Why Your Child Thinks Reading Is Boring—And How to Make It Magical | Charlotte Mason Episode

with families who home school? - A culture of delight and wonder,

“there is so much to know, there's so much to do”

that life feels always too short.

I think it's so often for me in school, it was how can I get the VA in the fastest way possible doing the least amount of work, totally. And what is the point of that? And instead it's that every day can matter

and be one of interest and ideas. Even though Mason says that children are born with imagination or the ability to reason the love of knowledge that those things can be stamped out over time. And I think we do have a generation

that is primed to potentially have lost their love of knowledge. - In my family, my husband and I, we knew from the beginning that we wanted children with bright eyes. They have interest and they're very interesting.

And you don't need traditional schooling to do that. (upbeat music)

- Education in America was never supposed to feel like this.

“Somewhere along the way, it stopped forming thinkers”

and started manufacturing compliant, screened Heather Kidd's train to sit still, perform on cue and stay distracted, while curiosity, wonder, and self-governance quietly fade. Reading, once the gateway to imagination and thought,

has become a chore so many kids actively hate. And the data backs it up, roughly two thirds of American public school students are not reading at grade level proficiency. Parents sense it every day.

Even if they can't yet put words to what feels so deeply off, they know something isn't right with school. Today, I'm excited to introduce you to Amy Snell and Celeste Cruz from the Charlotte Mason Educational Center,

two women who have spent decades living, studying, and applying an entirely different vision for education. Amy is the academic director of the Charlotte Mason Educational Center and has been immersed in the Charlotte Mason Movement

for nearly 20 years, homeschooling her own five children, including two graduates, while guiding families around the world. Celeste, on the other hand, is the executive director of the Charlotte Mason Educational Center, a mother of 11, and has spent over two decades

translating Charlotte Mason's philosophy into a real, livable education for modern families. In this conversation, we get into why less school can actually produce better results, how habits, not behavior charts, shape a child's character,

and why every form of education is forming values whether it admits it or not. We talk screens, boredom, nature, what a living book is, ADHD, teens who already hate school, how single parents can homeschool, and the fear every mom has

that, well, I just can't homeschool because I'm not qualified. If you've ever felt pulled toward homeschooling, but felt overwhelmed when you try to think about how to get started, this conversation will give you language clarity in a picture of what education rooted in truth, beauty,

and goodness can actually look like. Watch this episode on the real Alex Clark YouTube channel or culture of how to carry on Spotify. They've got video too. Make sure to leave us a five star review

to tell everybody what sort of education style your family uses. You can continue the discussion in the Cute Servatives Facebook group. Please welcome Amy Snel and Celeste Cruz from the Charlotte Mason Educational Center to culture-apothe the character.

What is the Charlotte Mason Educational Center? - The Charlotte Mason Educational Center is a nonprofit that joins to support homeschooling parents in being able to educate their children for a way of life.

We try to focus on our curriculum, but then really providing formation, resources, community because it's a hard thing to educate your kids at home. It's a hard thing to raise children. And we feel that we're better when we do it together.

“What is modern American education getting wrong about children?”

Charlotte Mason's first principle is that children are persons

and it seems like an obvious thing, but right now when we see that children are really suffering in so many ways, they have anxiety, depression. They're lack friendships. They feel pressured and anxiety that we think

that there is a better approach to giving them an education for a full life. - And what are each of your jobs at the Charlotte Mason Educational Center? - So I'm the executive director

and we lead a team of homeschooling mothers, consultants, other educators to offer events, as well as you create our resources and curriculum. - Hi, I'm the academic director.

and choose books, but then really deciding

what our content will be for our mother's education course. What themes do we think this year would be good for our community planning out the content for our retreats, all of those sorts of things? Do you think that we are getting to a point

where college is really overrated? - Yeah, I think that it's important for parents to consider the child that they have in front of them. And what are their gifts? What are they meant to do in the world?

“And where is the best way for them to move forward on that path?”

And to not think in such a monolithic way about that these are the steps for a happy life. And then I think the homeschooling movement really has been to question a lot about education and schools and colleges as well.

- I think Mason has a unique offering for us

when it comes to thinking about a child's path in life. I think starting with this idea of children born persons, she has this dual conception, which is that children are really called to as a person, as a human.

They have God-given gifts and facility. They come to us with imagination. They come to us with ability to reason. They come to us with a love of knowledge, a desire for knowledge, which I think,

modern education doesn't believe that anymore. These are all things that the child comes fully prepared into the world with, just by nature being a person. And yet, on the other hand,

“they also are a person in the sense of being an individual.”

So they also have unique gifts and callings, unique interests that they take the education that might be standard given to them and do different things with it. And so when we think about their future life,

we hold those two things in common as well, that we know that we're not trying to put out cookie cutter children, right? That a method of education should respect that. Yes, we want to give them a broad curriculum

that suits all children, and yet we also want to let them engage with it in an individual way. And so what that provides then is that we have students in our program, some do go to Onto College and do all kinds of interesting things,

and take it in a variety of directions. And even though it is a curriculum that is heavy on the humanities, it also includes science and math and a lot of hands-on work, handicrafts, and it really suits children for whatever they would like to do.

And so we have people majoring in all kinds of different subjects but then we also have families with students that go into the military, that go into the trades, that choose a different life at one home school their own children, and being open to that idea

as parents can sometimes be hard in our culture, just because it is this message that, you know, the path to success is college. Right.

“And I think for some children, that's going to be true.”

