Folk Songs, Term 2, 2015/2016 School Year

The notes about the song are not necessary to learn the folk song. They are provided because the background interested me, and I thought some others might enjoy it as well.

My GRANDFATHER'S CLOCK 

by Henry Wouk

My grandfather's clock was too large for the shelf

 So it stood ninety years on the floor.

It was taller by half than the old man himself,

Though it weighed not a pennyweight more.

 It was bought on the morn of the day that he was born,

 And was always his treasure and pride.

 But it stopped, short, never to go again

 When the old man died.

Chorus:  Ninety years without slumbering

 Tick tock, tick tock 

His life seconds numbering

 Tick tock, tick tock

 It stopped. Short- never to go again 

When the old man died.

 In watching its pendulum swing to and fro,

 Many hours had he spent while a boy.

 And in childhood and manhood the clock seemed to know,

 And to share both his grief and his joy;

 For it struck twenty four when he entered the door

 With a blooming and beautiful bride,

 But it stopped short, never to go again

 When the old man died.

 My grandfather said of those he could hire

 Not a servant so faithful he found.

 For it wasted no time and had but one desire;

 At the close of each week to be wound.

 And it kept in its place- not a frown upon its face-

 And its hands never hung by its side.

 But it stopped, short, never to go again

 When the old man died.

 It rang an alarm in the dead of night-

 An alarm that for years had been dumb.

 And we knew that his spirit was pluming for flight,

 That his hour for departure had come.

  Still the clock kept the time with a soft and muffled chime,

 As we silently stood by his side

 But it stopped, short, never to go again,

 When the old man died.

Chorus

When The Ice-Worms Nest Again
The poet Robert Service included one paragraph (the chorus) of this song in one of his novels of life in the Great North around 1911-The Trail of '98: A Northland Romance- and it doesn't seem to have been a true folk song before then.  By the 20s and 30s the full song had become popular with the trappers and traders in Alaska and Canada, and  Wilf Carter ('Montana Slim') recorded it in the forties.

A 1994 Polygram CD says in the liner notes that it was 'written by Norma Booth, with co-authors from Le Pas, Manitoba, and published in 1949" and that it 'dates back to an old folk song from the Yukon Gold Rush."

(Some of us are not comfortable with the 'husky dusky' description of the maiden.  You can just change the words- making it part of the 'folk process' or you can use the alternative shared below)

There's a husky, dusky maiden in the Arctic
And she waits for me but it is not in vain,
For some day I'll put my mukluks on and ask her
If she'll wed me when the ice worms nest again.

chorus: In the land of pale blue snow 
Where it's ninety nine below 
And the polar bears are dancing on the plain
 In the shadow of the pole 
Oh my Heart, my Life,  my Soul, 
I will meet thee when the ice worms nest again!


For our wedding feast we'll have seal oil and blubber;
In our kayaks we will roam the bounding main;
All the walruses will look at us and rubber,
We'll be married when the ice worms nest again.

And when the blinkin' icebergs bound around us,
She'll present me with a bouncing baby boy.
All the polar bears will dance a rhumba 'round us
And the walruses will click their teeth with joy.

Final Chorus:
When some night at half-past two
I return to my igloo,
After sitting with a friend who was in pain,
She'll be waiting for me there,
With the hambone of a bear
And she'll beat me 'til the iceworms nest again.    









Down by the Salley Gardens

(also sometimes misspelled Sally Gardens)

William Butler Yeats published this in 1889 in his The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems. He said "an attempt to reconstruct an old song from three lines imperfectly remembered by an old peasant woman in the village of Ballisodare, Sligo, who often sings them to herself."

 Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;

She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet.

She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;

But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

In a field by the river my love and I did stand,

And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.

She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;

But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.

Alternate suggestion for Ice Worms:  Young Man From Canada:

I'm a young man from Canada
some six feet in my shoes
I left my home for Cariboo
on the first exciting news
In New York City I met a gent
introduced himself to me
Said I, "I come from Canada
so you can't come over me."

I sailed on the crazy Champion
all in the steerage too
I thought I'd got among the fiends
or other horrid crew
If you had only seen them feed,
it quite astonished me
And I'd been years in Canada
in a lumberman's shanty

With seventy-five upon my back
I came the Douglas way
And at an easy-going pace
made thirty miles a day
I landed here without a dime
in 1863
But I'd been years in Canada,
'twas nothing new to me

In best of homespun I was clad
so I was warmly dressed
The wool it grew near Montreal
in a place called Canada West
On Williams Creek they called me green
and Johnny come lately
But, ah, I came from Canada,
I ain't from the old country

I started out my mining life
by chopping cord wood
But I was born with axe in hand
so I could use it good
My chum was from the state of Maine,
somewhere near Tennessee
But, ah, I came from Canada
and he couldn't chop with me

In a short time I'd made a raise
and bought into a claim
There they called me engineer or carman,
'tis the same
The drifters then did try it on
to boss it over me
Said I, "I come from Canada
and I'm on the shoulderee."

In two weeks I got a div
which drove away all care
I went over to the wake-ups
and had a bully square
I danced all night till broad daylight
and a gal smiled sweet on me
Said I, "I come from Canada
and I'm on the marry-ee."

Now all young men who are in love
and sure I am there's some
Don't count your chicks before they're hatched
or they may never come
O when I asked that girl to wed
she only laughed at me
"You may come from Canada
but you can't come over me." 



Jeanne's playlist is here.
Mine is here
(I like a wide range of examples and renditions of the same song)
Another AO member's playlist is here.

Have fun singing!

Folk Songs, term one, 2015/2016 School Year

Around fifteen years ago, AO added folk songs to our curriculum.  At the time, we were about the only CM homeschool curriculum that did.  Of course, that's largely because back then we were about the only CM homeschool curriculum out there.

Some people were and are skeptical about it, but usually, when they give it a try, they find their children really enjoy it, and often the parents do, too.  Folk songs speak to children in a unique way, and they give children the opportunity to participate in this traditional art form by singing the songs themselves.

