Category: Living Education

Home-Schooling the Charlotte Mason Method

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Raising Daughters in a Fashion Doll World

Saying “no” is very much an easy solution in dealing with child training. No, we do not do sleepovers. No, you are not taking ballet lessons. No, we do not allow fashion dolls in our home. No, you can’t have any candy. A dear mentor of mine encouraged me to be a mother who tries to say “yes.” Saying “no” can be an easy solution, but it can also shut down doors to teaching opportunities and experiences where my children can grow. So, I am learning that very often there are ways to say “yes” to things within biblical perimeters. I am not saying that my answer is “yes” to everything, but I try not to give an immediate “no” until I have thought something through.

I had a Barbie doll for a short time as a child. I truly enjoyed playing with it. But after having concerns with the impact the unrealistic image that doll could have on me, my parents choose to substitute my doll with another toy of my choice.

Like many young women, I did have a season where I struggled with having a godly perspective about the shape and weight of my body. I don’t believe playing with a Barbie doll had nearly much influence as the conversations and perspectives of the friends I listened to at that time in my life. But as a result of my struggle, even before I was married, I decided I would never let the world influence my daughters about what their body should or should not look like. I never wanted my children to own a fashion doll.

I truly was naïve then, in thinking I could protect my daughters from being critical of the body God gave them by not allowing them to play with a Barbie doll. And I wasn’t brilliant to think I had power to protect them from ever being exposed to worldly influences. At some point, my children will be exposed to the influences of the world. I can choose if I will be the person to discuss things with them or not. If I don’t address issues with them, it will be someone else who will. I have come to realize that I am unable to protect my children from the world, but I am able to prepare them how to respond biblically when they do encounter worldly perspectives. I actually fail in teaching my children how to think biblically if I protect my children from the exposure to the evil around them. They will be in shock and unable to grapple with what is out there if they are faced with it when they are on their own. I must make it a point to gradually, and purposefully address issues like body image with them while I am able. I currently have control of when and how they are exposed to things right now and I can teach them how to interact and perceive worldly influences in light of Scripture. Or I can even to allow another trusted adult, like a grandparent, Auntie, or godly older woman to also to be a part in the development of my daughter’s Spiritual development.

Allowing my daughters to play with fashion dolls is a perfect opportunity to teach them how to think and play appropriately with clothing and dolls, without being influenced by the image the doll portrays. Fashion dolls can be a great way for little girls to learn how to make and design clothes that are modest and creative. My girls also can learn how to fix hairstyles by playing with the doll’s hair. I consider incorporating fashion dolls into my girl’s lives as an asset.

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This is what I do. I buy used Bratz dolls. I take time to repaint and make them into child friendly wholesome faced dolls, instead of the seductive, dolls they are. A few years ago, I came across an amazing up-cycled version of fashion dolls by an Australian Artist, Sonia Singh. Sonia remakes the gaudy dolls into something lovely. She freely shares her methods and patterns about how to do that yourself. I spent time learning what she did and made dolls for my daughters from her website, Tree Change Dolls, and her printable instructions on Etsy. I have been able to create sweet faced fashion dolls for my daughters thanks to Sonia’s printables. For instance, the little blond doll pictured above is the same blond doll pictured at the top of this blog post. It is true! Following Sonia’s instructions, I can easily make footwear, hairstyles, faces, and clothes. It is incredible fun to be a part of the doll’s transformation and I know my daughters will enjoy repainting their own dolls in time.

My other concern with fashion dolls is finding them around the house with nothing on. I want to teach my children that it is wise to cover up and be discreet. So, my next step for the dolls is to make permanent swimsuits for them. The swimsuit will be stitched on and my girls can change their doll’s clothes, without the doll ever being completely undressed.

Fashion dolls can be used in an incredible way in my daughters’ lives to teach them about discretion, appropriateness, and modesty. As my daughters get older, I know they will also be able to learn how to create outfits for their dolls. So, the dolls will play a role in allowing my daughters to be creative with clothing learn some sewing skills, and have simple fun playing with fashion that is not over sexed. So instead of telling my daughter’s “no.” I have found a way to use a worldly toy to the advantage of teaching my children biblical principles, homemaking skills, and art.