And then for other children, that isn't true, that there are lots of different options now. I mean, the educational landscape has changed so much. Yes. Even in the upper years, and that's a great thing

for children and for families. So does the Charlotte Mason curriculum go k through 12? Or is it just little years? Yes, I think that. We really want to help family see that this is something

you can start with and go all the way through. And really what she was doing in the later years is even more exciting to us in many ways that there is this sense that in the morning hours is what we recommend that they have,

like a dedicated study, walking through their subjects, but then the afternoon is for what Mason called occupations and that the things that they want to do and spend time finding meaning in that they get to pursue that.

And so it's neat to see, and we both always say,

in our families, we basically are working through and they've read the same books and used the same math curriculum and yet then because we have this shared connection of our family life. But on the other hand, then they have each one is so unique

and they're going in very different paths. I would have loved that when I was in high school, the time to kind of focus on occupation. What I ended up doing was I had a couple of spots open where I could have electives and I chose the same elective

and guess what I chose. I did multiple radio TV classes. That's what I was doing. And then this is what I do for a living. So I am one of those people that knew to very young age

in a roundabout way what I wanted to do. It's funny because I thought I was going to pursue a career in a different form of media. I thought it was going to be written media in fashion journalism. But I knew that broadcasting all that was very interesting

to me and I liked it. So I ended up years later kind of honing that in and realizing that this is the path that I wanted to take.

And so yeah, I did dedicate my afternoons basically to an occupation. I found interesting.

“A lot of parents I think do believe that something is off”

with their kid school, but they can't necessarily name it. And when they think about pulling them out for an alternative form of education, they just feel really overwhelmed. It seems super scary. They're like, what if I mess my kid up?

What if they don't learn as well? If I take them out of the public school setting or a traditional even private school setting. And so they end up staying. But what is the risk for those kids you think

to stay in a traditional form of education? Now, there could be pros and cons. But how would you weigh that out?

I think that we always want to look to see is our family flourishing

where are they thriving? And to start to consider are there other ways of doing this? When you see a child that the pressure is too much, the friendships, those kind of the peer pressure, things like that are not going well.

And my family, my husband and I, we talk about like, we knew from the beginning that we wanted children with bright eyes. And that is looking for that spark in our children.

“And that's what we know that they then have this.”

They have interest and they're very interesting. And that is what we want to foster. And you don't need traditional schooling to do that. That is the moral of the story of this episode. We want to raise kids who are not only interesting,

but they are interested. I love that. You know, I think that even though Mason says that children are born with, like I said, imagination, or the ability to reason the love of knowledge,

that those things can be stamped out over time. That they're like habits in that, if, you know, for lack of use, they get weaker. And I think we do have a generation that is primed to potentially have lost their love of knowledge, right?

And so in the classroom, different things get substituted in for the love of knowledge in a traditional classroom. So, for example, we'd say, like, prize, place, power. There's other motivations that a teacher then is forced

basically to substitute because the child's love of knowledge

hasn't been nurtured and allowed to help them to grow. So I think that is a danger. Children can, in that environment, still live a full life. And, you know, grow, go on to do great things. Sure.

But hopefully it's not. And I was like, help us go to my child. I love us, we're, we're public schools. But I think, hopefully it's not in spite of their education. Yeah, that they become what they are, right?

Like, we hope that their education helps them to become what they are. And I think a lot of times the stories that we hear when we think of ourselves, we can think of ways that, in spite of our education, we retained our interest in X, Y, or Z, you know, in radio and film, or in English, for myself, that, that isn't what we hope for our children.

That's not the ideal. And we really are about, yes, being real, but also pursuing ideals.

“Like, I think that's an important thing for us not to lose sight of.”

I think there are a lot of conservative Christian families who are a little bit in denial. They're like, you know, what is the big deal of public school? It's just academics.

And the reality is that every education type is forming values,

whether they admit it openly or not, would you agree or disagree? I think definitely from the books we choose to what we do with them, the conversations that are directed around them, all of that is part of the formation of character of the person. And so I think in the last few years, more families are getting a sense

of what's happening in the classroom. But we think that all parents are the primary educators of their children. This is this God-given thing of what it means to be a parent. And we should be actively involved in that. And so we, you know, hope that we can encourage families

whether their kids are in school or your home schooling. That's the role we want to take. That's really led us to start the show. It makes an educational center so we could support families in trying to do that.

If we think about schools sort of being compartmentalized and that it doesn't necessarily have an effect on our children, we have to look at how we think character actually is formed then. And I think that Mason has this line where she says education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life.

So meaning that we are educated by that, misfear that we are in. And that would be kind of like the environment, not aesthetically, but the thought environment, the ideas that surround us.

We're also educated by our habits. So the things that we do every day and the habits that are set up in the classroom and the were educated by the ideas that are presented to us and so among those three things really helps to form our character. Now some of the time that the child spends will be at home.

And so they will have that atmosphere and discipline and life.

are also or any other situation which we put our children.

We'll go toward their formation. Like it's something you can't escape as what she would say that it is atmosphere to discipline and life. That's just the way education works. And so we can work with that or we can work like we can sort of fight against that.

And working with that would then be how do I set up an atmosphere that best supports my child's growth and the values that we want to cultivate with them? How do I set up habits for our family that lead them in that direction? And what sort of ideas do I want them engaging with? Those kinds of questions like Amy said it doesn't matter whether your children are in school

“or not, you should always be asking those.”

And then you can decide like how what answer makes sense for your family. And we really do find that homeschooling allows so many opportunities in that vein. Speaking of habits, what habits in the current school system unintentionally are being trained into kids?

Charlotte Mason says that the most important intellectual habit is the habit of attention.

And that is we think through the methods that are being used, the pace of the day, the pace of what the reading materials that that is just something that we are losing across age groups that we can't attend to what is in front of us and that has such a huge effect in our lives. What is wrong with the current pace of a school day in a average public school in America? Those wrong in both directions.

