Charlotte Mason Unschooling

*Note to readers: As this is a very popular post, I feel compelled to tell you that I no longer advocate blending Charlotte Mason with unschooling. I believe that at its root, and especially in its "radical" form, unschooling is contradictory to the Christian parental vocation. I am now a strong advocate of a Catholic adaptation of the philosophy and methodology of Charlotte Mason in an uncompromised, yet still contemporary, form. All of the goodness advertised in unschooling can be found by going further up and deeper into CM, without any of unschooling's baggage. However, I think that the content of this article remains of edifying value, so if you find it helpful on your homeschooling journey, then it has served its purpose. Thank you kindly for reading!

Before anyone screams at me, I realize that the title of this post is a contradiction in terms--which is exactly why it works for me. I have always been the eclectic type, in decorating, personal style, education, interests, etc... My personality is composed of diametrical opposites, which used to make it hard for me to understand myself. Now I'm perfectly comfortable with my seeming contradictions. You know, the whole "introverted extrovert" or "extroverted introvert" thing. I am a walking oxymoron. Will I stick with this label of my homeschooling style, Charlotte Mason unschooling? Hard to tell, since I am still waiting for the unschoolers to describe their lifestyle and what it is that they do (and don't do). But in the end I'll do my own thing anyway, so onward we go!

Lest you think that the CM method and unschooling go together like liver and strawberries, read Kathy Ward's online article, "Why I Like Charlotte Mason" (http://sandradodd.com/people/kathyward/charlottemason). She gives several quotes from Charlotte Mason and John Holt to show their philosophical similarity. I was so impressed with this that I don't think I could possibly express the idea any better than she has, so thanks, Kathy!

I was feeling like I needed to do something different with our homeschooling, though it was actually flowing along quite nicely. That seems ironic when I think about it. Shouldn't we leave well enough alone and not go looking for trouble? Maybe that was what got me thinking about unschooling. Since our system has been working so well, and I am happy with Beezy's academic progress, it seems to me to be time to branch out. Beezy is endlessly creative, so that isn't an issue. But we could get back to needlepoint projects, for example. We could go on day trips and travel around the country. We have access to the woods in Michigan that we could visit more often. She wants to be a singer, which may or may not work out, but she has from a very young age shown a talent for song writing. She is taking piano lessons, and her homework book already has her making up tunes. It pleased her that she has homework "like the other kids" now, but hers is "easier because it's piano and it's fun."

Today we handmade tons of valentines and baked a strawberry shortcake together. Beezy listened to Taylor Swift and had a friend over to play who lives nearby. Her cousin is spending the night, since she has no school tomorrow. This has been a good week to set school work aside and ruminate on how best to proceed. The Astra Taylor youtube video really got my wheels turning! I want to provide more opportunities for independent learning experiences for my child. I was inspired by the valentine creations to become a collage artist, and when looking for library books, I learned a new term--altered art. We looked at collage art images online. I have made "illustrated discovery journals" via the idea by Sarah Ban Breathnach in Simple Abundance for years. From my experience, children absolutely love collage art. So I am planning to create a new art area for Beezy for scrap booking and creating collages or whatever she wants to do with it. She makes stuff out of our paper recycling bin all the time. I want to create a similar artist workshop for myself!

I have encountered the writing of several other homeschooling mothers who have a Montessori background and also found themselves drawn to Charlotte Mason. I have pointed out the  similarities of these educators at various points in this blog. One notable difference between them is that the CM method is predominantly teacher-led (albeit only in the mornings), while Montessori's is child-centered for the most part (though the role of the teacher is crucial). Charlotte did not establish a highly scientific, prepared indoor environment like Maria's, because she was much more nature and literature oriented. Both gave their students plenty of free time and put a high premium on respect for children as people and their innate capacity to learn without a great deal of interference from adults. Both believed in the spiritual nurturing of a child as a foundational principle of education. Both approaches contain elements similar to unschooling's basic philosophy. I am leaning more toward the CM method now, as Montessori materials are very pricey and take up a lot of space, and a full application of the Montessori method would be very difficult to duplicate in a home setting. And I don't want my home to resemble a classroom!

For your further edification in the CM method, below are the 20 principles of Charlotte's educational method, followed by a sampling of attainments suitable for a six-year-old. Enjoy!