 Four things you should know about folk music:
1.  Folk music is fun to sing.

2.  There is no one right version. Folk music is created by something called the Folk Process- that is, somebody, somewhere, created a song, perhaps set to music an actual story he knew or just made one up to tell, much the same way somebody started telling the story of The Three Bears, and these things get passed down, and things change over time, and in different locations. You'll find variations all over the place. That's okay.

3.  Some folk music is earthy and bawdy.  Some is macabre and sad.  You don't have to sing those lyrics. (However, I personally think the macabre and sad ones are some of the most enjoyable to sing).

4. Folk music is fun to sing, so sing it, don't just listen to it.

Our folksong lineup for term one of the 2015/16 school year is:

The Bold Grenadier (English, originally, but pretty much every colonial country has a version they claim to own)
On the Road to Gundagai (Australian, distinctly)
Home on the Range (American)

Jeanne has a playlist for you here.  It's for the full year.

I have one for you here- it's currently just for this first term, but I will probably add more later.  I like multiple versions of the same song when I'm learning it and planning to sing it for school, and my playlist reflects that.

If you search Youtube, you will probably find playlists from other AO families as well.

Some of the songs on those playlists do have lyrics, but we also like to provide lyrics to our members when we can.  Here's what we've come up with.

 Here's one version of the lyrics to the Bold Grenadier (also known as One Morning in May or The Brave Volunteer) :

As I was a-walking one morning in May 

I spied a young couple a-making of hay. 

Oh, one was a fair maid, and her beauty shone clear, 

And the other was a soldier, a bold grenadier.

  "Good morning, Good morning, Good morning," said he.

 "Oh, where are you a-going, my pretty lady?" 

"I am going for a walk, by the clear crystal stream, 

To see cool waters glide and hear nightingales sing.:

  They had not been there but an hour or two, 

When out of his knapsack a fiddle he drew 

And the tune that he played made the valleys to ring. 

"Hark! Hark!" cried the lady, "hear the nigntingales sing." 

 Kind soldier, kind soldier, will you marry me? 

Oh no, my sweet lady that never can be,

 I've a good wife at home, in my own country, 

Two wives and the army's too many for me.

  As I was a walking one morning in May, 

I spied a young couple a-making of hay. 

Oh, one was a fair maid and her beauty shone clear;

 And the other was a soldier a bold grenadier. 

 Other versions begin 'one morning, one morning, one morning in May...' I've read that this is typical of the American versions, and the 'a-walking on morning in May' is more typical of those sung in the British Isles.

 Some refer to the brave volunteer rather than the bold grenadier. Both are soldiers, According to Wikipedia, the grenadiers were first established in the 17th century. Chosen from the largest and strongest soldiers, their primary function was throwing grenades. Over time the grenadiers retained their elite status, but were no longer strictly associated with grenade throwing.

 The second folksong for term 1 of this school year is the Australian On the Road to Gungadai- the lyrics are here.

  The third folk song for this first term of the 2015/16 school year is Home on the Range. I think it's kind of interesting that this song and Gundagai express similar sentiments- a nostalgic longing and love for home. There are a lot of lyrics to this one, as with most folk songs. Here are just a few:

 A HOME ON THE RANGE

 OH give me a home where the buffalo roam,
 Where the deer and the antelope play,
 Where seldom is heard a discouraging word,
 And the skies are not cloudy all day

Home,  home on the range!
Where the deer and the antelope play.
 Where seldom is heard a discouraging word,
 And the skies are not cloudy all day

 Where the air is so pure, the zephyrs so free,
The breezes so balmy and light
 That I would not exchange my home on the range
 For all of the cities so bright

(Chorus)

 How often at night, when the heavens are bright
 With the light from the glittering stars ,
 Have I stood here amazed and asked as I gazed,
 If their glory exceeds that of ours.

   (lyrics selected from those in the 1916 Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads)

Happy singing to you!

How to use the website and booklists

We're revamping our website and planning some changes, but they aren't done yet, and people are working on their school year now.
They visit us at amblesideonline.org, and are often overwhelmed by the information (honestly, sometimes we are, too!).

Who is this tutorial for? If you shut the website down in a panic one second after opening it, this might be for you.  If you find yourself feeling a little dizzy while you look at it, numbly asking yourself, "What do I do? Where do I start? This is all so confusing!"-  I hope this post will help with that.  It's intended for raw beginners, so I explain things that may seem obvious to old-timers, and don't explain some other things that I think can wait until newcomers get their feet wet a bit.

CM Philosophy in a sentence: It's better to know something of Miss Mason's philosophy, but what if you are pressed for time and urgently need to begin now?
Know this:

 Children are born persons. Much and varied humane reading, as well as human thought expressed in the forms of art, is, not a luxury, a tit-bit, to be given to children now and then, but their very bread of life, which they must have in abundant portions and at regular periods. This and more is implied in the phrase, "The mind feeds on ideas and therefore children should have a generous curriculum." 

This is a generous curriculum, based on Charlotte Mason’s ideas.  For help understanding how to implement the things on our website, feel free to ask questions on our forum.

Breaking it down into bitesized pieces of years, terms, and weeks:  We offer a 12 year curriculum list, although the years do not necessarily correspond to grades. We have had at least one student complete our program only through year 8 and still go to college on SAT scholarship. More commonly students have finished at one of the years from 9 to 11 and still been able to manage college.

 Each year is divided into 3 terms, 12 weeks each. We expect students to take 12 weeks to complete the readings assigned for each term. There is no benefit to completing them faster, and tearing through the school readings as though you’re driving on the autobahn is the antithesis of a CM education (by this, we mean, it’s not good. Don’t).

 There is a 13th week for exams. Don’t worry about exams yet. We do not recommend teaching to the test anyway, and we also offer exam helps on the website and forum, so we’ll be there when you get to exam week and need us.

