Mystie recommended Mary Pride’s Complete Guide to Getting Started in Homeschooling because of the section of the book devoted to explaining several home schooling methods (at least 4 of which I’d never heard of before). The paragraph at the beginning of the chapter on Classical Education & Great Books by Fritz Hinrichs caught my attention:\par
Most anyone familiar with history has come to the humbling realization that even our sharpest minds do not match the mental capabilities possessed by the shining lights of history. Many have found that the writings of our own nation’s founding fathers show an eloquence and depth of thought that put us to shame. In the past, homeschoolers have desired to simply return to a wholesome “back to basics” type of education -\’c3\’82\’c2\~ something like that had by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Today, many homeschoolers want to know how to raise an orator such as Patrick Henry or a man of the political insight and principle of George Washington. Increasingly, homeschoolers have been turning to classical Christian education for answers to these questions. Classical Christian education attempts to glean from the experience and wisdom found in the past in order to understand why our own contemporary attempts at education seem to fall so short.
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Sounds good, doesn’t it? Of course we want Christian statesmen and lawyers and generals who can think beyond this weeks current political landscape and forge ahead to the hopefully more godly future. But I’ll admit – my first thought when I read the above was that Patrick Henry, famous orator though he was, became a lawyer because he went bankrupt and couldn’t support his family as a general-store owner. Obviously this is for the best, as God had a special plan for him, but it is essential that there be competent store-owners around, isn’t it?\par
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My only point\’c3\’82\’c2\~is that the vast majority of our children will not be the shining lights of history – they’ll be the competent store-owners, engineers, accountants, diesel mechanics, wives and mothers that form the voting block for the shiny ones – and to educate\’c3\’82\’c2\~everybody to be shining lights is perhaps not really necessary or at least not mandatory.\’c3\’82\’c2\~\’c3\’82\’c2\~\par
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A friend of mine (and you know who you are) told me once that her educational philosophy was that we should “strive for excellence in all things” which sounds good and is true in a sense, but when you look at it in a different way, it is troubling. It bothers me because at the back of my mind I’m always thinking\’c3\’82\’c2\~”but you can only do so many things” and to my mind, education is only one of many things that we and our children are called to do. Plus, if you draw it out to its logical conclusion you end up dying from overwork – after all, learning one foreign language is good, so two is better and six is really excellent right? Learning algebra is good, calculus better, and deep wierd math (you know the kind with all of the imaginary numbers that they use for computers and such) is really excellent. How about history? Basic grasp of history good, deep knowledge of the founding fathers better, memorized quotes from every famous person throughout history really excellent right?\par
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Anyway, nothing against classical education (although the “back to basics” homeschooling philosophy really appealed to me), just a thought about what we really are shooting for – what is the end goal of educating our children?
I think that guilt-motivated excellence seeking is a hazard of optimism without perspective. I will never be the world’s best ballerina, and it really doesn’t make too much sense for me to try to be the best ballerina I can be. You’ve got to pick a set of things that you’re going to be somewhat good at, and develop those things. Good post, Elly.
In years gone by, one’s income level determined which type of education you received: a landed gentry needed a liberal education so he could lead; a peasant needed a basic vocational training so he could work. It’s not so convenient anymore.
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This was a good post!
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Indeed, not only can not everyone be Patrick Henry’s, but a society needs more laborers than public leaders. Laboring with skill is surely glorifying God. Still, the classical education proponents have a point — not that we should all strive to be a George Washington or John Adams or Alexander Pope or Queen Elizabeth — but that since our nation has turned from a classical education to chasing after innovation and trends, we have had NO such persons to lead us. Someone has to raise those people, but not everyone need be compelled. Even a “back to basics” education can readily be built on by an ambitious child — toward vocational or rhetorical skill. “Back to basics” generally at least encompasses the tools of learning that can be used to go any direction, as long as love of learning is imparted with the tools. \par
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We need to start our education group, I guess.