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Charlotte Mason's 20 Principles form a synopsis of her Educational Method:

1. Children are born persons.

2. They are not born either good or bad, but with possibilities for good and for evil.

3. The principles of authority on the one hand, and of obedience on the other, are natural, necessary and fundamental; but––

4. These principles are limited by the respect due to the personality of children, which must not be encroached upon whether by the direct use of fear or love, suggestion or influence, or by undue play upon any one natural desire.

5. Therefore, we are limited to three educational instruments––the atmosphere of environment, the discipline of habit, and the presentation of living ideas. The P.N.E.U. Motto is: "Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, and a life."

6. When we say that "education is an atmosphere," we do not mean that a child should be isolated in what may be called a 'child-environment' especially adapted and prepared, but that we should take into account the educational value of his natural home atmosphere, both as regards persons and things, and should let him live freely among his proper conditions. It stultifies a child to bring down his world to the child's' level.

7. By "education is a discipline," we mean the discipline of habits, formed definitely and thoughtfully, whether habits of mind or body. Physiologists tell us of the adaptation of brain structures to habitual lines of thought, i.e., to our habits. 8. In saying that "education is a life," the need of intellectual and moral as well as of physical sustenance is implied. The mind feeds on ideas, and therefore children should have a generous curriculum.

9. We hold that the child's mind is no mere sac to hold ideas; but is rather, if the figure may be allowed, a spiritual organism, with an appetite for all knowledge. This is its proper diet, with which it is prepared to deal; and which it can digest and assimilate as the body does foodstuffs.

10. Such a doctrine as e.g. the Herbartian, that the mind is a receptacle, lays the stress of education (the preparation of knowledge in enticing morsels duly ordered) upon the teacher. Children taught on this principle are in danger of receiving much teaching with little knowledge; and the teacher's axiom is,' what a child learns matters less than how he learns it."

11. But we, believing that the normal child has powers of mind which fit him to deal with all knowledge proper to him, give him a full and generous curriculum; taking care only that all knowledge offered him is vital, that is, that facts are not presented without their informing ideas. Out of this conception comes our principle that,––

12. "Education is the Science of Relations"; that is, that a child has natural relations with a vast number of things and thoughts: so we train him upon physical exercises, nature lore, handicrafts, science and art, and upon many living books, for we know that our business is not to teach him all about anything, but to help him to make valid as many as may be of–– "Those first-born affinities That fit our new existence to existing things."

13. In devising a SYLLABUS for a normal child, of whatever social class, three points must be considered: (a) He requires much knowledge, for the mind needs sufficient food as much as does the body. (b) The knowledge should be various, for sameness in mental diet does not create appetite (i.e., curiosity) (c) Knowledge should be communicated in well-chosen language, because his attention responds naturally to what is conveyed in literary form.

14. As knowledge is not assimilated until it is reproduced, children should 'tell back' after a single reading or hearing: or should write on some part of what they have read.

15. A single reading is insisted on, because children have naturally great power of attention; but this force is dissipated by the re-reading of passages, and also, by questioning, summarising. and the like. Acting upon these and some other points in the behaviour of mind, we find that the educability of children is enormously greater than has hitherto been supposed, and is but little dependent on such circumstances as heredity and environment. Nor is the accuracy of this statement limited to clever children or to children of the educated classes: thousands of children in Elementary Schools respond freely to this method, which is based on the behaviour of mind.

16. There are two guides to moral and intellectual self-management to offer to children, which we may call 'the way of the will' and 'the way of the reason.'

17. The way of the will: Children should be taught, (a) to distinguish between 'I want' and 'I will.' (b) That the way to will effectively is to turn our thoughts from that which we desire but do not will. (c) That the best way to turn our thoughts is to think of or do some quite different thing, entertaining or interesting. (d) That after a little rest in this way, the will returns to its work with new vigour. (This adjunct of the will is familiar to us as diversion, whose office it is to ease us for a time from will effort, that we may 'will' again with added power. The use of suggestion as an aid to the will is to be deprecated, as tending to stultify and stereotype character, It would seem that spontaneity is a condition of development, and that human nature needs the discipline of failure as well as of success.)

