“What is your favorite subject?” I, for one, default to that question far too often in my conversations with grade school students. It generally results in a profound dialogue something like this: “Math.” “Why?” “It’s fun.” “What are you learning in math?” “Times.” “So, do you like multiplying?” “Um. I don’t know.” Or imagine another […]
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The Mission Series, Pt. V | “A springboard to understanding the created world”: The Western liberal arts tradition
Those who become involved with classical Christian education quickly discover that, as with any specific discipline, there is a vocabulary that usually seems foreign and intimidating to newcomers. Classical educators liberally spice their conversation with words like “headmaster,” “dialectic,” “rhetoric,” “the Great Conversation,” and “trivium.” From context, most pick up some vague idea of what […]
Feedback: “What we have in common is more significant than what divides us”
A primary purpose for our events here at Cedar Classical Academy is to welcome people with different views to the table to continue what Mortimer Adler calls The Great Conversation. Our friend Dr. Peter Vande Brake spoke on classical education in an urban context at our May 10 Academy Dinner. Here, our friend Dr. David […]
“A fountain of joy alive in you”: How Music Tunes the Soul
What did Plato observe in music that prompted him to label it the most important of the liberal arts? He perceived that, of all seven, music best “tunes the soul.” Here Plato addressed the development of character, for music can inspire the unfolding of moral and mental qualities needed to be a virtuous person. Our […]
The Mission Series, Pt. IV | “The joy of finding hidden treasure”: The Classical Curriculum
Thinking is hard work. Being disciplined in your thinking is even harder. This is not always obvious because thinking requires little or no physical exertion, it has not been made into a sport, and you cannot post pictures of it on Instagram. It is often taken for granted that kids will learn to think clearly […]
The Mission Series, Pt. III | “Give me a place to stand and I shall move the world”: A Well-Ordered Understanding of Reality
This post is the third in a series aimed to unpack the kind of education Cedar Classical Academy will offer, through the exposition of our mission statement piece by piece. In our previous posts, we have covered parental responsibility and school partnership in bringing up children (Pt. 1), and the key concepts of moral and […]
The Mission Series, Pt. II | “Make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue”: On Moral and Intellectual Virtue
This post is the second in a series aimed to continue educating you about the kind of education Cedar Classical Academy will offer to students and their families. We have begun expositing our mission statement, one line at a time. In the previous post in this series, Caroline Hummel explained the God-given role of parents […]
The Mission Series Pt. I | The Finish Line, The Starting Line, and What We Mean By “Serving Parents”
Twenty Nineteen is right around the corner. Back in April 2017, when we first began using the phrase “starting a school in 2019,” it felt satisfyingly inspiring yet vague—like saying, “Someday I’ll run a marathon” or “I’m thinking about climbing Mt. Everest in a few years.” We didn’t realize how quickly 2019 would become a […]
What is the Value of an Education?
As a parent, you want to know what you are buying, right? What is the end product? What is the final result? What does it look like when the kids have finally “got an education”? Often, the answer to these questions, for Christian and non-Christian alike, is measured by “job” or “career” preparation. A child […]
Why Read Secular Works? Pt. II | What the pagans have to teach the Christians
In the last article, I began grappling with the persistent and important question of why we, as Christians, should have our students reading secular literature that was produced by pagans and often revolves around mature themes. If you remember, I argued that 1) a student – particularly a classical Christian student – cannot pretend to […]
Why Read Secular Works? Pt. I
“I’m curious as to why my son is reading a book in class that takes the Lord’s name in vain and contains cursing,” read the opening lines of an email from a rhetoric school parent. Thankfully, this email was courteous, genuinely curious, and was the beginning of a fruitful exchange. However, it was the latest […]
“And they lived happily ever after”: Training kids’ moral imaginations to meet life’s demands and to demand more out of life
Clear thinking first requires imagination that is trained to expect things to make sense. Dragons get defeated, stories end happily ever after, 2 + 2 = 4, truth is objective — all of these ideas make sense to a well-trained imagination. If a person does not expect life to make sense (or, more crippling still, […]
These ideas are for everyone. (Or, “Lessons from Pooh Bear.”)
“Hallo, Pooh,” said Owl. “How’s things?” “Terrible and Sad,” said Pooh, “because Eeyore, who is a friend of mine, has lost his tail. And he’s Moping about it. So could you very kindly tell me how to find it for him?” “Well, said Owl, “the customary procedure in such case is as follows.” “What […]
“Because we are given more than we are”: Good habits, good stories, and why we need both
“Stewardship.” “Inheritance.” “Heritage.” We keep returning to these words when we talk about classical education. Add up Shakespeare, Euclid, Augustine, and Laura Ingalls Wilder, and it equals a rich inheritance that can help teach us to be human and point us toward our Maker. We don’t have this heritage — these books and disciplines and […]
“I will learn the True, I will do the Good, I will love the Beautiful”: The culture of a classical school
As many of you know, we are in the process of founding a private classical school in Lansing sometime 2019-2021. We hosted an introduction to classical education on April 22 and visited two Michigan classical schools on May 1 and May 8. We have spent a lot of time this month talking pros and cons […]