At the same time, no one explicitly endorses the excision of reading from the curriculum as they would the penny from U.S. currency. We know deep down that reading is something we cannot do without. After all, how will the next generation read stop signs and Instagram posts? Yes, I am being somewhat facetious, but the point remains: society understands that it needs literate citizens to continue to function.

In this blog, I submit three reasons for society to embrace deep reading as both an immensely practical and inescapably moral skill to pass on to the next generation. By “deep reading” I mean more than reading for practical information or to enjoy the latest fan-fare novel. I mean the sort of reading that draws one into deeper opportunities for contemplation, discovery, and renewal. Recently, Dr. Patrick Egan made the compelling case for choosing to read old books over watching the news. This article will dovetail off of his work as it explores different facets of the human experience and how deep reading enhances each of them for the flourishing of society and its members.

Deep Reading is a pathway to creativity. 

In our technological age, the opportunities for entertainment are endless. With smartphones in pocket and streaming services on the rise, people who claim they are bored are without excuse. Whether we are waiting in line at the grocery store or have an evening to ourselves, never fear, the harvest of Silicon Valley is plentiful.

But what if humans were created for more than entertainment? What if we are actually designed, not to consume, but create? While theologians continue to debate the doctrine of imago dei, certainly one implication is that human beings have the capacity to make new things. God has endowed humans in his likeness with the rational, moral, and social capacities to order, build, program, grow, and build, creating new instances of beauty and order within his creation. 

In My Tech-Wise Life (BakerBooks, 2020), Amy Crouch, the daughter of author Andy Crouch, offers her thoughts growing up in a tech-wise family. As she reflects on boredom and entertainment, Crouch proposes that the cure for boredom is not distraction, but wonder (145). However, in order to experience wonder, we need to be undistracted. We need to experience boredom. It is only when our minds are given the freedom to not be inundated by external forces that it has the time to ponder for itself. This pondering leads to ideas, which in turn generate wonder and discovery.

Reading helps facilitate this process of wonder. Unlike screens, which captivate one’s attention from beginning to end, reading is an activity in which the reader remains in the driver’s seat. The reader can slow down at times to re-read a passage or give an idea more thought. She can pause to consider whether what she is reading is true. These moments of reflection allow the mind to wander and ponder, entering a flow of thinking and creativity. And lest we think that reading enhances creativity only in the humanities, this doctoral student in immunology at the University of Chicago would beg to differ. 

Deep Reading preserves a free and moral society. 

Behind the excitement about practical disciplines like business and engineering lies a dangerous assumption: contemporary society’s reading ability is “good enough.” We can move beyond the fundamentals of reading and writing because we have mastered them. After all, we live in a country where practically everyone goes to school and graduates “adequately” literate. But is adequacy the proper goal for a skill as foundational as reading?

Recently I have taken a deep dive into the writings of Wendell Berry and came upon an essay he wrote in 1970 entitled “In Defense of Literacy.” In this piece, Berry argues that the submission of literature to the practical is a perversion. He offers two reasons for this. First, the term “practical” is often synonymous with “immediate.” Once a thing falls out of short-term use, it loses its place in the world. This myopic thinking about time and place sacrifices long-term flourishing for short-term benefits.

Second, language preserves ourselves and our values. In a literate society, language is used both for good and for ill, but especially ill. Public discourse is premeditated and designed to achieve a proper objective. The surest way to confront language used for nefarious or deceptive ends is with language shaped by truth and goodness. Hence, Dorothy Sayers clarion call for the recovery of the liberal arts and the lost tools of learning. 

Towards the end of his essay, Berry clarifies that “a better language” grounded in morality will be discovered across the span of history, not “just the environment of prepared language in which most of us now pass most of our lives.” In other words, Berry recommends we read old books. For, as we read books outside the transience of the present, we develop “a more accurate judgment of ourselves, and the possibilities of correction and renewal.”

Deep Reading prepares future leaders. 

Parents and educators alike want their children and students to be leaders, not followers. This is a laudable aspiration. And while the term “preparing leaders” is a buzzword that is often overused and underrealized, the solution is not to abdicate from this goal, but to gain clarity on its true meaning. What do we mean by leadership? What are the traits of a godly leader? How can we prepare students to remain faithful to biblical principles of leadership, especially as headlines of fallen Christian leaders continue to break?

Interestingly, abolitionist Frederick Douglass, a leader of leaders in the latter half of the 19th century, heralded literacy as the pathway to freedom for African-American slaves. He understood that the ability to read and write empowered him to speak truth to power. Douglass would spend his life championing the cause of abolition as well as education for African-Americans during the Reconstruction Era. (For more information on Douglass and the liberal arts I recommend this brief article over at Circe institute.)

What is it about deep reading that prepares future leaders?

First, deep reading helps a young leader develop a thought life of her own. Leadership is rooted in the conviction to fulfill a vision for what the world could be, but is not at present. In order for these sort of visionary ideas to emerge, the mind must be fed with big ideas in the first place. But not only must the mind be fed, it needs to take part in this feast. In other words, young leaders need to spend time in thought about God, the world He created, and their unique place in it. While there are certainly plenty of successful leaders out there who have not developed a rich diet of deep reading, I would contend that those who do tend to be wiser, humbler, and more inclined to, in the end, finish the race.

Second, deep reading grants a developing leader glimpses of experiences they do not possess themselves. The greatest liability of a young leader full of potential is his lack of experience. He may have the academic qualifications, and even a couple notches on his belt, but he lacks that which a seasoned leader has in spades: lessons learned over decades of experience. While deep reading cannot replace these lessons, the voracious reader can make up for years, or lost years, by putting his head down in good books that illustrate key leadership principles. Learning these principles, and putting them into application on a daily basis, can put developing leaders on a fast track of wise and prudent leadership.

Conclusion

The art of reading, though not completely abandoned by society, needs a renaissance in education for the next generation. Deep reading, in particular, has the potential to shape young men and women to be more creative, committed to traditional morality, and capable of wise leadership.

Carl F.H. Henry, an American evangelical thought leader in the 20th century, once wrote,

Evangelical education stands on the brink of a pagan era in which men of faith can once more register a singular witness for God, and for objective truth and the name of Jesus Christ, and for man and freedom under God. God does not draft reluctant warriors for this larger conflict; they enlist as volunteers if they really count. And this is the hour for such volunteers. Tomorrow may be too late.

The God Who Shows Himself (Word Books, 1966), p. 119

Henry wrote these words over fifty years ago. Some would argue that the pagan era he predicted has arrived. If so, may his call for men (and women) of faith come to pass as well. If you are wondering what you can do to volunteer for the great cause of bearing witness to the name of Christ, perhaps a first step is to take some time to read a good book and let it do its work on you.

Enjoy this article? Check out Jason’s earlier article on the same topic: The Importance of Deep Reading in Education.

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For example, the habit of timeliness is indispensable for a life of ease. Imagine how difficult life is for the person who struggles with timeliness. He is constantly behind–missing meetings here, chasing deadlines there–and feels the constant pressure to keep up and keep calm despite the ever-present burden of the clock. On the contrary, imagine the person who has mastered timeliness. He is able to go about his day with an exceptional disposition of nonchalance. He effortlessly moves from task to task, allowing his habit of timeliness to pave the way for peaceful relationships and productive outcomes to emerge.

Charlotte Mason famously taught that the most effortful aspect of being a teacher is not the teaching itself. It is the habit training that goes on behind the scenes. If teachers equip students with good habits, then the lessons, provided they are of the right sort, will take care of themselves (Towards a Philosophy of Education, p. 99). Students will gain a newfound ability to focus, concentrate, follow instructions, and engage the ideas of the lesson with an exceptional degree of independence.

More recently, modern research has confirmed the fascinating neuroscience behind the formation of good habits. It has also confirmed that the formation of habits geared toward strengthening the will are the most reliable indicator for achievement. Modern researchers have given a name for this special bundle of will-power habits: Grit. 

In this article, I will explore how teachers can help foster grit in their students in the classroom through guidance from Charlotte Mason on habit training. The concept that comes closest to grit for the British educator is perfect, or thorough, execution. Perfect execution is the act of completing a task as well as one can within a reasonable amount of time. Cultivating this habit takes strategy and effort to be sure, but the reward is worth it. Over time, children develop habits of perseverance, responsibility, and care for one’s work, all leading to a unique strength of will: grit. 

What is Perfect Execution?

Have you ever wondered why some children write with remarkably elegant penmanship and others rush? Or why some children complete fitness exercises with perfect form all the way to completion while others struggle? 

While it is tempting to attribute these feats to natural talent or even gender differences, the truth is that both tasks were carried to completion through habits of perfect execution. By “perfect” I do not mean literally perfect, but the repeated act of aiming for perfection through giving a thorough effort each and every time. 

For children who complete tasks with thoroughness, two factors are at play: First, they care about their work. They have come to believe that the tasks they execute to some extent matter.

Second, they work with a resolved commitment to do their best. They do not settle for half-measures or shortcuts. They have the perseverance and fortitude to carry out a task to completion. This willpower did not appear over night. It came as the result of deliberate practice and usually, but not necessarily, the encouragement of a supportive mentor. 