18. The way of reason: We teach children, too, not to 'lean (too confidently) to their own understanding'; because the function of reason is to give logical demonstration (a) of mathematical truth, (b) of an initial idea, accepted by the will. In the former case, reason is, practically, an infallible guide, but in the latter, it is not always a safe one; for, whether that idea be right or wrong, reason will confirm it by irrefragable proofs.

19. Therefore, children should be taught, as they become mature enough to understand such teaching, that the chief responsibility which rests on them as persons is the acceptance or rejection of ideas. To help them in this choice we give them principles of conduct, and a wide range of the knowledge fitted to them. These principles should save children from some of the loose thinking and heedless action which cause most of us to live at a lower level than we need.

20. We allow no separation to grow up between the intellectual and 'spiritual' life of children, but teach them that the Divine Spirit has constant access to their spirits, and is their Continual Helper in all the interests, duties and joys of life.

Volume 6: A Philosophy of Education Charlotte Mason 1922

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"A Formidable List of Attainments for a Child of Six":

(A reprint of a curriculum outline from a CM school in the 1890s, from Summer 93 Parents Review published by Karen Andreola)

1. To recite, beautifully, 6 easy poems and hymns
2. to recite, perfectly and beautifully, a parable and a psalm
3. to add and subtract numbers up to 10, with dominoes or counters
4. to read--what and how much, will depend on what we are told of the child
5. to copy in print-hand from a book
6. to know the points of the compass with relation to their own home, where the sun rises and sets, and the way the wind blows
7. to describe the boundries of their own home
8. to describe any lake, river, pond, island etc. within easy reach
9. to tell quite accurately (however shortly) 3 stories from Bible history, 3 from early English, and 3 from early Roman history (to note, we may want to substitute early American for early English!)
10. to be able to describe 3 walks and 3 views
11. to mount in a scrap book a dozen common wildflowers, with leaves (one every week); to name these, describe them in their own words, and say where they found them.
12. to do the same with leaves and flowers of 6 forest trees
13. to know 6 birds by song, colour and shape
14. to send in certain Kindergarten or other handiwork, as directed
15. to tell three stories about their own "pets"--rabbit, dog or cat.
16. to name 20 common objects in French, and say a dozen little sentences
17. to sing one hymn, one French song, and one English song
18. to keep a caterpillar and tell the life-story of a butterfly from his own observations.

Deconstructing Education #3

Beezy understands that learning happens all of the time, not just when we are "doing school".  But she is also conscious of the lesson plan book I keep, of checking things off and being aware of how many separate items we accomplish.  I feel compelled to deconstruct these lesson times a bit.  For instance, last night Beezy was having trouble falling asleep, so she read a chapter in her Ginn reader and then told me that she read an interesting story about a pancake. She gave me a narration of the story without my prompting her in an obvious way while we were lying in the dark.  I had originally put the idea into her head to read if she can't fall asleep, and on her own she sometimes chooses to do this using a book light, which adds an element of fun.

I am torn. I like the Charlotte Mason idea of doing formal lessons in the mornings, being finished by 1:00 and having the rest of the day free. Is that like unschooling "part time"? I think it's fair to say that those unschoolers who believe that, from a philosophical standpoint, you can't unschool part time have a valid point. The consensus seems to be that unschooling is not doing school at home, so it is quite a different animal from homeschooling methods which duplicate the public schooling experience within the home environment. Yet allow me to argue that any method of homeschooling is indeed a radical expression of liberty. I know, now I am co-opting the term "radical" from the radical unschoolers!

I agree with Astra Taylor that it is important how we name things, and that unschooling, while a form of homeschooling, is something different from the styles which use a set curriculum and are adult led, etc... I also agree with the homeschooling mother in the audience that there is too much division between the two camps, and that it is a very brave decision to homeschool one's children in any shape or form. I also agree with that mother that homeschooling does not equal "helicopter" parenting.

The other night Beezy asked if she could have some gum. Since unschooling had suddenly come into my radar, I told her that she didn't have to ask for gum; she could have gum whenever she wants. She was surprised at this, but I told her that I thought she was responsible enough to make her own choice. I reminded her that brushing one's teeth is especially important if one chews a lot of gum. The thing is, we have always had candy in plain sight, available whenever Beezy might want to have some, yet she has always asked first. She doesn't feel a need to sneak it, and she typically doesn't eat too much of it. She loves sweets but doesn't over-indulge. Since allowing her to choose gum without asking, I have noticed no increase in her consumption of it.