 What year do you need? I don't know.  I always let somebody else answer this question.  Ahem.  Think about your child’s reading level, habits, and experiences. If you are taking a child out of public school, you might choose the year that matches the grade he just finished. If you have a five year old, you probably want year 0. If you have a six or seven year old and are just beginning your CM journey, you probably want year one.  But since this is also a question that often comes up on the forums and you can find more specific help by asking about placement there- people with children the same ages as yours can share what they’ve been doing, I'm not going to spend more time on this question here.

 Are you crazy?  These books are too hard!  The reading will appear quite difficult at first if you are not used to AO or Charlotte Mason’s approach. If you find that a year is too hard or too easy for your child, you can switch after you start- that’s the wonderful thing about a free curriculum. (Even if you find you bought books that you don’t need after all, you should be able to resell them in the buy/sell area of our forum).  But give it a chance. Respect the minds of your children (and your own mind as well!).  I bet all of you can do more than you think you can.

 Walking step by step through one curriculum year on the website: But you don’t have to have a year chosen to go through this outline of website helps.  Let's just pick any year- there will be some differences from year to year, but the general outline is mostly the same, so for now, go to our curriculum pages and click on AmblesideOnline Curriculum (click any pictures to enlarge):






 and look for the years in the left sidebar: http://amblesideonline.org/curriculum.shtml

Let’s pick year 4 as an example. Click on a year, and you'll see something similar to this (click to enlarge):

1. Every year has a quote at the top of the page, one we chose from Miss Mason’s writings which we thought was a good fit for that year.

 2. Next you’ll find a paragraph with short overview (not intended to be complete, just to give you a sense of direction for the year).

3. The most confusing part is perhaps a choice you'll need to make, so let's ignore that for a moment and come back to it.

4. There is also a grid which gives a picture view of the year. It’s basically just a visual overview of what you read in the paragraph of description.  Like that paragraph description, it's not intended to be a thorough picture.  We wanted to give you just enough information to give you a sense of direction for the year.

We offer both, because some people would prefer to read text, some want a look at a glance. Some find both distracting (see me, sheepishly raising my hand), and just want to get on with it, so let’s look at your choices.

We'll come back to the 36 week schedule later.  But DO Note: this is merely an overview.  It's not exhaustive, it's not a replacement for the actual booklist.  We also have a gridded schedule available with the schedules, and it is not enough to print that out alone.  YOU NEED TO CLICK THROUGH and LOOK AT THE BOOKLIST.  In fact, I find myself referring back to the booklist frequently.

basic vs detailed: We offer two options called basic, and detailed. The main difference is that in the detailed version we sometimes offer alternatives- more choices to make! There might be more than one biography to choose from for instance, or two or three options for church history, or several options to choose from for geography.

 In the basic version, we simplified things for you by removing all options.  We just give a straight list with no substitutions or varied selections (again, this was just to simplify things- you are always free to make substitutions, of course). You would choose the basic if you don’t want to make choices, if you are in a hurry, if you feel you are not really familiar enough with Miss Mason and her principles to make informed choices, if you live somewhere and some way that your options and time to process this information are limited anyway.

 Some years, especially the younger years, there are almost no differences because we didn’t offer that many options anyway- there weren’t many good ones, or it was obvious that the best of the best was simply the only option (Island Story for year 1 history, for instance).

The Booklist:  So pick one, detailed list with several options and choices to make for many of the books, or the basic ‘this is what you do, no alternative choices listed’ and click through:

Time Period: Every year except year 12 covers a specific period of history (with occasional side-trips, romps through events or biographies in other areas to keep things interesting, or because a theme matches even if the year does not). We list the main era covered at the top of the page for that year.

Asterisks = terms:  Every year is divided into 3 terms, and we break it down further and tell you what period of time each term will cover as well.  If you scroll down through the booklist you'll see asterisks in front of titles.  We denote the terms through the simple method of asterisks. One asterisk, *, means that item will be used in term one, two- **- means term two, and so forth.

Table of contents for each year: Before you get to the actual curriculum, we have a short table of contents for each curriculum year page. You can think of it as another brief overview.

 If this is your first time, you can skip that. All the material is on this page, and you can scroll down to look at it. This linkable, clickable toc will be immensely helpful to you later, when you want to look back at a particular subject for a given year to check your progress, or make sure you got the title correct, or see if you scheduled it properly- instead of skimming through the whole page, you can quickly skim a list of a dozen or so words, find the subject and click on it. For now, don’t bother with it.

Cunningly devised key to (mostly) free stuff: Next is a key, a table of symbols which will at first look confusing and overwhelming, but don’t skip it.

 This will help you find the books you want for the best price (or free!).
When we give the title to a book, we also share where you can find it. Whenever possible, we share free sources, because that is part of our mission- making this as cost friendly as possible, and something missionary families with weight limits overseas can use, as well as families who have just been through a devastating flood, a job loss, or some other life drama. If we were to list out all the sources for each book, it would make the pages longer, more visually overwhelming, and printing them out would be a real bear. So instead, we have a cunningly devised list of symbols (See above.  Isn't it cunning?)

 Our actual book titles in the curriculum lists are always hyperlinked to Project Gutenberg (our first choice) or other FREE online text if no Project Gutenberg text is available- provided a free online version is available. If we don’t know of a free online source, the book title will not be hyperlinked. When we find a new source of free online titles, we add it.

 So take a moment to look over that key and get an idea of what it means. For example, when you see a title followed by the symbol β , that is a clickable hyperlink to manybooks.net, another free ebook site. Whenever you see a ‘Δ’ following a title, that is a clickable hyperlink which will take you directly to a free etext version of that title at archive.org. When you see this symbol, ☊, (doesn’t it look like little headphones?), that takes you to a free audiobook at Lit2Go, and so forth.

