Disciplined Studies: Language Arts
Educating the WholeHearted Child: Chapter 11
Maybe it’s because I come from a family of teachers and have my own classroom experience, but I’ve never struggled with the insecurity I know many homeschool moms feel when they think of the enormous responsibility they have taken on as their children’s main teacher. The only time I waver a bit is in areas when I’m taking an approach that’s completely different from the way something is taught in schools.
One of the main places I see this is with language arts. Schools tend to use a systematic approach to teaching things like grammar, spelling, vocabulary and composition. I feel those things are best taught through regular exposure to good literature. The Clarksons have a similar approach.
“The more language your children are exposed to in the early years, the more they will naturally acquire good grammar. Grammar rules, which will never by themselves make any child good at grammar, can wait until your child is writing easily and well at around age ten, and then only if they are needed” (page 199).
The same is true for things like punctuation and spelling. Rules and word lists are not as affective as constant interaction with the written word. We use methods such as reading aloud, narration, copywork, and dictation to teach the same concepts, and it feels so much more natural helping Ian pick things up as we go along. I need to remember this when I start seeing what other people are doing and get worried. I really appreciated this chapter because it reassured me I’m not being negligent by postponing the technical side of things.
In my college music history class I remember being struck by the knowledge that composers like Mozart and Beethoven grew up learning music theory and the mechanics of writing music by paying careful attention as they copied beautiful music of other composers note by note. In the same way, I believe my children will learn how to write and communicate best by paying close attention to how other authors have used beautiful language before them.
Each Mentoring Monday I share my reflections on what I’ve been learning from my “paper mentors.” I am currently joining in a book discussion of Educating the WholeHearted Child by Clay Clarkson (with Sally Clarkson), so my Monday posts are all being sparked by things I’m reading in this fabulous book!