3 Things that Worked for Us

Basics to Our Home Education
By Amy Barr

My youngest of three children graduates from college in a few months. If you hang out with all three of my adult kids, you’ll find they are funny, reliable, and capable human beings with broad interests and firm opinions about restaurants. This officially qualifies me to offer some advice about homeschooling because my job as their personal educator is now complete. I’ve moved into an advisory role now.

I’ll now present with limited ado and a mild allotment of sarcasm, 3 things that were effective in the home education of my own children. Certainly, some will disagree with my wizened words while others will nod vigorously in union. Maybe these things will work for you too. Simply discard the rest. No need to email and complain.
I decided I would educate my children at home before I even had an interest in having children. When I was in college, I worked at a special collection library for education majors. I’ll save the specifics for my memoirs but, suffice it to say my experience was slightly traumatizing and my life was changed forever: I would never trust my (yet non-existent) child’s education to anyone else but myself and my (as of yet) undetermined spouse! Most people don’t have that lightning bolt moment to spur them on, but I did. The main benefit to this early decision was that I could start to build plans for how I might best educate a young mind. Here are three things. I have lots more where these came from.

Start with the End in Mind

This was easy for me because I had strong opinions about how my own education had gone (not that great up to that point) plus I had interests in how people learn best. My children hadn’t been born yet but I identified several goals that were important. Your list might be quite different. Here is a short list of what I wanted for my children:

• to enjoy reading good books (plus have time to do so)
• to have the chance for creativity
• to be prepared for anything academic, even if they didn’t choose college
• to be able to express themselves well in a variety of circumstances
• to have a good grasp of the practical skills necessary to make life pleasant

While each of these goals deserves more attention than a list in this blog, I’ll start with academic preparedness which took a very specific form for our family because mom and dad were ourselves in the very academic field of Classical philology (Greek & Latin), archaeology, and ancient history. I wanted my children to write well, communicate confidently, manage research analytically, and—above all--know how to learn for themselves without helplessly waiting to be taught. Sharing their parents’ interests in old Greek and Roman things wasn’t even on the table. That’s good because none of them were interested.
If given the opportunity, time, and means, children will excel at things that interest them. Offer as many tools (and seeds) as possible to keep that garden of subjects and interests growing for them. Enjoyment is robbed from learning when only the transcript matters. Some of that is unavoidable as students mature and form goals. It is difficult to flourish when education is nothing more than a chore list. The beauty of home education reveals itself when we can offset academic duties with subjects that our students genuinely enjoy.   
One of my favorite bloggers (Homeschool Libertarian) once said, “The idea that a child reaches cognitive milestones at a predictable age is damaging. Books that give lists of what children should know and when they should know it should be approached with the caution usually reserved for eating pufferfish or cobra wrangling.”  
Truer words were never spoken. The worst damage is done by well-meaning educators trying to convey perceived benefits by lock-stepping a child’s education through arbitrary academic steps before (or after) they are ready for that material. Learning happens best in leaps and lags, peaks and valleys. Don’t sweat the details because you aren’t accomplishing their education in the narrow confines of a single academic year. An education will happen but via the ebb and flow of many years. Their isn't meant to be a heart pounding sprint. They aren’t in an exhausting marathon either. Education is more like a hike along the Appalachian trail with flat paths, steep rock climbs, a few nice cold waterfalls, and a few long breathers when the view is good.

Have Them Read Real Books and Lots of Them

My children all had to learn sentence diagramming, writing, spelling, and all the other details that educators categorize as language arts. Some of that was done more formally than other parts but we carefully avoided those graded readers, that pablum that publishers insist elementary readers must endure before they are ever allowed to read real literature. We just went right into real literature as soon as we’d gotten through the basics.
My kids were given or selected for themselves stacks of books that interested them. If the book that looked good to them was a bit difficult for their “reading level” (whatever that is), no problem! What spurred them on to grow their vocabulary and broaden their interests was decoding a fantastic plot line written by writers who knew their craft well. When an older sibling held court at dinner talking about a new book series, the younger sibling might be keen to try it or go a different direction, just as a point of pride. Today, few high school graduates have read even a single literary work cover to cover. Simply keeping a love of reading alive through childhood and into the teen years is two-thirds of the battle won. Do whatever it takes to foster that love of reading.       

