Make or Break College Preparedness Skills: Subject Mastery

By Amy Barr, Sage Thinkiac at The Lukeion Project

Subject mastery isn’t usually something people think about during middle and high school years. At least for many, a modern high school education is nothing more than a mad dash to complete a list of class hours served before we hurry off to complete the next list of hours to serve. Does everyone need the same semester of time to learn algebra or biology or French? There’s nothing magical about a semester on one subject, or a week of classes, or an hour of lecture. Some students can master the material in a fraction of the time, others need triple with a dollop of review mixed in daily. If a certain subject is poorly presented—for any variety of reasons—all the time in the world won’t help bored students. 

Instead of the time-served approach (exactly like a prison sentence ) what if we return to a subject mastery approach. To do so, students need a few basic learn-how-to-learn skills that have fallen out of favor. Memorization, for example, has been tossed out in favor of “subject tools.” Mainstream educators argue that students simply need to know how and where to access the information they need to complete their work. In the modern world, they argue, it isn’t necessary to memorize the periodic table, the anatomy of a cell, or Latin verb forms when one can just look online. Imagine giving a baby a dictionary rather than expecting him to form new words for himself. Requiring a child to swim laps before she can kick-and-paddle is a cruel recipe for disaster. Telling a student to rely on “subject tools” year after year is equally cruel. 

But, one might argue, if a child isn’t going to become a biologist, Latin teacher, or physicist, does she really need a storehouse of memorized data to make progress in science, language, and math? Children will never one day become any of these things without memorization, and we wouldn’t want them to. Consider the difference between a memorized speech and one read from a teleprompter. An actor reading lines from cue cards can’t compare with one who memorized his lines. Your heart surgeon shouldn’t be searching subject tools while you are under her knife. A concert pianist never performs with sheet music. Your physical therapist should already know how to improve your poor swollen knee without a fast web search. 

Memorization is essential, normal, and not all that difficult once you get the hang of it. There are dozens of techniques for subject mastery that will help anyone do it well at any age. Here are just five methods that will work for anyone mastering anything.      

Write it out 

Qui scribit bis legit, “He who writes learns twice.”

The act of writing helps us remember. You can master a lot of information very quickly just by writing it out a couple of times. Take notes while listening or reading to cut study time down considerably. A student activates all mental muscles when pen is put to paper. Sight, sound, higher reasoning, analysis, and coordination all work together to help the student remember the material. Transcription is still an excellent way to teach spelling to younger students for this reason. Some teens lament they hate taking notes, but I know firsthand how information retention improves just by helping them build this skill.  

When it comes to note-taking, the magic only happens when pen or pencil hits paper. I don’t care if your handwriting is messy. Taking notes is the real secret. No one cares how they look.

Involve all your senses

"All our knowledge begins with the senses, proceeds then to the understanding, and ends with reason. There is nothing higher than reason." –Immanuel Kant

Good note taking habits make mastery easy because multiple senses are put to work. All effective study techniques involve more than one sense. When I ask a young student to “study” for an exam, he’ll likely flip open his book and stare at the words, hoping they will soak in. This is an exercise in futility. Teach  your young ones how to study actively. Tell them to try a variety of approaches including reading it aloud, writing it, drawing it, dancing it, singing it. Flash cards are still a powerful tool simply because they involve more than once sense. If done well, flash cards are portable, cheap, and used by subject masters worldwide. 

Teach it 

Homines, dum docent, discunt, “People learn while they teach.” (Seneca)

When I was in graduate school two of my fellow students had been teaching high school Latin for years. Though they were proficient in Latin when they started their teaching career, they had become excellent at it while teaching it at the high school level. The rest of us trailed behind by comparison. This principal applies to every subject and is one of the best perks of home education, especially at the high school level. We adults get to relearn all sorts of forgotten tidbits as we teach them to our children. When a big sibling instructs a little brother one of his favorite subjects, he has the chance to become exceptional at that subject. The practice of carefully explaining and illustrating anything makes one more proficient at it which is why assigning presentations is a good idea. Parent educators with large families shouldn’t feel bad about employing older siblings to educate younger ones within reason. They will gain as much as they give. If you have an only child, just ask her to teach the material to you or a friend.

Mix it up

"It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings." –Wendell Berry

Even the best study method can grow stale if used in isolation. Try a variety of study techniques so that mastery will come quickly and painlessly. Everyone has a slightly different learning style. Chanting something might work well for one person but utterly fail for others. Try out games, flash cards, study partners, diagrams, silly rhymes, funny songs, chalk drawings on the sidewalk, play acting on videos, and even audio recordings: Be creative. 

Do a little every day 

Assiduus usus uni rei deditus et ingenium et artem saepe vincit, “Constant practice devoted to one subject often outdoes both intelligence and skill.” (Cicero)

The battle for mastery over a subject is not won in a single night. How many of us can recount times when we pulled all-nighters in college? If only I could get back all that sleep I lost on geology and Hittites, about which (I should point out) I recall very little. To every cram-session success story you’ll hear a dozen sad tales of poorly written essays, flagging health, and plummeting grades. Help your student learn how to study a little every day. 30 or 40 minutes of clearheaded memorization over a week’s time is far better than 4 fog-brained hours the night before the quiz. Sleep is as essential to organizing and storing data as are short effective study sessions. Alternating periods of both are key.

Students will argue they are preparing for an exam while their brains fight for concentration between notifications from social media, the urge to change songs on a playlist, and a hilarious video complete with ads. They think this works because they haven’t ever tried it any other way. Study sessions should be conducted in a distraction-free zone. Phones, internet, television, social media, friends, and siblings will always win the competition for brain time. Even little distractions like music will conspire to rob a student of subject mastery. 20 minutes with no distractions will be far more effective than 2 hours with them. Short effective study sessions with small rewards for success and a nice break in-between sessions.

So, even if you are educated now (as most are) under the time-served style, you can turn time into mastery with just these few special skills that will give your brain super-powers. 

Make or Break College Preparedness Skills: Academic Writing

 

Start Early

By Amy Barr, Lively Classical Guide at The Lukeion Project

There will always be room for creative writing in life. If you have a calling to compose poetry or to craft the next great novel, please continue. If your day moves more smoothly after a good journaling session, carry on. Nothing that I say here should change this about you and how you are wired. Likewise, may all our different types of creatives flourish even in these hard times.

That said, most of us will never return to composing free verse, limericks, or sweeping fiction again after we start our high school years, and that’s also ok. Your writing years are far from over. Many prefer academic writing. During these important years, projects—even for our creatives—must transition to a range of styles that can be just as meaningful as a poignant ecphrasis or just as heart-melting as a sonnet yet differently creative. Let’s talk about academic writing.

If you have ever had to slog your way through a dry textbook, an intractable scholarly article, or a poorly composed instruction manual, you have experienced firsthand how much the world needs good academic writers. Yet academic writing often gets too little love and scarce attention during the high school years. Skills gained in deeply introspective journaling exercises or elegiac couplets are great, but they will not easily translate to precise, concise, persuasive writing with clear analysis. Too often high school educators—including home school parents—expect academic writing skills to be offered in college while college professors insist that all those basics to be taught years earlier. The winners in the debate tend to be the tutors at the college writing labs where many poorly prepared students go to make up missed skills in their free time. Students need preparation.