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First Day of School

I have been anticipating this day for some time now. I printed Ambleside Online’s lesson plans, created a daily lesson plan, and ordered books. I was awake at four this morning in excitement for the day.
I have four children. The oldest, Emma, is seven. She will be starting her second year of school today. I don’t hold to the standard grade system strictly. She has twelve to thirteen years of learning in front of her. This is her second year. If I had to place her in a specific grade at this point, I would say she would be in first and a half grade.

As Emma begins her second year, my other two daughters will be joining in the short group study. I will be reading to them some good storybooks. I expect they will accompany us on nature walks and various activities outside regular book learning as well. But other than that, I am giving them play time.

With the Charlotte Mason Methods, I do not use a large variety of textbooks. Most of the books we use are biographies, books with stories, and classical books. To keep my life simple, I stick to Ambleside Online’s lesson plans and book lists. Until Christmas, we will be finishing up a few books from year one, while beginning year two. After Christmas, she will be completely year two.

Emma’s Year 2 Lessons:

Math: Math-U-See Alpha Single Digit Addition & Subtraction Instruction Book, Student Workbook, Test Booklet & DVD
History: Fifty Famous Stories Retold, D’Aulaire biographies, Our Island Story: A History of England for Boys and Girls, Trial and Triumph: Stories from Church History
Natural History: The Burgess Bird Book for Children (Dover Children’s Classics), Paddle-to-the-Sea (Sandpiper Books), James Herriot’s Treasury for Children: Warm and Joyful Tales by the Author of All Creatures Great and Small
Geography: Charlotte Mason’s Geography, Home Geography for Primary Grades, and Mapping Paddle to the Sea
Copywork: Language Lessons for a Living Education 2 and Scripture Passages
Reading: Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, Books from Ambleside Online’s Free Read List
Timeline: Continuing to build a personal timeline of Emma’s life
Recitation: Memorizing the Walrus and the Carpenter by Robert Lewis Stevenson
Drawing: Step-By-Step Drawing Book (Activity Books for Little Children)
Handicrafts: Plastic Canvas Art
Piano: Basic Piano Lessons

Group Lessons:
Bible: A variety of Bible Stories, Scripture memorization, Catechisms, and Hymns
Poetry: Book of Poms
Art: John Constable
Language: French and Spanish from Little Pim (available on Amazon Video Prime)
Classical Music: Carl Maria Von Weber
Folk Music: Three a term, starting with Cockles and Mussels
Hymns: There is a Fountain by William Cowper
Exercise: Wii Fit for 30 minutes, or a nature walk
Nature Study: Handbook of Nature Study, National Geographic Kids Magazines, and Emma does a nature notebook

The day went very much how I expected. We accomplished what we set out to do, but it was not without its rough spots, some whining, and there is always the baby fussing and a telephone call. But we did it. We will spend a few days working out the bugs, but it will come together into some sort of system before too long. After a very rough start last year, I quickly learned to allow myself and the children grace as we begin a new school year.

AS AN AMAZON ASSOCIATE I EARN FROM QUALIFYING PURCHASES.
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The Charlotte Mason Method: A Living Education

“This idea of all education springing from and resting upon our relation to Almighty God-we do not merely give a religious education because that would seem to imply the possibility of some other education, a secular education, for example. But we hold that all education is divine, that every good gift of knowledge and insight comes from above, that the Lord the Holy Spirit is the supreme educator of mankind, and that the culmination of all education (which may at the same time be reached by a little child) is that personal knowledge of and intimacy with God in which our being finds its fullest perfection.” 
-Charlotte Mason

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Why I choose it? Although I studied and earned my master’s degree elementary education, I have not embraced all the methods of traditional education. In fact, many of my courses in college encouraged me to question things like grade levels, standardized testing, and the overuse of curriculum. I realized that although traditional education might have success in giving a teacher methods to impart information and evaluate students learning, it fails in building a love for learning. In the early years, children are naturally curious and interested, as that curiosity is stifled with mandatory home-work and a pressure to learn within given perimeters and methods. It is easy for a child to be spoon fed and learn information from traditional methods, but we must such learning is done at the loss of a child’s natural curiosity. Charlotte Mason believed a child could naturally develop a hunger and value knowledge on his own. After reading writings and books from Charlotte Mason, I found myself agreeing whole-heatedly with her Biblical philosophy of education. I think it was already my philosophy all along, she just put my thoughts into words. And she described how the goal of creating self-taught learners can be accomplished. I knew it was the course of education I wanted to use in home-schooling our children.