And on the one hand, we think that the children can be forced to be too long in a subject because we have to have this factory model and that Mason actually recommends short lessons that alternate in, you know, from like reading a book to doing hands-on work, to going to a science lesson, then back to a history lesson. And that alternation in short doses means that you can actually accomplish a lot in a school day.

But then, children need a lot of time to choose play when they're little, to be outside, to have a time for imagination, art, handicrafts, and have a longer periods of time for that.

“And so that's what homeschooling allows.”

We try to really help moms find a good schedule that will work for a family that has lots of kids and everybody needs to do math, everybody has to do their child's tours, all of those kinds of things. Is boredom in childhood and enemy or a gift? I think that unstructured time is a gift. Now, whether that naturally leads to boredom or not, I think it depends on the child.

So for a child who is used to stretches of unstructured time that then they are at liberty to fill, they find themselves rarely bored, that it is something that they are used to having. Like, boredom is something that tends to be cultivated through giving, you know, children, activities that are not age appropriate. And then the mind wanders, like Amy was saying, "When your tension is not at its full."

“So in that way, I think that it's like, you know, how they say children that are bored or boring.”

Yes, I say that. It goes with Amy's description before. If you have interests, you're interesting. I think they go together. And so I don't, you know, it's like boredom. I think I don't find bored children very often in my home. Like, they have a lot of the things that they do. Do you have parents that transition over from a traditional school setting into homeschool Charlotte Mason and they're really worried about unstructured time? How do you advise them on how to

let go of being like, "My kid isn't scheduled to do something every hour?"

Yeah, it can be hard to see at first. And that just be willing to take the time to let

that there's things going on inside that you can't see. And that at first, it might seem like what is there's nothing happening here. When is my child going to have that spark again? When are they going to, you know, I thought what they would start to love reading and choose activities. But if we have been in this like constant entertainment, constant way of making school flashy and, you know, especially if they're using two computer-based of learning and

and things like that, that there is kind of this deprogramming that has to happen and to make space for that. How much of an issue are screens in an educational setting? Because most schools now are implementing screen use throughout their day-to-day. It's a shocking thing when there is so little

tools that really can help us in life to have technology. Our families aren't like completely, you know, without tech. But on the other hand, to say that that's going to be our mode to go through life and learning. We want our children to have real books, real things to study from, you know, for science to be doing hands-on work and they're dissecting things in high school, but we're outside and observing insects and trees for science. That is way more valuable for the child's soul

for their ability to observe and attend. But then also, you just see, they're happy and they flourish and that a screen cannot give in the same way. Okay, this makes me laugh. I get a lot of hate online trolls, you know, people offended by my political views or whatever you name it. And they're go to

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“for 20% off your first purchase at gogevity.com. Does nature help kids learn math?”

Charlotte Mason says that nature is the best teacher for the young child. That nature can kind of give this whatever the next step they need. I've run a nature club for kids on Friday afternoons for over a decade. And it's so neat to see children out and having these discoveries,

these amazing moments with a bird or a grasshopper. It helps the children develop open eyes.

And Mason talks about the child, Mr. Eyes, and Mr. No Eyes. And this idea that we can go through life without eyes to see the things right around us. And I really related to that because as a child, I didn't really have any experience with nature. And really could probably say like a crow and a seagull and it was very limited. And was amazed that once I started adventuring with my children, all the things that were out there. And it's one of those that you realize, oh well they were

there all along. I just didn't have the eyes to see them right like when you're primed for something. All of a sudden your experience is so much richer. And the more that you do it, the more you see. And so I find that living in suburbia, you don't have to go out to the county parks, the fields,

the state beaches, and to be able to see amazing things on a daily basis. And that's really,

you know, I think when you ask like, does nature teach math? I do think nature teaches a little bit of everything. Because the person who is primed to experience and appreciate nature to really

into every other subject that they take on. Whether that's history or it's math or it's art, that they are a better person for it. And that goes for the four-year-old child as much as

“for the 44-year-olds mother that I think that's I think so many moms in our nature clubs have said”

that for them it's transformational as well. That it's something that has helped them grow as much as their children. And that's really exciting to think, you know, later in life that you can still

be growing on a daily basis in ways you never expected that homeschooling would allow, right?

That wasn't the reason I homeschooled, but it's like one of the reasons I keep homeschooling. Yeah, and then each of the subjects, because we use the same method with the Mason approach, really do reinforce each other. So the children are, when they're doing nature study, they keep notebooks where they're recording their findings. And so they're classifying, they're keeping bird counts, all things that's not their math time. They still have math time. But in this hands-on

way, they really are doing a lot of math in nature time. But then there is this relationship rather than keeping everything so segmented like we do in our modern system. When you're doing Sure, let me say that. There's a lot of focus on books. So I have a question. Is it okay if those

“children are reading books on tablets or kindles, or does it have to be a physical book?”

We prefer physical books. I think that we always want to give the children the best we can give,

but there are times where families can't get access to particular books. When you're traveling, right now, you know, the less kids are on a road trip with their dad and when you're talking about, you know, the ability to have, you know, do you bring books along or not or use a kindle? I enjoy reading books on my tablet. I also enjoy reading physical books, but I do feel that they are different experiences. So that's one hundred percent. You feel like you're a Saudi book, right?

And so I don't think, you know, we can place value on one or the other, but really it's just kind of acknowledging that those are different ways of engaging with a book. And so for school time, the thing that I noticed when I read from a physical book is I have a different sense of context where I am in the book that gets a little lost when I'm reading on a tablet. And then like kind of the way that I, you might skim across words on a page on a tablet versus on a physical page

“turning the act of turning the page feels different. So I think acknowledging those differences and”

then thinking what makes the most sense for a school book and that might be a different answer that you would have for leisure book and you know there's different ways I think of engaging with books and it's not necessarily one or the other, but that we also prefer physical books for school.

