Articles From The Classical Teacher

Ordering Knowledge to the Child's Nature
by Andrew Campbell

There is no doubt that the idea of "child-directed learning” would have struck the ancients as laughable: how can you entrust education to someone who, by definition, doesn't know what he needs to know? Classical education has always been directed toward the adult the child will one day become, not to his current immaturity.

What's more, Christian educators acknowledge that our nature—that which Rousseau and his intellectual heirs would elevate to a formative principle—has been wounded by the Fall. We simply cannot accept the premise that, left to their own devices, children will make wise educational choices based on their natural desires and interests alone. That is why Christian thought has generally not supported child-directed educational philosophies.

So does that mean that we should program our child's education from start to finish? Is there no role for freedom in education?

Where there is logical progression of facts and skills to be mastered, as is the case with the core academic subjects of Latin and math, we allow students direction at our (and their!) peril. While some exceptional students may "discover” mathematical principles on their own, unless your family speaks Latin at home, they are unlikely to internalize the Latin grammar without systematic instruction. In other subjects, however, we can and should make use of the child's natural curiosity. Where do the geese go in the winter? Why does my nose run when I have a cold? Why does it snow? The natural sciences are the proper arena for human curiosity—that is, in fact, the basis of the scientific method. "What if...?” is a deeply human question and one we can encourage in our children. Likewise, curiosity about the past is a natural outgrowth of a child's broadening awareness. Just as science asks of the future, "What will happen if...?”, history asks questions of the past: "Why are things the way they are now? How did they get that way?”

The answers to timeless questions—”What is 2 + 2?” "What is the genitive singular form of anima?”—require systematic instruction. Questions that arise from the child's sense of past and future may be more safely thrown open to natural curiosity. But we are still left with the responsibility to guide our children's understanding of the discoveries they make. If we can trace the projectile of a bottle rocket using the principles of physics, does that give us leave to shoot it off in a crowd?

The answer to that question comes from ethics, and there we must discern our child's maturity. A young child will simply be told, "No, not safe.” An older child can be guided, through that method of Socratic dialogue that every parent uses, to understand why. Here we are using the child's natural curiosity ("What would happen if...?”) while disciplining the will to obey reason, not impulse or appetite. This is something responsible parents do every day—all day, every day, it seems!

So freedom, yes, but within limits. We may legitimately use methods of discovery, both empirical and Socratic, to educate our children where those methods are proper to the field of endeavor. We must use didactic methods in disciplines where they are appropriate. But we must never substitute the child's nature for a wise teacher. We cannot abandon our responsibility to bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, including the natural orders of knowledge and authority that God has ordained.

Andrew Campbell is the author of The Latin-Centered Curriculum, which gives teachers and parents an interesting and easy to read guide explaining classical education, how it came about, and who its major exponents are. In addition to a useful scope and sequence for how a Latin-centered classical education can be accomplished in a home or private school, Campbell explains why the central principle behind classical education is the study of Latin and Greek.