Well prepared academic writers will start working on their skills no later than 8^th or 9^th grade. Students who practice academic writing acumen at every level will waltz through analytical essays in AP classes, they’ll flit through exam essays, dance through research papers, and do a smashing job at lab reports, scientific analyses, book reports, logic, rhetoric, philosophy, and the list goes on. Yet many assume creative writing skills translate effortlessly into the foreign language of style sheets, formal outlines, and proper citation. Nothing can be further from the truth. These are all things that need time and attention to detail (instruction and practice).

Parents: does your 8^th or 9^th grader need more focus on academic writing? Here's a short list of skills that students could use from early in high school through the rest of their education:

• Proper citation and style sheets (MLA, APA, etc.)
• Formal outlining
• Thesis statements, argument development, conclusions
• Evidence and analysis
• Precise/concise stylistic conventions
• Evaluation and appropriate use of good academic sources
• Persuasive and elegant use of language in a tone suitable to academic projects

Once a student can practice these skills in a variety of writing assignments, he or she should be asked to expand them to longer research projects, reports, and essays. With a bit more instruction, the first set of skills will translate well to the tools used in more interesting college assignments.

Thus our writing raison d'être at the Lukeion Project is to start academic writing skills early, practice them often, and challenge them again just before the college level. Starting out well-versed at what college classes expect in writing assignments means that at least a few of the worst stresses of the college experience will never manifest. 

A great foundation is Witty Wordsmith/Barbarian Diagrammarian in 7^th or 8^th grade. Next, 8^th or 9^th graders take the Skillful Scribbler course (and our new second-semester independent writing complement, Scribble On) to set students up for successful writing for the first few years of high school. By 11^th or 12^th grade, students should take College Composition in the autumn followed by College Research Writing in spring. Grade appropriate courses like Muse is perfect for our early high school, Classical Bard for 10^th or 11^th, and then mythology, history, or AP classes for our older students in 11^th or 12^th grade as those more difficult tasks correspond to skills mastered.

Students: when you get to college and sleep well the night before your first big research paper or lab report is due, let your instructors know they did a good job. We love to hear success stories.

Demokratia

Voting in Ancient Athens

By Dr. Sue Fisher, Luminous Classical Lit. Doyen at The LukeionProject

The first Tuesday after the first Monday of November is Election Day in the United States. Many people, if they have not already voted, will be heading to the polls to vote for important leaders and issues in our republic. In The United States, this right is afforded to all citizens age eighteen or older, which means that some of our Lukeion Project students will be voting for the first time. Given our current situation, this will be an election to tell the grandkids about someday. But have you ever thought about what voting might look like if you lived in ancient Athens? Let’s have a look.

It’s a beautiful morning. The sun is rising, a gentle breeze is rustling the silver-green leaves of the olive tree outside your window. A rooster is crowing to signal the start of the day. Today is the day of a big vote to finance the navy for the war with Sparta. The tax will be a burden felt by all Athenians, but Pericles has made it clear that the Oracle at Delphi confirmed that Athens’ hope is in its “wooden walls” (ships), and so a majority on this issue is clearly needed. Too bad for you though, Mirope! You’re female and will not get to vote. Neither will your household slaves, nor Sargon the Persian spice seller currently living in Athens as a metoikos (resident alien), nor any of your children under the age of eighteen. You sigh and go draw some water from the well and get ready to prod your husband into waking up.

It’s morning, apparently. You know this by the fact that Mirope is poking you in the stomach and telling you that it’s time to get up. You can’t blame her, honestly. The last time you were late you got red dye all over your best chiton from the ochre-dyed rope those Scythian slaves use to herd people from the Agora to the Pynx, where votes are held. It took her a long time of washing to get that stain out. Even if it weren’t mandatory for you, a citizen, to vote, you would still go. You enjoy the forty or more elections held every year on all matters from taxes, public buildings, laws, and military commanders to the annual exile (ostracisms) of persons deemed dangerous to the democracy. You give a mental shout-out to those who fought the Persians and kept you from being subject to a monarch and to Clesithenes too, whose reforms gave you, a non-wealthy citizen, a voice in the ekklesia (assembly).

Once dressed, you eat some bread and goat cheese and answer Mirope’s questions about the day. Will you vote today by hand as you usually do, or will you use the voting pebbles? It is not an ostracism so no potsherds for voting this time. How many votes will be taken? Ten, twenty? There are so many issues to decide each week. You know that Mirope is genuinely interested, but that she is also trying to figure out how much food to pack for you. She knows that with the debates, the session could be a few hours or more, and all of that on the unshaded hill of the Pnyx. You are hoping you can find your uncle Spyro in the throng of 6,000 or more citizens. He owes you 2 obols.

Climbing the hill of the Pnyx, you recognize your fellow citizens, and this fills you with pride. You love how you vote directly on every issue that faces your city, with no representatives, cumbersome bureaucracy, government departments, or civil service to distort your wishes. With war on the horizon, you know that today’s vote is important, and you are glad you backed Pericles as strategos (military leader) previously. You also have faith in the boule (council) and the jurors, all men elected by lot rather than by vote, and therefore shielded from the possibility of corruption. Speaking of the boule, your ears perk up and the crowd’s murmurings die down as the boule’s agenda for this meeting of the ekklesia is read. It will be a long morning, but an important one. The debates have begun, and you see the best speaker of your deme (tribe) rise to discuss his position. There was little debate on this first point and nearly all hands were raised in support. One vote down, fourteen more to go.

Speakers from other demes come forth, more debate ensues, and more votes are taken. After six hours you are done and returning home for a big meal and an afternoon nap. As you are nodding off to sleep you once again think about the isonomia of the Athenian constitution – being equal under the law. You think too about the kratos (power) of the demes…demos kratos…demokratia…something new to the world thanks to you and your fellow Athenians. You wonder if it will catch on.

 

Reduce your Worry

"What Ifs" Never Help Anyone

by Amy E. Barr, The Lukeion Project

Several times this semester I (or my faculty colleagues) have gotten a note explaining that a student couldn’t complete an assignment because he or she was so consumed with worry related to the pandemic. I even know that some have stopped schooling entirely until they find some unspecified worry-free point in the future. Maybe 2021? 2022? Nobody knows. With this in mind, today’s blog is a note to all our worriers.

 Many have successfully grappled with the “what if” monster and conquered that beast or come to terms with it. The whole planet is suffering under uncertainties (as we have before and as we will once again). Why are some utterly gutted with overwhelming worry while others soldier on? Why must some pause life to tend their mountainous concerns while others adapt and move forward?

As a mother of three grown-and-flown children, the caretaker of a small homestead, and a small business owner, I suppose I have my share of concerns but I am not consumed with worry. This trait can annoy those that prefer to foster their worries. “You are lucky,” they say. “I must have a lot more to worry about than you do.” I doubt it but I do adhere to the principle that being worried is a choice, not a necessity.

