I think Montessori’s approach to early years and “sensitive periods” is a good compliment to a classical education in later years. (I know some would disagree, and I don’t think Montessori was correct about everything, but in our contemporary culture, helping children engage with nature and be independent in the sense of being capable seems like a wonderful correction to much of the excessive victimisation/ coddling that seems to be the norm!)
I tend to agree with your reserved affirmation of the Montessori method. Some people take it in directions that I disagree with, but most of those boil down to a Rousseauian rejection of original sin. Children without direction won't find goodness, beauty, and truth on their own. At the end of the day, the child will need disciplined instruction in what is good, but there absolutely needs to be a 50-50 reciprocation between the teacher and the student. Montessori is so good at making sure that they have the student's buy-in.
As I mentioned Charlotte Mason has a similar vein to her. A few too many people tend to take her emphasis on child responsibility towards an 'unschooling' approach, which I find unfaithful to what I know of either author.
What a great round up! I’m looking forward to reading Ma’s interview. Her ideas sound similar to a Montessori approach to teaching math, where kids really get their heads around how numbers work. I once saw 4th graders in a Montessori school doing algebra with math manipulatives because they could actually construct a square and a cube.
That's very much in the vein of Singapore math and Ma's approach, which is really the American approach from 70 years ago (as Ma mentions in the interview). In reality, algebra is number manipulation with unknowns, and, if there's a tangible object that represents the unknown, figuring out its value is both obvious and technically algebraic.
I'm not familiar with Montessori techniques, but their emphasis on tangibility would probably lend itself towards a similar system as the Singapore bar models.
Thank you for this! This is the first I have heard of the books by St. Jean-Baptiste (though I’ve definitely heard of him/Christian Brothers schools) and Fr. Schwickerath.
Love Charlotte Mason and Stratford Caldecott. Liping Ma and Quintilian are on my list.
Have you read Norms and Nobility by David Hicks? I’d say it’s a cornerstone for classical educators.
Catie, I'm so glad to have been able to spread the good news of Jean-Baptiste and the Jesuits. To be great, we need great models, and I firmly believe that the men who gave their lives to education can serve as that.
I had not heard of Norms and Nobility but will be buying it pronto. Would you care to give any takeaways from that book?
Yes, I'd love to share my impressions of Norms and Nobility. I've only read it once, but I know I will be coming back to it again and again. From your list, it reminds me the most of Abolition of Man, and a bit of Liberal Arts Tradition, although it's very much in line with Charlotte Mason as well, as Lisa said above. It reminds me of Lewis in that much of the book is focused on the effects of different types of education on the individual and society, and explaining why classical is the best and "most human" form of education. It's very fun to read because the author was a young man when he wrote it, it was some kind of thesis for school, and so it's extremely idealistic and wordy, but the ideas are wonderful. Toward the end he does give a bunch of practical tips for how the curriculum and school day should look. I know many people have found it highly influential. Lisa could probably explain it much better than I, I wonder if she has anything to add?
I filled up my commonplace book with a bunch of quotes from this book, and this one I think best encapsulates the whole book, sorry it's a bit long!
"A statement made at the conclusion of James McLachlan's recent study of American Boarding Schools captures, in what reads like a cliche, something of the current attitude concerning ideals: 'As a society changes, its ideal types change. With such shifts the aims and methods of education also change.' But, is this right? Should ideal types, like cosmetic fashions, constantly be changing? These questions underline the problem with McLachlan's typical nonnormative presentation of his well-researched package of information: it does not stir a response in the reader; it fails to judge issues that cry out for judgment; it dresses up colorful moral dilemmas in drab amoral prose (so as not to forfeit a claim to objectivity). Thus we see the falsifying influence of the social sciences upon the study of man, the deception that inevitably arises when nonnormative methods are applied to the study of normative subject matter. Is it worth the appearance of objectivity to deceive the reader in this way? I think not."
It's been quite awhile since my last read-through of it, though I've read it several times now. I think what resonates most with me is his insistence that education is not for teaching us to know what we don't know, but equipping us to behave as we don't behave. In other words, it's not about knowledge acquired, but knowledge applied.
@James Dietz , James Taylor's "Poetic Knowledge" is another book you might want to add to your list - it goes hand in hand with Hicks in my opinion.
