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LLMom
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| Posted: Jan 01 2007 at 5:10pm | IP Logged
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This is in reference to another thread about needing to be enrolled in high school. The OP wrote:
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In Elizabeth's article on jump starting CM she says "You can’t live this lifestyle while trapped in a canned curriculum."
I haven't read the article in a very long time so I am not sure what else followed this quote but something has bothered me about this site for a while and I wanted to share my opinion so that maybe new people wouldn't feel intiminated or feel like their school was less "real" or good. For the last 2 years we have used a "canned" curriculum and we love it. I never thought we would, but it has been great for my large family. But my children are learning and are happy and sometimes I feel like if you use a "canned" program then your school isn't as good as CM schooling. However, I feel like we still really live this lifestyle and that the two can go together. We love to read a loud as a family. We love to go on nature hikes, listen to beautiful music, do crafts, bake, etc. All of my children persue their interests after their other schooling is done and they don't hate school. My boys actually like workbooks much better than narration and dictation. My girls love anything, workbooks or other! There is no shame in a canned curriculum and it is still real. Pre-packaged curriculums can be used any way you want. Most of these programs, if you look at them, are very flexible and encourage individuality. Many will let them be on different grade levels for different subjects, let you use different texts if you don't want to use theirs and most of them include very good living books.
So, if you can do all CM, that is great but if you use a pre-packaged curriculum, your children can still learn and still be happy.
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Bridget
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| Posted: Jan 01 2007 at 5:21pm | IP Logged
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Back in the old days  when Elizabeth wrote that, 'canned curriculum' was a popular term. I am positive she meant no offense by it. While she is committed to real learning, she is also very understanding of those who use packaged curricula. Everyone here is. We all know that real learning happens because of mom's attitude and example more than what curriculum one uses.
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Elizabeth
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| Posted: Jan 01 2007 at 5:52pm | IP Logged
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Bridget's right. Part of the book was written ten years ago. Things change. Now, there are curriculum programs and distance schools that allow you to tinker with the program and adapt it to your family. I still don't think that "school at home"--that is the exact same program for everyone, all the time,as if the home were a traditional classroom--is the best course of study. If nothing else, it can very very frustrating for a mother of many children to keep up with an individual course of study for each child every day while still being mother and wife as well. Frankly, it's hard to check all the little boxes when wee ones are sick and daddy's deployed. But that doesn't mean that home schooling isn't for families with sick children or military fathers.
And one of the greatest benefits to home education, imo, is the ability to adapt the program to the needs, interests, and aptitudes of each individual child. As long as distance learning allows for that, it can be a good thing. If it doesn't allow for that, then I think it makes it exceedingly difficult for a parent, and later, a child, to hear God's uniqiue call for that child. Education should not be modelled after the factory. Education should be tailored to the unique needs of each Catholic child in the family. To me, "Real Learning" is as it is defined on the mission statement of this board: We are passionate about learning in the context of real life. And we are in love with the Real Presence. We are joyously Catholic and sucking the marrow out of every category of knowledge with bounding enthusiasm but not necessarily within the confines of traditional classroom methods."
I really, truly believe that all of family life is God's intent for the education of our children. If pregnancy sickness finds you camped on the couch with nothing but read alouds for a season and your children find that the greatest lessons they are learning (aside from the literature read aloud) are household management, I believe that that is as God intends. But you won't find that written into a pre-packaged curriculum.
What you have described isn't a confining curriculum.While you might be using a pre-written curriculum as a tool, you aren't trapped in it. You aren't afraid to add to it or delete from it. You aren't deaf to the whisperings of the Holy Spirit and you aren't assuming that the experts who wrote that curriculum know your children better than you do.
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Elizabeth Foss is no longer a member of this forum. Discussions now reflect the current management & are not necessarily expressions of her book, *Real Learning*, her current work, or her philosophy. (posted by E. Foss, Jan 2011)
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MacBeth
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| Posted: Jan 01 2007 at 6:10pm | IP Logged
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Just running in quickly and saw this...
I think the key word here is "trapped." Some kids, surely, for we are all different  , thrive in a more structured environment than CM's methods suggest.
If you are using a canned curriculum, and you don't feel trapped, then the quote does not apply to you. The most important thing is to educate your children in a way that is best for your family. Many, many members use a canned curriculum in some way or another. I think we cover the full spectrum, from school-at-home to unschooling, which is one of the unique beauties of this forum! 
If, however, you do feel trapped by something canned, it can preclude you from feeling the joy that many of us get from educating our own children using CM's philosophy, ideas and methods. This group began as a way to explore those methods in the context of a Catholic home. For many of us, discovering and exploring CM lead to Real Learning, and freedom from what we felt was a trap. Some folks told us that they were so miserable using a canned curriculum that they were on the verge of putting their kids back in school. But there are alternatives, and this forum provides a place to share information about some of them.
Some folks who come here might need some reassurance about modifying a canned curriculum in either major or minor ways to achieve that joy. Others might want to toss the whole thing out. Still others might want to keep the whole can, but add CM to other areas of family life. Some folks might want to use more CM methods in liturgical life. If none of these folks feels trapped, then, again, the above statement does not necessarily apply.
Moreover, I'm sure that Elizabeth never meant to accuse anyone of using a particularly shameful method of education . Rather, she (and I, and others) like to make sure that folks can find the information about alternatives, and how to use them, especially if the more common methods of Catholic home education are not working.