Let's return to the idea that some foster their worries. True worriers tend their concerns like they are growing a garden full. If worry were a buffet, some go back for extra helpings at the worry bar. For some, worry is the main thing in the schedule and the main course on the dinner plate. Even when all energy is exhausted on “what if” concerns, worriers never grow closer to finding the much-desired hypothetical safe zone so they redouble their efforts to find more “what ifs” even as outdated ones fade away in the past.

Worry doesn’t live on one end of a continuum with safety perched tantalizingly on the other. The force of your virulent worry will never peddle you closer toward safety. Worry only gets bigger and it will certainly never repay you for your efforts. It will always consume more time and energy even as you increase your appetite for it daily. Worry takes you nowhere. There’s no reward in it. None. 

The obvious answer is this: stop worrying. Having lived for years with natural-born-worriers, I know you now ask, “how does one just stop it, especially when worry seems so unavoidable and so uncontrollable?” 

Humans are the only creatures that think ahead fully. We cultivate savings accounts, we take vitamin supplements, we reserve vacation time, we exercise when we’d rather sit, we get 20-year mortgages. We fervently plan or problem-solve for potential events many years in our future. Good problem-solving skills separate successful people--those with savings, health, a rewarding job, happy kids--from unsuccessful people burdened by debt, drama, doom. Neither group knew for certain what to expect in the years to come and luck is not always to blame.

Problem solving for the future is like a paved road going off into the distance. Most of us can look down this road to see roughly where it swoops over the horizon line or around a curve. Some have it easier because a mentor demonstrated how he or she has stayed on track during rough patches. Others, after a few halts, move down the road just the same. There will always be a point at which we can’t see the road in the distance. We’ll come to curves and hit major bumps (finances, health, relationships, disaster) so we recalibrate, we problem-solve, and we push on. The road ahead is visible but only poorly and only in patches. This is normal and unavoidable.

Worry is mismanaged problem solving for the future. Instead of working out a variety of strategies to move ahead down life’s unseen road—come what may—we build massive hypothetical worst-case scenarios. Instead of saving money for a rainy day, we focus on getting struck by lightning in that same rainstorm. We are going down the same road as before, but white-knuckled and terrified. We only have eyes for the hypothetical disaster (of our own design). Sure, some have it harder because a mentor or trusted source demonstrated the necessity to stay terrified about the road ahead or, the worse, your mentor failed to clue you in about life’s normal bumps and curves.

If worry is devouring your life, understand that it really is avoidable and controllable. First, look at your pile of worries. Listing them or discussing them with a non-worrier is a great idea (do bring them cookies). Sometimes just saying them reduces their scale and terror. Evaluate your worries. Some are worth a bit of energy right now –like how to get work done this week or how to help a sick family member--but most future "what if” worries are entirely unproductive. They are ready for the trash bin. “What if” worries are out of your control. There’s no productive course of action or reasonable solution for such uncertainties and hypotheticals because they do not exist now, and they will likely never exist in the future.

Stop equating feelings of uncertainty with foreboding and doom. Life, at least the kind that is worth living, is full of uncertainty. You can’t have it all planned and sorted as you smoothly round every blind curve. Life will never go this way. Accept uncertainty and put all your energy into things you can control like doing today’s work and taking care of today’s health and loved ones. There are certainly dips and curves ahead. You will never be in control of the road, only how you drive it. Apply all that misspent worry-energy on today’s troubles right now, small, or large. Come at life full tilt, learn how to do the tough stuff of the future by doing the manageable stuff today. You’ll find you have reduced your “what if” worry pile by half.  

“The art of life is to deal with problems as they arise, rather than destroy one’s spirit by worrying about them too far in advance.” Marcus Tullius Cicero

3 Myths About Studying Logic

Let's Think about this Logically

By Dr. Kim Johnson, Lukeion Logic Sage and Maths Expert

You may have seen Lester’s Logic Lounge offered at the Lukeion Project but been hesitant to enroll your students for various reasons. Maybe your learner has taken a few lessons on types of fallacies, and you think that is sufficient. Or maybe logic seems like a nice brainy topic for others with extra time but not right for your family. Maybe formal logic is something that is theoretically interesting, but not terribly applicable in the real world. Maybe the study of logic just hasn’t appeared on your radar at all!
Let’s explore the 3 main myths about studying formal logic.

Myth #1: You don’t need a formal logic course, it is enough to learn logical fallacies.

Logical fallacies are fun to learn, and they are important for maintaining clear thinking in this modern life. Advertisers, politicians, and everybody on the planet use a variety of wily methods to convince us to think, eat, watch, or buy things that may or may not be good for us.  If we can recognize a bad argument when we see one, we are better prepared to defend ourselves against the “dark arts” of persuasion.
It is not enough to learn informal fallacies. Imagine if you were taught mathematics by learning only incorrect computations, or history if you were taught only events that didn’t occur. It is important to recognize falsehood, but it is also important to be able to construct and use correct reasoning. Formal logic begins with the beginnings of correct argument: definitions and statements.  After mastering the basics, we consider how to put them together to make valid arguments. We analyze both good and bad arguments so we can recognize them in others and formulate them for ourselves.

Myth #2: Logic is only important for those following the classical philosophy of homeschooling.

Dorothy Sayers helped inspire today’s classical school of education with her essay, “The Lost Tools of Learning.”  She praised education that had its basis in the Trivium, emphasizing three stages: Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric. Today, there are plenty of curricula and groups which subscribe to this idea. All of them suggest logic as one of the required courses during middle school years when a student has moved into the “logic” stage (usually around age 13 or 14 for many students).
Formal logic has its place in every educational philosophy, from traditional to unschooling. No matter what your child ends up studying before or after graduation, being able to create and understand sound arguments will help him or her. 
Formal logic will help students in mathematics as well as philosophy, which focus on logical arguments. Students in the sciences also need to show the data they collect logically supports their hypotheses. Logic will help any student who must complete formal academic writing of any kind. He or she must analyze and explain sound theories based on data, regardless if that data is 17th century English authors or biology. Logic will help sociologists and psychologists develop studies that prove what they purport to show. Students in political science and economics need logic to create sound policies and then convince others that they are appropriate. The study of logic applies to every branch of higher learning.

Myth #3: Formal logic has no bearing on arguments in real life.

It is true that few arguments these days follow the classical syllogism form. The syllogistic argument goes like this: 

• All men are mortal, 

• Socrates was a man, 

• Therefore, Socrates was mortal. 