I think Montessori’s approach to early years and “sensitive periods” is a good compliment to a classical education in later years. (I know some would disagree, and I don’t think Montessori was correct about everything, but in our contemporary culture, helping children engage with nature and be independent in the sense of being capable seems like a wonderful correction to much of the excessive victimisation/ coddling that seems to be the norm!)
I tend to agree with your reserved affirmation of the Montessori method. Some people take it in directions that I disagree with, but most of those boil down to a Rousseauian rejection of original sin. Children without direction won't find goodness, beauty, and truth on their own. At the end of the day, the child will need disciplined instruction in what is good, but there absolutely needs to be a 50-50 reciprocation between the teacher and the student. Montessori is so good at making sure that they have the student's buy-in.
As I mentioned Charlotte Mason has a similar vein to her. A few too many people tend to take her emphasis on child responsibility towards an 'unschooling' approach, which I find unfaithful to what I know of either author.
What a great round up! I’m looking forward to reading Ma’s interview. Her ideas sound similar to a Montessori approach to teaching math, where kids really get their heads around how numbers work. I once saw 4th graders in a Montessori school doing algebra with math manipulatives because they could actually construct a square and a cube.
That's very much in the vein of Singapore math and Ma's approach, which is really the American approach from 70 years ago (as Ma mentions in the interview). In reality, algebra is number manipulation with unknowns, and, if there's a tangible object that represents the unknown, figuring out its value is both obvious and technically algebraic.
I'm not familiar with Montessori techniques, but their emphasis on tangibility would probably lend itself towards a similar system as the Singapore bar models.
Thank you for this! This is the first I have heard of the books by St. Jean-Baptiste (though I’ve definitely heard of him/Christian Brothers schools) and Fr. Schwickerath.
Love Charlotte Mason and Stratford Caldecott. Liping Ma and Quintilian are on my list.
Have you read Norms and Nobility by David Hicks? I’d say it’s a cornerstone for classical educators.
Catie, I'm so glad to have been able to spread the good news of Jean-Baptiste and the Jesuits. To be great, we need great models, and I firmly believe that the men who gave their lives to education can serve as that.
I had not heard of Norms and Nobility but will be buying it pronto. Would you care to give any takeaways from that book?
That's great James, I think you will love it!
Yes, I'd love to share my impressions of Norms and Nobility. I've only read it once, but I know I will be coming back to it again and again. From your list, it reminds me the most of Abolition of Man, and a bit of Liberal Arts Tradition, although it's very much in line with Charlotte Mason as well, as Lisa said above. It reminds me of Lewis in that much of the book is focused on the effects of different types of education on the individual and society, and explaining why classical is the best and "most human" form of education. It's very fun to read because the author was a young man when he wrote it, it was some kind of thesis for school, and so it's extremely idealistic and wordy, but the ideas are wonderful. Toward the end he does give a bunch of practical tips for how the curriculum and school day should look. I know many people have found it highly influential. Lisa could probably explain it much better than I, I wonder if she has anything to add?
I filled up my commonplace book with a bunch of quotes from this book, and this one I think best encapsulates the whole book, sorry it's a bit long!
"A statement made at the conclusion of James McLachlan's recent study of American Boarding Schools captures, in what reads like a cliche, something of the current attitude concerning ideals: 'As a society changes, its ideal types change. With such shifts the aims and methods of education also change.' But, is this right? Should ideal types, like cosmetic fashions, constantly be changing? These questions underline the problem with McLachlan's typical nonnormative presentation of his well-researched package of information: it does not stir a response in the reader; it fails to judge issues that cry out for judgment; it dresses up colorful moral dilemmas in drab amoral prose (so as not to forfeit a claim to objectivity). Thus we see the falsifying influence of the social sciences upon the study of man, the deception that inevitably arises when nonnormative methods are applied to the study of normative subject matter. Is it worth the appearance of objectivity to deceive the reader in this way? I think not."
It's been quite awhile since my last read-through of it, though I've read it several times now. I think what resonates most with me is his insistence that education is not for teaching us to know what we don't know, but equipping us to behave as we don't behave. In other words, it's not about knowledge acquired, but knowledge applied.
@James Dietz , James Taylor's "Poetic Knowledge" is another book you might want to add to your list - it goes hand in hand with Hicks in my opinion.
I was going to suggest Norms and Nobility, but you beat me to it! It's very much in sync with Mason as well as Clark&Jain, and Caldecott.
Wow! I was really hoping people would unlock some blindspots for me. This is great.