Wednesday Hodgepodge: Home Away from Home

Note from Mama Squirrel: I will be away from the Treehouse and will have limited computer access for the next few days. If I don't respond to a comment or visit you back, that's why.

Notes from our Hodgepodge Hostess: "First things first...there will not be a Hodgepodge next week because whoohoo! I'm moving! It's only been 13+ months since we got started, but it looks like moving day is finally here. I will do my best to post a Hodgepodge the week after, but that may be dependent on the Internet fairies. I will post something so you'll know, but for now plan on no Hodgepodge Wednesday Nov 2nd, hopefully a Hodgepodge on Nov. 9th, and definitely a Hodgepodge on Nov. 16th. This week though, there is a Hodgepodge and here are the questions. Answer on your own blog, then hop back here tomorrow to share answers with all your friends and neighbors."

1. Besides your very own house, describe a place where you feel most 'at home'? 

I had a strange experience years ago (maybe harking back to last week's question about the sixth sense). One summer during university, I took a job at a camp just outside of the town where I grew up. I had actually started the summer working at a different job, but left it to take the camp job. I got up early on one of the first mornings I was there, and was just enjoying being outdoors wearing shorts, and not in an office wearing pantyhose, and I had a sense of being where I was supposed to be, of feeling at home. Soon afterwards I was talking to my grandmother, and she said that the land now owned by the camp was part of the farm where she lived as a young child. Maybe it was just a coincidence, and anyone would have felt equally happy to be out there in the country on a summer morning. But I've always thought there was something more to it than that.

2. When did you last 'hit a home run' with something? Explain. 

Big things, small things? I think the last big thing was the conference talk I gave in Texas, that seemed to just grow until it was done. Right now I am finishing up the final wording of a shorter talk, on a topic that I know more about, that should have been easier to put together; but with this one it's felt more like a few pop flies and then a very slow trot, one base at a time. 

3. Tell us about something you love in your house or kitchen that is 'homemade'. 

That's almost too big a question, because we have a lot of homemade things here. Our house itself was built fifty-plus years ago by Mr. Fixit's grandfather, along with friends and family who were in different trades like bricklaying and masonry. The fake wood graining on all the inside doors was done by hand, with a special tool. (Grandpa might have enjoyed some of the decorating DIY that goes on these days.)

We also have furniture that Grandpa built, since that was also one of his skills along with building cupboards and putting in floors. The hall console that holds our holiday decorations was one of his projects.

4. 'A man's home is his castle'...which of the world's ten most captivating castles (according to The Travel Channel) would you most like to visit and why-

Mont Saint-Michel (France), Edinburgh Castle (Scotland), Neuschwanstein Castle (Germany), Glamis Castle (Scotland), Windsor Castle (England), Chateu de Chambord (France), Hampton Court Palace (England), Prague Castle (Prague), St. Michael's Mount (England), Leeds Castle (England), and Swallow's Nest (Ukraine)

You had me at the word "castle." I have made it my personal mission in life to get everyone to give Ivanhoe a try. So, Scottish castles first, and then English if there's time.

5. What's a recent or upcoming plan or project that's required you do a little homework before getting started? Did the homework cause you to abandon your plan or adjust it in some way?

Yes, there have been lots of them, but my brain must be fuzzy this morning because I can't come up with one specific one.

6. In your opinion, is homework an unnecessary evil or a valuable practice? Should schools be done with homework? Why or why not? 

Tough question, and I'm somewhere in the middle. I do have a different perspective on this because we homeschooled through elementary, and if I gave someone an independent assignment, like reading a book, I wasn't always sure if that would qualify as "homework," especially if they decided to work on it in the off-hours. Let's just say I am in favour of giving some independent work, but not of making students work for hours and hours, especially if the material hasn't actually been covered in class. But I do think the opposite approach is interesting, too, if it's used right: having students watch a teaching video online, at home, and then use the class time for what would have been "homework," with easy access to the teacher.

7. Share a favorite memory of your childhood hometown. 

Scooting down Main Street Hill on my vintage (no handbrakes) bike. Very dangerous, but fun all the same.

I'm up here, you're down there.