While we spend a lot of time discussing classical syllogisms in formal logic, it is not an end in itself. We study the classic syllogism to understand arguments in a tame environment before going out into the wilds of everyday language. 
We start with finding the conclusion of an argument and separating it from the premises. Sometimes just doing this helps us to understand what is really going on in an argument! We look at how statements are related to each other. For example, two statements can be consistent without being logically equivalent, or contrary but not contradictory. We can link these statements into arguments.
In the end we move on to arguments, formally stated and informally stated. Since no one speaks in formal syllogisms, the end of formal logic is to analyze ordinary arguments. We first translate the arguments into formal language to get rid of the imprecision of ordinary language. Then, when we are sure we understand the terms and how they relate to each other, we can attack the argument itself and whether it is valid (which may or may not lead to a true conclusion) or sound (which has true premises, a valid argument, and a true conclusion).
After spending time in formal logic, most students start looking at the world from a new (and more logical) perspective. They may start translating everyday-sentences into logical form and explaining why the argument you make about whether they get more dessert is invalid. Don’t fear! The next step your student takes is effectively arguing points in a history class or an English paper.
Our textbook writers Nance and Wilson define logic as “the art and science of reasoning well.”  In Lester’s Logic Lounge, we break down real-life arguments into their smallest components, put them together carefully, and analyze them in simple cases so that, when the complexity of reality breaks in, the student is prepared to respond with their mind instead of gut feelings. Don’t let these myths stop you from studying logic. The benefits of logic reach well beyond a single class and spread through students’ entire lives. We apologize in advance if your child starts making a much-improved case for more dessert.

The Follow Instructions Mindset

Can Academic Success be Found THAT Easily?

By global blogger Amy Barr, The Lukeion Project

A regular topic of conversation among educators is, “WHY do so many students fail to follow basic instructions?” While some teachers stick to complaining about the issue, most place the blame on ourselves at first. We double efforts to clarify instructions as we add bullet-points, illustrations, recaps, finger-puppets, examples, charts, modern dancing… but the problem persists as handouts get longer and sometimes weirder. First, our email inbox is filled with notes asking basic questions already answered in handouts. Next, the inbox is filled with notes from students who scored poorly on something because they didn’t “know” what to do (even though that was spelled out in finest detail). 

Because the art and science of instruction-following have become rare, educators place an increasingly large percentage of assignment scores on doing all of what is asked on assignment. Even after students know this is the case, they will still refuse to follow instructions, as grade points diminish week after week. Watch a competitive baking show (or any other creative competition) to see people make the best biscuit for thousands of dollars yet “fail to follow the brief.” Often the big winner is just the one that ticked all boxes.

Why is this simple skill so poorly represented? Is there a science to following instructions? Is it an art form? Is it a state of mind?

25 years of teaching experience tells me that there is a connection between people who consider themselves clever or “excellent” at something and their refusal to follow directions. For example, students who have been strongly praised by others in the past for their writing skills will invariably ignore instructions for a writing assignment or, if they don’t’ ignore them, they will claim they don’t understand the instructions given. When pressed, I normally find the issue isn’t so much that they didn’t understand instructions but that surely the assignment specifics shouldn't apply to them. After all, they have been “writing novels for years!” The instructions for authoring an academic essay are being unfair to THEM. 

A study on this topic was published several years ago by a joint research team from Cornell and Harvard Medical School. People who refuse to follow instructions are an expensive problem in corporations, government positions, and in college classes. Hundreds of thousands of dollars and hours are lost over this challenge. Perfectly intelligent people utterly fail at basic tasks because they can’t or won’t follow the steps necessary to complete assignments. Why? The results of the study were clear. People who see themselves as “special or entitled” would “rather lose at something than submit to the rules of others.” 

Aside from the obvious, that some of us can blame an overly generous dollop of old-fashioned narcissism, there are several other contributing factors when perfectly smart students ignore instructions. Here are a few things I see at the front lines.

Dumb Tourist Approach

I devised this term for the behavior I witness repeatedly when traveling abroad (and especially when I was working as an archaeologist) from tourists who cut in line, wander across clearly barricaded areas as a shortcut, wander fecklessly into closed museum galleries, or stagger into blockaded excavation areas for a quick sneak peek. When caught violating all rules of “tourism good behavior,” they would feign ignorance and plead for special help getting themselves back on the tourist path. Flummoxed and harassed staff would comply just to get the “dumb tourist” out of their hair. The “dumb” tourist would still enjoy that shortcut, a special sneak peek, and subsequent boasting rights, just as he or she planned all along. 

Some students discover there are big benefits to being a “dumb tourist.” They exert minimal effort, but when they forget an assignment or ignore instructions, they claim ignorance and seek second chances, extensions, and do-overs. This technique works well for them so they place bets that all flummoxed and harassed instructors (bosses, coaches, and parents in their lives) will give them help just to get them out of their hair or go easy on them when grading. This technique has short-term benefits. Even the most forgiving instructor and most encouraging coach will catch on. 

Instructions are for Dummies Approach

Everyone has heard about the guy who tries to assemble a massive backyard playset without looking at the instruction booklet. It is practically a cliché for how stubborn people can be about reading instructions! All of us are guilty of similar foolish moves (there was the time we didn’t add chain grease to a new chainsaw until after we cut up a medium-sized tree). As we get older and hopefully wiser, we learn that only dummies SKIP instructions. This knowledge comes with experience and the cost of losses. Students need to gain this valuable insight for themselves. Tasked with a long writing project, will they or won’t they find out what is expected before they hand it in? Suffering a major grade gauge once or twice is a small price to pay for this important experience.

Genuinely Confused Approach

Sometimes instructions are genuinely confusing! Ever ordered something online only to discover that even the English instructions were not written in English? If you’ve never assembled a thingamajiggy before, the first time can be tricky. Since there aren’t YouTube videos on how to complete your assignments in your classes, you will have to find clarity. Try these steps:

1. Read the whole assignment handout from beginning to end. Read all of it. Don’t skip anything.

2. Next, go back and write out a project flow list for yourself using the instructions. You can be as detailed as you need to be but organize the steps for what your instructor wants from you in this assignment. Don’t forget details like formatting and the due date but include special instructions for yourself like “visit local university library on Saturday” or “interview uncle Steve about this topic.” Writing out the steps for yourself will help you visualize the whole project and how long it might take you. The flow list might be short (put it in your planner) or be longer and include multiple self-set due dates.

3. If you are still confused, contact your instructor to ask. Sometimes you aren’t so much confused but irritated that you are being asked to do something different than you’ve done in past classes. Ask for clarification but follow the instructions. How will you master new skills if your abilities have been perfected at age 16? You have much more to learn over the next 80 years. If you are being asked to do things differently, DO them differently by following the instructions.

Instructions are fabulous things. Instead of avoiding them, become excellent at following them. Aside from brain surgery or pygmy goat herding, being able to follow instructions can lead you to great heights of excellence. Cooking beautiful feasts just like Nana, or crafting extravagant art pieces, or making great smelling handmade soap all come from following instructions. Following instructions can turn you into a top-level student who is a joy to have in class both now and in the future. Adopt a good mindset for following instructions and then make it a habit.

Murderous Mathematicians

Math Can Be Dangerous

By Dr. Kim Johnson, Lukeion Project Logic Sage

The life of a mathematician may seem completely devoid of intrigue, and perhaps of any interest at all. On the contrary! There are many mathematicians who lived exceptionally exciting lives, facing dangers like conspiracies, duels, and even murder.

Pythagoras

Pythagoras was one of the first to have the job description read, “mathematician.”  He was born around 470 B.C. in Samos, Greece and died in Croton, Italy, about 75 years later.  Most famous for the theorem named after him, he and his followers introduced other mathematical innovations.  They used letters to refer to angles and sides in the drawings they made in the sand.  They used colored chalk to demonstrate the equality of lines or angles. According to some legends, Pythagoras was the first teacher paid by his students. The Pythagoreans were an interesting cult. Adhering to a vegetarian lifestyle, men and women studied together. Using their superior math skills, they invented the 8-tone scale, determined by ratios between the notes.  

