He ate and drank the precious words, His spirit grew robust, He knew no more that he was poor, Or that his frame was dust. He danced along the dingy ways And this bequest of wings Was but a book. What liberty A loosened spirit brings. – Emily Dickinson,...
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My children are many years away from graduating from high school. I have no idea what interests they will have at that time or what direction they will want their lives to go. I do not know if they will want to go to college or to work straight...
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The same Emily Bronte who penned that famously over-the-top Gothic romance, Wuthering Heights, wrote a poem in which one of the most bedrock truths of the Christian faith is expressed in the very first stanza. Bronte dives right in on the importance of faith and of fearlessness: No coward soul...
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“When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” This quote by Joseph Kennedy, father of President John F. Kennedy, urges the soul under attack to hunker down and work harder, putting forth extra effort to battle adversity. The pithy sentiment, designed to inspire a perseverance mentality, often encourages...
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This morning I visited my local Classical Conversations community and observed my son’s Challenge II class and my daughter’s Challenge B class. For both, I was able to be with them during the math seminar and witness some good math teaching. I will not name the tutors, so as...
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“We believe parents are their children’s primary teachers not because parents know everything but because each child is uniquely (and wonderfully!) made and because the people who know and love a child best are the ones most motivated to help that child succeed.” We believed in parents educating their children long...
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When you think about the trivium in any subject, the rhetorical level is the level in which you should show the most mastery of the subject. Latin is no exception. During the grammar stage of Latin you memorize the endings and the vocabulary. The dialectic stage focuses on Latin...
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May I ask you a question? As a mom, I am good at that: “Are you up yet?” “Do you need some help?” “Why did you leave that here?” “Is your throat sore?” “When will you be back?” “Do you call that clean?” As a homeschool mom of two...
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InTen Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child, Anthony Esolen writes an “indispensable guide to overcoming today’s treacherous trends in parenting and education—and the overwhelming banality of contemporary culture.” Esolen’s scope is broad, but my focus was narrow. I looked for how these cultural shifts, which Esolen strongly...
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Feeling guilty seems to be a permanent condition of motherhood. It is often magnified for homeschooling mothers: it seems impossible to finish the “perfect” lesson plans we have made; if we participate in too many activities, we worry that we are overloading our children… if we do not participate...
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Calvin Coolidge’s father, a notary, administered the oath of office to our thirtieth president in their home when President Harding suddenly died. They had neither electricity nor telephone, so that night when the news arrived at the telegraph station, the operator had to drive up the mountain and wake...
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OK, I am like a kid with a new BB gun. I do not really know how to use it, but it looks like so much fun. In that spirit, please allow me to wield Aristotle’s common topics. I just hope I do not shoot somebody’s eye out. Aristotle’s...
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