I have also been allowing our days to flow organically this week. Yesterday I pulled my back out right before my RCIA director came to catch me up on classes I had missed. Beezy helped clean the house before the director came, and she ran errands with her dad during our meeting. Since I was in too much pain and couldn't move around well at all, we didn't do school. Beezy decided to visit her grandma. Then her cousin came over to play, and the three of us went to the Ash Wednesday Mass. Her dad and I both read to her yesterday, and she read to herself. No doubt plenty of learning took place despite not having "school time".

I still want to keep track of the books and materials we are using, but I think maybe I will put the lesson plan book aside and not write each activity into a subject box. Sometimes I feel stressed in the effort to get a certain amount of things done. It is nice to have school out of the way early in the day on the one hand, but on the other that gives the message that the most important learning happens during that specific time frame. There is an advantage, I think, in not having sharp lines between school and the rest of life. I also think it is nonsense to say that in the unschooling method one must use absolutely no curriculum. Charlotte Mason advocated a broad curriculum focusing on living books and exploration of the natural world. The whole world and everything in it qualifies as educational curricula! In the Montessori Method, role modeling is the best practice to teach children in the way they should go.

What I want to work on is better preparing the home environment to be interesting and stimulating. This will require more organization and closet cleaning, and Beezy can be a part of that. I want to let the day unfold organically but with a purpose toward creativity, spiritual growth, and learning that is both teacher-directed and self-directed, and I want to extend such open source learning more into the community, traveling and going to intriguing places. Now it is time to make Valentine cards, according to Beezy, and she isn't hungry yet for breakfast. So begins our day!

Deconstructing Education #2

http://yes-i-can-write.blogspot.com/2010/12/unschooling-is-not-relaxed.html

This link will take you to the blog, "I'm Unschooled. Yes, I Can Write." This is written by a 21-year-old who was unschooled and is a very good writer, in my opinion. She distinguishes in this post between unschooling and relaxed homeschooling. I appreciate that there is a distinction and that unschoolers are concerned about the co-opting of the term by homeschoolers who do not actually unschool. Yet there is also a definite difference between "radical unschoolers" and plain old unschoolers, so obviously this is a term with a subjective and relative definition. Just as there are many styles and variations of homeschooling, it stands to reason that unschooling will mean something a little different to each person.

For example, I met a homeschooling mother who asked me something like, "Do you homeschool or do you do a co-op?" She seemed to be under the impression that this was an either/or type of thing. We belonged to a co-op which met for only a few hours on Mondays at the time. This did not mean that was all we did as homeschoolers. I considered the co-op to be supplemental, with my child's core education coming from home. People outside the homeschooling community seemed often to be under the impression that the co-op was the primary teaching tool, the "real school" if you will, and were confused about why it met only once a week and for only two, 10-week semesters a year. Clearly this is because it fit into their conception of what school should be better than the idea of a home-based education. To me, the co-op was mostly for socializing purposes for my only child, to do things with other children in a group and to have teachers other than me. It wasn't necessary for her education.

Today we do not belong to a co-op. We are involved in other community activities that fulfill the needs that we previously got from participating in one. Many of the classes there were excellent in quality, while others were perhaps not the best use of time. Belonging to the co-op took time away from myself, since I had to be a teacher there and spend a lot of time outside the co-op to prepare my lessons, and it took away from time I thought would be more beneficially spent focusing on other things with Beezy. At any rate, co-ops can certainly be a viable part of a homeschooling experience; it is not an either one homeschools or one belongs to a co-op type of proposition. This is to point out that even among homeschoolers there are varying beliefs about what homeschooling means, about what it should or should not be.

As far as unschooling goes, I think that term is sometimes used in very "radical" situations when unparenting or uneducating would better apply. But barring those extreme situations in which parents simply fail to parent and the learning of children is seriously stunted, unschooling seems to be a viable option of enriching education which encompasses an entire way of life. In my opinion, unschooling means that one does not generally apply the tactics and methods used for education in the public schools to one's approach to the education of one's children. Open Source Learning, a term I believe John Taylor Gatto coined, may be more accurate to what unschooling actually is.