Pythagoras may or may not have authorized the first mathematical murder. One of the cult’s most strongly held beliefs was, “All is number,” or more accurately, “All is ratio.”  When one of his followers noticed the hypotenuse of a triangle with two equal legs could not be written as the ratio of two whole numbers, the followers of Pythagoras tipped him over the side of the boat. Most of what we know about Pythagoras comes from texts written well after his death so the details of this hypotenuse homicide are a bit unclear.

Perhaps Pythagoras deserved his eventual fate.  His school at Croton got involved in some politics which angered the local populace.  They burned down the Pythagorean academy and chased Pythagoras himself across the fields.  Some stories suggest he was killed because he refused to cross a field of beans, sacred to the Pythagoreans.

Descartes

Rene Descartes (1596-1650) was another mathematician who lived a life worthy of a spy novel.  He was very sickly as a child and, because of this, when he was sent to Jesuit school the rector allowed him to remain in bed until he felt like getting up.  As a young man he joined various volunteer armies mainly for the purpose of seeing the world rather than seeing battle.  His travels and conversations around Europe led to his philosophical and mathematical insights.

Descartes invented a way to locate points on the plane by noting how far they were from two lines, the “x-axis” and the “y-axis”.  Each point was identified by a coordinate pair, (x,y).  This was revolutionary because it allowed mathematicians to link geometry (great pictures and relationships between shapes) to algebra (filled with equations, x’s, and y’s). One can build a solution using equations — or one can graph the equation using the Cartesian plane to see the same solution.

Later in life Descartes retired to the Netherlands.  His peaceful life was interrupted by a letter from Princess Christina from Sweden. To her credit, she wanted to make the capital of Sweden an intellectual center.  Unlike Descartes, the princess enjoyed waking up incredibly early to study in a cold room and insisted that Descartes join her at 5 AM for lessons in philosophy and ethics.  He died later that year from pneumonia. Feel free to use this the next time someone wants you to get up early to study math. 

Galois

French mathematician Evariste Galois (1811-1832) lived a perilous life, at least for a mathematician. He grew up after the French Revolution and the Napoleonic empire, but politics problematic.  He was accepted into the second-best school in Paris, only to be kicked out when he complained that the students of the academy were not allowed to help overthrow Charles X.  

He was arrested twice for making controversial political statements including raising a toast to King Louis-Phillipe with a dagger in his glass. He wrote some brilliant papers but had a few were rejected due to political bias. One was lost when the person he sent it to, died before reviewing it. In the end, Galois got into a duel over the honor of a “floozy” (his words). The night before he died, he wrote several farewell letters, including directions to find his groundbreaking mathematical writings.  Thus he died at the age of 20 while his techniques for finding roots of equations inspired a new branch of mathematics named after him, Galois Theory. 

Math can be dangerous  

Not included in this list are many other mathematicians who died in mysterious or violent circumstances. Archimedes was murdered by a Roman soldier for telling the soldier not to mess up his drawings. Hypatia was murdered by a mob for mixing religion, politics, and mathematics. Cardano committed suicide on the day he had astrologically predicted he would die. Ramanujan died from cold weather and bad food in England. Fourrier died after falling down the stairs while wrapped in too many blankets. 

Although the Bureau of Labor and Statistics has ranked mathematician as one of the safest jobs in the world, mathematicians themselves have historically interesting deaths.

Writing: What do Educators Want from You?

Why We Torment Students With Many Writing Assignments
Plus: How to Improve Scores Right Away

By Amy E. Barr, The Lukeion Project

“AARGH! I don’t know what I am supposed to DO for this writing assignment! Why do I have to WRITE stuff for this class?”

It is that time of the year when the first big writing assignments are due in many Lukeion Project classes. Depending on the class, students have been tasked with all sorts of writing tasks ranging from short research pieces to creative genre-specific assignments, to solid five-part exam essays, to close readings of literature with exacting analytical style and careful citation. 

Expect a bit of hair-pulling and griping. We instructors certainly do. 

In an ideal world, students will be tasked with a gradient of writing tasks throughout their education. Starting in middle school they should see short objective investigative projects with basics in good outlining, thesis development, five-part essays, and other fundamentals. Students would continue to improve their skill set to include robust research and analysis by the time they finish out their high school years. If things have progressed smoothly, college writing assignments gently integrate themselves into the upward trend of a student’s writing development. BLISS!

In the real world, there’s no “gentle integration.” New college students too frequently experience something a bit closer to a painful writing crisis and sudden familiarity with red ink and the college writing lab. The more normal "gradient of writing tasks" in high school looks like this: Based on early opportunities to write subjectively and creatively in high school, many students will have too early subtracted themselves from membership in the “good writers club," much the same way that others consider themselves good or bad at chemistry, computer languages, or art. We might universally want a modicum of chemistry, COBAL, and cinematography but, in the real world we will certainly require the ability to write. 

Over the course of middle through high school, students should conquer and practice various forms of writing proficiencies. Without a bit of structure, few are prepared to handle the tools of reason, logic, theory, and analysis, much less research, citation, style sheets, scholarly tone, outlining, argumentation, and persuasiveness. No wonder so many of us think we aren't good at writing! 

One’s first college lab report, case study statement, or market research project will have no rubric for “strong adjectives” or “nice nouns.” That special request email to your professor better be persuasive. That first English paper better not include clichés and slang. That first extended exam essay better be comprehensive and comprehensible. Students must become proficient writers in a relatively short time. Not all of us are called to be Twain or Tolstoy but most of us can become reasonably good at many types of writing. 

Writing is an essential life skill. Annoyingly, good educators know this. If they have your best interests at heart, they will keep requiring you to write more (and MORE!), to write differently, and to write better. 

Students: Here are three pointers to help you get the best possible results from your efforts here and now (or, in medias res, to use the poetic device).

1.  Writing has rules. Follow the ones that apply to your task. 

No matter what you are writing, that writing project has rules. Want your boss to take your seriously? Don’t use text abbreviations and slang when explaining why you are late to work again. Want to write an A-grade history paper? Don’t write like the narrator from Ancient Aliens with Wikipedia as your main source. Want to receive top marks on your AP essay? There are rules. If your instructor tells you to never use rhetorical questions or “X is defined by Webster’s Dictionary” in a scholarly introduction, don’t put her to the test and use these things anyway. 

You get the idea. Your personal journal, blog, vlog, texts, social media can all play by your rules. Everything else has rules: Find them, follow them closely, and practice them. If you your instructor merely said, “MLA format.” Welcome to writing at the college level! Those are the rules.

2.  Writing is a cumulative skill. You get better at it by doing more of it and by doing it longer. 

At The Lukeion Project we introduced a program called Skillful Scribbler for 8th-10th grade because we discovered that most of our students—at all levels--were poor at basics like developing a thesis, outlining, paragraph transitions, formal academic tone, basics of research, and five-part essays. In fact, most students had almost zero experience with these tasks even in 11th and 12th grade classes so we found all levels of students needing these basics. We also have College Composition and College Research Writing so students can develop important advanced writing skills by 11th or 12th grade as they work through AP classes and prepare for college writing. In the meantime, our literature, history, and upper level Latin classes task students with mastery of basic writing skills. 