What is it? Charlotte Mason was a brilliant English educator in the early 1800’s. Besides writing down her philosophies of education, she created her own curriculum as well. Her books were written toward both the parents and the teachers of her day. Home-schooling parents have adapted her thinking, but her books were not written to or in favor of home-education. She was creating an educational system based on her philosophies of education. She was an educational philosopher similar to Montessori or Waldorf.

Charlotte Mason believed exploration and developing a healthy curiosity was the most important step in education. Even brilliant Albert Einstein stated: “The important thing is to not stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” Charlotte believed that developing a curiosity about all things, begins with exploration of nature, and exposure to beautiful things like art and music. Charlotte did not promote teaching young children, simply exposing children to various experiences and letting them ask questions as they observe. She believed that children will develop a healthy curiosity if they explore the world at a young age.

Charlotte Mason method does not rely on textbooks. Instead she uses “living books.” From my educational background, this is still a method I am working on being confident using. I believe it will be effective, but it goes against the secure grain of traditional methods. “Living books” are an incredible method of retaining and applying information. Even as adults, we are far more able to remember and associate with a biography of Stonewall Jackson, than just by reading his name in a list of Civil War generals in the textbook chapter on the Civil War. Living books are classical books, historical books, biographies, autobiographies, and poetry. Along with those books we do students in the Charlotte Mason method give oral recitation. Meaning my daughter has to re-hash what we have read in the book. It helps her remember, learn to express her thought in speech, and it helps me know what she has learned. In time, she will write essays as well. The Charlotte Mason Method is method similar to the classical method of education that founded the one-room schoolhouses in America. Today Classical Conversations are the spin off that philosophy of education and similar in many ways to the Charlotte Mason method.

What We do. I began thinking I would create all our own curriculum. After it took be a week to put together a plan for our Bible lessons, I realized, I could not effectively do that for each child, each subject, and each school year. My time was too valuable for other needs at home. So, I researched various ways to implement the Charlotte Mason Method. The one I choose to use was Ambleside Online. Ambleside Online not only provides book lists and lesson plans, but support as well. And it is all free. We have a non-existent budget for education, so it made sense to use a method that was very inexpensive. The most I spend a year for one child is $200, less for each child after, because I can use the same books. Math is the most expensive book, because I do buy a curriculum called Math U See. Other than purchasing a math text, I use a few items like art picture studies from Simply Charlotte and some form of copy work text. The rest of our school year I use old books I buy online for a few dollars. I also use audio books and library books as needed. Ambleside Online does all the basic footwork for our education. It works well for us, and I love the books we have discovered through the website. Can you believe I had never heard of James Herriot’s Treasury for Children before? And what a joy we have had reading about early church history in Trial and Triumph by Richard Hannula.

Last fall began our first year using the Ambleside Online format. To be perfectly honest, the first few months of home-schooling were a bit rough. I had visions of my children sitting nicely while we did group studies together sipping on morning tea. But the baby would choose our school hours as his fussiest, the littlest girls would whine and fidget, the phone rang, folks stopped in, we got sick, and life happened. I realized home-schooling was far more a lifestyle and not so much a formal moment. We began reading books throughout the morning and took breaks to feed a baby, switch loads of laundry, and spend a few minutes chatting with a neighbor. It was a lot more reasonable once I realized I had to allow myself more flexible than a teacher in a classroom.

So far, this is what we are doing for home-education. I feel it is very much new learning territory, even though I was home-schooled my entire life. Teaching my own children is a totally different genre than being a home-school grad. My children seem to like it, but they really don’t know anything different. Like any method of education, I do believe home-education has its advantages and disadvantages. This is simply what we are doing and where we are at in life. And I am enjoying the season of life and the wild and crazy blink in eternity I have to teach my children.