For somebody who's never heard of Charlotte Mason, what problem with children or education

was she trying to solve? I think that at the time that she was writing, she was actually addressing a lot of different social issues that she saw. And surprisingly they are still issues today or maybe unsurprisingly. She talks about lots of different philosophies that were coming out in some of those were more child-led philosophies as well as you know the industrial revolution happening and the idea of factories and mechanization and what would that mean for education,

a standardization of different forms of learning. And those are all things still relevant to us today. I think she also talked a lot about parenting and talks about permissive parenting and as opposed to authoritarian parenting. And in each of these she definitely critiques one side or the other but in the end her solution is often a middle way. And so it's kind of goes back to that idea of what does it mean that a children is a person? Like, guess it means that they have unique things,

but it also means that they have certain needs and we have certain duties toward them. It's the same thing when she's looking at these social issues that there's like a middle way that she can offer that really gets to back to natural law, back to the heart of really Christian thought of what a conception of a person is about what would our goals, as parents, our goals for education. So I think that the things that she was responding to all of the, they were unique to her time,

both the solution and the ways she kind of comes to it are still relevant to ours. How does less school produce better results? Well, Mason says that she has a method whereby teachers teach less and children learn more and we really see that when we allow children to do their own that she calls it self-education that then they are able to retain this, not as information,

to a question that we ask ourselves. And so we want to have children who have bright minds that they're

asking questions, they have a sense of wonder and they want to pursue that and that really questions lead to more questions that we can go deeper in all of all subject areas. So I really feel like there is this chance that we have to rethink educational approaches and Mason has the answer for that she really thought through all the subjects that we teach and how we go about teaching them.

“And I think with a method like narration, for example, which is a method that she uses across all of”

the subjects and that it's a good example of how you can spend less time in the lesson and get more out of it. What do you mean, what does narration mean? So narration is kind of the art of telling back. And it's a way that the student takes in some material and that might be a reading from a book, but it could also be a picture that they're painting their studying or piece of music, something in art in nature from their observations. They take in that material and then they assimilate

it through having to tell it back in their own words or in their own way. And that could be drawn. It doesn't mean words. It could be drawings or lists or in the younger years acting out. The story they just heard, so you know, can even be drawn in and such. But that process sounds deceptively simple and yet and it is simple to implement and yet the mental work behind that process

is extremely involved, engaged, powerful, and what it allows the student to do is in a single

reading of a text to then walk away from that text with it part of them that they can recall it weeks later on in exam. And we know with our children as we'll be like years later, something comes out and we think I didn't know you remember King Alfred and the cakes from back in first grade or whatever. Which he thought is if you rely on a single reading, then you can save so much time in the school day. I think cramming, rereading again. Oh,

now we're going to outline it. Now we're going to read it again and really try to study it

“whatever that means with school books. That's how people use books in regular schools.”

And this is totally different. It says give your full attention, read a passage that you are able to attend to completely for the amount of time that you can and you narrate it back and that's all. You narrate, you put in your notebook, whatever form of narration takes and then you move on to the next passage. And so you can imagine the amount of progress you're able to make just from that kind of slow, simple work. It's a totally different way of approaching education than this like

revision revision go over it again, cram type of scenario that especially at the high school level.

Like even at the high school level students are doing this kind of work and it's amazingly powerful

mentally. What do people who are fans of other educational styles and curriculums say or pigeonhole Charlotte Mason to be that you disagree with? One, there's a misunderstanding that it's only for the early years and people stop there. They think that the children do play outside all day and have long hours of nature study, but that they don't get to do real science or look into

“actually what the academic program was. So that's why they really developing a good curriculum”

was so important to us. But then they don't understand when she says that she respects the personhood of the child that then she really does believe that the parent, the teacher, has an authority and what their role would be. I think that's a big one. Right, her idea of deputed authority, this idea that it isn't that we allow the children to just grow up along their own lines that we are given them as parents and have particular duties toward them and it is to help them build

the habits of a good life and to introduce them to wonderful ideas to create an environment where they can really thrive but also grow in their relationship with God, relationship with others. So that idea is our authority comes from our God-given role as the parents and so whenever we are helping our children to form good habits it's in such that the idea is we're not doing it for our own benefit, we're not doing it for our own whims of how we want our home to be but with this like keen sense

that the authorities given to us by God and that we also will answer to him about the ways that we have served our children well. So it is I think that that is something that people don't understand if they kind of think that she's more of a child-led that's common or like a free kind of

that people hear about her love of living books and then they came sometimes think that we teach

everything but through stories and that wasn't necessarily what Mason thought of a living book that definitely great classic stories are living books and we love classic stories and this children do have tales and literature all the way through from K to 12 in the early years too but there's also living science books there's living history books that are not historical fiction for example.

“What is that? This idea that there are living books and that's how children should learn?”

