Is Classical Ed compatible with gentle discipline and respectful parenting?

[slightly crunchy]

I hope my title comes across right. I guess what I am wanting is some reassurance that "of course it is."

Classical ed. a la TWTM really resonates with me. The best school that I attended as a child, was similar to this idea, and that is what I want to make available to my own kids. Though, I am sure I would be tweaking it some down the road. I have a 4 yo, so not doing any of this yet.

How does it work, to have work for the child to do in a general timeframe, if one does not use the typical rewards and punishments as a parent? I guess I have this fear--what if he just doesn't want to do certain things? Like I read TWTM, and basically disagree with her advice of what to do if a child just doesn't want to do something. But, is there an alternative?

Do you have to separate the parent-child relationship from the parent-"facilitator" relationship? It seems like that would be impossible.

I know some posters here are using a more structured curriculum with your children. How do you do it? Is it just an expectation that is set up and the kids follow along? Is it just not an issue?

I guess I am concerned because my 4 yo is SO headstrong and persistent (which I actually think is a good thing!). I know he will mature and change in other ways as he gets closer to school age, but this is part of his personality. I think about us homeschooling and I get a headache.
No, really, I think I want to do this, but I would love to hear how it works for some of you.

Thanks!

[~*SugarMama*~]

I have no experience with this but I am very curious about the advice.

[Roar]

I can only say it wouldn't have been been compatible at our home. What we did was take the things we liked from classical education and not try to follow the exact method outlined in a WTM. I think a lot of her expectations for young children are unreasonable for many - too much repetition, too much handwriting, too much sitting still. These things aren't necessary for learning our child and I can't see the point. With any homeschooling method you need to start first by looking at your kid and work from there.

[GoodEats]

Of course it is.

I can only say that, though, because Bailey likes to do her book work. She's 5 and we're into first grade. We don't spend nearly as much time as prescribed in TWTM on any of our subjects - I think I average about 2 hours a day on language arts and history together - and we do more "fun" things to extend some of the subjects, like "spelling drills" where Bailey finger-spells the words (which I like because it reinforces the ASL alphabet she learned and she has to picture the word and translate it, so it lays down the spelling memory along different paths, if that makes sense) and taking walks and naming the common and proper nouns we see along the way, that sort of thing. She looks forward to her weekly memory work and the new poem to memorize and recite for us; I pick silly poems from Shel Silverstein and others.

We read our history lesson and talk about various aspects as there is an opportunity (like the differences between modern farming practice and the earliest farmers while we're passing corn fields around here) and work biographies and whatnot into our bedtime reading.

Math and science are generally just worked into our daily lives and activities at this point because I haven't finished compiling our resources.

But, yes, I think they can be completely compatible, depending on your child's personality. I certainly don't stand over her with a stick, demanding one more line of "A"s or whatever. (I do try to limit the amount of book work she does in spelling and handwriting, though, just because I like to have one spelling lesson per week, etc.) but I do announce, after breakfast adn getting dressed and whatnot, that it's time for lessons because otherwise, she'd park herself in fron of the t.v. all day long. Normally, when she's finished with the book stuff that I don't need to sit and direct, she'll tell me she's going outside or upstairs to the playroom to play for a while, then she'll come in and be ready for the next thing on her own. Starting lessons seems to redirect her focus just generally away from the t.v. for the day.

I wouldn't call what we do "child led" by any means (though we do follow her interests where they lead when questions come up) but I'm also not filling the drill sargeant role. I'm more of a benign nudge. And we also "school" year round, so we can work on things at whatever pace is working for us at the time and take detours as they come up.

Does that make any sense at all? I feel like I'm having a less than lucid day.

[warriorprincess]

I agree with the PP that's no, it's not child led, but you can take off and do months of whatever interests your child. I think it also depends on how strongly you feel about using rewards- I've never had a problem with that, since most palces you will work have some sort of reward system (merit raises, special parking, or whatever). So yes, there's a lot of "when...then" reward based stuff going on, which makes our days go much smoother. (When all the schoolwork is done you can play a video game/go to your friend's house/watch a movie).

My nine year old needs the rewards, but my 7 year old seems to like the book work.

[Butter]

Of course it can be. View it as a guide, not a requirement. My daughter chooses how much of each subject to do when and has lots of input on what subjects she learns (which is why my 6 year old is learning Latin lol). We have never and will never use rewards in relation to education. We believe the purpose of education is learning, not to finish a workbook or whatever.

[Butter]

Double post

[Butter]

Triple post.

[Charles Baudelaire]

I don't see why not. We've been using TWTM for a few years now, and we don't strictly abide by the schedules either -- and neither does Susan Wise Bauer, as she explained in an interview some time ago; the publishers made her put the schedule in the book. :

No, it's not child-led, that's true. However, although I love and respect and honor my child, I have a greater base of knowledge than she does about what a child needs to know by the time she's eighteen, and I'd like to believe that I've not gotten too much
dumber as I've grown older so that I can apply that hard-won knowledge to my parenting and educating now. The advantages of TWTM over child-led learning are manifold, in my opinion, not the least reason for which is coherence, but that is another subject.

Within the framework of classical education, though, there are many ways in which a child can appropriately direct his or her education. If s/he's really interested in ancient Rome, you can go to museums, rent movies, read books -- and breeze past the Olmecs if they're not really what interests her (and vice versa). For another example, we tried Saxon Math (TWTM's recommendation) and HATED. IT. DEEPLY. Way too much repetition! Arrgh! We switched to Miquon and it was far better. In short, you can do some tailoring to the child's needs and preferences. Some days when she doesn't feel like doing a
particular subject, we skip it until the next day, or do something different that still addresses the same set of skills. In short, classical education has the virtue of *any*
homeschooling -- you can tailor the education to the child, not the child to the education.

[eilonwy]

I think so. Well, I'm trying, at least. My children are very young and very much academically inclined, so perhaps I haven't hit the snares yet, but at this point, I'm optimistic.

[slightly crunchy]

Thank you for the responses--very encouraging.

Eilonwy, I missed that other thread; off to go read it, now.

Thank you!

[Hera]

I agree with CB for the most part, and won't repeat what she said.

I do want to add that I use TWTM as an outline for myself, so I know what comes next. Doing actual lessons is child-led for us, but the content is not. Dd doesn't know enough about math (for instance) to know what she does and does not want to learn next. She does not know enough about history to say "OK, mom, I'm ready to move on to Rome." She knows when she is ready to do some school, and when she'd rather build a fort, or ride her bike, or play with kids.

Also, if and when she comes up with interests of her own, we take time to learn about them.

[Brisen]

I think Hera explained it well -- using it (or any curriculum) as a guide for you, but letting the individual lessons be more child-led. Just take what works, and leave the rest.

FWIW, I find A Thomas Jefferson Education to be similar to Classical Ed. in the ways that I liked it, yet more child led. It's kind of a mix of classical and unschooling.

[USAmma]

Of course it can be!

[papayapetunia]

Honestly, Classical Ed and gentle discipline has been a huge challenge for me. I am re-reading gentle discipline books that I read a long time ago, because it's been such a challenge.