Living
Books
{V3,181} "...to quote the golden words of Milton:
'Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them
to be as active as that soul was, whose progeny they are; nay, they do
preserve, as in a vial, the purest efficacy and extraction of that living
intellect that bred them. As good almost kill a man, as kill a good book; who
kills a man kills a good reasonable creature, God's image; but he who destroys
a good book, kills reason itself--kills the image of God, as it were, in the
eye.'"
{V3, 177} "Principles
on which to select School-Books--"
"I think we owe it to children to let them dig
thjeir knowledge, of whatever subject, for themselves out of the fit book; and
this for two reasons :What a child digs
for is his own possession; what is poured into his ear, like the idle song
of a pleasant singer, floats out as lightly as it came in, and is rarely
assimilated. I do not mean to say that the lecture and the oral lesson are
without their uses; but these uses are, to give impulse and to order knowledge, and not to convey
knowledge, or to afford us that part of our education which come of fit
knowledge, fitly given."
"....ideas must reach us directly from the mind of
the thinker, and it is chiefly by means of the books they have written that we
get into touch with the best minds."
{V3,178} "Marks
of a Fit Book--
A fit book is not necessarily a big book.
Again, we need not always insist that a book should be
written by the original thinker.
...we have it in us to discern a living book, quick, informed with the ideas proper to the subject
of which it treats."
"How
to Use the Right Books--
The children must enjoy the book.
The ideas it holds must each make that sudden, delightful
impact upon their minds,
must cause that intellectual stir, which marks the
inception of an idea.
The
Teacher's part in this regard is to see and feel for himself, and
then to rouse his pupils by an appreciative look or word; but beware how he
deadens the impression by a flood of talk."
{V3,179} "Children
must Labour--
This of getting ideas out of them, is by no means all we
must do with books.
'In all labour there is profit'
...and the labour of thought is what his book must induce
in the child.
He must generalise, classify, infer, judge, visualise,
discriminate, labour in one way or another, with that capable mind of his,
until the substance of his book is assimilated or rejected, according as he
shall determine"
"Value
of Narration--
The simplest way of dealing eitha paragraph or a chapter
is to require the child to narrate its contents after a single attentive
reading,--one reading, however slow ,
should be made a condition
2004
Charlotte Mason Conference ~ Extra Literature Selection Quotes
Volume 3 p. 340
"Lesson-Step 1--Decide with the pupils as to some principles which should
guide us in the choice of books, such as the following:--
Never waste time on
valueless books.
Have respect for the
books themselves.
Try to cultivate taste by
noticing the best passages in any book that is being read.
Time is too short to read
much; there is a necessity, therefore, for judicious selection.
The best literature can
only be appreciated by those who have fitted themselves for it.
It is more important to
read well than to read much.
The gain of reading some
of the most beautiful literature while we are young is that we shall then have
beautiful thoughts and images to carry with us through life.
To get at the full
significance of a book it is necessary to dig for it."
V1 p177......The children
must enjoy the book, The ideas it holds must each make that sudden, delightful
impact upon their minds, must cause that intellectual stir, which mark the
inception of an idea."
".....ideas must
reach us directly from the mind of the thinker, and it is chiefly by means of
the books they have written that we get into touch with the best minds."
V6 p109 "...He (the
child) is an eclectic; he may choose this or that; our business is to supply
him with due abundance and variety and his to take what he needs. Urgency on
our part annoys him. He resists forcible feeding and loathes predigested food.
What suits him best is pabulum presented in the indirect literary form which
Our Lord adopts in those wonderful parables whose quality is that they cannot
be forgotten though, while every detail of the story is remembered, its
application may pass and leave no trace.
p111 but an idea clothed
upon with fact, history and story, so that the mind may perform the acts of
selection and inception from a mass of illustrative details. Thus Dickens makes
'David Copperfield' tell us that,--'I was a very observant child,' and that
'all children are very observant,' not as a dry abstraction, but as an
inference from a number of charming natural incidents. All roads lead to Rome,
and all I have said is meant to enforce the fact that much and varied humane
reading as well as human thought expressed in the forms of art, is, not a
luxury, a tit-bit, to be given to children now and then, but their very bread
of life which they must have in abundant portions and at regular periods. This
and more is implied in the phrase 'The mind feeds on ideas and therefore
children should have a generous curriculum.' "
"...education is of
the spirit and is not to be taken in by the eye or effected by the hand; mind
appeals to mind and thought begets thought and that is how we become
educated..." (Vol. 6)
"...For this reason we owe it to every child to put him in communication
with great minds that he may get at great thoughts; with the minds, that is, of
those who have left us great works; the only vital method of education appears
to be that children should read worthy books, many worthy books." (Vol. 6)
CAN WE DO THIS? p.178 "..we have it in us to discern a
living book, quick, informed with the ideas proper to the subject of which it
treats
V6 p244--"The best
available book is chosen and read through in the course, It may be of two or
three years."