Well, I think it's easy when you look at a book that's not living to know, right? A textbook

where you have multiple writers then go through multiple editors and the the information is

pre-digested into these little soundbites that you can't really take in and have this understanding of and instead we would want to have this one single voice that is speaking from experience, from their knowledge, their passion and being able to then express that but you can then have a living book in science in math in history right as well as of course literature to really then be captivated by subjects that we thought were dry and boring and dead in school

a living book helps you to see the the living thought of of the author or the people from the past as real people that means that they were flawed, that they had things that were like us, that there were were ways though that they were exceptional too and and and so we really find that the Charlotte Mason student has a gratitude for life for the past and the sense that they have

“overall to play in the world around them and that their life has meaning and I think that comes”

through living books but then the living method then as our children are getting older and leaving the home to see then that they are going out trying to do something with their lives to help others and to make a difference. So what's an example of a living book for like a nine-year-old average nine-year-old? What would you recommend? We love to have the kids read fairy tales and myths when they are young and that really builds this imagination, a moral imagination of right and wrong

like rumble steel skin or Norse myth and myths or you know the stories that were real classics that even of American past like Pocohanis or something like those old folktales are you know so need to read and the tall tales so those would be in that kind of literature realm but also classic novels too that you would think of like you know Francis Hodgson Burnett or Norse street filled or C.S. Lewis or all of the kind of the classic children's authors that have these stories

that have lasted through the generations and I think a lot of times we do reach for older books because those are you know often time-tested and they speak to you know it's their universal and some way. So would Dr. Suce fit in for the really little kids or is that not kind like in Charlotte Mason like you guys like Dr. Suce or is that like too flimsy silly? I still think we have any Dr. Suce for on the program but we do think that there can be if a parent loves a book

they when they read that book they do make it living for the child that's good. I think if the test is if you don't like reading that book aloud you find it silly you find it boring you're not present to that when you're reading to the child that's a really good test that it is in something that is meaningful and we'd rather read there are so many books in the world why settle for you know something like that but there can be silly books with kids right it's not

that a living book it like that series is we have to always be serious and I think we also see that

books have appeal in different ways so for example like if I were to read Dr. Suce with my little ones it's really for the word play yeah and the rhymes and how creative that those can be it's not

“necessarily for the plot line and so that's the that's what the student would take from that then”

of like this ability to be fun with words I think books that have something unique to offer the child can serve a special function and so even if they aren't part of the program that there is you know this opportunity for this wide leisure reading but I think especially with the younger

that we want to make sure that we get to share with the kids you know like they're only

little so long except that the good picture book really indoors through the ages right and the

“older kids enjoy that too so I think that's another good test one of you or both of you have kids”

that have graduated high school now yes both of us okay so those kids I'm just curious for the teen years what have they said oh you know what book I loved that we read well like what in their teen years what have been some of the favorites my son really has gone with um not just he loves philosophy but then he also really is into reading um books about nature and trees and then like a we have a book on our program the the secret network of nature so he has this other whole

route um of his life that was a surprise that developed later and so was he wanting to do with his life right now he is a real mix so we'll see but he has like is into uh philosophy law and then this like kind of you know you know stewarding our land better approach as well so I don't be interesting to see what comes of that maybe like an environmental lawyer right yeah you know what about your

“kids have they said any favorite books for sure and I think it's really hard to choose especially”

when you get to the teen years and you've read so much good literature and and within the subject you know across the subjects and then they read so widely so that you have a kid that is like well you know in science I'm reading this and but I love this novel and this novelist they're really passionate about right but poetry right at the end of each term um I like to ask my children to choose their two favorite books from the term and kind of take a photo to document

their favorites from that year and it always surprises me what they pull out so you know my daughter

consistently for years in a row chose the Oxford History of the American people by Samuel Morrison which is like a college textbook I mean it's like this large but she loved that book and it was really Morrison's voice the and she likes history but it wasn't her historical fiction which she loved too but it was a different kind of love and but then I think she you know blue tarq is always a favorite and you would think what American teenager is going to choose blue tarq as a favorite book it's just

not a common um choice but I think that we see students at that age loving blue tarq loving their the Iliad or um Gerard Manley Hopkins poetry those are all favorites from my children um biology texts and they're not necessarily science minded but the the book like you're saying across subjects they do such wide reading that an individual book from an individual living voice comes a life for them and makes that subject one of their favorites and it isn't you know the next year that

subject might not be a favorite and they'll they've moved on to something else but the book remains with them all right listen up you think your AirPods are cute you think their harmless no they are tiny radio frequency transmitters glued to your skull constantly admitting radio frequency radiation zapping your neurons while they gossip with cell towers even when you're not on a caller listening to anything they're scanning, pinging and sending data it's like your own brain has Wi-Fi and that

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about math and science and history I mean how are your kids learning these other subjects especially math with the Charlotte Mason method Mason really thought that if the subject was taught in first

like this the way that the is true to that field then it would be living and you know we always say

in math so often the way it's being taught in elementary schools hasn't it looks nothing like what a math petition does and in all of the subjects where Mason really has the student you know reading the best living books in that subject but then also taking on doing the kind of work that would be done in that field the key thing like within math is that they are narrating it so not just answering problems like we would do you know in my math program we have your

30 question the teacher presents it then you do your 30 questions but can you actually at the end

“explain the concept and narrate that well it does I think explain why then they have this”

real assimilation of ideas it is something that we try to help families with at the CBC because it is true that when you get to high school all these subjects come up that feel really intimidating like you're like how am I going to get my lab credits to graduate this child and you know in math and such so we have a neat group of high school families but what we do offer is the support for them to for example implement labs at home so that we do have a great living and you know

biology book for example and then we have the resources for doing the dissections at home the video links to go with them if you need some additional support the same thing in physics the same thing in chemistry and that kind of support I think at the high school level you know in the early years you may feel like okay right I can handle this on my own I can I can teach someone how to you know add and subtract but then when you get to the upper years that support becomes really valuable