Training the Habit of Perfect Execution

We tend to assume students will grow more proficient in a task over time simply through repetition. After all, we are told, practice makes perfect. What we fail to realize is that imperfect practice yields precisely that: imperfection. Admiring the German and French schools of her day, Charlotte Mason observes, “…if children get the habit of turning out imperfect work, the men and women will undoubtedly keep that habit up” (Home Education, p. 159).

To train the habit of perfect execution, Charlotte Mason taught that parents and teachers should hold high yet realistic expectations of children as they work. She writes, “No work should be given to a child that he cannot execute perfectly, and then perfection should be required from him as a matter of course” (Home Education, p. 159). The key to growing in perfect execution is to prioritize quality over quantity, and to expect and support the highest quality the child is capable of each and every time.

When it comes to teaching penmanship, for example, it is tempting to think that a great quantity of practice is the surest way to learn to form letters. But Charlotte Mason cautions that it not so much how many letters are written, but the quality of the letters:

For instance, he is set to do a copy of strokes, and is allowed to show a slateful at all sorts of slopes and all sorts of intervals; his moral sense is vitiated, his eye is injured. Set him six strokes to copy; let him, not bring a slateful, but six perfect strokes, at regular distances and at regular slopes. If he produces a faulty pair, get him to point out the fault, and persevere until he has produced his task; if he does not do it to-day, let him go on to-morrow and the next day, and when the six perfect strokes appear, let it be an occasion of triumph.

Home Education, p. 160

In the quotation above, Mason is clear to emphasize that perseverance and perfect execution matter most in habit formation. Likewise with other activities, teachers should always expect the child to give her very best: “So with the little tasks of painting, drawing, or construction he sets himself––let everything he does be well done. An unsteady house of cards is a thing to be ashamed of. Closely connected with this habit of ‘perfect work’ is that of finishing whatever is taken in hand. The child should rarely be allowed to set his hand to a new undertaking until the last is finished” (Home Education, p. 160).

So often in our modern world we feel the pressure to be efficient and useful. In a block of time, we would rather perform ten tasks poorly than one task exceptionally. But here we see the secret for setting up children for long-term flourishing. The solution is not to pile on hours of homework each night after a full day of school. It is not to assign endless loads of busy work to keep students occupied. It is to assist students in approaching each and every task with the discipline to do their very best. This is how we as educators train the habit of perfect execution.

The Power of Grit

In her New York Times bestseller Grit (Scribner, 2016), psychologist Angela Duckworth shares her findings on the power of grit to drive achievement. She defines grit as the unique combination of passion and perseverance, determination and direction (8). People with grit are resilient and hardworking, propelled by some deeply held belief. They are convinced that whatever they are doggedly pursuing matters.

Central to Duckworth’s research findings is the notion that in examining cases of achievement we tend to be distracted by talent. That is, when we encounter a person who has achieved great things, we often chalk it up to raw ability. While there is certainly something to be said for God-given strengths and abilities, too often we let  natural ability overshadow the dedicated work ethic an achiever cultivated to get there.

To reconcile natural talent and the power of grit, Duckworth argues that “effort counts twice” (35). Rather than drawing a direct line from talent to achievement, the psychologist suggests there is more to the equation. For achievement to occur there are two instances of calculus. First, the achiever invests effort into his or her natural talent to develop a particular skill. Then, the achiever builds on that skill through more effort to reach the level of exceptional achievement. Effort counts twice.

More Important than Grit

It is important to note here that grit in and of itself is not equivalent to character in the moral sense. It is possible to have a lot of grit, and therefore to be a high achiever, but to be a very bad person. In Duckworth’s own social science parlance she distinguishes between strengths of will, heart, and mind (273). Strength of will, or willpower, includes attributes like self-control, delayed gratification, grit, and the growth mindset. Strength of heart includes what we would classically describe as moral virtues: gratitude, honesty, empathy, and kindness. And strength of mind includes curiosity and creative thinking.

In a 2018 interview with the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, Duckworth acknowledges that strength of heart does not lead to the same levels of achievement as strength of will, but it is more important. She admits that she would rather her own daughters be good before they are great.

This is an important word for classical educators, including Charlotte Mason followers. All this talk about perfect execution, grit, and achievement can quickly get our minds churning about how we harness this power for, say, elevating standardized test results. We would do well to remember, as Duckworth does in her own secular way, that “while man looks at the outward appearance, God looks at the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7). At the end of the day, more than achievement, we will be judged not by what we accomplished, but how we lived.

Fostering Grit Through Habit Training

So how do we help our students become more gritty, not for the sake of worldly achievement, but for true human flourishing? A great place to start is by cultivating the habit of perfect execution in the classroom. Commit to having your students only work on tasks they can complete with excellence and then hold them to it. 

Briefly, here are three steps for cultivating this habit:

1. Clarify your expectations. 
2. Cast vision for the worthiness of the work. 
3. Support them throughout.

By clarifying your expectations, you are making it unmistakably clear what your students are to do and how they are to do it. They should have a good sense of “the final product” so they know what to aim for. And they should understand that process and format matters: the “how” is just as important as the “what.”

When you cast vision for the worthiness of the work, you are giving your students a picture of why this work matters. This is what Charlotte Mason would call “sowing the idea.” If they are working on a map of Asia, for example, you could emphasize the beauty and variety we observe across the globe. Highlight some unique cultural artifacts from the region to help them form a concrete relationship with it. In order for the habit of perfect execution to take, student care is a necessary precondition. High teacher expectations without student ownership and care devolves into micro-management all too quickly.

Once they begin their work, teachers must support students throughout the assignment. There is a reason why the habit of perfect execution is so rare. It is hard work! As humans, our wills often fail us and we take the path of least resistance. We need wise and supportive mentors around us to hold us to the standard we set out to meet. This is the indispensable work of the teacher, and as Charlotte Mason warned, it takes the most effort!

Conclusion

As classical educators, we seek to form humans holistically as virtuous young men and women. We believe that school is not reserved exclusively for the cognitive domain, but that there is work to be done in the moral and spiritual domains as well. Through helping students develop the habit of perfect execution, we are helping students forge wills of perseverance and grit. As we do so let us keep our motivations in check. It is not ultimately to propel our students to chase after worldly achievement or to elevate their will-power over others. It is to help them grow as workers in the field, reaping the harvest the Lord has prepared for His people, as we wait for His return. Habits of perfect execution and grit, I believe, can only aid them in this worthiest of work.

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Mason’s revival of narration therefore stands as a signpost of her larger project. And it is a project that we find inspiration from here at Educational Renaissance. The renaissance had a healthy respect for and appreciation of the classical past, while at the same time being quite innovative in a number of areas. In a way narration is simply one piece of this broader puzzle: all the pieces will help create a more accurate picture of Charlotte Mason as an educator within the liberal arts tradition of education.

In this article we come to Charlotte Mason herself to see how her recommendations for narration square with those of the classical and renaissance educators we have surveyed. We will see that Mason’s use of narration was at least as innovative as any other educator in its history, even if the steps she took make perfect sense as natural developments. In the process we will discern some new possibilities for narration, including how we could revive the narration practices of earlier educators to supplement Charlotte Mason’s recommendations, or even reach out into new and uncharted territory with narration to attain new pedagogical goals. 

We will begin by looking at three issues raised by Charlotte Mason’s practice of narration: 1) the focus on rich texts, 2) the main goal of knowing content, and 3) the methods of narration.

Charlotte Mason’s Practice of Narration, Issue 1: Focusing on Rich Texts

Readers who are familiar with Charlotte Mason will be aware of some of the ways that Mason’s narration differs from that of the educators we have surveyed so far.

The first and most obvious difference, perhaps, is that the focus of Mason’s narration is upon a rich text, and not an informative lecture, as in Erasmus or Comenius, or else the telling of any story that the child knows, as in John Locke. In this way Mason sides with Aelius Theon, Quintilian and the secondary steps detailed by Locke. 

Charlotte Mason has a very practical and down-to-earth set of considerations for her decided preference for what she calls “living books” over “oral teaching” (not to mention the “dry-as-dust” textbooks of her era). Her thoughts in her third volume School Education are worth reproducing in full:

“Reason for Oral Teaching.––Intelligent teachers are well aware of the dry-as-dust character of school books, so they fall back upon the ‘oral’ lesson, one of whose qualities must be that it is not bookish. Living ideas can be derived only from living minds, and so it occasionally happens that a vital spark is flashed from teacher to pupil. But this occurs only when the subject is one to which the teacher has given original thought. In most cases the oral lesson, or the more advanced lecture, consists of information got up by the teacher from various books, and imparted in language, a little pedantic, or a little commonplace, or a little reading-made-easy in style. At the best, the teacher is not likely to have vital interest in, and, consequently, original thought upon, a wide range of subjects.

“Limitations of Teachers.––We wish to place before the child open doors to many avenues of instruction and delight, in each one of which he should find quickening thoughts. We cannot expect a school to be manned by a dozen master-minds, and even if it were, and the scholar were taught by each in turn, it would be much to his disadvantage. What he wants of his teacher is moral and mental discipline, sympathy and direction; and it is better, on the whole, that the training of the pupil should be undertaken by one wise teacher than that he should be passed from hand to hand for this subject and that.”