8. Insert your own random thought here. 

Like being at the top of Main Street Hill, I'm up in the air this morning, ready to jump on and scoot (I almost wrote Scott), but this time it will be on a VIA train instead of an old bicycle. This weekend is L'Harmas, an annual gathering of Charlotte Mason educators, readers, and thinkers, and I am leaving early to meet up with some friends at a "home away from home" (not a castle, though). Hopefully it will all be a home run.

Linked from the Wednesday Hodgepodge at From This Side of the Pond.

If you've read Ivanhoe and want to laugh

(SPOILERS INCLUDED IF YOU HAVEN'T READ IVANHOE)

Dollygirl and I are partway through Ivanhoe, to the part where the castle is being besieged by...basically everybody who's not in the castle.  When the Black Knight was mentioned, she calmly stated, "That's King Richard in disguise."  Well, I know Dollygirl is very astute in these matters--she'd already nailed Robin Hood and Friar Tuck, but I was surprised she'd just figured that one out.  "Oh, I read it in the Betsy-Tacy book you gave me for my birthday," she said.  Oh yes...Betsy has to read Ivanhoe too.

Well, that's not such a big leap anyway, and it doesn't spoil the story at all to know who the Black Knight really is. And it's still going to take us at least a couple of weeks to finish the novel. But if you have finished it already (or your kids have) and you want something fun to end the school year, pick up a copy of Edward Eager's Knight's Castle, published in 1956.  Edward Eager, if you don't know already, was a big fan of E. Nesbit, and this is a very Nesbit sort of book: about wishes and magic gone slightly askew.  Some children playing "Ivanhoe" with a toy castle (they've just been to see the MGM movie) wake up at night to find that their props have come to life, and that they're now in the story as well.  Except that the story seems to be rewriting itself, and it's up to the children, especially the main character Roger, to fix what's gone wrong.

The book contains lots of cheesy "varlet" dialogue (what some people call Howard Pyle-esque).  It also includes a Saxon-Norman baseball game, an Ivanhoe who's obsessed with science fiction novels, a can of peas, and the U.S. Marines. There's a more serious sub-plot about the children's father who is in the hospital, and if there's anything I'm a little iffy about, it's his "magic cure" that depends on Roger's wish (granted only if the quest is successful).  It raises the ante of the plot, and I'm not saying the wish isn't well-earned, but, like those movies where children "wish" their separated parents back together, it's not perhaps very sensitive toward those whose real-life wishes don't come true.

Anyway, that complaint aside, it's very funny and has held up surprisingly well.  You really do have to have read Ivanhoe or at least seen a film version to enjoy it, and be warned that there are some Ivanhoe spoilers too--how the book ended and so on.  So keep it for an end-of-Scott treat.

(Oh, one warning for those who do not allow books with witches etc.: the two girls in the story call themselves witches and sorceresses, but only as a means of explaining themselves to the Ivanhoe characters.)

There's another review of the book here.

A Term's English and French History, Week by Week (Dollygirl's Grade Seven)

In the Parents' Union School Programme 94, for Form III (grades 7-8), the following is required for the term's work in history:

English History.

Arnold Forster's A History of England (Cassell, 8/6), pages 131-186 (1154-1307).  Scott's Tales of a Grandfather (University Press, 2/3), pp 84-106. Make a chart of the 12th Century (1100-1200), (see reprint from P.R., July, 1910, 3d.). Read the daily news and keep a calendar of events.

French History.
Creighton's First History of France* (Longmans, 5/-)  pp. 45-81 (1154-1307).

General History.
Read from De Joinville's Chronicles of the Crusades* (Dent, 2/6).  The British Museum for Children,* by Frances Epps (P.N.E.U. Office 3/8), Chapter 12. Teacher study preface. Keep a Book of Centuries* (P.N.E.U. Office, 2/6), putting in illustrations from all the history studied. Stories from Indian History (O.L.S.I.), Vol. 1., 2/-, pp. 1-25.