“at least for me so I think that that joining together with other families in a cooperative setting”

can help with a lot of those types of subjects when things feel intimidating to do it together and have one one mom sort of preparing that and it's interesting when we get together in groups and do community learning how people's experience starts to jump out and you didn't realize that your best friend was a biologist in her prior life or your other friend was you know top composers or was a piano teacher and now teaches composer study to your students not that that's necessary

but in the high school years it does give you some confidence and is in is like a unique opportunity for teens how is progress measured when your home's going this way another unique part of Mason's approach is that the students did do these term exams but they were very unique and the the the questions are set in every subject and it is actually a new learning opportunity the way that she asks the questions that we want a time at the end of every term

to shift back the material and pull it together in a different view than when you're working

“through it slowly through the semester and so I think then as the parent when you can see”

over the course of the year how things are brought together in each of these term exams it gives you a better understanding of actually what's happening then the ups and downs of every individual day a try to encourage parents to see is the most frustrating day is actually a lot of learning in the actual subject let alone their character and habits and all of that is actually still a very good day but but actually probably a lot of math knowledge is happening even though

they they don't get it their frustrated there might be tears that that we don't have to immediately think that this approach is bad or I need to you know maybe we should shift to finding some you know online program that makes this you know with videos and fun like we'll know like it's okay that there's frustration because that is also usually a point where

where we are learning and about to have a breakthrough so you know how can we take a posture to

along those lines but the progress for a Mason that Mason recommends is that we just see that

“they're working through their books and then it's up to the child what they're going to do with it”

and that that means that we don't give grades because we're not assessing from the outside how what they're doing according to some standard we think this is a beautiful program we're going to you know set up the habits of our timetable walk through these books together and that then I am offering you this education I know that you're taking it but it's up to the individual child what they do and so it does mean that the Mason approach works with children of all abilities

and interest personalities strengths then because of that one of the interesting things about

Mason's exams is that as opposed to traditional exams is that you can have two answers that are completely different and yet both are great work the questions are written in a way that allow the student to take an angle that meets their interest in the subject but also does pull from them sets up an expectation that they are assimilating the material and they do need to be able to express it at the end but in a way it's like open enough that they can take it in

a different direction so like I you know looking at exam answers side by side in our home on the same book with two children about the same age and seeing how it reflects their personality but also I'm looking for what did they get out of the material and how did they assimilate it what were they thinking when they were writing this and it's a more specific insight into them and I think that the Mason instead of giving marks grades they gave remarks so comments and I think

that is kind of indicative of the dynamic from between the teacher and student that it opens up an opportunity for conversation but I wouldn't say that it's completely free like in the high school years I think what we've set up is an expectation of good work and then in the day to day that can be very free then but the boundary kind of exists of that we've developed those habits we have

the atmosphere in place we've given them very rich texts and so they they rise to that it's amazing

how they rise to that I think that's it's like hard to believe sometimes just in our engagement with children today that that would be true and yet it is true like that we all rise to a challenge

“when we feel that like our best selves are being called forth and and that's what's happening”

every day in the Mason classroom that the children feel that and it's a confidence in them if there's a parent that's interested in switching over to a Charlotte Mason curriculum but they're convinced their child hates reading how do you advise them I think it's worth it to make the switch that the answer wouldn't be to stay in a place where they hate reading and that they aren't liking school we offer things in a way that we see across families

across the country across the decades centuries really with Mason families all over the world are finding a different path for learning and that children love books and they might like some kinds of books better than others some subjects better than others right it's there's there's differences of course but there's times where we're called to have real courage and to make a change and and to allow them the time for that the the seeds to be planted and to take root

before you're able to actually see this blossoming flower that doesn't mean that it isn't working what does it mean to focus on habits and not discipline or behavior charts when we focus on habits there is this piece that comes that we are setting up pathways to continue to grow and if we fail we know how to get back up and and go along the path and Mason uses this beautiful metaphor of that as parents we're laying down the rails and it will lead to the child to be able to have

these smooth and easy days to just be able to go along the rails of life but it can be hard work at the beginning of laying down the rails for us but it's really neat to see such capable kids that are able to take care of themselves know where to find the information they're looking for

“and and to have a confidence in themselves and I think it's unique that the habit of”

school time and the habits of home life are really one in the same in the Mason method and so

in some ways like so if you have a particular set of habits in the classroom at school and then you come home and there's completely different expectations and a different way of approaching

“behavior that is confusing to a child and it leads I think to some sort of distraction in the in the”

pattern of growth whereas if the methods of the home and the methods of school are actually the same methods but just used in a new way it it allows the child to feel a sense of cohesiveness but also grow more quickly and I think that the idea of you know behavior charts and that kind of thing is again not sort of looking at the child's personhood but assuming that some kind of quantifiable schematic is going to be required to control the child and we would think coming alongside the

child setting up good lines of habits setting an atmosphere that supports those habits having high expectations but also a sense that the child and I you know I'm an ally of the child we're working together toward a goal it's just a different approach to good behavior and what

“is what we're aiming for is not like a veneer of good behavior but real character you know the”

actual change and who they are as a person it's easy to get a veneer of behavior but it's a lot more important meaningful to work for the character of the child and that comes through the ideas that they take in the atmosphere they're in and and those little habits that we build you know did a

day. What's your response to moms who say I could never homeschool that sounds incredibly isolating

not only for me but also for my child will never ever see other people. It's important to see one with homeschooling there allows this real relationship in the family that is so beautiful that stays intact that the siblings are friends and that we have this day-to-day family life that meets a lot of our our social needs but then from there we're able to go out with this strong understanding of who we are and the family that we're a part of and go out and make relationships