 About our Amazon links: When you see a capital K following a booktitle, that is a clickable hyperlink which will take you to a free Kindle text from amazon.com. ($) will take you to a hard-copy book purchase from amazon.com, and the K in parentheses (K), is *not* free- it is a clickable link which will take you to (K) a Kindle purchase from amazon.com. For about the last three years, the Amazon links have been affiliate links, and this is how we cover expenses such as the website, research materials, and related costs. I say they are affiliate links, but of course, Amazon does not pay us for free books. That’s not a criticism, just a clarification. We do get an affiliate percentage if you click through to Amazon through one of our links and then also buy something else there on that visit. We appreciate it, but do not require it- we are a ministry first, and not a business at all, or we’d have more than Amazon links, and we’d have had them for far more than the 3 of our 17 years or so of existence.

 This is for Amazon.com, not Amazon.CA or Amazon.UK. We don’t have affiliate status there.   If you want an easier- just-fill-your -shopping-cart without worrying about finding the cheapest version option, we also have an amazon A-store- it's here on our blog, over on the right side.  You know best what best meets your needs.

 So the key tells you some of the places we know of where you can find free versions of the books, and it links to Amazon, and sometimes Christian Book Distributors.  This key, confusing as it may appear upon first light perusal, is your friend, and it will help save you boatloads of money.

Daily and weekly subjects:  Next on the page is a list of subjects under daily and weekly.  At the moment, it looks like this, although we are in the process of streamlining it and making some things more clear:

  The reason for this list is that there are some necessary subjects in a CM education that do not rely on a specific title in our book list, but are still an integral part of a CM education.

 For year 4, we have these things- and if you don't know what any of them mean,   you can search the website (go to our ‘articles’ section), search Miss Mason’s volumes, or ask at the forum:

 Daily:
Penmanship or Copywork (also called transcription in Miss Mason’s books)- there is a right way to do this and a wrong way.

 Math- you choose your own curriculum, but we do offer suggestions on the website.
Foreign language- your choice, but we do offer suggestions on the website.
Latin (I consider this optional, but you should know Charlotte Mason didn't and neither does Auxiliary member Brandy, and both of them are smarter than I)
Musical Instrument Practice- your choice.

Recitation (or memorization) practice should be here, and will be soon. Its absence in year 4 is really just an oversight. It is included in the other years.

Weekly:
Art Appreciation (this is picture study)
Art- this refers to skills such as painting and drawing.  You don't want to omit it even if you think nobody in your family can draw.
Grammar (there's a hint or two as well on what to do for grammar in those years where grammar is taught as a separate topic)
Correspond history readings with a timeline or century book [tl] and map- there are different ways to do this, most families I think just do this one day a week for a few minutes, others may do it every time they read.

Handicrafts-this is meaningful craft work such as sewing, weaving, carving, leatherwork, crochet, carpentry, and so forth. If I can, I prefer implementing this several times a week.
 Music Appreciation, including folksongs and hymns- in my family, singing was a daily activity, not weekly.
Nature Study 
One Life from Plutarch per term (we help you schedule these out over the term)
A Shakespeare play each term (same as above)

You can learn more about these later- right now, just note that you will need to include them in your schedule, although Plutarch and Shakespeare are scheduled for you if you wish to use our optional 36 week schedule.

Finally- the BOOKS!:
 Now we come to the topics where specific books are required. This is what year four has first:

"Bible: This site has many versions. [1]"

 We have here a link to versions of online Bibles, and a footnote to our site.

Important note about our footnotes:  We used footnotes to make the booklists easier to print and less visually cluttered, but some people are used to skipping footnotes.  This is not a good idea for our website.  They really are not the sort of footnotes that you should skip as though they were just extra, unnecessary information only of interest to geeks and nerds (and we love geeks and nerds). Our footnotes are really expansion, additional information you probably need.
For instance, this footnote takes you to this text:

” It is preferable for a child to become accustomed to the language and flow of the King James Version of the Bible, as a familiarity with King James English will make other literature more accessible. Please read Lynn Bruce's article on the King James Version by clicking here. The weekly schedule lists readings taken from J. Paterson Smyth's commentaries, with Old Testament readings focusing on Joshua and the Judges, and New Testament in Mark and the beginning of Acts. (see AO's Bible plan) Charlotte Mason taught both with commentaries, reading the Bible passage first, then narration, then reading the commentary, but Smyth's commentaries may reflect the doctrine of his era and denomination; they are not necessary to follow the Bible schedule. Optional Bible Resources: Timeline; Study questions with maps.” 

You see, if you skip the footnote, you’ve missed what version we officially recommend and why, you’ve missed that we do offer a scheduled reading plan, and you’ve missed the additional optional mapwork for Bible. Our footnotes are important.

Next in year 4 we have:
History: 1700's up to the French and American Revolutions

This Country of Ours, by H.E. Marshall β Δ ($ K) Ω [2]
** *** George Washington's World, by Genevieve Foster ($) [5]

This is from the ‘basic’ version. Had we chosen the detailed version, it would have looked like this:
 This Country of Ours, by H.E. Marshall β Δ ($ K) Ω [2]
** *** George Washington's World, by Genevieve Foster ($) [5] OR The Story of Mankind, by Hendrick Van Loon ($ K) β Δ Ω [3]

Optional: A Child's History of the World, by Virgil Hillyer; An Island Story, by H. E. Marshall β Δ Ω [4]

And then:
History Tales and/or Biography
* Poor Richard, by James Daugherty ($) [6a]
** *** Abigail Adams: Witness to a Revolution, by Natalie S. Bober ($ K) [7]
Optional:: Trial and Triumph, by Richard Hannula ($ K) [6]

Remember the asterisks denote terms- so Poor Richard is for term one. It is not in the public domain, so the title is not hyperlinked. When you have to buy a text, we only list two places- Amazon or the Christian Books Catalog. We use those because they are readily accessible to all, and we have affiliate links there, but you are free of course to buy a copy anywhere you like, or to check it out from the library or borrow it from a friend. The footnote to this book answers a common question we get about it- the way it ends makes some readers think their book is missing a page. We used the footnotes to  explain why it isn’t missing a page.