Students who may never have described themselves as “good” at writing should be given every opportunity to develop satisfaction at becoming competent and then even proficient at writing through practice.    

3.   Writing takes time.  

This will come as a complete shock to many of you writers: Your educators can tell if you took time and effort to complete a writing assignment. Yes, LONG experience tells us if you sat down 52 minutes prior to the deadline to crash your way through the given task.  

The more writing experience you have, the better you can perform under tense time constraints. Gained experience learning how and what to write contributes beautifully to how well you do with only limited time. Not only do you improve your writing skills with more practice, but you also improve your ability to write well quickly. This is why in AP Latin, for example, I grade beginning essays more lightly than later essays: you should develop skill and speed. 

Every busy student can confirm that speedy writing skills are a bonus at college. While writing will always be improved with a bigger time investment—especially if you can get away from a project and come back later for final edits—writing gets better and faster with practice. No writing chore, task, or assignment is a waste of time. Getting good at writing AND fast at it, takes time. 

Three Myths about Learning Classical Mythology

Let's Talk Myth Congeniality

By Amy E. Barr, The Lukeion Project

Ah! Classical Mythology! I’ve offered a course on the subject for more than a decade. This is the first year I’ve taken a break. Students love to read vivid tales of heroes, monsters, and adventure. Parents love to see their kids learning more about vocabulary, history, and writing while they grow to love good literature. Soon students become thirsty to read more, explore ancient art, search for Classical themes in music, and maybe even go see a Greek tragedy or start their own Classically inspired writing projects. What’s not to like about a course in Classical Mythology? Yet, this tends to be a course with ridiculously small enrollment even though those that do join the class, love it. 

I have a theory. I think a few too many people believe a few of these myths about Classical mythology.

Myth #1: Classical mythology is childish and is best for young students.

Indulge your imagination with tales of Jason and the Argonauts as they outwit the serpent and steal the Golden Fleece. Construe your own heroic escapes from the Cyclops, Cerberus, and Charybdis. Cheer or boo the crafty Greeks as they outwit the Trojans with a wooden horse. Rick Riordan has a huge following of young fans who adore how he’s applied Classical mythology to the fictional lives of modern teenage heroes. These stories are a lot of fun, but can mythology bring more to the table for older students than fluffy entertainment?

Outside the sporadic head-sprouting Hydra, man-eating turtle, or deadly gorgon, the subject matter of Classical literature requires the maturity of a student who is well into the logic stage and is ready to express himself coherently as he reasons through the complexities of the story at hand. A younger student can memorize scads of mythological names, get a kick out of Odysseus outwitting the Cyclops, or cheer on Theseus fighting the Minotaur. Yet the younger student will likely misinterpret Achilles’ rage, fail to understand Hecuba’s desolation, misconstrue Clytemnestra’s revenge, and miss the mark on Oedipus’ hubris. Simply put, most Classical stories are PG-13. 

Older students love to wrestle with the complex dilemmas posed by myths in Classical literature. Did Penelope’s suitors deserve their fate based on the mores of the ancient guest-host relationship? Why did Theseus grow suddenly absent-minded as he abandoned Ariadne? Was Achilles justified in all that rage? Did Oedipus deserve his cruel fate? 

Save mythology for your high school learners who crave weighing in on life’s bigger questions. Your teenagers will love to debate the weightier questions of Classical mythology even while enjoying a few violent cyclops stories.

Myth #2: Classical Mythology isn’t an appropriate subject for persons of faith.

One time I was in my booth at a homeschool conference when one very angry woman stormed up to me and asked if I taught Classical mythology. I’d never had anyone angry at me for this sort of thing but when I said yes, she glared and snorted, “I can’t believe people still believe in the Olympian gods.” 

She spun and left in a huff.

She must think the strangest things about historians, science fiction writers, literature teachers, and artists of all types.

Despite some admittedly problematic decisions by those Olympians, many notable scholars and authors of faith have been experts in Classical literature. A quote credited to C. S. Lewis sums things up nicely, "I believe Christianity as I believe the sun has risen, not because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." Lessons of courage, hospitality and loyalty can inform and instruct as well as tales of greed, pride, and cowardice. The vast range of Classical literature has inspired authors from Augustine to Shakespeare, from Twain and Tolkien to our C. S. Lewis who himself who wrote poems, essays, and elegant epics with strong Classical underpinnings. 

Myth #3:  Classical mythology isn’t a good use of precious busy high school time

I saved this for last since it is one that many hardworking home educators fervently believe (because it’s the one I hear quite often). With an impossible schedule of duel enrollment and 3 AP classes, I find a lot of students skip the study of Classical literature because they think it isn’t particularly useful for serious-minded folks trying to get into a serious-minded college. Likewise, students who are not planning on the college path are expected to grind away on the same topics that have failed to inspire before so they can tick boxes and be done. 

“Mythology,” mom says, “won’t help you finish your math and science diploma requirements nor get you into college.”  

Mythology in Classical literature may be one of the most practical topics a high school student can study. Hear me out: Greek and Latin word roots and origins found in mythology will open wide the potential for English word power. Mastering Greek and Latin literature will pull back the velvet curtain on the currently maligned Western Civilization. Virtues like courage, hospitality, civic duty, and hard work are exemplified in these ancient tales. Concepts like liberty, responsibility, perseverance, and loyalty abound. Nearly every great literary work has been inspired by the Classical world in some way. Skipping Classical literature is like pulling half the blocks out of a building’s foundation. That building may not fall, but it will surely be rendered useless and flimsy during toughter times.

Once considered an essential part of an excellent education, mythology in Classical literature has now been consigned to the academic discard pile by public, private, and home educators alike. Shifting perceptions about education have pushed it out of the way out to make room for more math and science. 

Ignorance about Classical literature will narrow one’s perspective and can make the mind’s terrain a tad barren. Encourage your high school student to take on the intellectual challenge of a good Greek tragedy, a finely worded epic, or even a suspiciously funny retelling by Ovid.  You never know where his interests might lead him; maybe he’ll be this generation’s Aristotle, Shakespeare, Tolkien, or C. S. Lewis.

Lukeion Students: Mythology took a short vacation during the 2020-2021 academic year at The Lukeion Project. Look for the new version to roll out for the 2021-2022 academic year under the genius tutelage of Dr. Fisher, Muse. 

Five Myths About Learning Latin

Let's Clear Some Things Up

by Amy E. Barr, The Lukeion Project

What’s so great about a dead language that one might want to dedicate so much precious time and resources to master it? What awesome things can Latin do that causes some parents to start Latin at home as soon as their toddlers can hold a flashcard? Let’s look at a few popular myths about learning Latin to help you can decide if Latin really pays off in the long run or if, for goodness sake, you’ve already missed your opportunity if you didn’t start learning Latin while I elementary school.

Myth #1: A person must start Latin young to be a success.  