“and so I think homeschool kids are famous for being able to talk to anybody talk to adults you know”

there's that aspect but we really try at the CMEC to help people form local communities because we think that that's important too and you say that they're focused on truth beauty and goodness yes what does that mean the one model we think is easiest to start with to form a local community a cooperative of learning is what we call these TBG groups where we pull together a fine arts curriculum so that way whatever families are doing at home can stay the same but when we come together we're

gonna study the great artist composers we're gonna learn hymns we sing folk songs the the children do poetry recitation with Mason's approach it doesn't matter if you are born not trained in those

things you may never have even stepped foot in an art museum or a concert hall but you can

have with her approach and we create guides for this have this wonderful learning time of children of all ages and the moms are learning right alongside the children too so you don't have to have an education yourself to teach Charlotte Mason you don't have to have a degree in education exactly again partly because we think that education is self education where the child is doing the work it's also because we say that the books the things are their teachers we just are setting

up those relationships and helping them have the habits of their learning so I was telling

to less that I had never stepped foot in an art museum and yet here we are having the last you know

15 years of home schooling studied so many artists and they're a part of the my imagination and now love getting to travel and go to art museums all over the world and visit when you see a painting we've studied that you know it so well it's like getting to see an old friend it isn't about you know the sense of like being high minded or or cultured in that way it's that the this is beauty and this artist had something to say that continues to speak to people over hundreds of years it's

this gift why wouldn't we want children to be able to see this art and hear this music but Mason said it up in a way that is accessible for a five year old and the adult in the room and we all get so much out of it everyone is sick right now everyone chances are you are to your nose is doing things it shouldn't be doing you could probably serve a soft serve comb with those nose boogie's happening

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do you know single parents who homeschool I fake we know families of all sorts that homeschool so how are they doing it because I have been informed that it is impossible for single parents homeschool that only rich single income households can homeschool and I have talked to so many people in my audience that have been of all yeah all backgrounds that are homeschooling

“there's a lot of reasons why people need to be creative with their homeschooling and I think if”

you're a single parent working during the day that there are ways that you can still homeschool your children and you know I think in that setting it would depend on like a great support system and a community that you could join in with and and feel that sense of support because it can be I think having you know the support of a spouse is really helpful and so finding that in other ways but then also being creative with your time with your resources we really have families in

all settings in the CMEC but then you know in our experience with homeschooling just have met all kinds of moms who are doing and and that's who are doing great work homeschooling their children and independent of the situation that they're in their financial situation where they are in the world yeah I think that it's it's accessible for everyone and you guys have both homeschooled

“and you have five kids and you have 11. How long is an average school day for your families?”

It really is based on the child's age so the neat thing with Mason's approach is that in the early years in early elementary school it's about two hours of formal lessons and then they have their occupation time where they're playing and and then that grows slowly over time so we really have as moms this dedicated time in the morning with our kids that we have our phones off we're not doing any work you know we're not checking boxer or anything like that of messages are

coming in and that's dedicated to that time table but then the kids are playing and that's able where we're able to get our work done for the CMEC for our family our home even for the high schoolers I think my high schoolers school day is roughly 9 a.m. to about 2 p.m. with the break for lunch

time table subjects so it includes a lot of different learning over the course of the day and then

we have a free or free days when we do our cooperative or our nature club so it even allows for that additional reading for the evenings or craft work or different projects that they're working on that would you know extend their day in one way and yet is kind of under this category of afternoon or leisure time so what happened when you guys had older kids who you were homeschooling but then you had toddlers we did all kinds of fun things with that of being able to keep those toddlers happy

and occupied as well we have things like I set up schedules where each child of the older kids would have a half hour break and they would be in charge of playing with the toddlers so then I could do school with the others there was times where you would do school celeste in during nap time have that dedicated time with yeah I did nap time school for many years with my elementary kids it would be they had a free morning to play with all the little ones and you know and just

enjoy free time outdoors and then as soon as we would get the babies down for nap it would be like okay we're starting our time table grab your school books and so we would have like a solid you know 12 12 to two with me and then maybe an additional hour after that where they would be able to do

“some independent work but I think there's lots of creative strategies with toddlers one thing that we”

are really passionate about is making sure that I think there can be a sense where we're like we just want the little ones to be quiet so we can get our school done and we really believe that little children deserve a full life too and so thinking of ways that allow them to have rich enjoyable growth oriented occupations that are natural to their developmental stage while also being you know that they can do kind of a long side while we're handling school time with our

older kids we have like a kinder lab and we call it which is means child life this kinder lab and resource that is for younger children and the family and it includes all kinds of stories occupations and that's really what I use now with my three and five year olds while I'm doing school with all the rest of the children that they feel like they have real work to do that's so important for young children that they feel like they have real leisure they do get that time outdoors

“so it's always a balancing act and I think every year you know it's children they grow so fast”

when they're young and so they're always going through different stages and so it's definitely being flexible

as the homeschool mom and thinking you know in each stage what would meet our needs now and how can I shift things to make sure that everybody is getting what they need during the school day but then the high schoolers are so independent and responsible for their work I think that's part of their success in whatever area they go into is that they know how to manage their time work through books and and take care of themselves and that is isn't that like whatever profession you're in

that would be huge anytime that I feel like oh I wish there was more of me or I feel I'm spread there's then I actually see it as this opportunity for the all of the kids to really thrive and have a sense of independence too does the Charlotte Mason method work well for ADHD kids

“yeah I think we see a lot of families in the CMEC talk about this that there's things like”

the short lessons alternating lessons allowing the child to narrate in the way that they can is a real game changer for families the fact that the way that the methods that Mason again has are all built around cultivating the habit of attention is what she thought of all of the that you know such a long time ago and when now we see so many suffering with that that that it's it's really something to look into right there's a lot of overlap between

what occupational therapists recommend for ADHD children and Mason's methods with narration and short lessons so I think that the parents who have come to us who are using consistently