Abigail Adams is a book we use in two terms, the second and third (see the asterisks). It’s available for purchase from Amazon in Kindle or hardcopy ($ K). In this case (and for the next book), the footnote explains some caveats or concerns some parents might have, and directs readers to a helpful discussion of those caveats in the forum.

 Whenever the footnote is red, that takes you to an explanation of something we believe some parents would want a heads up about so they can discuss it, or even omit it, as they choose.  We are not your Holy Spirit, and we can't, of course, foresee everything parents will find objectionable.  We also don't see that such warnings are as important as the students get into the upper years.  It's meant as an aid, not a substitute for the parent.

So you finally have all your books.  What are you supposed to do with these books?   How do you use them?

Prepare the Lesson when you can.  See this Parents' Review for some ideas.  Always be sure to link what they are about to read with what they already read- this can be as simple as saying "Where were we?" and letting the child tell you, or reading the last paragraph of the previous reading. Preparation shouldn't take more than a few minutes.

Start Reading. Have your child read them if possible, and you read aloud if the child can't read them yet.  You do this in small increments over time- the more you quit while the child is hungering to finish the story, the more time he will spend thinking about it, dwelling on it, reviewing it, analysing it- without any extra effort on your part, and that's performing his own review and evaluation and assessment!  It's fantastic when this happens, and we don't want to stymie the process by reading larger chunks of material just because the child begs us to keep reading.  I know it's hard.  Be strong.

Immediately after the reading, the child narrates.  That's basically it, although there are many expanded tips and suggestions for parents in the forum and on the website.  None of them will involve creating cut and paste projects, turning the reading into a math problem, making a six foot model of a drawbridge from a mattress box, or studying goat husbandry just because you read Robinson Crusoe.  Charlotte Mason is not a unit study curriculum, and for good reason.

 Now, you can schedule out the readings yourself (divide the number of pages by 12, that's about how much to read in a week, then sort it out by day as best it works for you), or take advantage of our 36 week schedules diligently created by the rock of AO, Leslie Noelani Laurio (Jesus is The ROCK of AO, Leslie is the lower-case-r-rock), it’s up to you.  You will have the best results by using the curriculum as intended, and that means however you choose to schedule them, you schedule the books out so the children are not reading huge chunks of text at one time. Spread the readings out.

 The children should narrate after every reading. If that is sometimes not possible, they should at the very least never know that they will not be narrating until after the reading. The narration is where the children process the material they’ve read, think about it, sift it, analyze it, organize it. It’s not really a negotiable part of a CM education. One of Miss Mason’s students actually explained it by saying “We narrate, and then we know.” They will not truly know the material they do not narrate.  They will also retain far more material and think of it more carefully through narrating than through any other 'project.'  There are ways to vary the narrations and use some creativity with them, even make them hands on.  It’s enough to know at the beginning that narration is basically telling back, but you should take further time to read about it as you are able. You might start here. http://archipelago7.blogspot.com/2015/03/narration-helps.html

Some other odds and ends: 
Copywork, once the child has mastered handwriting or letter formation, is taken from the books he's reading (not his own writings), and is an integral part of the language arts curriculum.

nature study: This is science.  It's about the child observing and drawing conclusions for himself, from real life.  It's foundational for future science. It will help children develop their attention skills, and it will help them appreciate the world their Creator made, and thus, the Creator as well.

Drawing- this, too, will help children learn to observe and really *see*, even if they don't seem to be actually drawing well.  It will also be useful for science later.

For more about the folk songs, picture study, poetry, composer study, hymns, and so forth, look at the left side bar and click on those topics.

Additional helps: You will find much more specific help and can get answers to additional questions in our forums.  We know that many people are intimidated by the forum, so Auxiliary member Naomi has made a couple videos to walk you through it:
the direct links are
http://youtu.be/KKAxd6ekloE
and
http://youtu.be/7gm5fVg9M-0

I hope this helps.  Should you have any other questions, or other areas of the website you'd like explained, feel free to ask here or on the forum.  We wish you the very best for your upcoming school year!

P.S. You might find the masterbooklist helpful: On the main curriculum page, scroll down to the bottom, or visit here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nPPei_V-x1tKURTQ6InmFSmFXuRNH3t91B_1ZYtlPgE/edit#gid=1434456495
There is a a separate tab with all the extra, optional Geography selections for high school. (special thanks to Kathy Livingston)

Be sure to read the notes on each book on the AO Geography page (http://amblesideonline.org/GeographyOptions.shtml) since many of the books need parental previewing.

From the Parents' Review: How to Prepare and Present a Lesson

A hidden gem on the Parents' Review page: the article "A Rational Lesson"  by S. De Brath, from Volume 8, 1897, pgs. 119-125.

Here's a sample:

The stages by which the former kind of idea [general truths able to be described in language] is reached are very easy to follow. 

First comes the direction of attention to the matter in hand; then that careful note of successive sense impressions which is called Observation; then the separation by the mind of what is distinct in these different percepts from what is common to them all; and lastly, the expression of this in correct language.

These four stages have been called Attention, Observation, Generalization, and Formulation.... The lesson should move this process as a key moves a lock. Sound teaching, which habituates the mind to move logically, must be adapted to it, and the corresponding stages of each lesson are: Preparation, recalling the old, and directing the attention towards the new; Presentation of the new matter, to all the senses as far as possible; Association of the particulars and that which is essential in each; and Formulation, the expressing of the result attained in good plain English.

The really valuable part of this article is that, using several different school subjects, S. De Brath takes us through each of the four stages in detail. How does all this apply to a geography lesson, a literature lesson? If you want Charlotte Mason nuts and bolts, this is it.

Beginning Charlotte Mason's Methods with Older Students

by Karen Glass

Your children didn't start narration at age six? They haven't been keeping a Book of Centuries since they were ten? They've never made a single entry in a nature notebook? It must be too late to start a Charlotte Mason education now...right?

Wrong.

