Classical Charlotte Mason
Classical Charlotte Mason saw a need to provide Classical and Charlotte Mason resources for home educators. The greatest advantage of home education is the ability to choose what works and what doesn't work for your family. As the teacher, you can blend educational philosophies to tailor an education for your family and each individual student as needed. Classical Charlotte Mason blends two very similar philosophies to make what we believe is the best of both worlds. Listen to the needs of your family and your inner calling and style. What works best for you? Don't be afraid to adjust, tweak, and change. Even the best curriculum resources out there may not be a perfect fit for every individual or every family. There is no "One Size Fits All" curriculum or even educational philosophy. Classical Charlotte Mason is only your guide to simplify your journey. It is up to you to decide what that journey will be.
At CCM we believe in keeping the lessons short and choose only the best books students and parents will love. We want every student to have a solid foundation to grow upon, without the busy work of other curriculum.
Classical Education
Classical Education returns to the time-honored educational theory of the past. The classical method was the only educational theory in pratice in Western Civilization for over two millenia. The early years of school are spent in absorbing facts, systematically laying the foundations for advanced study. In the middle grades, students learn to think through arguments. In the high school years, they learn to express themselves.
The core of Classical Education is the trivium which seeks to tailor the curriculum subject matter to a child’s cognitive development. The trivium emphasizes concrete thinking and memorization of the facts of the subjects in grade school; analytical thinking and understanding of the subjects in middle school; and abstract thinking and articulation of the subjects in high school.
Subjects used in Classical Education to accomplish the goals of the trivium are Grammar, the science of language usage; Logic, the science of right thinking; and Rhetoric, the science of verbal and written expression. Classical Education embraces study of literature, poetry, drama, philosophy, history, art, and languages; including Greek and Latin.
Charlotte Mason
Charlotte Mason lived in England in the 1800's. Never married, she devoted her life to children and their education. Her ideas were ahead of her time - while others thought that children were no more than empty slates to be filled with information, she believed that they were already real people capable of independent, intelligent thought and that they needed vital ideas, rather than dry facts, to feed their growing minds.
The students in the schools she founded read and discussed living books written by excellent authors on various subjects, took daily nature walks and recorded their observations in notebooks, enjoyed art and music, cultivated and maintained good personal habits such as attention to detail, focused attention and consideration to others, and learned foreign languages. And, by using short lessons, they accomplished all of this, and more, by lunchtime so that they had their afternoons free for their own individual pursuits.
The Charlotte Mason method uses living books with an emphasis on quality rather than quantity, narration instead of comprehension exercises or composition, copywork for handwriting, spelling and grammar modeling, nature observation as the primary means of early science, and literature, poetry, art and music to give children's minds beautiful ideas to feed on.