Charlotte Mason, School Education, vol 3 pg 170

For Mason an inspirational lecture requires a master-mind, in a way the type of teacher that Erasmus called for in his work on education, who could interpret to his students the best of a whole host of great classical works of literature on all topics. But in Mason’s day and age, the master-mind teacher approach would require experts on a variety of subjects, like science and literature, history and math, art and Bible—a feat that was becoming less and less attainable as scholarship proliferated in the modern era. At the same time schooling was spreading to more and more children of the British empire, making this ideal less and less viable, or even desirable for teachers specifically. Teachers were no longer scholars. Specialization had virtually ruled that out. 

And for Mason the practice of narrating from rich texts allows the teacher to focus more, not less, on the “moral and mental discipline, sympathy and direction” that students really need. As she says at the end of her 1st chapter on “self-education” in her final volume Toward a Philosophy of Education:

“In urging a method of self-education for children in lieu of the vicarious education which prevails, I should like to dwell on the enormous relief to teachers, a self-sacrificing and greatly overburdened class; the difference is just that between driving a horse that is light and a horse that is heavy in hand; the former covers the ground of his own gay will and the driver goes merrily. The teacher who allows his scholars the freedom of the city of books is at liberty to be their guide, philosopher and friend; and is no longer the mere instrument of forcible intellectual feeding.” (vol 6 pg 32)

Narration focuses on living books or rich texts as a means of providing the most vibrant and vital source of thought, while relieving the average teacher of the burden of inspiration. She can be a philosopher-guide even in territory she has not mastered to the point of being able to speak on it with power and conviction. 

Exceptions to Focusing on Rich Texts Only

There is an exception clause to Charlotte Mason’s nixing of oral teaching, and that is foreign languages. In her 6th volume Toward a Philosophy of Education, Mason reports on a development in foreign language instruction at her House of Education (the training school for future teachers and governesses) and the Parents Union School at Fairfield where they were apprentice-teachers:

“The French mistress gives, let us suppose, a lecture in history or literature lasting, say, for half an hour. At the end the students will narrate the substance of the lecture with few omissions and few errors.” (vol. 6, p. 212)

It should be noted that this occurred with the senior students, and was a less frequent exercise than narrating from a text. Early training in French, German, Italian or Latin consisted of narrating from texts after they had been translated or “thoroughly studied in grammar, syntax and style” (vol. 6. p. 213). 

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Mason’s concession to the value of oral teaching. As she herself admitted:

“We cannot do without the oral lesson—to introduce, to illustrate, to amplify, to sum up. My stipulation is that oral lessons should be like visits of angels, and that the child who has to walk through life, and has to find his intellectual food in books or go without, shall not be first taught to go upon crutches.” (Parents Review, Vol. 14, 1903, “Manifesto Discussion with Charlotte Mason”, pp. 907-913)

We have to wonder if Mason’s concerns would have been quite the same, if podcasts had been available in her day… or equally, if books had not been so cheap and readily available. Mason seems to base her advice to focus on narrating from books upon the practical realities of lifelong learning that were available in her day. Books would be the chief source of intellectual nourishment for her students, and so they should learn to walk on their own two feet in reading books from the start. 

Charlotte Mason’s Practice of Narration, Issue 2: The Main Goal of Using Narration

The second area in which Charlotte Mason’s practice of narration differs from the other educators of the classical era or renaissance is in the main pedagogical goal. For Quintilian, Aelius Theon and John Locke the main goal had been rhetorical training: the development of style through imitation. Students were learning, through narrating texts or stories, to speak fluently and to the point, with concise and clear expression. They might very well remember many of the exact details of things they narrated, and certainly stocking the memory with words, phrases, ideas, and common topics was necessary. But the point of all that memory-stocking and practice was the students’ own rhetorical style and fluency. 

As you’ll recall, this changed with Erasmus and Comenius in the renaissance. Now the focus was on the content of the teacher’s lecture or explanation. And they even made a point of emphasizing that the substance of the things, rather than the style of the teacher’s expression, was the important thing to be narrated in the child’s own way. For them, the main goal of narration is the students’ knowledge or memory of content, a scientific rather than rhetorical pedagogy, if you will. Students were learning, through narrating their teacher’s lecture or explanation, certain truths either as background to a text or as pictures of the way the world works. The emphasis is entirely upon narration as a sealing up of new knowledge, and not upon the development of style. 

Well, Charlotte Mason made an innovative leap. Familiar with John Locke’s narration from texts to develop style and fluency in speech and writing, and perhaps also with Comenius (given her quotations from him), she fuses the approach of the two to focus narration upon rich texts, with the main goal of memory of content or the development of knowledge. If you take a moment to glance at the table I have made below, “Narration in Historical Perspective Table,” you can see that she has pulled from the left and top right sections down into the bottom right.

Now here we must note one or two exceptions that seem to indicate that Charlotte Mason had rhetorical training in mind, even if she preferred for various reasons not to emphasize it as the main goal of narration. For instance, when discussing composition of the youngest students (Form I) in her 6th volume, she mentions the style of students’ narrations, as well as the accuracy of the content, saying, “The facts are sure to be accurate and the expression surprisingly vigorous, striking and unhesitating” (vol. 6, p. 190). However, she is still adamant against Locke’s method of coaching students to correct their narrations, whether written or oral, in the younger years: 

“Corrections must not be made during the act of narration, nor must any interruption be allowed.” (vol. 6, p. 191)

“Children must not be teased or instructed about the use of stops or capital letters. These things too come by nature to the child who reads, and the teacher’s instructions are apt to issue in the use of a pepper box for commas.” (vol. 6, p. 191)

“But let me again say there must be no attempt to teach composition.” (vol. 6, p. 192)

Even for the oldest students (Forms V and VI), Mason’s emphasis is against too much active focus on matters of style and rhetoric, preferring a natural imitative process that comes passively through a focus on content:

“Forms V and VI. In these Forms some definite teaching in the art of composition is advisable, but not too much, lest the young scholars be saddled with a stilted style which may encumber them for life. Perhaps the method of a University tutor is the best that can be adopted; that is, a point or two might be taken up in a given composition and suggestions or corrections made with little talk. Having been brought up so far upon stylists the pupils are almost certain to have formed a good style; because they have been thrown into the society of many great minds, they will not make a servile copy of any one but will shape an individual style out of the wealth of material they possess; and because they have matter in abundance and of the best they will not write mere verbiage.” (vol. 6, pp. 193-194)

In essence, Mason’s approach to the development of style was as an afterthought that will take care of itself by narrating rich texts if the teacher doesn’t get in the way. This approach will fall short of what many modern classical Christian educators desire, who value the revitalization of active teaching of the art of rhetoric as a major goal of the movement. We might situate Charlotte Mason in this conversation by imagining the dangers of a “stilted style” or overly programmatic formalist structure, that might result from certain types of prescriptive rhetorical training. The long, natural process of narration that Mason envisioned might, in and of itself, subvert the dangers of formalism in our students’ writing and speaking, even if our schools do engage in somewhat more active coaching in grammar, punctuation, style and rhetorical forms than she envisioned. 

Charlotte Mason’s Practice of Narration, Issue 3: The Method of Narration

We leave to the last the method of narration, whether oral or written. As we saw, classical educators often emphasized one or the other, or else both in sequence. Aelius Theon seemed to envision older pupils, trained in writing previously, coming into his rhetorical school ready to write their narrations immediately. Quintilian, and John Locke after him, envisioned a process that started earlier with oral narration, moving to written narration and composition exercises as students grew in facility with the skill of putting pen to paper. From reading in between the lines of their comments, Erasmus seemed to envision written narrations to be turned in to the teacher, while Comenius implied students becoming teachers explaining truths aloud to the rest of the class after the teacher had first done so. 

Charlotte Mason provides the fullest vision for narration as a consistent pedagogical practice, where both oral and written narration play a consistent role in students’ education. Students gently progress to writing their own narrations as they are able. Examinations at the end of the term utilize written “narration” of any amount of knowledge previously stored in students’ memories by initial narration. Given how central narration became in Charlotte Mason’s schools, it is not surprising to find her and her schools after her innovating other creative ways to narrate through the fine and performing arts. Karen Glass quotes from an article in the Parents’ Review long after Mason’s death about the practice of artistic narrations:

“But is narration…always merely ‘telling back’? It must be, we know, the child’s answer to ‘What comes next?’ It can be acted, with good speaking parts and plenty of criticism from actors and onlookers; nothing may be added or left out. Map drawing can be an excellent narration, or, maybe, clay modelling will supply the means to answer that question, or paper and poster paints, or chalks, even a paper model with scissors and paste pot. Always, however, there should be talk as well, the answer expressed in words; that is, the picture painted, the clay model, etc., will be described and fully described, because, with few exceptions, only words are really satisfying.” (Know and Tell, pp. 46, 48)

It may be a matter of debate how much these dramatic and artistic forms of “narration” began during Charlotte Mason’s lifetime, and to what extent they would fall under her definition of narration. Interestingly, Helen Wix, the author of this article, emphasizes the need for words. Acted narrations require words necessarily and are attested nearer Miss Mason’s time (see the second block quote on Know and Tell, p. 48 from The Parents’ Review of 1924, the year after Mason’s death). We also know that illustrations of particular moments from a literature or history book were a common practice in PNEU schools that Mason supported. So I have included drawn and acted narrations as innovations of Charlotte Mason. But it seems clear that oral and written narration were always the core and regular daily methods of narration, while other artistic “narrations” featured as occasional experiences that kept things fresh. 