Mason's methods are always surprised at that with dyslexia for example that there's a

way that the chance for them to not in a school environment where they would say well once you are falling behind in the ability to read your own texts then you don't have access to the information in those texts anymore and with Mason's approach it allows the student with this the teacher reading aloud as long as they need allows the student to still get all of the ideas while they're working on their reading skills so it's very it's a very flex naturally flexible

method and I think that a lot of the the human needs that we have are attended to through the method and so the human struggles that we have are also attended to through the method.

feast of ideas there's these realms of knowledge in so many categories of of the world that we

want our children to be able to have an experience and that's what the way that we set up the curriculum we organize the day is that there is then the the city of books but then also these other aspects of of learning that really make for this full life and I think that with along with the habits to be able to live that life so many of us do you know we are inspired we get motivated but then we we don't have the that framework we weren't given that in the education that we had

and and Mason really does that and I would say Charlotte Mason is for you if you want to enjoy

“homeschooling and you want to enjoy your children I think that's what really drew me to Mason in the”

first place is trying to envision what our school days would look like and you know at the time

we had decided to homeschool and I felt a little hesitant because I thought I just can't imagine myself sitting like grading worksheets and doing like the peel and stick crafts I don't want my days to look like that and yet I really wanted to have a family environment where we would have these family bonds we would have a shared family culture I knew that homeschooling was a great way toward that and then I came upon the Charlotte Mason method and the way that I could then

envision my day with experiencing the best literature the best art the best music outdoors that's education for people and I think that the mother can enjoy it as much as the children it also sets

up enjoying your children that there is a different dynamic for the teacher and child that doesn't

put them at odds with one another but working toward the same goal and I think that's a great place to be if you're going to be their parent and their teacher it can be hard to wear both hats at times but I think that with the Charlotte Mason method it really it's the same role the way that you want to engage with your child as their parent is you can bring those same qualities into your role as teacher and so it feels very cohesive. What kind of culture do you think that we're rebuilding

with families who homeschool? I think it's a culture of delight and wonder where we think that

“there is so much to know there's so much to do that life is it feels always too short that”

it's just exciting again where it didn't feel like that I think so often for me in school it was how can I get it the A in the fastest way possible doing the least amount of work totally and well you know what is the point of that that A then you know and it just was like to do the next thing and get to the next deadline and and people kind of go through life like that now like when it's going to be my next vacation and instead it's that every day can can matter and be one

of interest and ideas. Remind everybody the name of your organization and then what do you offer families who are looking into Charlotte Mason education? So the name of our organization is the Charlotte Mason Educational Center and you'll find us at the cmc.org and we offer a K to 12 curriculum as well as resources for implementing that curriculum and a vibrant community of thoughtful parents through life meetings, webinars, all kinds of community support and all over the world and

not even just in America. That's right because we do have some international listeners. Okay yeah 20 countries that a lot are Americans that are abroad for some reason but we love our Canadian Australian South African families too and all 50 states. And where can people find you on Instagram at the dot cmc? If you could offer one remedy to heal a sick culture it could be physically

“emotionally or spiritually what would your remedy be? I think there's so many things we would”

say that we have found in trying to have a full education for children, each of the subjects that we study end up providing the thing that that we need that there is something for us in learning history, knowing American history that that is good for us but the same thing of nature and and being out in nature and so we don't want to over specialize or create children that are really like we're programming them like there's some sort of computer or device

let's get back to treating children as persons and that will be the thing that really heals our culture again. Just to echo what Amy said I think the Mason called her education broad and balanced and I think that that is a life worth living a broad life and a balanced life

time I'm thinking about what you were saying earlier with just getting the aid to move on to the

“next thing to move on to the next thing everything's a means to an end and what's the end and so to be”

able to experience joy and living now and then the other two qualities she says are steadiness of mind

which is the powerful thought for today and man and him it he of spirit so this generous

hearted soul these are things that I definitely could heal our culture if we had an education that cultivated those qualities. Absolutely so beautifully said. Amy's less thank you for coming on culture pathocary. Thank you. Thank you. If you love this episode on education I've done

“several others with Heidi St. John Hannah Frankman clear denult in Katie Faust just Google their”

names and Alex Clark and will come up this time last year I also came out with an episode all about Waldorf education and even attended Waldorf kindergarten for a day literally like with the kids and I made a YouTube vlog on the real Alex Clark YouTube you can watch that and see me attend Waldorf kindergarten and kind of see the differences between Waldorf education for the younger years and Charlotte Mason. New episodes of culture pathocary come out every Monday and Thursday at 6 p.m.

Pacific 9 p.m. Eastern with new expert guests anywhere you get your podcast you can find the show on Instagram at culture pathocary where we put out like extra content and fun little graphics and things just to give you more education on the topics that we cover on the show and then I'm also on there at Real Alex Clark with full disclosure I put my foot in my mouth a lot on there

and start a lot of fights and it's basically like the bloods and the grips just on my Instagram

stories at all times don't ask questions just enjoy also let me just make a point that every family is different and every child is different Waldorf might work great for somebody's kid Charlotte Mason might work great for another person's kid maybe a private school traditional school setting is what is good for you Montessori what have you on this show I cover so many different

topics in regards to education and also just a myriad of other things basically everything

we're going to have guests that say and believe different things so that you can hear different ideas and opinions and figure out what works for you so me doing a Charlotte Mason episode

“is not me saying that Charlotte Mason is the end all be all in the only thing that you should”

be doing for teaching your kids just as when I did the Waldorf episode I wasn't saying that now what I am saying is that I do not think that public education is good enough for any kid period so I would say if you are a conservative Christian family then you better get your kids at a public school everything else is pretty much up for debate but that is the only line running through all of the education episodes that I do on this show so there you have it I'm Alex Clark

and this is culturep off carry find it out in the comments