It is not too late, not even a little bit too late, and in spite of the fact that I did begin using CM's methods earlier with my own children, I feel quite confident in saying that it's not too late to begin now, even if your child is starting high school, because Charlotte Mason didn't think it was too late.

Children are born persons, right? Well, they are still persons when they start high school, and all of the things Charlotte Mason said were true of little children--that they have a living mind which is hungry for knowledge--are still true if your child is fourteen. If they've been educated with meager or non-existent portions of living ideas, they might even be starving. I don't think we'd tell a hungry famine victim that just because they aren't used to good food, it's too late to eat a healthy diet now. It would be just as silly to make our older children subsist mentally on starvation rations when a feast of living ideas is available.

If you are in this situation, and want to begin using Charlotte Mason's methods with your older children, I recommend spending a little time reading what Charlotte Mason herself thought was possible for 14 to 18-year-olds who could only attend school for eight hours per week ("Continuation Schools" allowed that much time for education for wage-earning young people when the Fisher Act was passed in England in 1915.) Without any consideration for what type of schooling they might have had previously, she is confident that they can begin narration (which is a very natural human activity), read and understand meaty books, and get through a generous amount of liberal education in the time allotted for them. It would be encouraging to read though the chapter "The Scope of Continuation Schools "(originally published as a stand-alone pamphlet) from A Philosophy of Education.

Charlotte Mason thought they could accomplish much in that amount of time. She didn't worry about Latin--or even math (assuming they already had basic math, probably, and would continue to hone those skills)--but she was concerned to offer them all the riches of an education in the humanities. She gave them credit for having a natural hunger for knowledge, and she concludes with confidence:

We can give to the people the thought of the best minds and we can secure on their part the conscious intellectual effort, the act of knowing, which bears fruit in capability, character, and conduct. (Vol. 6, p. 298)

The desire for that fruit is probably what motivates a homeschooling parent to change gears and pursue a Charlotte Mason education with their older children, and we have much more than eight hours per week in which to accomplish it, which should allow time for the necessary modern extras and requirements as well.
The first question most parents coming to AmblesideOnline will ask is "what year should I start with?" The answer to that question is going to be a little different for each individual. Any of the years from 7 and above are appropriate for high school students, and where you begin will probably reflect, in part, what history your children have already covered. You'll also want to consider how many years of homeschooling you have left. Specific questions about where to start in your situation can be asked and will always be answered on the AmblesideOnline forum.

 One of the most overwhelming new things is the process of oral-to-written narration that makes up the bulk of "composition" or "writing." This may feel daunting, and your children may not be used to narration, but an older student can adapt quickly, and within the course of one semester, reach a similar degree of fluency in narration which younger children might take five or six years to achieve. Consistency is the key. Your children already know how to narrate--they have probably narrated the plot of their favorite books, movies, and television programs to you or to their friends, or described in detail a dramatic occasion during a camping trip or sport event. They know how to narrate, but what they have to learn to do is give enough attention to their school work to be able to bring that power to bear. I've broken down the process into what I believe is a very manageable approach for students who still have about four years of homeschool left.

First semester: Begin oral narration immediately, and after a few weeks of oral narration, begin asking for written narrations. I'd start with 2 per week, and add another every week or two until they are doing written narration 4-5 days every week. There is no need to ask for any special form, and no need for correction at this stage, although it would be fair to insist on proper capitalization and punctuation for this age. Just ask for written narrations, so that your child can grow fluent in getting his thoughts down on paper (or let him type if that works better).

Second semester: Keep it up, unflaggingly. Remember, consistency. Until you see it happen, you have no idea how powerful and formative a year of daily oral and written narration, based upon excellent books, will be in the life of a young person.

Third semester: After a full year of informal written narration, begin the next year where you left off (4-5 written narrations per week). If your child is a bit bored of just "telling back," that's perfect. They are ready for more. Begin asking for more focused or creative narrations once per week (or even every other week at first). The list of possibilities is endless, so choose the ones that will capture the interest and imagination of your child: a dialogue between a fictional character and a historical one on a topic at hand...a character sketch...a letter to the editor about a historical situation (war, election, slavery, etc...) as if it were a current event...a first-person diary account as if written by the main character in a book, etc, etc. Give them some scope to stretch their creative wings, and don't worry them about corrections just yet. You'll be teaching grammar and (hopefully) doing dictation at other times, and those activities are sharpening the skills that will make their writing better as you continue.

Fourth semester: This is a good time to introduce a book about writing or style. Strunk and White's Elements of Style and William Zinsser's On Writing Well are my choices, and are both recommended in the AO curriculum. You might ask for a longer writing project this semester that will require a couple of weeks' work. It's also a good time to introduce the idea of refining a "rough draft." (All of their written narrations are rough drafts.) Choose one paper or narration per week, read it aloud sentence by sentence, and talk about ways to improve each one. If there are grammar/punctuation issues, you can begin the process of learning how to find/fix those errors. Ideally, your child should be able to write 300-500 word narrations very easily at this point in the process. (If they aren't typing yet, get them started.)

The last two years: With two years of copious, and mostly informal writing under their belts, most children will be ready to begin formal instruction. Difficult as it is for us to realize today, Charlotte Mason didn't recommend formal writing instruction until the last few years of school, even for those who had been been following her methods from the beginning. Narration is a natural process of building composition skills. Trust that process. Now you can pick a writing program and begin shaping your narrations into standard forms. You'll still have two good years left to work on it--and it is enough. I have done it exactly as I have described here. Children who are fluent in writing narrations don't need more than two years to learn how to produce standard types of writing such as comparison/contrast or cause/effect papers.

In twenty years of online community with fellow Charlotte-Mason homeschoolers, I have seen the same story played out over and over again. Charlotte Mason has so much to offer us as parent/teachers, that our lives have been enriched and changed for the better. Of course it's not too late for our high schoolers. We just need to have the same confidence in them that Charlotte Mason had--confidence enough to follow her principles and lay out the feast for them.