We are following this outline quite closely, with these exceptions:  we are not reading either The British Museum or Indian History, although we are doing the chapter on Architecture that also appeared that term (under Science).  One other slight difference is that the next time this cycle in history came around, several years later, the period covered in that term extended to 1327 rather than 1307, and I decided to go with that.  We are also doing the literature suggested, Ivanhoe (we started reading that aloud last term), and Shakespeare's King John.
So how does one take the pages referred to above and turn them into twelve weeks' work?  This is the plan that I have so far.

Week One 
English: pages 132-138 --Canterbury Cathedral—how it was designed, prologue to the Becket story
The King and the Archbishop—Henry II & Thomas, introduction (explaining how the Church was both a positive and negative influence in England at that time)

French: begin chapter 7, Philip Augustus : Third Crusade, 1190 

Week Two 
English: pages 139-145 The Quarrel : question of whether churchmen should be tried in public courts; also a question of paying homage. Becket banished but then returns.
The Murder : events of December 29th.

French: none this week.

Week Three 
English: pages 146-153 The Pope's Gift (the Pope "gives" Ireland to Henry II)
The Crescent and the Cross (Richard)
The Crusade: Richard's abduction, return, and death

French: continue chp 7 to p. 51: Philip and Richard, former friends, now enemies --Siege of Acre, 1191

Week Four 
English: pages 154-top of 159 John and Arthur (begin chart of the 13th century)
What Charters Were, and How They Were Won

French: continue chp 7, to p. 53: conquest of Normandy, 1204; John loses other territories

Week Five 
English: pages 159-164 The Sealing of the Great Charter (signing at Runnymede, 1215)
What the Great Charter did for Englishmen

French: continue chp. 7, to p. 55: Albigensian war; crusade led by Simon de Montfort. Influence of St. Dominic.

Week Six 
English: pages 165-top of 172 The Judges of Assize (travelling courts)
Personal Liberty and Trial by Jury
How the Law Protects the Weak (Week Six, continued)

French: continue chp 7, to death of Philip, 1223.
Chapter 8, to p. 60: Louis VIII (short) and begin Louis IX (St Louis, king 1226-1270)

Week Seven
English: pages 172-180 Magna Charta and the Seamstress (example of law protecting property)
"Things New and Old" : question of whether laws become outdated
Famous Fifteen (trick for memorizing particular dates)
Henry III (kiing 1216-1272) and his Foreign Friends (Simon de Montfort, his brother-in-law)

French: Continue chp 8 to p. 66, story of St. Louis. Also read from de Joinville. (First Crusade of St. Louis, 1248-1254)

Week Eight
English: pages (bottom of) 180-186 Laws and Law-makers : the House of Commons
The First Parliament -- "Mad Parliament"
The Fall of Montfort (battle), 1265

French: Finish chp 8, the Second Crusade of St. Louis, 1270. Also read from de Joinville.

Week Nine
English/Welsh: pages 187-194 (first half) Edward I (king 1272-1307) : England at War
The Breaking of Wales - death of Llewelyn 1282

French: Read half of chp IX, The Flemish Wars.

Week Ten
English/Scottish: pages 194 (bottom half)-203 Scotland : "Over the Border" (description of Scotland, more about Edward)
The Fight for the Scottish Crown - 1296, William Wallace (d. 1305); "Edward's death saved Scotland"
Edward II (king 1307-1327)  "The Making of Scotland"

French: Finish chp IX, The Flemish Wars 1298-1302. If time, begin chp X.

Week Eleven 
English/Scottish: pages 204-208 (Bannockburn, 1314) PLUS begin "The Rise of Robert of the Bruce" in Tales of a Grandfather

French: Read half of chp X, to page 80, mostly about Philip IV and Pope Boniface VIII. The Estates-General, 1302.

Week Twelve
English/Scottish: Finish "The Rise of Robert of the Bruce" in Tales of a Grandfather (the book will be continued next term).

French: Finish chp X. Persecution of the Templars; death of Philip in 1314; the last Capetian kings. 

Treasures from the antique market, and a frugal thought

There are three or four antique markets in our area where Mr. Fixit goes regularly to pick up vintage radios for his business.  This weekend our Sunday afternoon family plans got changed at the last minute, so we decided to go for a browse at the two closest ones (across the road from each other).