The Practice of Narration for Charlotte Mason and Classical Christian Educators Today

What can we learn from this history of narration to guide our practices today? I will conclude this series with a list of propositions and suggestions for the future of narration in our movements today. These twelve points summarize what we’ve learned and point forward to exciting possibilities for using narration as classical Christian and Charlotte Mason educators.

1. Narration began in the rhetorical tradition with the main goal of developing students’ style in rhetorical training.
2. Renaissance educators shifted the focus of narration from books to lectures and the goal of narration from style to knowledge of content. 
3. Charlotte Mason adapted narration from the tradition for her context in accordance with her philosophy of education and mind. 
4. Her innovations in narration included taking the focus on rich texts from the classical era and joining it with the main goal of knowledge of content from the Renaissance educators. 
5. She also elevated it to the core status of the primary teaching and learning tool of the PNEU, a development that has support from modern research on retrieval practice.
6. Therefore, classical Christian educators who adopt narration may want to revive some of the rhetorical training pedagogy from John Locke, Quintilian and Aelius Theon.
7. Educators who follow Charlotte Mason may also want to consider more carefully her concerns about training in style or composition and whether or not the concerns she had about creating a “stilted style” were responding to specific trends in composition or rhetoric instruction during her day. 
8. Perhaps some Masonites will opt for more explicit rhetorical training than she might have envisioned, even while avoiding the errors she was warning against.
9. Given the technological developments of our modern world in audio and video recording and the free accessibility of high quality material from “living” voices and scholars, both Masonites and classical Christian educators might want to expand the role of inspirational lectures and oral teaching in education, with narration as the learning tool for either content or style. 
10. Classical Christian educators may feel that many of their teachers (or video instructors) reach the level of “master-minds” (in Charlotte Mason’s terms) and therefore inspirational lectures should play a larger role in their schools, or online courses. 
11. If the power of the spoken word is gaining new prominence through video recording and sharing technologies, then perhaps the next important innovation in narration would be to employ video recordings of great modern orators for students to narrate with the goal of developing their own rhetorical style, while also learning content.
12. At the same time, the use of lectures/speeches as a focus of narration should not crowd out the central importance of rich texts (either for Charlotte Mason or the classical tradition). In our day and age, a facility with the thoughts of the best minds of earlier eras has never been more crucial for students’ development of moral wisdom and historical judgment. 

Hope you have enjoyed this series! Share your thoughts in the comments on why you think the history of narration matters.

Earlier articles in this series:

Part 1: Charlotte Mason’s Discovery?

Part 2: Classical Roots

Part 3: Narration’s Rebirth

The post Why the History of Narration Matters, Part 4: Charlotte Mason’s Practice of Narration in Historical Perspective appeared first on .

As we saw, narration has its roots in the classical era with rhetorical teachers like Aelius Theon and Quintilian, where its goals included the development of memory, fluency and style for future orators. It was particularly powerful as a practice because it fused the natural oral story-telling of pre-literate cultures with the refinements of classical Greek and Roman rhetoric. Before moving to the rebirth of narration in the Renaissance and early modern era, I have to admit to an unfortunate gap in my own knowledge. 

I cannot claim to know that narration was absent from medieval pedagogy. In fact, I suspect that it was not. But I have not (as yet) found any direct evidence of it. There are undoubtedly more places to look than I have had the opportunity of doing so to date. So I would encourage any interested readers to keep an eye out and let me know if you find mention of any narration-like practices occurring in the Middle Ages. However, for the purposes of this series I will have to temporarily conclude that, like much of the tradition of classical rhetoric, narration went into dormancy during the Middle Ages. 

After all, the political situation changed drastically after the fall of Rome, and as a result rhetoric training itself underwent a shift. Without democratic political bodies to convince of a particular course of action, ceremonial and legal rhetoric predominated and crystalized into a more literate and scholastic form. As George A. Kennedy, a leading rhetorical scholar, put it: 

“With the end of orderly civic and economic life not only did public support of education disappear, but the reasons for rhetorical education in its traditional form declined. Fewer councils remained in which an orator could speak, and legal procedures were disrupted; on the other hand, barbarian kings easily acquired a taste for being extolled in Latin prose or verse, even if they did not understand what was being said.” (Classical Rhetoric and Its Christian and Secular Tradition, 2nd ed.; Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999; 196)

The golden age of oratory had passed. It was no wonder that grammatical training predominated, followed by the refined logic of scholasticism. And likewise, it is no wonder that, when the tides turned toward the Renaissance and a return ad fontes (“to the sources”), back to the rhetoric of the classical era, that we would see narration reborn as well.

Narration’s Rebirth, Stage 1: Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536)

I owe to Karen Glass my awareness of the first two stages in narration’s rebirth: Erasmus and Comenius (see Know and Tell: The Art of Narration, p. 16). However, the context of Desiderius Erasmus’ work is enlightening, because it illustrates just how indebted he was to the grammatical and rhetorical tradition. The chapter leading up to his mention of narration reads like a passage out of Quintilian. In fact, Erasmus himself references his dependence on Quintilian, saying,

“As regards the methods of the rudiments—that is, of learning to talk and knowing the alphabet—I can add nothing to what Quintilian has laid down.”

Desiderius Erasmus, Concerning the Aim and Method of Education, translated by William Harrison Woodward (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1904), p. 168

Erasmus affirms the value of teaching students to speak both Latin and Greek as the main sources of all the important knowledge then available. Then he gives instructions for exercises in composition, followed by how the teacher should guide students through reading classic texts. His composition exercises are based on the classical principle of imitation: “The Master in the course of his reading will be careful to note instances which present themselves as models suitable for imitation” (170). He then recommends the more challenging exercises of Quintilian, like “paraphrasing poetry into prose and the reverse process” (171). 

While we judged this exercise of Quintilian’s to be an extension of narration, in which the student would write a paraphrase from memory rather than with constant reference to a text, it is almost certain that this is not the case for Erasmus’ recommendations. One clue comes in his recommendations for translating from Greek into Latin and vice versa in the same section—what Walter Ong might call an art of high literacy and one which almost certainly relies on being able to reference the text itself (see Erasmus, Aim and Method of Education, 171-172).

Given the invention of the printing press before Erasmus’ lifetime, highly increasing availability of texts, we are probably right to assume that the educational situation of Erasmus’ day was quite different from the Roman era. Narration of texts from the teacher’s single reading would have become more counterintuitive because texts were cheaper and more accessible. Why would one narrate merely the text itself when it is there at hand?

We might bemoan this fact as the fulfillment of Plato’s dire predictions in the Phaedrus (see the final section of the previous article). However, the challenging composition exercises that Erasmus proposes would have probably compensated for the loss. And this isn’t even to mention how Erasmus himself transformed narration into a practice for assimilating the teacher’s lecture in a passage that out-flanks Plato’s objection:

“The master must not omit to set as an exercise the reproduction of what he has given to the class. It involves time and trouble to the teacher, I know well, but it is essential. A literal reproduction of the matter taught is, of course, not required, but the substance of it presented in the pupil’s own way. Personally I disapprove of the practice of taking down a lecture just as it is delivered. For this prevents reliance upon memory which should, as time goes on, need less and less of that external aid which note-taking supplies.”

Erasmus, Aim and Method of Education,177-178.

Here we can see narration endorsed as “essential” in the case of the teacher’s lecture, rather than with texts. Of course, we have to remember that Erasmus has already discussed imitative composition exercises on topics taken from the classic texts that the students would read. So it is not as though there would be no opportunity for students to assimilate the subject matter of texts through their own writing.

What may be more surprising is Erasmus’ stance against note-taking during the teacher’s lectures and in favor of narration. His reasoning involves the training of the memory and the reduction of an “external aid” over the course of a student’s education. For Erasmus “note-taking” is a crutch, or better yet, corresponds to the use of training wheels for the memory. They should be taken off as soon as possible. 

Narration, then, in the first stage of its rebirth, has shifted its focus from the text read aloud to the spoken lecture on the text. In a similar fashion, the training of a student’s rhetorical style has been almost entirely subsumed in the training of the memory for content (note “the substance of it presented in the pupil’s own way”), and the narration is most likely a written enterprise, since it causes “time and trouble to the teacher,” most likely because of the extra work involved in reading and assessing the students’ narrations. 

Narration’s Rebirth, Stage 2: John Amos Comenius (1592-1670)

The great Czech educational reformer, philosopher, pastor and theologian, John Amos Comenius, sometimes called the father of modern education, represents the next stage in the history of narration. The opening statement of his stunning work on the philosophy of education Didactica Magna or The Great Didactic promises much in terms that are familiar to advocates of narration:

“Let the main object of this, our Didactic, be as follows : To seek and to find a method of instruction, by which teachers may teach less, but learners may learn more; by which schools may be the scene of less noise, aversion, and useless labour, but of more leisure, enjoyment, and solid progress ; and through which the Christian community may have less darkness, perplexity, and dissension, but on the other hand more light, orderliness, peace, and rest.”