Plutarch: North gets to the gut

by Anne White

In working on the revised study notes for Plutarch's Life of Philopoemen, I came across a funny example of why North's translation is sometimes easier to understand than Dryden's. Imagine this scene: Philopoemen is in the midst of a battle, and someone shoots a javelin through his leg. He is not so much reeling in pain as annoyed by the fact that he can't fight, because things are just getting interesting.

Dryden says that " he was transported with the desire of partaking in [the battle]." 

North says "it spited him to the guts."

What Is Twaddle?

Whenever two or more Charlotte Mason parents get together, especially those who are newer to the approach, there is sure to be some discussion of twaddle, and what it is, and more keenly, what it is not.  None of us wants to admit that the books we adored in our own childhood might just be twaddle, and we don't appreciate the kill-joys who try to tell us otherwise.

Often there is skepticism as well about just how much it matters, and did Miss Mason really understand what she was talking about, anyway?   You may enjoy this letter to the Parents' Review schools written in 1967 by a former skeptic much like many of us.  Here's an excerpt:

Although a trained teacher, I knew nothing of Charlotte Mason's methods. I ordered 'Home and School Education' and read it with interest; but I must confess to some scepticism.

'Children have no natural appetite for twaddle,' she had written in the chapter on Aspects of Intellectual Training.

'Huh!' thought I. 'Haven't they though?'

I underlined that sweeping statement; and in my mind I classified it along with a few odd ones I had heard at college'Children are not naughty,' and the rest. Experience had fast taught me that children are downright wicked unless they are kept so busy and interested that they have no time to think up any fresh devilment.

I cannot possibly describe my bewildered, fascinated disbelief when the first batch of books arrived. Of them all, 'Plutarch's Lives' hit me hardest. Those long, measured periods in difficult language! Alison, at eleven, would not understand a word! How on earth was Robin going to assimilate 'Mankind in the Making' and 'The Spangled Heavens'? What was Charles going to make of 'Pilgrim's Progress'?

By the time I had been through them all I was in a whirl of doubt. However, I was prepared to give the programmes and the method a try. I threw my notions about 'giving lovely lessons' out of the window the more readily because I was aware that I simply could not give a lesson, lovely or otherwise, on the origin of the Solar System! We bashedand that is the only verb that describes our progress in those early days through the text-books, got the gist of them by determined attention, and miraculously found ourselves enjoying every minute. Narrations were wobbly affairs, half inarticulate, half incorporating remembered phrases from the reading. Parsing and Analysis they found absorbing and rewarding. French and Latin were fun. After all, languages were words, weren't they? A sudden word-hunger seemed to grip them all; and a new world had opened up. When, at morning prayers, they sang:

'Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning! Praise for them springing Fresh from the Word!'

Their eyes shone. They were not thanking God as a dutiful routine, but joyfully.

They have retained their sense of delight and wonder.

Those of us who plead for the reduction, or better, eliminationm of twaddle from your family's literary diet do so not because we are kill-joys, but because there is a deep, abiding richness to the quality of joy, delight, and wonder which comes from living books (and the rest of CM's methods), which is precisely what twaddle cannot truly give. 

But what are we to do, when we have not all grown up with living books?  How does one learn to develop a taste for real books when we have grown up on cotton candy and pizza?

The first step is in recognizing that not all reading is equal anymore than all foods are equal. It is not true that it doesn't matter what they read, so long as they are reading. This notion is a sort of a buzzword of our non-reading generation, but it really cannot stand up under scrutiny.  Is it really just fine if a human soul spends an entire lifetime reading only about wimpy kids and heroes in underpants?   It does matter, or we might as well merely all read cereal boxes and Disney picture books and nothing else (shudder.  Disney picture books are truly among the worst).

Let's conduct a little thought experiment.  Let us imagine  two groups of children.  The children in each group have access to only two books for their first 8 years of life.  Group A may have the 800 page 'Disney Princess Comics Treasury' and nothing else (no link, because, ugh). Group B will have only a complete collection of Hans Christian Anderson's original tales, perhaps this one: The Complete Fairy Tales and Stories, which is even unillustrated.  Or we could substitute Aesop's, or Grimm's, or Jacob's, or even Pilgrim's Progress, so long as it a recognized work of literary value, a book everybody agrees is a living book.  Each group will be read to from the assigned book and only the assigned book at least fifteen minutes a day, and in every other area will be treated precisely the same.  Will there be absolutely no discernable difference between the language skills, the ideas and thoughts and imaginings of a child who has never read anything but Disney?   The mind feeds on ideas, and twaddle is not sustaining.  So please, let us dispense with the false notion that it doesn't matter what they read so long as they are reading.

 The next step is a little harder- how do we learn to detect twaddle?

I have two excerpts to share which help us in defining living books vs twaddle.  This is from a Parents Review article by Charlotte Mason:

What manner of book will find its way with upheaving effect into the mind of an intelligent boy or girl? We need not ask what the girl or boy likes. She very often likes the twaddle of goody-goody story-books, he likes condiments, highly-spiced tales of adventure. We are all capable of liking mental food of a poor quality and a titillating nature, and no doubt, such food is good for us when our minds are in need of an elbow-chair; but our spiritual life is sustained on other stuff, whether we be boys or girls, men or women. 

  This is from volume 6 of her six volume set (Toward a Philosophy of Education):  

"I do not know better how to describe the sort of books that children's minds will consent to deal with than by saying that they must be literary in character. A child of seven or eight will narrate a difficult passage from The Pilgrim's Progress, say, with extraordinary zest and insight; but I doubt if he or his elders would retain anything from that excellent work, Dr. Smiles's Self-Help! The completeness with which hundreds of children reject the wrong book is a curious and instructive experience, not less so than the avidity and joy with which they drain the right book to the dregs; children's requirements in the matter seem to be quantity, quality and variety: but the question of books is one of much delicacy and difficulty. After the experience of over a quarter of a century [The P.U.S. was started in 1891.] in selecting the lesson books proper to children of all ages, we still make mistakes, and the next examination paper discovers the error! Children cannot answer questions set on the wrong book; and the difficulty of selection is increased by the fact that what they like in books is no more a guide than what they like in food."