I think it would be true to say that the Montessori Method is a style of unschooling, even if it is implemented in a classroom setting, although spending long hours away from one's family and segregated from the larger community is still problematic. Montessori's method is based on educating a child for life, on giving children a high level of, but not absolute, freedom of choice, and on being auto-educative and child-centered. Children have freedom of movement and are not shackled to desks. They are also not sequestered with children solely their own age, but have multi-age groupings. Teachers facilitate rather than dictate what a child learns. These are all tenets of unschooling. But unlike some forms of unschooling, there are rules, and the three Rs of respect for oneself, respect for others, and respect for one's environment are intrinsic to this method.

Efforts to instill good habits in children are important. Children are, after all, less mature and less experienced in life than adults (although there are surely exceptions to the rule!). They do not automatically know right from wrong, or how to resolve all of their own conflicts, and they couldn't possibly know what they might be interested in learning more about unless they have first had some exposure to a topic. With unschooling, I understand that this exposure happens more organically rather than by the direct intervention of adults. At the same time, I don't think unschooling necessitates that a parent never initiates a learning experience or that an adult never directly teaches her kids anything. Children thrive best with healthy boundaries and gentle guidance, gradually being given increasing levels of responsibility for themselves. In my opinion, unschooling does not mean that you can't read a book about rainforests to your child unless she has expressed a clear interest in the subject!

So can relaxed homeschooling be understood as a type of unschooling? At this point in time, I would say yes. If you disagree, I want to know why! I did not go to Wikipedia for a definition of unschooling to see if I am understanding the concept. It is clear that some unschoolers themselves misunderstand what it means to de-program oneself and one's children from the spirit-killing effects of government schooling. After all, when John Holt coined the term unschooling in the 60s, it was synonymous with homeschooling. I think some unschoolers have found only an alternate way to kill their children's spirits, well-intentioned as they may be. Yet it is also apparent that many unschoolers have found a way of living that works very well, producing well-rounded individuals who think for themselves and express themselves with extreme proficiency. Furthermore, these kids grow up to be happy people!

As with homeschooling, I will suggest that there is no single, right way to do unschooling. I am unschooling myself by not going to an online dictionary to have someone else's opinion thrust upon me about what this is and whether or not I can call myself an unschooler. I'm not saying that I am an unschooler. I'm saying that I'm thinking for myself about what such a term truly implies. I do not think, for example, that it implies allowing a child of 5 years old to eat junk food all day, and then try to tell people that it is because I trust my child that I allow him to do this. To me, that is simply ludicrous. Such "radical" unschooling really has nothing at all to do with education or authentic spirituality. Right now I have begun to experiment with unschooling. I will continue to log my thoughts, results, questions, successes, failures, and conclusions, and I welcome your imput on the journey!

Deconstructing Education #1

Yesterday I began reading John Taylor Gatto's Weapons of Mass Instruction, and as usual Gatto's writing has the potential to strike terror into the heart of anyone with children. From being fearful for today's public school children, the next logical step is to call to mind my own experiences in public schooling and realize with horror that yes, I was brainwashed in many ways. It isn't the fault of teachers. The system is simply set up that way. And today it is much worse than when I was growing up, thanks to George W. Bush's "No Child Left Behind" policies and the current "Race to the Top" schemes. The methods used to dumb us all down are subtle and perhaps all the more insidious for that reason.

I was talking to a friend recently who has been a teacher for a long time, and I told her the strongest impression I have of my high school memories is being physically uncomfortable. I was always cold, and there were no windows in the classrooms to let in fresh air and sunshine. I was hungry all the time. I ate breakfast when I got up at 5:45 a.m., was starving by lunch time, and then ate a school lunch that was usually unappetizing. By the time I got off the school bus at 3:00 p.m., I was ravenous. Luckily we always had healthy food to eat at home.

Aside from gym, the long lunch line, and changing classes, I remember only three occasions of being out of a chair while in high school. Otherwise we were always sitting in rows, facing front toward the teacher's desk and the blackboard. Mrs. Campbell was an excellent English teacher, and one day we moved our desks all out of the way to do some play acting with Shakespeare.  (We would also stand to read our book reports.)  In Spanish, Miss Baird, another good teacher, led us through the halls one day to sing Christmas carols in Spanish (likely this would no longer be allowed). In Oral Interpretation and Debate class, we stood for our debates and duet acting. I'll be writing more on why the standard set up is problematic in later posts.