John Amos Comenius, preface to The Great Didactic

Charlotte Mason found in narration an ideal “method” for attaining Comenius’ golden key of education: teachers teaching less and learners learning more. Of course, the extent to which Comenius anticipated Charlotte Mason, or Mason followed Comenius, is an area ripe for more study, at least for me. 

My Head of School Dave Seibel and I are planning to read Comenius’ Great Didactic together starting this January to see what we will make of it. Classical Academic Press also has a short introduction to Comenius in their Giants in the History of Education series, which I plan to purchase and read as well. But I already know from Karen Glass that Comenius recommended that “every pupil should acquire the habit of acting as a teacher. This will happen if, after the teacher has fully demonstrated and expounded something, the pupil himself is immediately required to give a satisfactory demonstration and exposition of the same thing in the same manner” (as qtd in Glass, Know and Tell, 16). Glass quotes from another of Comenius’ works The Analytical Didactic (trans. Vladimir Jelinek; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953; 193), in which Comenius “reinterpreted the principle of nature that he had described in The Great Didactic as a principle of logic” (John E. Sadler, “John Amos Comenius” in Encyclopedia Britannica; accessed January, 2021). 

As stated, Comenius’ variant on narration embodies the golden key of his Great Didactic by turning the student into the teacher after a teacher’s “demonstration” or “exposition”. It thus follows Erasmus in focusing on a spoken lecture or explanation by the teacher rather than a text. The new development present in Comenius is to emphasize the ironic transformation of student into teacher. Chris Perrin of Classical Academic Press has referred to this pedagogical idea as the classical principle Docendo Discimus (“By teaching we learn”) in his course Introduction to Classical Education. (I wonder where Perrin himself derived this Latin phrase from…. Was it from Comenius or an earlier thinker in the tradition? Or is it a phrase he himself quipped to represent a traditional conception?) Similarly, I have often referred to the classical principle of self-education, citing Charlotte Mason’s quip that there is no education but self-education and Dorothy Sayers’s remarks about students learning how to learn in “The Lost Tools of Learning”.

I am confident that more remains to be said on Comenius and narration, but I have not as yet been able to procure the rarer work that Karen Glass quoted from (though a used copy is now in my Amazon shopping cart). However, for now we can conclude that in Comenius’ hands narration of the teacher’s lecture became the mechanism for learners learning more and teachers teaching less. The narration most likely occurred orally, given the internal logic of the student becoming the teacher, but we cannot be sure without looking closer at the context.

Narration’s Rebirth, Stage 3: John Locke (1632-1704)

John Locke represents a final and perhaps unconnected stage in narration’s rebirth. To suppose that he did not engage with either his partial contemporary Comenius, or with the famous Erasmus, would probably be going too far. But his early modern Enlightenment philosophy no doubt registered itself in his treatise, Some Thoughts Concerning Education (Hackett, 1996; orig. published 1693). I have already expressed my view elsewhere that he, like Erasmus, was directly dependent on Quintilian (see the author’s A Classical Guide to Narration; CiRCE, 2020; p. 96, n. 122). So his recommendations on the topic are best categorized as a part of narration’s renaissance or rebirth. 

For Locke narration is the solution to a problem with the “classical” education of his day. He begins his section on rhetoric and logic with a defense for speaking so little of them up to this point in his treatise:

“The reason is because of the little advantage young people receive by them. For I have seldom or never observed anyone to get the skill of reasoning well or speaking handsomely by studying those rules which pretend to teach it; and therefore I would have a young gentleman take a view of them in the shortest systems [that] could be found without dwelling long on the contemplation and study of those formalities. Right reasoning is founded on something else than the predicaments and predicables, and does not consist in talking in mode and figure itself.” (140)

In objecting to “rules” rather than practice, Locke continues a theme that he has already established in the book about training young children by habit rather than memorized rules. In A Classical Guide to Narration I pointed out that this error of the “classical” training of Locke’s day amounts to a misunderstanding of the classical distinction between an art and a science: 

“The rhetoric teachers of Locke’s day had been treating the art of rhetoric as if it were a science that could be mastered through acquiring knowledge about the art: various names of figures of speech and rules for types of speeches. But without the facility with with language based in practice and cultivated habits, all of it was useless! (A Classical Guide to Narration, 96)

Of course, this antagonism toward logic and rhetoric might make John Locke seem anti-classical in his philosophy of education. But this would be a misunderstanding. Locke is simply endorsing the renaissance humanist stream of classical education over the encrusted scholasticism of the late medieval era. He was refocusing attention on the great authors of the past (ad fontes) and on imitation of worthy models. As he goes on to say, 

“If you would have your son reason well, let him read Chillingworth [an Oxford scholar and churchman, who was a skillful debater, mathematician and theologian]; and if you would have him speak well, let him be conversant in Tully [Marcus Tullius Cicero, the great Roman orator and statesman] to give him the true idea of eloquence, and let him read those things that are well written in English to perfect his style in the purity of our language.” (140)

Developing the arts of reasoning and eloquence, for Locke, come by reading the right authors to provide ideas and models of proper thought and speech. But it also comes by practice, as he says later:

“They have been taught rhetoric but yet never taught how to express themselves handsomely with their tongues or pens in the language they are always to use: as if the names of the figures that embellished the discourses of those who understood the art of speaking were the very art and skill of speaking well. This, as all other things of practice, is to be learned not by a few, or a great many rules given, but by exercise and application according to good rules, or rather patterns, till habits are got and a facility of doing it well.” (141)

Locke’s point accords well with the modern research on elite performance that Anders Erikson and others have brought to light in delineating the value of deliberate practice (as well as near proxies like purposeful practice) for acquiring high level skill. The arts are complex skills and are best trained through coached practice, not mere comprehension of concepts, however true and inspiring. 

Locke’s narration recommendations remarkably embody the principles of effective practice, including the importance of critical feedback, specific focused efforts on improving one aspect of performance at a time, and systematic development of mental models. The entire passage is worth sharing here:

“Agreeable hereunto, perhaps it might not be amiss to make children, as soon as they are capable of it, often to tell a story of anything they know, and to correct at first the most remarkable fault they are guilty of in their way of putting it together. When that fault is cured, then to show them the next, and so on, till one after another all, at least the gross ones, are mended. When they can tell tales pretty well, then it may be time to make them write them. The Fables of Aesop, the only book almost that I know fit for children, may afford them matter for this exercise of writing English, as well as for reading and translating to enter them in the Latin tongue. When they are got past the faults of grammar and can join in a continued coherent discourse the several parts of a story without bald and unhandsome forms of transition (as is usual) often repeated, he that desires to perfect them yet farther in this, which is the first step to speaking well and needs no invention, may have recourse to Tully and, by putting in practice those rules which that master of eloquence gives in his First Book De Inventione §20, make them know wherein the skill and graces of a handsome narrative, according to the several subjects and designs of it, lie.” (141-142)

Like Quintilian, Locke begins with young children telling stories, though he is content for them to tell “anything they know” at first, as the tutor or parent simply plays the role of coach: correcting one fault at a time, as the child practices telling again and again. Instead of focusing narration on the content to be learned, like Erasmus and Comenius, Locke has brought into sharp relief the skill of story-telling and the fluency of speaking gained thereby. While he does recommend Aesop’s fables, like Quintilian, the shift to written narrations form the main focus, and fixing the student’s “faults of grammar” and “bald and unhandsome forms of transition” is his main concern. 

In essence, Locke has restored narration as the foundation stone of rhetorical training, rather than as a method for learning content in any subject. Narration is, for him, the backbone of an English gentleman’s practical skill in speaking and writing that will equip him for the duties of his life. Daily practice in imitating classic authors and especially in learning to write letters (“The writing of letters has so much to do in all the occurrences of human life that no gentleman can avoid showing himself in this kind of writing.”) form the bedrock requirements for his education (142).

Readers who are familiar with Charlotte Mason’s practice of narration alone may be surprised by some of these different applications of narration. Whether it’s narrating from a teacher’s lecture, or correcting the faults in a student’s narration with a focus on skill rather than content, narration’s rebirth through Erasmus, Comenius and Locke defies the standard assumptions of Charlotte Mason’s practice of it. After all, Charlotte Mason seems to almost exclusively envision students narrating from texts without stylistic corrections but a primary focus on content.

In the next and final article in this series, we’ll compare Charlotte Mason’s pedagogy of narration with its classical roots and its renaissance rebirth. Our aim will be to distill some further conclusions for educators today, both practically in terms of how we should use narration in our 21st century context, but also philosophically in what this all means for the classical Christian education and Charlotte Mason movements today.

Other articles in this series:

Part 1: Charlotte Mason’s Discovery?

Part 2: Classical Roots

Part 4: Charlotte Mason’s Practice of Narration in Historical Perspective

The post Why the History of Narration Matters, Part 3: Narration’s Rebirth appeared first on .

These are longer block quotes that will whet your appetite for exploring old articles you may have missed. If you’re new to Educational Renaissance (as many of you are), think of this as a cliff notes guide to some of the core ideas in education we’ve been recovering during these past 6 months. The longer format of these quotations gives our authors a chance to develop an idea more fully than the memorable maxims of last year.