V3, p. 340
"It is more
important to read well than to read much.")
V6 p. 248 CHOOSING LIVING BOOKSTo two further points I must invite attention; the choice of books and the character of the terminal examinations. I do not know better how to describe the sort of books that children's minds will consent to deal with than by saying that they must be literary in character. A child of seven or eight will narrate a difficult passage from The Pilgrim's Progress, say, with extraordinary zest and insight; but I doubt if he or his elders would retain anything from that excellent work, Dr. Smiles' Self-Help! The completeness with which hundreds of children reject the wrong book is a curious and instructive experience, not less so than the avidity and joy with which they drain the right book to the dregs; children's requirements in the matter seem to be quantity, quality and variety: but the question of books is one of much delicacy and difficulty. After the experience of over a quarter of a century [The P.U.S. was started in 1891.] in selecting the lesson books proper to children of all ages, we still make mistakes, and the next examination paper discovers the error! Children cannot answer questions set on the wrong book; and the difficulty of selection is increased by the fact that what they like in books is no more a guide than what they like in food.
GIVE CHILDREN THE KNOWLEDGE OF GODNow our objective in this most important part of education is to give the children the knowledge of God. We need not go into the question of intuitive knowledge, but the expressed knowledge attainable by us has its source in the Bible, and perhaps we cannot do no greater indignity to children than to substitute our own or some other benevolent person's rendering for the fine English, poetic diction and lucid statement of the Bible. Literature at its best is
always direct and simple and a normal child of six listens with delight to the
tales both of Old and New Testament read to him passage by passage, and by him
narrated in turn, with delightful touches of native eloquence. Religion has two
aspects, the attitude of the will towards God which we understand by
Christianity, and that perception of God which comes from a gradual
slow-growing comprehension of the divine dealings with men.
Part II.--School-Books V3 p229 Books that supply the Sustenance of Ideas.--Mr. H. G. Wells has put his finger on the place when he says that the selection of the right schoolbooks is a great function of the educator. I am not at all sure that his remedy is the right one--or that a body of experts and a hundred thousand pounds would, in truth, provide the manner of schoolbooks that reach children. They are kittle cattle, and, though they will plod on obediently over any of the hundreds of dry-as-dust volumes issued by the publishers under the heading of 'School Books,' or of 'Education,' they keep all such books in the outer court, and allow them no access to their minds. A book may be long or short, old or new, easy or hard, written by a great man or a lesser man, and yet be the living book which finds its way to the mind of a young reader. The expert is not the person to choose; the children themselves are the experts in this case. A single page will elicit a verdict; but the unhappy thing is, this verdict is not betrayed; it is acted upon in the opening or closing of the door of the mind. Many excellent and admirable school-books appreciated by masters are on the Index Expurgatorius of the school-boy; and that is why he takes nothing in and gives nothing out. The master must have it in him to distinguish between twaddle and simplicity, and between vivacity and life. For the rest, he must experiment or test the experiments of others, being assured of one thing--that a book serves the ends of education only as it is vital. Literature
Guides to Choose Living Books
Older Students:
Outlines of English and American Literature William Long
How to Read a Book Mortimer
Adler
Invitation to the Classics Oz
Guiness
Brightest Heaven of Invention (Shakespeare) Peter Leithart
Heroes of the City of
Ancient History from Primary Sources Harvey, Laurie Bluedorn
and American Literature
Simonds History of American Literature http://www.bibliomania.com/2/3/270/frameset.html
Homeschool Catalogs: (these catalogs give descriptions of books
that they recommend)
All Ages -
Greenleaf Press www.greenleafpress.com
Veritas Press www.veritaspress.com
Literature Recommendations:
Ambleside Online www.amblesideonline.org