Posted in Homeschooling

When I first started Homeschooling in 1999 the first book I read was Sally Clarkson´s Understanding the Wholehearted Child.  I loved the book. She quoted Charlotte Mason´s writings a lot in this book.  This made me eager to read Charlotte´s book. This started my journey toward a Charlotte Mason Education for my children.  In 2003  our Mom´s group in Shelbyville started a reading group on Karen Andreola´s A Charlotte Mason Companion.  So I started reading that book and even though the reading group dissolved before we finished the book, I went ahead and finished the book and I loved her ideas and philosophy of education.

In 2006, I was looking for a way to homeschool closer to the way Charlotte Mason taught and I came across Amblesideonline.  While looking through the files I found the original Charlotte Mason Home Education.  I started reading it back then but I never finished it.  I picked it up a few months ago and I have started reading it again. 

This is such a meaty book. This is a quote from Charlotte Mason's book Home Education. Here she is talking about a mother:

"She must ask herself seriously, Why must the children learn at all? What should they learn? And, How should they learn it? If she take the trouble to find a definite and thoughtful answer to each of these three queries, she will be in a position to direct her children's studies; and will, at the same time, be surprised to find that three-fourths of the time and labour ordinarily spent by the child at his lessons is lost time and wasted energy."

In some way I have asked my self these questions many times.  I have changed some of my answers over time.  When I started out home educating I followed the advise of a seasoned homeschooler in choosing my curiculum.  Over time I have abandoned most of those book and moved to a more pure Charlotte Mason style with living books.  The tried and true books have stayed.  For us it has been the Making Math Meaningful curiculum and Getty Dubay Handwriting.  We have continued to read living books which we began when Rachel started school.

We have such a long way to go to be 100% Charlotte Mason but we are so much closer now than we were when we started 10 years ago. Since starting Ambelside we have add nature study, artist and composure studies and hymn and folk songs studies. We were doing artist studies before but we were not focusing on one particular artist.

I am really excited about starting our new school year in July.  I think this will be our best school year yet.  I think the girls are looking forward to it also. All our books are purchased and have arrived (with only a few that will be brought this summer.). We are ready to go!