If you missed our Summer Conference Edition article, check that out, especially if you’re new, for some updates on where Educational Renaissance has been and where we’re going. Hope you enjoy these quotable quotes!

Quote 1:

“The Roman world is one we can readily recognize because it contains so many of the trappings of our day. How many students moaned to go to school (ludum) because it meant they couldn’t play games (ludos)? What a peculiar word, then, to describe these two seemingly dichotomous things? Unless, of course, the word itself reveals that “school” and “game” are not after all dichotomous. If school is actually a place to play, and play is a place of learning, maybe the word ludus reveals something we are prone to miss about the reality of education.”

-From School Is a Game: Finite and Infinite Games in Education

Quote 2:

“A sense of piety, of duty or obligation to one’s family, city, culture and the divine, would properly recognize the individual as coming into the world dependent and situated within the broader story of the culture, within which the family and individual find their place. This contrasts sharply with the quest for “self-discovery among a buffet of potential selves” that characterizes modern individualism (Clark and Jain 22).”

-From The Flow of Thought, Part 6: Becoming Amateur Historians

Quote 3:

“As Charlotte Mason observed, there is nothing quite like the experience of being struck by an idea. The experience is equivalent to being the recipient of some unexpected treasure. Ideas loosen our grip on holding a thin view of the world. They open our minds, especially through narration, to connections previously gone undetected and stir our imaginations to explore further up and further in. Ideas light the fire beneath us to learn, search, and discover.”

-From Charlotte Mason and the Power of Ideas

Quote 4:

“The hardest part of writing is staring at a blank page. The biggest hurdle is putting pen to paper or fingers to the keyboard. Making the cursor move forward is a major victory. What is it that keeps us from starting? It is the internal editor. Before we’ve even begun writing, our internal editor is already criticizing our work.”

-From The Writing Process: Sentences, Paragraphs, Edit, Repeat

Quote 5:

“The first step in recovering the love of science is to strip away the sense of impersonal system hanging about it. One of the reasons we tend to discount the idea of being an amateur scientist—engaging in the work of science simply for the love of it (amateur coming from the Latin word for ‘love)—is because of science being conceived as an impersonal system for determining objective truth.”

-From The Flow of Thought, Part 7: Recovering Science as the Love of Wisdom

Quote 6:

“Children are not be treated as mere cattle on a farm or products on an assembly line. They enter this world with immense potential to think, create, explore, write, observe, perform, analyze, and more. As a result, the sort of work we give children to do in the classroom ought to activate and strengthen these capacities to the limits of each child’s potential.”

-From Charlotte Mason and the Liberal Arts Tradition, Part 1: Mapping a Harmony

Quote 7:

“The satisfaction and joy of understanding is a profound experience, but it only comes after time spent in deep work. Waitzkin expresses the concept of deliberate practice as “numbers to leave numbers.” When we are confronted with highly technical information, it needs to be assimilated in such a way that it becomes integrated into our intuition…. A concert pianist doesn’t think about scales and arpeggios while performing on stage. This would detract from her expression. What we can assume when watching a virtuosic performance is that hours upon hours have been spent internalizing scale patterns so that the finger patters are simply part of her being. There is no thought of scales or of fingerings, simply of music. She has studied scales to leave scales, which is what Waitzkin is expressing here.”

-From The Art of Learning: Four Principles from Josh Waitzkin’s Book

Quote 8:

“Christ’s yoke may be easy and his burden light to the one who has taken it on himself (see Matt 11:30), but this is only so for the one who has taken up his cross to follow the master to the place of his own brutal execution. Even for Socrates, the love of wisdom was a “practice of death” (Phaedo 81a). So perhaps I should rather urge you to read philosophy not for flow and pleasure, but for pain and death, and because you must, not because you will want to. Such is the minimum commitment necessary of one who would be a philosopher-teacher.”

-From The Flow of Thought, Part 8: Restoring the School of Philosophers

Quote 9:

“So if one central aspect of classical education is the cultivation of the life of the mind, Charlotte couldn’t agree more. Her insistence that children read from a broad and liberal curriculum fits right in with the broader liberal arts tradition. In particular, her recommended practices of narration, transcription, dictation, and recitation all cultivate a healthy intellectual life for the child, regardless of upbringing, social class, or ability.”

-From Charlotte Mason and the Liberal Arts Tradition, Part 2: Educating the Whole Person

Quote 10:

“The love of learning is not watching some namby pamby cartoon with its prepackaged tasty morsels of information. It’s the exhilaration felt after facing your fears and wrestling that monster in the dark, or slaying the dragon of chaos just beyond the order of your understanding. It’s struggle and suffering in the pursuit of a meaningful goal. Learning, like life, is not all roses and cupcakes, even or especially when you love it.”

-From The Flow of Thought, Part 9: The Lifelong Love of Learning

Quote 11:

“This calling is found in scripture, for example, when the apostle Paul instructs fathers in the Ephesian church to bring up their children “in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Eph. 6:4 ESV). Discipline, or training, requires dedicated effort and intentionality on the part of both parent and child. It does not come by accident. And effective instruction, the meeting of minds around wisdom and knowledge, requires the instructor “to know that which he would teach,” as educator John Milton Gregory put it in The Seven Laws of Teaching (26). Most importantly, the discipline and instruction Paul refers to is to be “of the Lord,” that is, God-centered and in line with scripture.”

-From Cultivating and Community: Wisdom for Parents Educating at Home Amidst the Present Crisis

Quote 12:

“An infectious disease causes a pandemic that decimates the major urban centers in northern Italy. Doctors are recognized by their masks. The economy is disrupted through the loss of a workforce. The social order is overturned. Many turn to religion as a response to the pandemic, yet dogmatic norms are questioned.”

-From The Black Plague and an Educational Renaissance

Quote 13:

“If you’re looking to “optimize” the effectiveness of your teaching, focusing on forming relational connections with students is ironically one of the best investments. Students are eager to learn from a teacher they trust and admire; even the best students struggle to learn well from a cold and distant instructor.”

-From The Benefits and Drawbacks of Online Learning: 6 Hacks to Mitigate the Drawbacks

Quote 14:

“Curiosity is content without certainty and knowing all the answers. It is not concerned with saying the right thing or knowing ahead of time how people will react. Instead it remains focused on rumbling with vulnerability, embracing the unknown, and pursuing further knowledge in order to lead most effectively.”

-From The Importance of Courage and Curiosity for School Leaders Today

Quote 15:

“So what does it mean when I say life occurs in our classrooms? For one, it means that our students are whole persons. We are not just interacting with our students’ minds. Students are also emotional, social and spiritual creatures, just like we are. All dimensions of their personhood come into the classroom. All dimensions of their personhood are being trained and cultivated.”

-From Education Is Life: A Philosophy on Education

Quote 16:

“This holistic vision of a wisdom education in the vein of Proverbs requires much of the teacher. In classical education, likewise, the teacher must be a magister of the arts, a sage, a philosopher; must be a participant in the Wisdom that comes from above. Only then can the teacher cultivate wisdom in the young and simple. Only then will the teacher wisely order techniques, practices and assessments to the right ends.”

-From The Problem of Technicism in Conventional Education

Quote 17:

“As we think about nurturing confident faith in our youngest children, we must not begin with lofty arguments, but instead, the very best stories. These stories will shape the moral imaginations of students, filling their souls with a rich feast of ideas, characters, stories, poems, and fables.”

-From Teaching Confident Faith in an Age of Religious Uncertainty

Quote 18:

“So, what is the future of habit training? As we explored habit training in an online distance learning environment, we saw that the heart of the method hasn’t changed. My prediction is that habit training will remain the same. The method I have outlined here was essentially the same in Charlotte Mason’s time, and look how many technological and cultural shifts have occurred since the early 1900s when she wrote her six-volume philosophy of education. What this means is that investing in this method even now will reap benefits in your life as a teacher for years to come.”

-From Habit Training During Online Distance Learning

Quote 19:

“The only lasting solution to scientism in education is ultimately an entire Renaissance project in which we return ad fontēs (“to the sources”) in an effort not simply to generalize a definition of what classical education is, but to distinguish between the different visions and practices of the multifaceted tradition. In so doing we will have to be prepared to not like everything we see; we may be forced to engage in some negative judgments on some aspects of the tradition, even as we are inspired and challenged by others.”

-From The Problem of Scientism in Conventional Education

Quote 20:

“One aspect of the joy of learning is addressing this concept of humility. As human beings, we are limited, frail and fallible. Frequently we attempt to cover this up, to hide what we truly are behind the smoke and mirrors of our expertise and accomplishments. True human growth, though, only occurs when we uncover our true nature and deal with it. As an individual confronts an area of lack, there is a transformation that can occur, whereby something about us becomes strengthened.”

-From Summertime, and the Learning is Easy

The post 20 Quotable Quotes from the First Half of 2020 Educational Renaissance appeared first on .

The instructions on shampoo bottles and Pop Tarts boxes seem silly. The inclusion of the word “repeat” on shampoo bottles adds a metaphysical quandary. Have we just entered an infinite loop? How do we know when we’ve finished washing our hair? Instructions on consumer products and bits from comedians have much in common. Both are attempting to be extremely precise in their use of language. The economy of words on the shampoo bottle is almost elegant.