Usually I just look at things, especially the stalls of vintage books (there can't be that many of us who actually like looking at old school books).  But this time I found one book to buy at each place.   I am much pickier than I used to be about bringing home books from anywhere more expensive than the thrift store.  They don't have to be in perfect condition, but they have to be things I don't see all the time.  They have to be either useful (like a very cool sewing book) or have something great in them to read, or be something we need for school.  Mostly, I have to like them.  If they're early-to-mid-20th-century hardcovers with paper dustjackets, so much the better.

(These aren't my photos, but they're like the books I bought.)

The White Deer, by James Thurber

Tales of a Grandfather, by Sir Walter Scott, in the Blackie's Famous Books edition.

I know the photo shows a Katy book instead, but they're all very much the same style, with the squiggly things up the sides and the list of other books on the back.  A new paperback copy of Tales of a Grandfather would cost about $30 (Canadian) if ordered through our local bookstore, because who orders Tales of a Grandfather?  This one was $10.  Sometimes antiquing actually saves money. (UPDATE: I realized later that this Tales is somewhat abridged, which does it make it less useful than I had hoped.  But I still like it.)

Favourite read right now: Guy Mannering, by Sir Walter Scott

How do you manage to spruce up someone's clothes when they can't be bothered to notice what they wear, but would be insulted if you asked them to change?

Honest Mac-Morlan received this mandate with great joy, but pondered much upon executing that part of it which related to newly attiring the worthy Dominie. He looked at him with a scrutinising eye, and it was but too plain that his present garments were daily waxing more deplorable. To give him money, and bid him go and furnish himself, would be only giving him the means of making himself ridiculous....On the other hand, to bring a tailor to measure him, and send home his clothes, as for a school-boy, would probably give offence. At length Mac-Morlan resolved to consult Miss Bertram [a young lady whose late father was a friend and employer of the Dominie], and request her interference. She assured him that, though she could not pretend to superintend a gentleman's wardrobe, nothing was more easy than to arrange the Dominie's.

'At Ellangowan,' she said, 'whenever my poor father thought any part of the Dominie's dress wanted renewal, a servant was directed to enter his room by night, for he sleeps as fast as a dormouse, carry off the old vestment, and leave the new one; nor could any one observe that the Dominie exhibited the least consciousness of the change put upon him on such occasions.'

Mac-Morlan, in conformity with Miss Bertram's advice, procured a skilful artist, who, on looking at the Dominie attentively, undertook to make for him two suits of clothes, one black and one raven-grey, and even engaged that they should fit him--as well at least (so the tailor qualified his enterprise) as a man of such an out-of-the-way build could be fitted by merely human needles and shears. When this fashioner had accomplished his task, and the dresses were brought home, Mac-Morlan, judiciously resolving to accomplish his purpose by degrees, withdrew that evening an important part of his dress, and substituted the new article of raiment in its stead. Perceiving that this passed totally without notice, he next ventured on the waistcoat, and lastly on the coat.

When fully metamorphosed, and arrayed for the first time in his life in a decent dress, they did observe that the Dominie seemed to have some indistinct and embarrassing consciousness that a change had taken place on his outward man. Whenever they observed this dubious expression gather upon his countenance, accompanied with a glance that fixed now upon the sleeve of his coat, now upon the knees of his breeches, where he probably missed some antique patching and darning, which, being executed with blue thread upon a black ground, had somewhat the effect of embroidery, they always took care to turn his attention into some other channel, until his garments, 'by the aid of use, cleaved to their mould.' The only remark he was ever known to make on the subject was, that 'the air of a town like Kippletringan seemed favourable unto wearing apparel, for he thought his coat looked almost as new as the first day he put it on, which was when he went to stand trial for his license as a preacher.'