If you want to keep college plans on your child’s horizon, her transcript must include a minimum of two reasonably hearty years of the same foreign language at the high school level. 3 years looks even better to the admissions dean. A challenging 4^th year might win her college language credits by succeeding on the AP exam. Modern students can choose from Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and Latin. Aside from the pleasures of academic success, most of us want our children to adeptly use and enjoy a foreign language but we fear the time has flown by too quickly. There is so much pressure to start new languages extremely early. Can a person start Latin late, in high school, and still be a success? Absolutely yes.

Parental guilt about early language instruction (or lack thereof) is common and often crippling. Such guilt is generally unwarranted. If your child wasn’t accurately conjugating his Latin verbs at age 6, please don’t despair. While there’s normally no harm in starting Latin early, the ideal time to start is closer to grades 8-12. Give him some strong background in English language mechanics and then let your 13-18-year-old invest his energies in Latin when his formal reasoning skills promote the best success. The ideal starting point is late middle school/early high school.   

Myth #2: Learning Latin is no different than studying any modern language.

Latin is mostly unspoken with some fun exceptions in class. While students must learn to properly pronounce and read Latin, most won’t invest much time making casual conversation. When a person learns a modern language, she’ll spend hours on proper pronunciation and comprehension clues in short, basic sentences. Accent mimicry and active listening nurture mental muscles from even a young age, but the ability to analyze Latin’s visual cues develops later. Older students have formal reasoning skills that younger children lack. Latin will unlock the secrets of language mechanics, but your child needs some mental maturity to make that happen. This rule applies to all languages. Even if your child began Spanish at age 6, in most cases she won’t be ready for any substantial grammar and sophisticated literature until her teen years. Unlike French, Spanish, or German, there is no real advantage to starting Latin early just to master proper accent.

Myth #3: Any type of Latin will do.

It is easy to feel intimidated by Latin if you have never studied it for yourself. It makes sense that some programs are specially designed for the unskilled home educator to teach without any background in Latin. As there are for modern languages, one can find textbooks, full curricula with piles of worksheets, computer-based programs, vlog-style video, or little interactive language apps. Light, fruity, and fun approaches can launch the Latin ship for some but how far will it sail?

Visualize language objectives as early as possible. If your goal is limited to writing 2 years of Latin on a high school transcript, your child must still invest appropriate time and effort for those credits. Many approaches offer little more than extended busy work. If you or your learner has a real interest in learning the language, words, or writing, select a more approach rather than anything that plods slowly through worksheets or constant review of basics. Pursue mastery instead of simple familiarity. It will take the same amount of time to LEARN Latin rather than just play with it, but the investment in effort will pay huge dividends as far as skills gained.

Another consideration is the type of Latin being taught to your student. Latin was a living language for over 2000 years. It went through many changes over time. Consider English. Even modest calculations suggest we use only 1/6^th of Shakespeare’s vocabulary. All languages simplify. Vocabulary shrinks and grammar gets easier. Many elementary instructor-friendly approaches rely on Late Latin for this reason: it is very, very easy. Don’t be surprised if several years of rudimentary elementary Latin count for very little while your student must start over from the beginning for high school credit. Latin programs are seldom one size fits all. Elementary Latin offers the bare basics and a little vocabulary to make a student familiar with the basics rather than well skilled.

Myth #4: Latin is best reserved for above-average students.

Is Latin is more academically challenging than other languages? Latin, like biology, algebra, and history, always has its challenges. All these subjects require determination and effort. Students who take high school Latin tend to pursue more academically challenging fields in college. Students who take Latin in college tend to move to the top of their chosen field after graduation. Students who excel at Latin in college often go to graduate school. Some get the connection backward. Latin doesn’t naturally attract academically ambitious people, it creates them. Latin, like math and music, trains the brain to be more analytical, observant, focused, and logical. Latin is not best reserved for above-average students. On the contrary! Latin makes a student above average.

Myth #5: Latin is not practical.

The same scene repeats itself often. I ask the boy if he is interested in learning Latin. The 14-year-old shrugs and says Spanish is more practical. He doesn’t seem convinced, so I ask, “Oh? What do you plan to study?” I notice he is fairly interested in the Latin text as he recognizes many of the words. He admits he doesn’t know what he plans to do or study. All he knows is that he’ll encounter Spanish speakers more often than people who speak Latin. Is Latin really impractical?

Colleges require students to study a second language for a variety of, particularly good reasons. Americans have a horrible track record of failing to master other languages. This failure to be more global is far from the primary consideration. Learning another language does several important things to us and for us. The side effects of learning a language are just as important as the language itself.

Language study requires discipline.  Even a brilliant student will struggle a bit to rewire the language centers in his brain. Regular practice is the only way to succeed and so language learning requires determination. Most of us already succeeded at mastering a first language in our infancy, but we had to struggle with it daily (even though we don’t remember). Picking up a second language is comparatively easy though we’ve gotten out of practice. Mastering a language also requires analytical alertness. One must observe, understand, and employ the rules again and again until they become an effortless habit. Discipline, determination, and analysis are all ideal characteristics for a successful person in any field, career, ambition, or endeavor.

There’s intrinsic value in learning any language but is Latin as practical if not more so than most? Think of Latin as the source code, the foundation, or the blueprint for all languages. If it doesn’t directly contribute to the grammar and vocabulary of the language (such as Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, and a sizable proportion of English) then it is one of the best language models available. It offers everything we need to decode languages of every kind from Indo-European, German, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, or Swahili. If one is only going to learn one other language in a lifetime, Latin is an excellent choice. If one plans to master many more, Latin will make that process 50% easier.

Latin is foundational to mastering any other language including English. It also goes without saying that Latin is essential in the sciences, medicine, and legal profession. Finally, a serious study of Latin helps builds the skills necessary to tackle anything with determination, discipline, and logic. Latin is the most practical subject one could hope to master. 

Above All, Don’t Quash the Squash

Sundry Garden Metaphors for Educating your Own

By Amy E. Barr, Latin guru at The Lukeion Project

Pardon all the garden talk lately. It is that time of year. I moved to the middle of nowhere so I could have a big garden, chickens, fruit trees, and fewer neighbors. Before I took up the responsibilities of owning a bit of land, I fancied myself as clever about growing things. I was wrong. My horticultural efforts are only impressive to the most amateur neophytes and those that see my carefully edited photographs on Insta. Painful comparison of my efforts to successful growers comes weekly when I visit the nearby Amish community. Their lovely produce is a nice supplement to my inability to grow enough potatoes and cucumbers in any given year. I confess I did manage to produce some fine cabbages and squash this year for once. I’ve been growing things and gardening since I was a kid, but I still have a lot to learn.

If I were to give up my day job teaching Latin, it would be fun to teach gardening lessons. My first bits of advice would be: prune often, coddle seldom, and thin regularly. Since my day job is teaching young people, my advice can be a bit similar so hang in there, we are about to talk veggies.