Did you watch the Brian Regan video? He gets lots of laughs. It looks almost effortless. Comedy also requires precision with language. But behind Regan’s bit stands hours of work honing words and sentences to optimize humor. Now I want you to watch another video. This is Jerry Seinfeld describing his writing process. (I linked to his Pop Tart video above if you want to see the finished product.) Again, I will wait.

Previously I wrote about the aims of writing. Students should learn to write for an interested audience and to produce perspective. I think we hear both of these at work in Jerry Seinfeld’s writing process. But in today’s article, I want to dive deeper into the nuts and bolts of writing. If my previous article addressed the why question, this article lays out the how.

Defeat the Internal Editor

The hardest part of writing is staring at a blank page. The biggest hurdle is putting pen to paper or fingers to the keyboard. Making the cursor move forward is a major victory. What is it that keeps us from starting? It is the internal editor. Before we’ve even begun writing, our internal editor is already criticizing our work.

Young students can also get locked up with the mechanical effort of writing. Their hands get tired. Some students find the effort of thinking tiresome as well. Other students find it difficult to convert their thoughts from speech to writing. For each of these situations, doing small and frequent writing sessions will help build up strength and stamina. Transcription can help a child with weak fingers. Go for well formed letters done with sufficient speed, so that when it comes to writing their thoughts down, they aren’t hindered by a slow hand. You can record a student speaking his thoughts, and then have them listen back and write those thoughts out. The goal here is to establish the link between thought and writing.

Once students get past these more mechanical problems, they will eventually have to confront the real dragon. The editor that exists in all our minds wants to review and revise our words whenever we speak or write. Effective writing, though, best occurs when we turn off that internal editor. We should teach our students to put words down on the page, any words, even if the words don’t represent our best work. I think this is best done in the classroom, but only if the proper atmosphere has been established.

We can build a writing atmosphere by doing several things regularly. First, students should learn in an environment in which discussions occur. Being able to put ideas out through speech builds a sense that the environment is suitable for expressing and exploring ideas. Discussion transfers to the written word. Putting ideas on the blank page is really not different than putting ideas out into the classroom. Second, writing should be a part of everyday life. Being called upon to write shouldn’t be a new and daunting event. If students feel like writing is an everyday thing, it becomes more and more natural to express oneself in writing.

Writing is such a vital tool for life, we need to bravely challenge students to cultivate this mode of expression. Writing enables us to see thought. Writing words on paper forces us to slow down our brains through the act of composing our thoughts. And then once our thoughts are written down, we can actually look at the thoughts our minds have produced. Seeing this written record then enables us to interact with our thoughts. Without this tool, we often spin our wheels never gaining clarity in our minds. We do this with our shopping lists (think about how difficult it is to hold a week’s shopping in our heads). How much more should we do this with great ideas from literature, history, philosophy, science and mathematics?

Resurrecting the Editor

Okay, so we defeated the internal editor so that we can just get words down on the page. Great! But we actually need that editor if we’re going to take our mere words and shape them into something with meaning and purpose. Very few people can write their best during a first draft. Yet, we often allow ourselves and our students to write in first draft mode as if it is final draft mode. Editing has to be part of the writing process. Yet editing doesn’t come naturally for most students; it’s also not always intuitive how best to teach the editing process. Let’s look at two major layers of editing: solidifying sentences and processing paragraphs.

Editing Layer 1: Solidifying Sentences

Sentences should be the first layer of editing. Each sentence should be examined carefully in three units. Begin by identifying the actual subject of the sentence. By actual I mean that we frequently bury the subject in the back part of the sentence. This is quite natural, since when we write in free flow the mind needs some filler words to get going. Editing now takes those loose words and reorganizes them so that the true subject can be placed in the subject slot of the sentence.

A different way of approaching the subject slot of the sentence is to think about the grammatical subject in the most concrete terms possible. Students should learn to avoid vague terms, especially pronouns. A pronoun introduces vagueness, which is the enemy of both clarity and succinctness. The subject slot, by the way, does not have to be the first grammatical element of a sentence. Transition phrases and adjectival qualifiers can add to the quality of a sentence. But a student should be able to reorganize any sentence so that it can begin with the subject phrase, even if there are good reasons to choose a different sentence structure.

A key goal to note thus far is intentionality. A student should learn that there are numerous ways of expressing the thought in a sentence, but that an intentional choice to use one particular way of organizing a sentence is based on sound reasoning. Learning how to make these choices increases the student’s power of expression.

Next we consider the verb. Having secured for ourselves the most concrete form of the true subject, we want to pair the subject with the most active verb possible. Many teachers focus on eliminating passive verbs and linking verbs. Sometimes, though, a linking verb or passive verb best communicates the state of affairs relative to the subject. A better way of approaching what I think these teachers are getting at is the idea that verbs communicate action. Therefore we should devote time to consider the most active verb possible. Notice the difference between these two sentences:

• There is a congress consisting of two chambers in which laws are made.

• The bicameral congress creates laws.

The second sentence both eliminates the vague pronoun, condenses the true subject to a powerful three-word phrase, and finds a more active verb.

Lastly we deal with all the remainder of the sentence. Two decisions need to be made. First, are the predicating words and phrases in their proper order and using their best expression? Much of the back end of a sentence can be rearranged, so play with the arrangement to make sure the flow assists the understanding of the reader. In addition, stylistic flourish and interesting vocabulary are well placed after the subject-verb complex. The reader has been assisted with a clear subject and verb, so the latter part of the sentence can be used to expand upon the topic at hand. This leads to the second decision. Has the sentence become too complicated? A long sentence isn’t necessarily a complicated sentence. But if someone gets lost in the syntax far removed from the subject, clarity is lost. Consider chopping off any unnecessary clutter or divide the complicated sentence into several shorter sentences.

Editing Layer 2: Processing Paragraphs

Students differ greatly in their conception of paragraphs. Some have lots of tiny paragraphs, some produce complete essays without ever breaking it up into paragraphs. Paragraphs are about developing one topic. In academic writing the convention of starting a paragraph with a topic sentence is sound. The structure of assertion and support is another helpful concept.

Jason shared with me a ten-sentence paragraph structure that I find immensely helpful. The paragraph begins with a topic sentence. Three pieces of evidence are used to support the assertion in the topic sentence. Each piece of evidence is introduced with a transition sentence. Then the evidence (most often a quotation) is laid out. The evidence is then followed with an explanation. This rhythm of transition, evidence, explanation should become engrained in students’ minds. Evidence should never be presented as self evident. It always needs explanation, with the explanation driving home the relevance of this evidence to the assertion made in the topic sentence. With three sentences per piece of evidence added to the original topic sentence, we arrive at the ten-sentence paragraph. To this can be added an eleventh concluding sentence.

The rule of three is an ancient rhetorical strategy. There’s something about sequencing ideas in groups of three that resonates with people. Pastors learn about the rule of three in homiletics courses. Comedians use the rule of three to create jokes (premise, premise, punchline). The knock, knock joke follows the rule of three. The ten-sentence paragraph operates with the rule of three: three pieces of evidence packaged in a three-sentence structure. The rule of three can now be used to expand an essay by having three paragraphs, each with its own topic sentence and support. Another iteration can be used to create three groups of three paragraphs. Students can start thinking about section headings (for some reason it feels more like academic or professional writing when you can use the heading tool in a word processor).

Once we start building multiple paragraphs, our attention can turn to arrangement. Have students reorder their paragraphs. Ask them how different sequences feel when the order is changed. Once students see that they’re not locked into one way of arranging their ideas, they gain new freedom to revise their work.

Editing becomes less about finding spelling errors and actually becomes part of the creative process. In this article I tried rearranging sections, placing the paragraph section before the sentence section. I decided to stay with the sentence-paragraph order. However, the exercise enabled me to see that there isn’t a strict order here. A teacher may want to work with a class at the paragraph-building level first and then zoom in at the sentence level.

Many Smaller Essays

One insight about the editing process is that smaller writing samples enable students to get practice editing at both the sentence and paragraph levels. The more practice they get free writing and intentionally editing helps them use the tools needed to expand to long form essay writing. One of the detriments to effective learning is writing long essays that become unwieldy for both the teacher and the student. Learning how to edit effectively takes repeated practice.

Short pieces provide more scope for practice on sentences and paragraphs. Long essays hinder the editing process for two reasons. One, the sheer amount to be edited can be overwhelming. Teachers receiving lots of lengthy papers understand the feeling of overwhelm. It takes time and concentration to give substantive feedback. The same holds for students working even on their own written work. If the editing process can’t be applied effectively for lengthy pieces, the students won’t fully learn the process. Two, writing long pieces before editing skill has been cultivated and honed means that students are getting lots and lots of practice writing suboptimal essays. It would be like swimming long distance with bad form. Every swim just reinforces the bad form. and the swimmer never learns the efficiency and freedom of proper swimming form.

An additional benefit to shorter essays is that you as a teacher can be more involved in providing substantive feedback more frequently. In some upper level classes where a lengthy essay is assigned the amount of feedback a teacher can provide is rather limited. Plus the time needed to mark multiple long essays means there’s a significant gap between initial composition on the students’ part and the feedback they receive. One method for solving this problem is to divide the long essay into shorter episodes that accumulate to a full essay over time. I have worked with several teachers now who have overseen senior theses, and each of them approached this massive project by dividing it into bite-sized pieces.

