6 : 10 Reasons You Can Homeschool - Reason 6: Literature & Art
Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.
Philippians 4:8
Charlotte Mason’s Principles, #20: We teach children that all truths are God's truths, and that secular subjects are just as divine as religious ones. Children don't go back and forth between two worlds when they focus on God and then their school subjects; there is unity among both because both are of God and, whatever children study or do, God is always with them.
There is no faculty within the soul which can be spared in the great work of education; but then every faculty, or rather power, works to the one end if we make the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake the object of our educational efforts. We find children ready and eager for this labour and their accomplishment is surprising. - Charlotte Mason
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Transcripts
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Hi.
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Welcome back, friends to our "Top 10 Reasons Why You Can Homeschool."
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Today we're gonna talk about sharing beautiful literature
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and arts with your child.
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Philippians 4:8 says, "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true.
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Whatsoever, things are honest.
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Whatsoever things are just.
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Whatsoever things are pure.
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Whatsoever things are love.
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Whatsoever things are of good report.
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If there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things."
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We want to raise our children loving these true and honest and just, and
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pure and lovely and good things.
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Things that are virtuous.
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And it may feel really hard that in our society, in our culture,
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that we can't raise our children to ascribe to all these things.
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We can, we'd have to take intentional action to make sure our children
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are influenced by these things.
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Children in homeschool, they can be exposed to composers, art.
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They can learn about botany and zoology and do hands-on activities.
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They can read good and powerful, beautiful literature.
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They can paint, they can learn all about God's truth from these
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wonderful things in God's world.
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Charlotte Mason, one of her principles, number 20, is "We teach children
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that all truths are God's truths, and that secular subjects are
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just as defined as religious ones.
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Children don't go back and forth between two worlds when they focus on
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God and then their school subjects.
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There is unity among both because both are of God and whatever children
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study or do, God is always with them."
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When we study other subjects, we know that they relate to our natural
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world and our spiritual world.
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So, please remember that.
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Remember that nothing is dissected, so to speak, from God's truths.
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And when we share with our children that all subjects are ordained by God, because
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we learn in His natural world, wow.
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Can that be amazing?
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And it can be such a wonderful experience for parent and child alike.
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So we want the question to not be "What was covered in our child's day?
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Or our child's grade?
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Or our child's year, or education?
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Instead, we wanna know how much do they care.
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And that is another quote from Charlotte Mason.
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We want to expose them to these topics, to so many different arts.
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They don't know what they don't know.
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So when we expose children to beautiful literature and to the music, and to the
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great pictures and great artists, for them to see different types of art, that
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is helping them to cultivate in their own little brains what am I interested in?
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And that wisdom can be brought into the rest of their lives.
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During a child's free time, they can cultivate their interests.
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We like to do this in the afternoons.
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We save the mornings for formal studies.
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We, for our homeschool, get together for lunch, and then we have bible and singing
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and science and history time together.
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But the afternoons are there to cultivate their own interests.
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So, My daughters love to paint or create.
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My youngest does cardboard projects or small parts play.
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My son had his hand at woodworking for a little while and then soap carving.
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He is an avid coder like his dad, so he's taking a class
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for that, which is very neat.
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My middle daughter is knitting right now.
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My two daughters together love to listen to books together or
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dance and spend time together.
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We'll send them outside and they'll create little worlds or, have a hand at
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gardening or even collecting bugs in their little containers where those poor
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little bugs, they might end up dead in those same containers but the children
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had fun naming them and playing with them.
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So this is very different than the monotony of textbook learning.
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I wanna get through the lesson.
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I have to get through the lesson because even when we're doing
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those formal lessons, they're shorter lessons, but they're also
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lessons that are based in truth.
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We don't give them enough credit.
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They want real topics.
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They want a liberal arts education where they're learning about the Greeks
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and the Romans and Egyptian times, and then going into the Middle Ages
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and the Renaissance and Reformation.
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Children wanna learn about these things.
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And they will make connections from knowledge of God, knowledge of man,
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and the knowledge of the universe.
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Charlotte Mason didn't mince words about the importance of exposing our children
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to a great number of subjects and in her Volume Six, Towards the Philosophy of
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Education, she wrote "Their Lives," and this is her quoting William Wordsworth.
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And then she writes how right Wordsworth is.
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She talks about Wordsworth a couple times in this volume.
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But this is a poem from Musings near Aquapendente by William Wordsworth,
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"There lives no faculty within us, which the Soul can spare, and humblest
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earthly Weal demands, for dignity, not placed beyond her reach, Zealous
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co-operation of all means given or required, to raise us from the mire, and
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liberate our hearts from low pursuits by gross Utilities enslaved we need more
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of ennobling impulse from the past.
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If for the future aught of good must come."
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And Charlotte, she continues to say, "There is no faculty within the soul,
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which can be spared in the great work of education, but then every faculty
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or rather, power works to the one end if we make the pursuit of knowledge
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for its own sake, the object of our educational efforts, we find children
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ready and eager for this labor and their accomplishment is surprising."
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Wordsworth also says, "If rightly trained and bred, humanity is humble.
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We live in times critical for everybody, but eminently critical for teachers
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because it rests with them to decide whether personal or general good should
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be aimed at whether education shall be merely a means of getting on or a means
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of general progress towards high thinking and plain living, and therefore an
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instrument of the greatest national good.
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Without knowledge, reason, carries a man into the wilderness
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and rebellion joins company.
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Fundamental knowledge is the knowledge of God.
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And while we are ignorant of that principle, knowledge, science,
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nature, literature and history."
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So here Charlotte is talking about the importance of combining all
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those subjects and never taking for granted what that's going to mean
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to each child, each and every child.
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And this becomes her philosophy, I believe, of the science of
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relations that children will make connections for themselves of all
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the subjects you're teaching them.
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And we should never hold back from the great art and the great literature and
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the great music of old and of today.
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I hope that encourages you today, whether you're just starting out, whether
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you aren't a homeschooler yet, I just encourage you to expose your children
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to these beautiful things so Philippians 4:8 can ring true in your own home.
