For the Children's Sake (eBook)

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What Is Education?

Our first child was growing up in London, and as school age approached we began the search for education. As young parents we wanted the best for our curly-headed toddler. But what was the best?

We visited schools and imagined our daughter living out her child life in them. We reacted instinctively. It couldn’t be the school where the desks were so crowded that an adult couldn’t walk through the room. And would we be satisfied with the school where a teacher had told a friend that it was so noisy she didn’t try to teach reading? We were further discouraged when this same lady later said, “I can’t remember the children’s names. Who is Ruth?”

Could we imagine our creative, singing Margaret sitting in a desk memorizing facts from morn to night? Or would we be satisfied with the opposite, the noisy chaos of endless free play?

This is a problem many parents face. What should we aim for when thinking about education? We want the best, but when we look around at what’s available, we often have to settle for situations that we would not have chosen in the first place.

When we tried to figure out guidelines in education, we couldn’t find a practical overview of the subject. We invited experts to lecture to groups, but somehow it didn’t help.

Well, Margaret had the best we could find, and all went well until we moved. The school near our new home turned out to be a blight on our youngster’s life. Why? One reason was that the program of learning just didn’t fit this particular child. Although we hadn’t been able to organize an overall understanding of the subject, by now we were experienced enough parents to realize that something was badly wrong; drastic action had to be taken. We took Margaret out of school. Suddenly our child revived. She read books, played in the garden, worked alongside of us, enjoyed music. But an inspector didn’t feel this education was satisfactory. Margaret should be in school. At that time, we didn’t realize that he was wrong. The law in England allows for “education otherwise than at school.” Eleven years later, Margaret’s younger brother and sister were able to enjoy home-based education. But at that earlier time we sadly accepted that in the law’s eyes “education” equals a schoolroom. In this case it meant two frustrating years, with forty children to one teacher. Was this what a child’s life was meant to be? A drive to a closed-off cement area, a crowded room, a day so tiring that at the end Margaret and her younger sister came home taut with exhaustion?

We did the best we could in the hours spent away from school. But our prayers were becoming pretty desperate. And then, unexpectedly, the answer came.

The end of that story must wait to be told later in this book. Suffice it to say that the answers came when we found a little school run in a cottage. After our children went there, we realized that here was something really different. What was it? It seemed that the school still practiced the gentle art of an education based on a certain Charlotte Mason’s ideas. We were, quite frankly, impressed. Could we find out more about these educational ideas? Was this what we were looking for?

We sent off for books (now out of print) by this lady who lived nearly a hundred years ago. I can remember how we sat in bed reading, often stopping to share some newly discovered concept. Our enthusiasm grew. The ideas made such good sense! We found that they are relevant to today’s child and today’s society. They are of such universal nature that one can apply them equally well at home, in different kinds of schools, in an orphanage in Africa, in an Indian village, in an inner-city school or day care center.

The ideas are so true that many of them are instinctively used by those with different educational or religious systems. They give us a satisfying view of education, or a child’s life, from a Christian viewpoint. They provide a framework.

Before we continue with a consideration of these ideas I ought to introduce you to Charlotte Mason.

Charlotte Mason

Charlotte Mason (1842–1923) was no armchair philosopher. Her views were shaped by her teaching experiences, not the other way around. She first decided that teaching was to be her life’s work when she was still a child and saw a young teacher with a class of poor children. Neither did she ever consider that she had arrived at a final, authoritative “last word” in the field of education. There is a striking lack of pride in the title of her final book: An Essay Towards a Philosophy of Education.

A modest view of her own achievements, however, was not accompanied by any timidity when it came to putting her ideas into practice. Charlotte Mason believed passionately that children are persons who should be treated as individuals as they are introduced to the variety and richness of the world in which they live. She believed that biblical Christianity is truth. She had a pivot, a foundation.

Her determination was tested to the full at the age of sixteen by the sudden death of her parents. In the face of personal grief, she persisted in her ambition and was successful in securing a place in the only teacher training college in England at that time. It was the beginning of an impressive, pioneering achievement which has a place in the history of women’s contributions to society. But she was not able to remain a student for long. Probably because of the pressures of her financial situation, she obtained, after only a year at the college, a job as the teacher of a small school in Worthing. She managed to continue her studies in her spare time, as well as recording her experiences and thoughts. The year 1863 brought her the welcome award of a First Class certificate based on her work.

She really loved the children she taught. They were not just interesting specimens or an intriguing challenge. From the very start, they were valued friends, persons whom she respected. And this in a generation when children were normally meant to be “seen and not heard.”

When the Bishop Otter College in Chichester appointed her as vice principal in 1874, Charlotte Mason had the chance to prepare lectures on the subject of education. Four years later ill health forced her to give up the post, and it seemed that her contribution to educational thought was destined to die an early death.

The enforced leisure was useful, however, as it gave time for further study and observation. Her thoughts crystallized into broad, helpful outlines. These she expressed in a series of lectures to parents. They found them so helpful that a National Society of Parents devoted to these ideas was started. Publications, journals, and finally specific curriculum guides gained wide and eager acceptance. Some parents were already teaching their children at home, but soon some families banded together to form schools. These were the famous Parents’ National Education Union schools (after this referred to as PNEU schools). One thing led to another. Charlotte Mason opened a House of Education at Ambleside in the English Lake District. This was a college for young women training to be teachers. Many found their first taste of true education for themselves as they prepared to teach others.

To begin with, the children whose parents followed Charlotte Mason’s teaching were those of the educated classes themselves. But Charlotte Mason never forgot her first vision. She asked all parents who had been helped to organize meetings and so pass on the ideas to the mothers who would never be reached through her books. Perhaps her greatest joy was when numbers of underprivileged children had the richness of her school curriculum and practices applied in their overcrowded and underfunded schools. She delighted in the awakening of these previously dimmed minds. Children became fluent speakers and lovers of literature and art. Her vision was that these good wholesome aspects of life would bring joy, stability, and richness to every child.

By the time of her death in 1923, she had written several excellent books. She was the founder of an important educational movement and of a family of schools that touched countless young lives. She had started and led a “house of education” that had trained many students, not only for teaching, but also for living an abundant life. Through her work, families had been strengthened and guided in their life and purpose.

What happened? Why have so few heard of her today? Why do so few remember that she was one of the great educationalists, one who changed the whole idea of what education is and how we can go about it? I believe one reason is that the strong Christian base upon which she built became unpopular. The view of what life is all about, changed. In fact, our generation cannot grasp the key that explains exactly what human life is. Children have often been the chattels of the adults. Their worth is constantly expressed in terms of dollars and cents, their education in terms of their being a cog in a machine, to be made fit for the highest paid job possible.

What a tragedy.

Christians can’t develop a Christian view of education by accepting the usual aims and views of our society and then adding a “Christian message” or interpretation.

No, we start from a different basis. We have another worldview, another people view!

When a baby is picked up,...