Reading thoughts

I have been planning to homeschool my children since before they were born. I have read a ton of information each building on each other or leading in another direction. All the reading put me finally in the path of learning about Thomas Jefferson Education, which as changed my life in many ways and has accelerated my learning about education, child development, and homeschooling in general plus has given me the inspiration to begin my own education in other areas of interest. Along with Thomas Jefferson Education, I look to Charlotte Mason's theories and I like some of the ideas in "A Well-Trained Mind" by Barbara Wise. Although I would never implement this style of curriculum after learning about TJEd, there are lots of good ideas in it. As I continue to read it is amazing how I stumble upon things.

Charlotte Mason was a teacher in the 1900s who is known as the founder of the modern homeschooling movement. She wrote a 6 volume series especially for homeschooling. The volumes are extensive and somewhat repetitive, but I have learned a lot. She emphasises the importance of exposing children to a wide variety of knowledge from books that are challenging...real books, not textbooks. She argues that children are able to comprehend well above their reading level and in fact naturally hunger after knowledge. She voices the idea that the mind is an organ perfectly capable of digesting knowledge without teacher or parent trying to make them understand. She says just as the stomach and intestines know how to handle food by keeping what it needs and discarding what it doesn't, so does the mind with knowledge and ideas. She advocates teachers/parents reading to their children from a wide variety of good books on several subjects. She then wants the students to narrate back to the teacher/parent what they heard after only one reading (starting with 1 paragraph for young children and advancing to longer passages and then chapters). The teacher/parent is not supposed to interrupt the narration or tell the child what he/she should have gotten from the reading. She also emphasises variety by teaching that you remain in one book for a short period of time for the day and then move on, allowing readings from several books to be completed in one day. She emphasises that this keeps the mind from becomming fatigued and keeps the child engaged and interested. This is the jist of her curriculum theories in very short summary.

So, the point I'm trying to get at, is that this week I picked up a book from the library called "The Knowledge Deficit." One thing I have read and heard over the past several years is that children who are taught to read early surpass their peers in school until they hit around 4th grade where they level out or drop below their peers. Many have said this was because they loose their love for reading having been pushed too early. Well the author of "The Knowledge Deficit," argues that it is not the early teaching of the mechanics of reading but lack of knowledge. In the first few years of school, reading is evaluated mostly from the mechanics. When they hit upper grades it is reading comprehension, and student's lack of knowledge hinders their ability to comprehend their reading. He argues too much time is spent in the mechanics of reading without giving students the knowledge they need and want. This totally made sense after reading Charlotte Mason's theories. Both Charlotte Mason and this book by Hirsch agree that children can comprehend the spoken word far above their reading level. Anyway, this is just some ramblings from me because I was excited by this connection. It gives me a lot to chew on.

When Derek is old enough I plan on doing momschool from TJEd by following the "Well-trained mind" timeline for teaching science and history and using Charlotte Mason's methods of reading a large variety of books in many subject areas, in short segments. This I hope will inspire my children to explore areas they hear about during momschool, give me some guidance about where to begin, and allow much children to begin building a broad knowledge base from which to make them excited and able readers. As I still have a little time, Derek being just 4, I try not to get too excited and anxious and ready to jump the gun...as I am totally excited to explore areas I don't remember or were never exposed to in school too. Okay, enough rambling for one day:)