Volume 6, page 248


 *Whether or not somebody enjoys a book is no guide to determining whether or not it is twaddle.

 **Pilgrim's Progress is not twaddle, Dr. Smiles 'Self-Help' is.  The diligent mother may use this comparison to good effect by clicking through the above link and comparing them.  'Self-Help' reminds me very much of a couple of popular books and lessons that are generally marketed as 'Character Education,' or 'Character Studies.'

 **** The opposite of twaddle includes books that are "Literary in character"- this is a bit harder for many of us to define.  

This quote from  another  Parent's Review Article may help:
Another foe to simplicity in our era is the multitude of books about books. Personally I have almost a horror of this class of belles-lettres.   We don't want elucidations, we want the classics themselves. Many people read notes and criticisms and commentaries and preliminaries and antecedents and never reach the original. It is as though a person bent on seeing Westminster Abbey were to stay listening to a tittle-tattle of the verger instead of seeing Westminster Abbey. Another evil of the time from which we should abstain is the plague of cheap editions. This reaches an acute crisis when it consists of a cheap edition of detached fragments of world's literature.


I'm going to name some names here, although I realize that there is a danger of touching on somebody's favorite and thereby offending.  The Junior Classic books, Childcraft, and the like, beyond the first couple of volumes (because the first one or two volumes are usually nursery rhymes, fables, and fairy tales which do stand alone), are 'detached fragments of world's literature.' Bill Bennet's Book of Virtues is also, to me, more like the tittle-tattle of the verger- the stories he chooses are good stories, but he introduces them with tittle-tattle, and sometimes rewrites them himself, and it is my opinion is that the result is rather flat and lacks the charm of the originals.

Twaddle does not respect the mind of the child, but trivializes it:

"the Bible has this, among other marks of a classic, that its language has the power of attracting young minds," and it is deeply to be regretted, we think, that children should lose the delight of Bible stories as they are told in the Bible--should be given instead the reading-made-easy twaddle of some little book of Bible stories. Not even a Bible story told by "mother" herself will have for a child the rhythmic charm and pictorial power of the stories in Bible words.  (from the Parents' Review, review of a Bible for children which used the Revised Version and was edited by omission, leaving out stories such as the one of Lot and his daughters).

We no longer really understand what 'literary in character' means, and often confuse flowery, Victorian prosiness with 'literary.'  So how do we get better at it? From a Parents' Review Article (I strongly suggest reading all of this one): 

The literary mind is indeed rare. For a hundred who will read a book for what it has to tell or for amusement, only one perhaps will read it also for its literary value. The appreciation of good literature, for all our schools and universities, remains the possession only of a few.
Yet, just as the average person can be trained to appreciate good music and art, he can also be trained to appreciate good literature. And it is in the nursery that the key to the palace of good literature is opened. The reason why so few people have developed the critical faculty with regard to reading is that so few have grown up in the company of good books--only good books--but have been allowed, while their minds were growing, to read any printed twaddle within the covers of a book or magazine.

In the world of nutrition, many people these days have been trying the 'real food' approach, eating only whole foods without additives they don't recognize and can't pronounce. One of the interesting results those who try it discover is a new appreciation for the flavor of basic, unprocessed foods prepared simply.  Another result (I admit one I found a little depressing) is that many of the over-processed foods one previously ate no longer taste good.  One breaks one's strict diet regimen for a special treat only to discover it's no treat at all, but rather a slightly nasty,  over-sweetened bit of glop with a metallic after-taste. 

So, what is the application if we wish to distinguish Living Books from Twaddle?  

1.  I suggest that in order to strengthen one's ability to detect twaddle, to distinguish true works of literary value from over-processed, over-sweetened, bits of glop, try your own 30 days of daily reading of real literature- books that pretty much everybody agrees are living books, and no twaddle at all. For an easy list, try the books from AO's year 1-3.  
2. I suggest further that one limit one's electronic screen time, including Kindles and other electronic reading devices (hear me out- I love mine.  I just suggest a temporary fast), and definitely limit computer time as well (yes, even here), and social media.  Just spend time with the classics.  Even if you're only reading really good selections in picture books and children's fiction, I venture to suggest that at the end of the month you will have developed a taste for quality, as well as improved your ability to distinguish quality. 

In other words, off with the twaddle, in with the classics.  Try this out for at least 30 days and see if you don't find yourself appreciating the living books more and detecting the twaddle more easily at the end.

That sounds like a lot of effort though, and everybody has always told us we're good readers, right?  So why should we bother?

From volume 2:

"In literature, we have definite ends in view, both for our own children and for the world through them. We wish the children to grow up to find joy and refreshment in the taste, the flavour of a book. "We do not mean by a book any printed matter in a binding, but a work possessing certain literary qualities able to bring that sensible delight to the reader which belongs to a literary word fitly spoken. It is a sad fact that we are losing our joy in literary form. We are in such haste to be instructed by facts or titillated by theories, that we have no leisure to linger over the mere putting of a thought. But this is our error, for words are mighty both to delight and to inspire... "Children must be Nurtured on the Best––For the children? They must grow up upon the best. There must never be a period in their lives when they are allowed to read or listen to twaddle or reading-made-easy. There is never a time when they are unequal to worthy thoughts, well put; inspiring tales, well told. Let Blake's 'Songs of Innocence' represent their standard in poetry; De Foe and Stevenson, in prose; and we shall train a race of readers who will demand literature––that is, the fit and beautiful expression of inspiring ideas and pictures of life..." 

 We want to reduce the twaddle in our lives, in our children's lives, because we want something greater for them and for ourselves. We want 'the fit and beautiful expression of inspiriting ideas.  We want something living, sustaining, a new world, with an even greater sense of joy and wonder.

 'Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning! Praise for them springing Fresh from the Word!'