A Month with Charlotte Mason, #14

"For people who want to do the "living books" thing that Susan Macaulay has popularized, here is the kindergarten program all worked out for them.""--Dr. Ruth Beechick, review of a preschool-K curriculum

I use some of Ruth Beechick's books in our homeschool, and she has many good, practical ideas, especially (perhaps ironically) in using real books to teach language skills. However, I also think this comment is typical of the general misunderstanding around Charlotte Mason and "living books" in particular. In both fiction and non-fiction, the term “living books” has been overused, abused and confused, to the point that almost any chapter book set in some other era is now considered quality historical fiction...and, in the review above, "classic" picture books also suddenly join the list. Some people may take offense at that, and please understand that I am not discouraging the reading of picture books in general--only saying that these were not "living books" in the way that Charlotte Mason used the word.

If we’re going to be faithful to Charlotte Mason’s literary standards, we need to understand that she wasn’t exaggerating when she talked about little children playing Robinson Crusoe, or a schoolboy spending his whole Easter break reading Southey’s poems. It wasn’t so strange that Anne of Green Gables and her friends chose to act out "The Lily Maid" in 1908. Authors like Scott, Pyle, Kipling, Bunyan, Defoe, Kingsley, even George Eliot, were just considered The Books That There Were. They were the standards of the time, and children in "literate" households grew up familiar with Those Books, along with the Bible. If you look at the books Charlotte Mason refers to in the second half of Ourselves, which is meant to be read by older high school students, there are casual references to George Eliot's novels and other books that most of us are lucky even to get around to reading in college. For her students, they were common currency.

Now there must have been hundreds or thousands of books published over the last century, and most of us have gotten much worse at reading and at making time for reading. We’re hesitant, like Joyce McGechan, to put this kind of meal in front of our children because we’re not even sure we’d want to eat it ourselves. We’re in an era where, in a lesson plan for fourth graders, it’s expected that you should define words like “average” and “develop” before reading a book to them—and the lesson plan I found that in is for a picture book.

So I’m very aware in saying this, that the verbal and cultural gap between CM’s students and ours can seem insurmountable. But the fact is that there’s very little being published now, especially for children, that has both the literary power and the idea power of the books from the earlier eras, so we will often find ourselves turning back to them, not exclusively, but as a solid foundation.

Remember this from the third post? "Despising children is not doing the good that we should do in loving them or teaching them, because we undervalue their intelligence, their value as persons, their capacity for good, or even their capacity for bad."

And why are we using these hard books again? Is it because children develop character by chewing on gristle?

"Let us imagine an author at his craft, say, Herman Melville while writing Moby Dick, or Jane Austen working on Pride and Prejudice. Now assuredly what these literary artists hoped above all else was that a century or two from their own time students in high schools would be using their great works not better to understand love or honor or revenge or nobility or happiness, but to “analyze how multiple themes or central ideas in a text interact, build on, and, in some cases, conflict with one another”; as well as to “analyze the impact of the author’s choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama (e.g., where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed).""--Terrence Moore, "Dressing up Standards, Dumbing Down Schools," quoted by the Deputy Headmistress

Children, if they’re exposed to rich language from an early age, even if we find ourselves stumbling through some of the books, will get it, and will want more. Remember the little girl at Bending the Twigs who threw a sentence about Cerberus into her grammar lesson?

A leisurely education means having the freedom (time, space, opportunity) to discover what makes us fully human.

February Reading List

In January I was very disciplined. I read one book, then I started another one. This month I keep starting books and then starting other ones. Sometimes it's more fun that way.

I'm crossing them out as they get done.

Already reading:

The Heart of Mid-Lothian, by Sir Walter Scott
Discover Your Inner Economist, by Tyler Cowen
Rough Crossings, by Simon Schama
Godric, by Frederick Buechner
Plutarch's Life of Theseus
Deep River, by Shusaku Endo

Waiting to start:

The Maytrees, by Annie Dillard
Rebels of the Heavenly Kingdom, by Katherine Paterson

Vegetating with Scott

"Indoors," he went on, "it was just the same. It's all very well to be told to rest and keep your mind empty, but that was never my way. I brought out a heap of books with me, and was looking forward to getting a lot of quiet reading done. But the mischief was that I couldn't settle to a book. I had intended to read the complete works of Walter Savage Landor--have you ever tried him, Dougal? I aye thought the quotations from him I came across most appetising. But I might as well have been reading a newspaper upside down, for I couldn't keep my mind on him. I suppose that my thoughts having been so much concerned lately with my perishing body had got out of tune for higher things. So I fell back on Sir Walter--I'm not much of a hand at novels, as you know, but I can always read Scott--but I wasn't half through Guy Mannering when it made me so homesick for the Canonry that I had to give it up. After that I became a mere vegetable, a bored vegetable."--John Buchan, The House of the Four Winds

Books, more books

Finished:

1. The Talisman, by Sir Walter Scott. Heads will roll. Ewww... But it was an excellent story--knights and honour and chivalry and jousting in the middle of the desert.