For now I want to simply begin a journey toward deconstructing the school experience, starting with intense analysis of my own time in public school and the experiences of my classmates. My task is to unlearn everything I think I know, all of those ingrained notions of what education is and how it should be accomplished. When people object to homeschooling, they are by and large reacting to their own school brainwashing and the current idea that only a certified, specialized person can know or teach anything. The idea that school is not only unnecessary but damaging to the human spirit is intensely threatening. There is a vested interest in insisting that school is good. Also, past generations did not have it as bad as kids do today, and they don't realize how slippery the slope of American government schools has actually become. Mostly I will be writing stream of consciousness style, letting memory and thought flow organically as it will.

What can we do, beginning today in our homes, to free our children to truly learn and grow at their own pace, in their own way and time? How can we create a self-educating environment? How can we give them opportunities to make their own choices and discoveries? How can we avoid the pitfalls of duplicating school in the home? How can we unschool without falling into irresponsible, neglectful "unparenting", as happens sometimes at the radical end of the spectrum? Can we be respectful friends of our children as well as figures of authority? These questions and more must be addressed, and no doubt looking so closely at our histories will be uncomfortable, probably even painful. But how can I set my child free until I have broken my own chains? Let's do it one day at a time and have the courage to unwrap the truth. I welcome your comments! Am I alone here in my efforts? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

The Unschooled Life--A Call for Guest Authors

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwIyy1Fi-4Q

Here is a link to the youtube video, "Astra Taylor on the Unschooled Life".  Astra is a filmmaker who was unschooled until the age of 13. She has advanced degrees and even attended Brown University, but she never studied cinematography. She reflects on her unschooled life, her experiences in the public school system, and her time in college. She gives a balanced view of both the pros and cons of unschooling and distinguishes this mode of education from homeschooling.

 Astra Taylor

One thing Astra wishes she had more of as an unschooler was an intellectual community where she could be creative with other kids, having fun and doing projects. This was an unmet need even though she had siblings. She found such a community among her public school friends, who she said were trying to give themselves the unschooling experience she had though they went to a public school. They sought to be self-directed learners.

Self-education is the cornerstone of unschooling. Adults facilitate the learning process rather than teach their children according to a schedule and curriculum. Astra emphasized her enriching home environment and the natural world outside as being sufficient motivation for spiking her curiosity and providing the materials to find out what she was interested in learning. This reminds me of my Montessori experience. The prepared classroom environment was key to this method. Children were free to choose any materials from the shelves, as long as they had been shown the proper handling and use of the material, and they were free to come up with their own variations.

The lessons teachers gave were predominantly individual and small group, and children had the right to not have the lesson if they were not interested or were busy working on something else. We did our best not to interrupt their concentration. But being a school situation, there were lunch times, group circle lessons, and outdoor play times. We tried to make transitions smooth and not hurry the children, and to allow a child who really did not want to break away from his work to finish it whenever possible. It wasn't an ideal situation, and for some children, the school day was excessively long. They could come as early as 7:30 a.m. and stay until 6:00 p.m. The spirit of following the child, a child-centered rather than teacher-centered approach, was intrinsic to this method.

But what about the unschooled child who does not have an enriching home environment or adequate exposure to the community and the arts? Who doesn't have books at home or access to a library? The idea of "radical unschooling" disturbs me, by which I refer to the practice of giving children no rules, no formation of good habits, no regular routines of sleep or meal times, letting them do whatever they want, whenever they want, trusting them to somehow "self-regulate". If they are not exposed to certain things, how will they know what interests they would like to pursue?

So to further my understanding of unschooling and the different types that may exist, I am inviting unschooling parents, and even the kids themselves, to be guest authors on this blog. We could do a Q&A session, or you can write your own article. Please contact me via Facebook or on the blog comments site if you are interested! I look forward to learning more about the unschooling process.

Are Public Schools Constitutional?

Recently a homeschooling friend of mine told me that the establishment of compulsory public schooling by the federal government was unconstitutional. Being that she is more politically savvy than me, I suspected that she could be right. I have a lot more research to do on this. I'm sure it is covered in The Underground History of American Education by John Taylor Gatto. This is a huge tome which will require much time to wade through, but you can begin with his youtube videos. I found this link to the issue of constitutionality that makes for another good start: http://www.newswithviews.com/Stuter/stuter9.htm. The author cites the violation of religious liberty as the basis of the unconstitutionality of public schools. This is interesting, since government schools claim to protect religious freedom by eliminating any references to God.

