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The Classical Conversations Blog - Post Page 91

Discover Posts on Homeschooling and Classical, Christian Education

Aug 07, 2013

The Educational Waters in Which We Swim (Part One)

After speaking at a Practicum in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, I was listening to the radio on my way back to the hotel. American Family Radio was airing a program called “Crane Durham’s Nothing But Truth.” On this program, the subject of worldview was being discussed. The speaker referred to our worldview...

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Aug 06, 2013

Thermometer or Thermostat?

“Are you a thermometer or a thermostat?” The question was originally posed to a group of teenagers at a Christian summer camp. When I heard the query, I was struck by how apropos it seemed for me, a mom preparing for another season of homeschooling. A thermometer reports the...

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Aug 01, 2013

It’s All about Value!

Did you know that math is about more than numerical values arranged in symbolic sentences? It has great value in itself for practical application, of course, but it has much merit as well in the general skills and virtues that its study encourages. Recently, I have been reading a...

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Jul 31, 2013

Learning to Be Musical

You may remember from my previous article that I argued that we are all—barring some handicap—able to be musical. Therefore, I will not go into much detail about that point because that article addresses most of my reasons for believing this. Keeping this in mind, however, the question becomes: if we are all...

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Jul 29, 2013

“Altared” States

Summer Practicum season is often the “pause that refreshes,” as Coca-Cola would say. Inspiration abounds from speakers keen to be God’s conduit for truth. Encouragement flows freely among those who have “been there” before—and survived a certain stage of the homeschooling journey. Renewal and recommitment to the challenge are...

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True Fellowship: Classical Conversations Community

There is a scene in The Fellowship of the Ring that totally redefined the word “fellowship” for me. “Fellowship” is a word that has become so common among church members that it has been watered down to mean almost nothing. If teens are talking outside, but doing nothing, we say, “Well at...

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Jul 25, 2013

Multitasking No More

Has this ever happened to you? Two hours ago I opened my laptop to begin this article. As I was typing some notes, I noticed incoming email about an upcoming conference. Oh good! I opened it just to make sure everything was all set and to look over the...

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Promoted: the Role of the Classical Educator

“If the Challenge Guide has the weekly assignments in it, what do I do all summer?” asked a mom at a Parent Practicum. She had homeschooled her children for years before participating in Classical Conversations and she had recently decided to enroll her youngest child in Challenge I. Previously, she...

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Jul 19, 2013

Are You Musical?

Are you musical? What a question! And the answer will affect so much of what we consider our children and ourselves capable of, much less what we are willing to attempt. As you might have guessed, I suspect that far too many of us consider ourselves unmusical—or maybe I...

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Jul 17, 2013

What Is Sabbath Rest?

In Genesis 2:2–3, Scripture tells us that “on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had...

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Jul 16, 2013

Can Books Really Teach Us Anything? (Part Two)

In Part One of this article, we looked at two recent arguments in favor of letting children’s desires dictate what they read. This common contemporary argument is directly opposed to the idea of a classical, Christian education. While the aim of most contemporary educators is to prepare their students for the...

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