2. The Treasure Seekers, by E. Nesbit, with Ponytails.  One of the Bastable Children books.

3. Ourselves and Philosophy of Education (re-read), both by Charlotte Mason. These two books are very closely connected--if you're into jotting in margins, you can cross-reference them back and forth in many places. In fact, two different parts of Philosophy are pretty much summaries of Ourselves. One of the points that keeps hitting me as I've been rereading through the Home Education Series (Charlotte Mason's books) is that The Curriculum is a vital part of what she's talking about (although some people have misbegotten the idea that a specific curriculum isn't central to CM), and yet it's not where you need to start working through her ideas, and it doesn't even take up a great amount of space in the books. She did give lots of detail on what school lessons should be like, and education, schools, and children were obviously where her heart was; but that was just one application of her bigger picture. I think that's why she made that somewhat mystical comment to a student teacher at her college: "My dear, you have come here to learn to live." (The Story of Charlotte Mason, by Essex Cholmondeley)

Working on:

1. A Biblical Psychology of Learning, by Ruth Beechick. You can see it with its new title here.

2. The Wouldbegoods (second in the Bastable series), with Ponytails

3. Finishing up some odds and ends and things I started too long ago.

Scott? Who reads Scott?

The novels of Sir Walter Scott were so familiar and important to the educator Charlotte Mason that she not only included them in term programs as a matter of course, but referred to them frequently in her own writings. The second part of her book Ourselves is loaded with illustrations from Scott (as well as from Dickens, George Eliot, Plutarch, and other writers with whom she assumed teenagers would be familiar!).

I can hardly conceive a better moral education than is to be had out of Scott and Shakespeare. I put Scott first as so much the more easy and obvious; but both recognise that the Will is the man....Both Shakespeare and Scott use, as it were, a dividing line, putting on the one side the wilful, wayward, the weak and the strong; and on the other, persons who will.--Charlotte Mason, Ourselves

Unfortunately, most of us didn't grow up reading Scott, and although we might have a vague idea of what Ivanhoe or Rob Roy are about, or might have heard about some of his poetry, many of the other books are strangers to us. Scott's books aren't even on a lot of best-books-you-must-read lists any more, except again maybe for Ivanhoe, and some people don't even count that really as one of his best books. I read one discussion of "classics" (I've forgotten what it was now) that simply lumped Scott with "writers who are no longer read," implying that there was good reason for that. The books are long, the first chapters are usually boring, they're extremely politically incorrect in all kinds of ways, and there are said to be lots of historical inaccuracies in them.

But if you want to do some exploring of what made Scott so vital to the Victorian mind, or if you want to get some idea of the plots of the novels, the Walter Scott Digital Archive is a good place to start. If you click on Works, you get a page for each book, with plot summaries; and the site has lots more Scott stuff as well. There's also a complete list of the books, if you want to see the "Waverley Novels" all in order.

A bit of Scott trivia to end with: did you know that those were the books that kept Laura sane during a difficult pregnancy in The First Four Years?

And now the four walls of the close, overheated house opened wide, and Laura wandered with brave knights and ladies fair beside the lakes and streams of Scotland or in castles and towers, in noble halls or lady's bower, all through the enchanting pages of Sir Walter Scott's novels.

She forgot to feel ill at the sight or smell of food, in her hurry to be done with the cooking and follow her thoughts back into the book. When the books were all read and Laura came back to reality, she found herself feeling much better. (The First Four Years, by Laura Ingalls Wilder, pages 107-108)

I hope this helps anyone who's interested in Charlotte Mason but is as bewildered by all the references to Scott as I first was.