Hopefully this article helps stimulate your thinking about teaching writing in your class. Not everyone will become devoted to their art the way Jerry Seinfeld or Brian Regan have. They are virtuosos in their field. What we can learn from them, though is that writing is a process. We confront the blank page and get our ideas down. Then we hone our work until it really shines.

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1) The Primacy of the Audience

2) Perspective is Power

3) Multiple Styles

In teaching an art form, we can tend to focus on the technical aspects of the art, but we also need to take a long-term view of the role an art form will take in the person’s life. How will the art form enable a person to create meaning and purpose in life? How will the person use the art form to connect to others? These kinds of questions cannot wait until after students have learned to form complete sentences, paragraphs and essays. It should already be integrated into writing instruction from the time a student enters the abstract reasoning (formal operational) stage of development.

The Primacy of the Audience 

First, students should be taught to think about their audience. Most students write for an audience of one: their teacher. But the teacher is the worst possible audience to write for. The student that writes for a teacher is thinking predominantly about the grade a teacher might give. Now a teacher has to read what the student is writing. That’s what a teacher is paid to do. But in the real world you don’t want to have to pay others to read your writing, you want to get paid when others read your writing. Sure, this sounds a bit crass, but it’s the reality of professional writing. 

A quick aside. What do I mean by professional writing? We can all picture journalists and novelists as the epitome of professional writers. But what I mean is anyone for whom writing is essential to the accomplishment of their job. Lawyers, for instance, must spend a significant amount of time writing professionally. Office managers, musicians, museum curators, police officers, legislators, advertisers all have to write in some capacity. Their ability to excel in their profession often comes down to their ability to write effectively within their field. And writing effectively means serving the widest possible audience within that field. I am writing predominantly to teachers through this blog. Think about all the writing tasks your job entails: lesson plans, classroom newsletters, report card comments, lecture notes, emails, etc. Effective writing in this field requires thinking through who your audience is. The next time you write, say, a classroom newsletter, would it impact your style if you thought to yourself, “I want to write in such a way that these parents want to share this with their friends.” What if you create a culture where the parents can’t wait for your next newsletter? Okay, enough with the aside. Back to the students. 

Students should be taught to write for somebody who will be interested in what they have to say. Students should be writing, so that the person who reads this (basically you as the teacher) can picture and advocate for their potential audience. My feedback as a teacher incorporates a sense of effectiveness in getting noticed by an audience. I could give comments like, “You really grabbed my attention with that illustration.” Or “Consider moving this idea into the introduction to draw your audience in.”

My thinking on writing as communicating with an audience was crystallized by the excellent work being done at the University of Chicago. There is an excellent YouTube video by Larry McEnerny. At the time of recording he was director of the Writing Program at the University of Chicago. I don’t know how many other universities are teaching writing in such a forward-thinking manner—my guess is not many. The premise McEnerny is working with is that students in his class will largely be in academic and professional fields. However, his advice is pertinent for creative fields as well.

Too often colleges and universities teach an orthopraxis of writing to fit students into the mold of accepted procedures for student writing in college courses. What better way to kill inspiration, creativity and motivation? This trickles down to secondary education as well. We teach writing with a view to the conventions of the college classroom. It is well and good to be prepared for college, don’t get me wrong. However, students should have already cultivated a love for writing for an audience before leaving for college, so that they can glean the most from their college education for the benefit of those they will serve as writers. There’s no switch that gets flipped at graduation that makes students stop being classroom writers and start being writers attracting an audience. They need to learn all along the way to be writing for an audience. For fear of losing my own faithful audience, I will end my diatribe there.

One final thought before moving on. Recently several prominent voices have offered advice for those seeking to build an audience. (I’m thinking predominantly of Seth Godin, Simon Sinek and Tim Ferriss, although I’m sure there are others who would lay claim to giving this advice as well.) The idea is that seeking to build an audience is the best way to alienate an audience. Instead, writing for an audience of one—namely yourself—is the best way to build an authentic audience. I think this has serious implications for teaching writing to students. We need to be careful to help them find their own voice and to promote their own interests as writers.

(Again, I need to carefully define what I mean: to find one’s own voice actually means to ingest many ideas from others—the great books—and to imitate the work of others. This is NOT some free-association exercise where a student discovers some special source within.)

Our ultimate aim is to promote the audience of one ideal, which means that the teacher/grader cannot be the audience of one. Students should learn how to create the pieces they desire to see exist in the world. What thesis, poem, novel, film script, sports analysis do they want to enact for no other benefit than their own interest? It is exactly this kind of impulse that attracts an audience.

Perspective is Power

Second, students should be taught to write about their perspective. They should learn how to write a thesis. They need to give an opinion, to share their perspective. If they can’t share their perspective, then all they’re doing is giving information. In this day and age information is cheap; it’s everywhere. The internet is glutted with an infinite amount of basically free information.  What people really want and need is perspective. If our students can learn how to convey their perspective, then they will be creating something of value for their audience.

I recently had a student who was struggling to create a thesis statement. He couldn’t articulate his perspective. So what I told him to do is practice in an area of interest. He likes to watch soccer. So I told him to start a blog (“You don’t even need to publish the blog…”). Analyze the game and give a perspective as to why your team won or lost. Then support your perspective by marshalling evidence such as how effective the team’s formation was, what players were on the field, were bad fouls committed or did the referee manage the game poorly.

Notice how highly transferable these skills are. This student can now apply these skills to an analysis of literature, a review of recent legislation, or the impact of events on a historical era. The student has learned to provide something of value to his audience: perspective.

Let me be clear about what this entails. Obviously to share a perspective, an author must work with information. One must differentiate the best information from the chaff that the wind drives away. One must plumb the depths of what the information means. One must connect one piece with another, especially finding links that perhaps others haven’t seen or given enough consideration to. One must bring to bear upon the information the accumulated background knowledge, even while humbly admitting a sheer lack of knowledge in the face of the infinite information out there. Yet, the work of writing is not just to repackage information, it is to bring perspective to the information.

Multiple Styles 

Third, students need to learn how to write in multiple styles. What do we mean by multiple styles? Too often we try to teach only an academic style. The academic style is great for particular kinds of writing, but it’s very limited in accomplishing the first and second ideas I mentioned. It is not a great style for attracting the widest possible audience, and it is not always the best style for conveying perspective. It can be great for conveying perspective if what you’re trying to do is present a very detailed argument in an academic setting.

Now don’t get me wrong, academic writing has to be part of any writing curriculum. Students should learn how to write judicial and deliberative essays. This is a style that demands precision and logical skill. However students should also be encouraged to explore different kinds of style—narrative styles, poetic styles—so that they can expand their sense of how to communicate ideas. I also want to add that there is no dichotomy between academic and other styles. Really effective academic prose incorporates narrative and poetic elements.

Learning about different styles and stylistic choices contributes to the first two points. To attract an audience and to provide perspective, students should be exposed to and practice different styles. Teachers should have students read different styles, analyze their attributes, and then imitate those styles, so that they can gain power in what they have to say. A great way to do this is through assigning a written narration or more complex imitation responses, like modernizing a work.

When I’m working with students, I find that when they are trying to work in an academic style they will often use overly elaborate sentence structures, thinking that’s what academic style is. This elaboration, using compound and complex sentences, feels sophisticated. But what happens is students start to lose clarity and focus in their writing, and if you lose clarity and focus, you lose power. You lose command of language. You lose the ability to communicate to an audience and provide perspective. So I encourage them to cut those sentences down. Find your subject and verb. Use short sentences. Create power through smaller sentences. Then build them together. You’re now maximizing clarity over complexity. 

Updating Classroom Aims

So what have I not mentioned as keys to an effective writing program? I haven’t mentioned such elements as topic sentences, paragraph structures, or the organization of writing such as introductions and conclusions. I haven’t mentioned the use of evidence, which is perhaps the bulkiest aspect of the formal writing curriculum. Students certainly ought to learn MLA style for quoting, referencing and citing sources. But if these elements receive primary focus, we can lose the reason why we write in the first place.

A practical consideration is how one incorporates this view of writing into our classroom instruction. Over the years I have drawn on a few different rubrics for assessing and giving feedback on written assignments. ERB’s WrAP rubric is quite helpful. Similar rubrics exist for other standardized tests, such as the SAT or ACT. These rubrics help get at some of the nuts and bolts of academic writing. (I also use rubrics for creative writing, simply to develop categories to discuss with students.) To these one can add the two broad categories outlined above. Does this piece of writing show an awareness of audience benefit? Does this piece of writing communicate substantive perspective? When marking papers, one can add notes about how a student is connecting with a potential audience or bringing perspective. I’m also mindful to show places where these aspects can be further developed. 

Students should come away from our classes on writing feeling that writing serves a grand purpose in their lives. Writing is a craft, and they should sense that they are part of a community of craftspeople who enjoy this kind of work. Writing for the widest possible audience and giving perspective to that audience is meaningful work. Students who start viewing writing in this way find greater enjoyment in their writing tasks.

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