Prune Often

Tomatoes, roses, peach trees, and most people, do best with regular pruning. When it comes to people, think of pruning in terms of well-calculated challenges. Twelve long years of bland or overly simplified education results in adults who seldom bloom. If a tomato just sprawls on the ground, it will continue to leaf, but it will not produce much fruit. Challenging a plant with a good pruning along with a bit of support and feeding, followed by several more pruning sessions is a good tactic in education. Support and nourish? Yes. Challenge and rectify? Also, a big yes. Growth, blooms, and fruit are stimulated when students encounter challenging subjects, endure a set back or two, and then learn to grow past failures and challenges while they meet new ones.

I once met a gifted student who was terrified by the thought of even the smallest academic failure. His terror was so severe that he had to be cajoled into completing every single assignment given to him. Hoping to mitigate his academic anxiety, his mother made it far worse by constantly trying to “help” him avoid those very academic challenges. She begged for extensions, she pled for special grading, she demanded a unique schedule, even though this student performed quite well whenever he decided to do so. This student had been fed and supported, but never pruned much.      

Coddle Seldom

This year I grew a bed of giant sunflowers. I love their cheerful yellow but admire their ambitions to grow to 10 or 12 feet before sustaining the weight of massive seed-filled blooms. Winds, thunderstorms, squirrels, and a few chomps from our old goat Otis (living next door) did not knock them down. They went from sprouts to towering giants in a few months. They grew strong because they were not shielded from sun, wind, and rain. They were given appropriate challenges along maturation so that I never had to prop them up artificially.

Students can grow the same way. Education shouldn’t be something done TO or FOR a child, with minimal expectations of the child’s engagement in his or her own education…yet it often is.  There’s no magic grade level in which a student can start working on challenging or exciting subjects after clocking enough hours in boring worksheets, primers, and prerequisites…yet we often think there is.  Likewise, too powerful a challenge at too young an age can stunt grown.

Learners are like young plants. The wind must blow, and the rain must fall from the start so that a student responds appropriately and grows strong enough to sustain harder challenges. Greenhouse veggies are tender, but they need hardening-off before you can plop them in the garden. Don’t keep your learner in the greenhouse for twelve years. Let them enjoy some sun and rain now.    

I once spoke with a person who bought an exotic specimen tree for her front yard. Since the tree was still small but represented a sizable investment for her landscape, she strapped a strong pole to the little trunk to make sure it grew straight and tall. After the tree had grown for two years, she decided it was mature enough to remove the support pole. She was horrified to find her little tree snapped in half after a rainstorm a week later. Strapped to external support, the coddled tree had not encountered any real challenges as it grew. It appeared to have been maturing, but appearances were deceptive.

Thin Regularly

Carrots are difficult vegetables. They don’t like to germinate and, when they do, they take their sweet time about it. Carrot experts always plant way more seeds than necessary if they plan to get a normal harvest. If one is patient enough to grow carrots, one is also aware of the need to thin those hard-won sprouts before they crowd each other and fail to grow. Thinning carrots is a tedious, but necessary task for everyone planning on a good harvest. What can carrots tell us about education?

Thin your child’s schedule regularly so he or she won’t get crowded out. Thin intelligently and in the best interest of your learner rather in the best interest of somebody else. Lots of upper level high school students forgo classes that interest them so they can pile on prestigious classes that might look good on a transcript. Sure, an ambitious student should add an AP class or two, but only if the subject is engaging to the student. I teach an AP Latin class. About three-quarters of my students love the subject. It gives them great satisfaction to succeed at that level of Latin so the AP credit is a nice bonus. About one-quarter of my AP students are there because they hope it will look good on a transcript. They are not terribly excited about the material, but they will spend a lot of energy on it anyway. They are likely taking a variety of other AP classes and they are stressed to the max. Instead of easing into their best transitional year, they are tired and a little bitter. Crowded schedules keep people from healthy growth, regardless of their age. Thin the timetable a bit if you want to see improved development.  

Don’t quash the squash

This time of the year my garden is consumed by a few sprawling winter squash plants. As the main growing season comes to an end, I don’t mind if my pumpkin vines start to crawl over the asparagus or shoot up the tomato trellis. There’s an especially sturdy offshoot headed into my cowpea patch right now. I try to keep the roots watered, fed, and relatively bug-free while vines head in all directions. If a vine is relatively healthy, I let it head off on its own unchecked. In a few weeks, I’ll look for the fruit (hopefully some butternut squash, some pumpkins, and maybe a large summer squash that went unnoticed too long under the vines). Some of the biggest and best fruit comes from healthy vines that were allowed to grow in a direction of their own choosing.

Good Literature Informs Life

Literature has the power to shape character and steer paths long after the last page is turned.

By Dr. Susan M. Fisher, Classical Lit. Guru at The Lukeion Project

Call me Ishmael. Rather, call me Ahab, because that’s who I am in this particular tale. The setting: my vegetable garden. The “white whale”: an unseen deer that keeps getting into my beds and topping my plants.

This analogy came to me the other morning when I was yet again shoring up the defenses of my netted gardens against what has been an unprecedented onslaught of deer damage this summer.

This story, however, is more about the fact that I compared my struggle to that of Captain Ahab against the relentless Moby Dick than it is about the struggle itself, especially since Moby Dick stands out as the one book I really and truly loathed from my high school literature classes.

What struck me as funny is the fact that despite my feelings about this book, it was informing my life, as good literature does. Was I becoming obsessed by the deer as Ahab was with the whale? Was I ignoring other important aspects of life and work in my pursuit of victory? Would Ahab’s mostly pyrrhic victory be my fate as well? I pondered these thoughts and more while I staked and netted, pulled weeds and picked beans.

The importance of literature has taken many blows in the last decade or more as colleges have gotten more expensive and students now compete for jobs in a global arena. As humanities departments have shrunk, the value of literature has been obscured in the myth that it does not have direct relevance to the post-academic world. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Certainly not everyone will become an English teacher, but that is not the point. Nor is literature just a fun past-time, although it is that as well.

Beyond being a good read, high-quality literature informs life. It has the power to shape character and steer paths long after the last page is turned.

Jobs come and go. In fact, according to the 2019 Bureau of Labor Statistics people change jobs, on average, twelve times in their lives. But people live with themselves their entire lives. The lessons of literature read will be there to inform, challenge, condone, console, and influence them the whole time.

As I continued to work in the garden my thoughts moved from the censure of the Ahab revelation to thoughts of permanence. The impending shift to the fall garden had me thinking that, unlike the Latin poet Horace, I was not “building a monument more lasting than bronze” nor would my vegetables nor I escape Libitina. This might have made me sad if I had not remembered the words of Japanese author Motoori Norinaga that “To know the beauty of the passing of things is to discern the power and essence, not just of the moon and the cherry blossoms, but of every single thing existing in this world…”

While I worked, I was Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden, wondering awestruck at some small seedlings unfurling. I was Laura Ingalls Wilder preparing for the impending Dakota winter. I was my grandmother and hers before her and generations yet to come. I was continuing Wendell Berry’s legacy of place and community and innovating like William Kamkwamba who harnessed the wind. I was all of these and more.

Humans are natural storytellers and good literature cultivates this predilection. In fact, so powerful is the force of a well-written story that not only can it resonate with us whether we liked it or not, but it will continue to steer and shape us long after we put it down. This is quite an investment.