222) Better Late Than Early, Raymond Moore Reading-Literature Series Thirty Million Words, Dana Suskind (Contains affiliate links) Montessori Small Moveable Alphabet Reading-Literature series on MainLesson.com

Episode 45: Listener Q&A #8 Sep 09, 2016

Show notes

This week's podcast episode on the Charlotte Mason method of education--the delectable education--is a question and answer session. Listen to this lively, animated, and slightly controversial discussion of short lessons, nature study, free time, and Bible lessons. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "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." (From "Suggestions" accompanying Programme 42) "The Children's Day will, on the whole, run thus: Lessons, 1 1/2 to 4 hours; meals, 2 hours; occupations, 1 to 3 hours; leisure, 5 to 7 hours, according to age." (From "Suggestions" accompanying Programme 42) "Children between 6 and 9 should get a considerable knowledge of the Bible text. By 9 they should have read the simple (and suitable) narrative portions of the Old Testament...and [the Synoptic] Gospels." (Vol. 1, p. 249) The Laws Guide to Nature Drawing and Journaling (Contains affiliate links) Episode 20: Nature Study Episode 22: Interview with Cheri Struble John Muir Laws' Website Episode 41: Interview with Jack Laws, Part 1 Episode 42: Interview with Jack Laws, Part 2 Episode 17: Bible, The Living Book Living Books Library post on Electronics Parents' Review Article: Imagination is a Powerful Factor in a Well-Balanced Mind A Delectable Education's Schedule Cards

Episode 44: Language Acquisition Sep 02, 2016

Show notes

This week's Charlotte Mason podcast focuses on language. Mason's method was based on a child's nature, and this is most apparent in observing how her method runs along the line of a child's natural acquisition of language skills. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "Many persons consider that to learn to read a language so full of anomalies and difficulties as our own is a task which should not be imposed too soon on the childish mind. But, as a matter of fact, few of us can recollect how or when we learned to read: for all we know it came by nature." (Vol. 1, p. 200) Thirty Million Words, Dana Suskind (Contains affiliate links) The Teaching of Mathematics: The Story of An Experiment

Episode 43: Listener Q&A #7 Aug 01, 2016

Show notes

This week's Charlotte Mason podcast is another Q&A session with Emily, Nicole, and Liz. It is inevitable, as we implement the feast, that questions of presentation and content arise about details not mentioned in the designated episodes on those subjects, and here are some of the latest ones. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "Never be within doors when you can rightly be without>" (Vol. 1, p. 42) "There is no selection of subjects, passages, or episodes on the ground of interest." (Vol. 6, p. 244) Anne White's Plutarch Books can be found here (Contains affiliate links) Nancy Kelly on Plutarch Anne White's Study Guides free online Overdrive Media Console

Episode 42: Interview with John Muir Laws, Part II Jul 29, 2016

Show notes

Charlotte Mason knew nature study is critical to the good life and fundamental to education. This week's podcast is the second interview with contemporary naturalist John Muir Laws (Jack) in which he inspires, encourages, and explains to us not only what to do when we go outside, along with many how-to practices we can implement to make the most of that nature study, but how we can change our motivation and focus to experience a rich and rewarding relationship with nature. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome Last Child in the Woods, Richard Louv The Nature Principle, Richard Louv The Laws Guide to Nature Drawing and Journaling, John Muir Laws (Contains affiliate links) Jack Laws' Website Jack Laws' Nature Journal Suggested Supplies List Nature Journaling Club Curriculum Jack's Blog Post on his favorite blue pencil CMPeoria "The Field Before Us" Regional Retreat

Episode 41: Interview with John Muir Laws Jul 22, 2016

Show notes

This Charlotte Mason podcast episode is an interview with John Muir Laws (Jack), inspiring naturalist and scientist. Join Nicole to hear how expertise and aptitude are not key to making strides in discovering the world of nature and science, but that, as Mason asserts, curiosity and willingness to explore are. If you as mother and teacher, or your child as student, are intimidated by the field of science, this interview will set you free to thoroughly partake of this part of the educational feast, and if you are intrigued with the field of science, make you aware of how much more you can enjoy it. Listen Now: If you are seeing this message, please make sure you are using the most current version of your web browser: Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Chrome "Marks, prizes, places, rewards, punishments, praise, blame, or other inducements are not necessary to secure attention, which is voluntary, immediate and surprisingly perfect." (Vol. 6, p. 7) "Let them get at the books themselves, and do not let them be flooded with a warm diluent at the lips of their teacher. The teacher's business is to indicate, stimulate, direct and constrain to the acquirement of knowledge, but by no means to be the fountain-head and source of all knowledge in his or her own person. The less parents and teachers talk-in and expound their rations of knowledge and thought to the children they are educating, the better for the children." (Vol. 3, p. 162) John Muir Laws' Website A Curiosity Framework

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