Yet, it can be argued that government schools actively teach secular humanism:

Noun

Humanism, with regard in particular to the belief that humanity is capable of morality and self-fulfillment without belief in God.

Is secular humanism a religion? Religion does not only refer to one's beliefs in God but relates also to beliefs about God. The origin of the universe, questions of morality, and the meaning and purpose of life are tied up in religion, whether or not one believes in God or feels that God is necessary.  Atheism is a religion. Humanism is defined as a belief in relation to morals, self-fulfillment, and the existence of God. Sounds like a religion to me, and one of its primary tenets is the philosophy of moral relativism, which you can read more about here: http://carm.org/moral-relativism. The basic idea is that morality is based upon no absolute truth, but is always relative to personal opinion, the particular situation, popular culture, historical time period, and the like. This is the religion taught in government schools.

"The anthropologist Clifford Geertz defined religion as a 'system of symbols which acts to establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in men by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic.' " (Wikipedia)
Darwin's theory of evolution is also a tenet of secular humanism. Is creationism even taught as a scientific theory anymore in the public schools?

Secular humanism, moral relativism, and Darwin's evolutionary theory fit Geertz's religious criteria. As the HHS mandate attempts to infringe upon the First Amendment rights of the people of the United States, we need to be especially vigilant to guard against further violations of religious liberty in the public schools and in relation to homeschooling laws. Give the dragon an inch, and he'll take the whole highway.

Christian Homeschooling

When I was in high school, a group of students including myself would call out to the others while passing in the hallway, "Attitude check!"  The response given to this was, "Praise the Lord!"  How well would this go over today in the public schools?  Would such students be hushed, sent to the principal's office, put in detention, even suspended?  In the last couple of years a student was suspended for wearing a Rosary in honor of his sick grandma, on the pretense that it could be interpreted as a gang symbol.  This was a good student with a clean record and no history of violence.  Would bowing one's head in prayer even be tolerated in the classrooms of today?  Some schools no longer include the Pledge of Allegiance because of the phrase "under God".  God has been kicked out of school.

I did not choose homeschooling for religious reasons.  God calls me to homeschool, which I understood from the beginning.  However, I didn't use a Christian curriculum.  If Beezy wanted to hear the Bible, I would read it.  We have always prayed together as a family at the dinner table, and bedtime prayers are a nightly routine.  But our studies did not revolve around Christian material.  I wouldn't have called myself a "Christian homeschooler" until recently, when being Catholic became the focus of my life as a wife and mother.  I did notice early on, though, that I was hearing a lot about God's being expelled from the public schools, and it bothered me.  The logic goes that by not allowing religion of any form to be part of the school day in any way, no one's religious or atheist sensibilities would be offended.  Do school children not have First Amendment rights?  Their parents pay taxes, don't they?  I pay taxes, even though my child is not in the public school system.  I have the right to object.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that parents are the primary educators of their children, regardless of the schooling method.  I think that most Christian homeschoolers give precedence to getting their children into Heaven over getting them into Harvard.  The character of the child and his or her spiritual formation is the top priority.  There is little use in book learning without a firm religious foundation.

What I don't think gets enough press is the spiritual warfare being waged between the forces of good and evil as it concerns us homeschoolers.  It only occurred to me recently that attacks against my homeschooling efforts have their origin in Satan.  My new motto is, stop feeding the dragon.  The devil wants us distracted from our sacred purpose.  He wants all parents distracted, but I think the ones who are making a point of focusing on religious instruction get his special attention.  Those keeping their children out of harm's way, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, are going to more acutely experience his wrath.  Enmity has been placed between the dragon and the seed of the Woman, and since the serpent couldn't conquer the child born of Mary, he is going after the rest of her offspring.  This is taught in the Book of Revelation.

I think we need to grow thicker skins.  God has given us a great task, and the devil will do anything to make us doubt ourselves and to thwart our efforts, and to turn others against us.  The best way to defeat the dragon is to stop feeding him ammunition.  He eats anger, low self-esteem, depression, self-doubt, fear, guilt, malice, hopelessness, and despair.  He is repelled by Faith, Hope, and Love.  Shove those in his mouth, and he will be silenced.