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You'll be making a change from connecting the dots for your child to teaching her how

to connect the dots for herself.

Welcome to the Simply Charlotte Mason Podcast.

I'm Sonya Shafer.

Some people think that a Charlotte Mason approach is a unit study approach.

But there are some key differences between the two.

And if you're making the change from unit studies to Charlotte Mason in your homeschool,

you need to understand those differences.

Let's take a look at them by exploring three tendencies you might have in your thinking.

Tendency #1: You're probably used to making the mental connections for the student.

Usually in a unit study approach, the teacher picks one theme and tries to connect as many

school subjects as possible to that theme.

But in a Charlotte Mason approach, you don't force those connections ahead of time.

The focus is on giving your student a wide variety of subjects on different themes and

allowing the student to make the connections for herself.

It's something that Charlotte called the "science of relations."

As we learn more about this wide world in which we live, we begin to form mental relations

between the things we learn about.

Perhaps you're learning about Greek mythology in history and you read the story of Prometheus.

A few days later, you read the next poem in the poetry book you're reading by Longfellow.

The poem is called "The Lighthouse"—a completely different topic from Greek mythology.

But near the end, the poet calls the lighthouse "a new Prometheus, chained upon the rock,

Still grasping in his hand the fire of Jove."

Suddenly your mind lights up!

You've made a connection.

You understand that relation for yourself; it is your own possession.

And that's when learning sticks, when your student is allowed to make those connections

for herself.

So focus on providing the wide variety of subjects, and give your student the opportunity

to experience that personal joy of the science of relations.

Tendency #2: You might feel like learning didn't happen if your student didn't do a

hands-on project.

It's easy to look at a finished project as proof that learning took place.

But remember that busy hands do not guarantee that the mind is engaged.

You will know how well your student's mind is engaged when you hear her narration.

Being able to retell or explain what you read, and put it in your own words, is a great test

of what you know.

And that is one of the foundational learning tools that you want your student to practice

using.

You see, a Charlotte Mason approach is about making the move toward self-educating, rather

than teacher-focused educating.

Self-education is the goal, and the methods that are used in all the grade levels are

designed to give the student practice with key tools for learning.

Narration is one of those tools that can reassure you that learning did happen, even without

cutting and pasting.

I'll leave a link to more about the tools for learning in the notes.

(And by the way, if you read those blog posts only once and then try to narrate them to

yourself without looking back, you will understand how powerful narration can be as a learning

tool.)

Tendency #3: Perhaps you worry that your child will get confused with a wide variety of subjects

and no common theme.

Well, maybe it would help to look at it from the other direction.

Variety is the spice of life.

Rarely does life fall neatly into one common theme.

Variety is what keeps life interesting.

And variety in lessons can help to keep them interesting and enjoyable.

Think of your lessons as meals for the mind.

Just as you don't serve all one type of food for your family's meals, so you don't want

to serve all one theme in your family's mental meals.

In Charlotte Mason circles we often refer to "spreading a feast" of ideas.

Wide variety will do that.

Variety will also help your student, over time, get into the habit of looking for her

own connections, and thus, mentally interacting more with what she is learning.

Now, over the past few episodes, we've looked at three tendencies and three practical tips.

So let's keep that trend going.

Here are three tips that will help you make the change from unit studies to Charlotte

Mason.

Tip #1: Make regular entries in a Book of Centuries.

A Book of Centuries is basically a timeline in a book.

Each two-page spread covers 100 years, a century.

Every time you read about a person or an event, flip open your Book of Centuries to the appropriate

page and make an entry.

Over time, as you enter more and more people and events, you will start to see connections

between them.

When you flip open to a century to enter a new person, you will see all of the other

people you have already studied who lived in that same century.

That's what will help tie everything together.

You don't have to tell your student who all lived at the same time in history.

Just be faithful to make those Book of Centuries entries and your student will see if for herself.

I recommend keeping a family Book of Centuries when the children are young, so they can see

how it works.

Then when each student's handwriting is well-established, you can give her a personal Book of Centuries

to start keeping.

It is a key method to help her with the science of relations and with self-educating.

Tip #2: Simplify and trust the methods, especially narration.

Narration sounds easy, but it's harder than you might think.

Read the passage in the living book to give your student those living ideas—for younger

students, you read the passage aloud; older students can read it on their own—and then

ask her to put that passage into her own words.

Sometimes the narration might just be her talking.

That's okay.

The mental process she is going through, in order to tell, will help cement that knowledge

in her mind.

Then sometimes you could ask for a narration in a different way—a more project-oriented

way, if you will.

You could say, "Draw a picture of your favorite part of the story, and tell me about your

picture."

Or you could say, "Build today's story with your blocks, and then tell me about it."

For older students, you could say, "Pretend you are the main character in the book and

write three journal entries about what happened in our reading today."

Or you could challenge them to write and present a one-act play about the day's reading, or

to present the events from the reading as a news broadcast.

The main difference between those kinds of narrations and many unit-study-type projects

is that the narrations are very open-ended.

You suggest the type of media (picture or journal or news broadcast) and then you let

the student take it from there.

There are no pre-printed pages to be filled out or pictures to make their project match.

They have freedom to interact with the material that was read, to pull from it the ideas that

they connect with, and to present them to you in their own words with their own personality

involved.

Trust that method.

Tip #3: Go ahead and provide resources that can be used for hands-on learning.

Set them out where your children can access them.

But don't worry about coming up with teacher-directed projects using them.

Instead, focus on giving your student lots of great living ideas in the morning lesson

time and lots of free time in the afternoons.

You will know your student has made that knowledge her own when you see her act out or play the

history story or the poem or the art picture in her free time.

But it should be her idea, not yours.

You simply provide the capes and the swords or the building blocks for pretend play or

the art supplies for drawing cartoons or whatever.

When you see your student voluntarily create something out of her own mind that was prompted

by a living idea in one of her books—when it is her own creation—you'll know that

she has made that knowledge her own.

You see, reading, narrating, the Book of Centuries, and creating something of your own—those

are all tools for self-education!

Your student can use all of those tools on her own to learn about anything she wants

to.

Those methods are not dependent on someone else telling you what to do.

And that's one of the main goals of a Charlotte Mason education: to give the student the tools

for self-education, and lots of practice with them, so she can continue to use them and

enjoy learning for herself over a lifetime.

Remember, you can ease into those tools and using Charlotte Mason methods.

I'll put links in the notes to direct you to the episodes that outline how to make the

switch gradually, one step at a time, as you're ready.

If you enjoyed this video, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram,

or your favorite podcast app so you don't miss an episode.

You can also subscribe to the audio version of this podcast or read the blog post on our

website at simplycharlottemason.com.

All of those links will be in the notes along with links to resources I mentioned.

Thanks for joining me.

See you next time!