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MacBeth in NY
Don's wife since '88; "Mom" to the Fab 4
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Leonie
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Like MacBeth, I think the key is "trapped." If you are using a pre-packaged curriculum and everything is working - well, you can be living CM-ish and you are certainly not trapped. If, however, you are using a curriculum and are unhappy with it, perhaps some change is necessary.
The same goes with unschool-ishness, imo. If you feel trapped, that the kids are missing out - go for more CM and/or more structure.
I find Elizabeth's words to be encouraging. As always. 
Thanks, LLMom, for bringing this up - nice to re-visit words and writings and meanings.
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Jenny
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I have a question along these lines. I will finish out our hs year using what we have:
3rd~MCP, Sound Beginnings, Baltimore Catechism (I also have Faith & Life which I bought at a great price but haven't used), Language of God, RC History.
1st~MCP, Sound Beginnings, St Joseph's 1st Communion Catechism (F&L unused), RC History
K~MCP, SB, F&L unused & RC History
Plus read lots of read alouds & reading time, nature walks/study...
I really need some help with next year. I have a 3rd, 1st, preK/K, 3yo & 14 month old. I am wondering...I like the idea of "Real Learning"/Charlotte Mason; it seems do-able with the number of children I have plus the fact that they are so young & need mom. The problem is that I tend to get off track, or decide it is too much work involved so we don't do anything. The plus side seems to be that we can work together as a family. I also would rather learn from a living book, that a bit or chunk from a text book. But, if we don't do anything, we don't learn anything. CHC looks so sweet, but I think for High School I will end up using something else...I like the classical approach; I feel like I could add any living books I wanted to based on subject matter. But in the early years, it requires a lot of mom time which I am in short supply of at times. It's not like I have all day to only school children; I also have a husband, house and 2 little ones that need mommy; they deserve some mommy time. I wonder if I need the structure/workbooks of tradition school, but would we end up hating school b/c we just sit around doing workbooks, but we would be doing something right?? Or, would it be too much work at 3 different grade levels?
I recently had to think about my "why" for homeschooling and my "what", what did I expect from homeschooling. I want to enjoy learning with my children. I want them to have a love for learning and a love for thinking. I do not want them to digest info for a time, I want the information to stay with them, to enhance their lives and lead them to a greater understanding of God, self and others. I want all to be in light of our faith. Am I asking too much?
I am really struggling with this decision of what to do. I am now at a point where I have to make some decisions.
Any guidance and/or prayer is deeply appreciated.
In Her Heart
Jenny
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Jenny
Chris' wife and momma of 7. My blog: The Littlest Way--Bible Journaling, Inspiring Bible Quotes, Daily Affirmations, Prayer Journaling & photography
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Jenny
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| Posted: Jan 02 2007 at 10:38am | IP Logged
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After reading that, I think I have a discipline problem, not curriculum/learning style problem. I need to work on my daily discipline b/c the books are fine, the learning is relaxed & fun, yet covers everything...
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Jenny
Chris' wife and momma of 7. My blog: The Littlest Way--Bible Journaling, Inspiring Bible Quotes, Daily Affirmations, Prayer Journaling & photography
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aussieannie
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| Posted: Jan 02 2007 at 3:46pm | IP Logged
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Leonie wrote:
I find Elizabeth's words to be encouraging. As always.
Thanks, LLMom, for bringing this up - nice to re-visit words and writings and meanings. |
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I just thought I’d say, I think Elizabeth’s book and the forum has released me from the panic you really can live out daily in a ‘canned curriculum’ that contains no ‘indemnity clauses’  for those who cannot complete it all and a lot of women go through this, I talk to them all the time. 
I can say Real Learning and 4Real has shown me the true meaning of the Church’s words...”primary educators of their children.” The truth is I haven’t thrown away all my curriculum...I held onto what I liked and worked well, but I felt free to tweak it and mold it more to me and the children (couldn’t think past that before  ) and then with the added CM approach of narration, copywork, lapbooking etc. I really felt I could incorporate my liturgical year into the schoolwork more effectively and more individually, all my favourite and cherished literature – this was all starting to really express myself and what I wanted for my children – that was exciting!
I have always been a girl who thought ‘outside the circle’ in so many areas in my life but I am baffled as to why, for so long, I felt the compelling need to bring my only personal experience of school, into my home!! Real Learning has freed me from that because I think that it understands the complex needs of a mother who is trying to give birth and raise, quite often, many children and nourish them in love and faith. A mother who may not have the best of health or maybe her children haven’t. Then when you look at the other factors that feature in the lives of many...of all sorts, that make you feel like a liner weaving through a field of icebergs!
MacBeth wrote:
| I think the key word here is "trapped." |
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I know that I have thought it, I still talk to women who are thinking it - the book was needed to help those women remove their various 'blinkers & blind spots' - what they do with all the information after reading, (and everyone differs) can truly be their own undertaking for the future with a strong feeling of confidence in their role of 'primary educator.'
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Willa
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4mothermary wrote:
| After reading that, I think I have a discipline problem, not curriculum/learning style problem. I need to work on my daily discipline b/c the books are fine, the learning is relaxed & fun, yet covers everything... |
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Also, I think it's fine to have seasons in your homeschool life. Even with older kids I find there are times we can go slower and other times when we're more structured looking. I'm just mentioning that because I didn't realize until after several years of homeschooling how much my ideas of "discipline" were based on a school schedule and on the typical post-industrial "business hour" week rather than on a seasonal mode where different things are emphasized at different times.
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Willa
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: "Real Learning"