Allow Them to Have an Acceptable Form of Procrastination

One of many fatal flaws in the modern academic system is the belief that we can shove absolutely everyone through an identical education yet still expect them, at age 18, to have unique strengths and opinions about what they’d like to do when they grow up.
I had only three to educate and they couldn’t be more different. My oldest was compelled to draw. My youngest was attracted to all things musical. My middle child wavered between architecture, cooking, chess, and figuring out puzzles. Since both mom and dad worked from home, we’d take turns sweeping through the house to find out how daily academic progress was going for everyone. The tacit agreement was that our artist was allowed to procrastinate with a bit of art before we could get her to focus on something else (I just kept buying stacks of sketchbooks). Our musician needed to pound out on the piano whatever piece he was learning before he could settle down and think serious thoughts (he was very keen on playing during the time allotted to algebra). Our middle child needed a spot of time on Minecraft or Rollercoaster Tycoon and then he could work his way through the next school project quickly enough.     
Today my eldest is a senior graphic designer and illustrator. My youngest is training to be a sound engineer and already enjoys working with state-of-the art equipment and big-name professional groups on stage. My middle child, who easily grew bored with puzzles once they were solved, is finishing his studies as a physical therapist (humans are unsolvable puzzles). We are happy that we always gave them the room to explore their own interests, even if a more conventional approach would have just called it procrastination.

100

The Lukeion Project in Retrospect

By Amy Barr of The Lukeion Project

This is our 100^th Sassy Peripatetic Blog! Sassy Peri began September 21, 2018, after a full decade (likely more) of people pestering us about starting a blog. Of course, we knew we should start a blog, but for the first five years of The Lukeion Project, we hadn’t worked out how to get a full night’s sleep much less how to add anything new to our workload. It took us another 5 years to catch up. Many of you may not know our story, so gather around. This is the abbreviated version.

The idea of The Lukeion Project was hatched toward the end of 2005 by two Classical archaeologists, namely me and Regan Barr, as we painted our daughter’s bedroom (pink and purple, if you must know). We had settled into very mundane lives after over a decade in the archaeological field, digging at places like ancient Troy. A financial crisis forced us to get creative about our future. As crises almost always do, we were given the chance to return to our roots, namely our passion for dead languages, Classical history, archaeology, and Classical literature. We wanted to teach they way we wish we had been taught. We wanted to take our students seriously.

When we began our small venture, we had to pick a name. We had no intention of becoming a full school or academy offering a comprehensive curriculum to all ages. We were well skilled in Latin, Greek, and related fields but had no intention of adding things like art, sports, and science nor did we have the patience of saints necessary to teach all ages.

As everyone should, we turned to Aristotle for answers. His philosophical hangout in Athens was known in Latin as The Lyceum. In Greek – as Aristotle would have used—it was called Λύκειον (Lukeion). Aristotle established his school in Athens in part of the temple to Apollo in 335 BC (he worked with what was available). He lectured there, led his students on walk-abouts (thus their name Peripatetics), and established the first European library in history. He had always been a book collector and then his student, Alexander the Great, helped by sending him crates of scrolls and copies of important works as gifts to his former tutor.

The word Project in our name was chosen because we didn’t want people thinking we were a full school nor an academy since our courses were meant to supplement the curriculum of our primary audience, home educated students working at the high school level.

When we first began classes in the spring of 2006 there was only one other online program out there. Most of their classes were still conducted by correspondence but a few had gotten high tech like our classes. This meant we were the first of our kind. Every big flashy online program that we see at conferences today first talked to us way back then about what we were doing and said, “hey, that’s a good idea.”

When we first went to homeschool conventions to spread the word about our classes, we spent half our time explaining what an online class was. Terms like webinar were not commonly understood. Words like blog, vlog, and podcast were still in the formative stages. The wizardry of having students synchronously join us online, hearing, and seeing material as we taught was also virtually unknown at the start. Our first online learning platform was for business meetings. It often had as much as a 7-second delay making online discussions a bit tricky. Such technology has now become so mundane that even 10-year-olds get irritable if our internet gets crackly or because we don’t let them play with the video filters in class.

In 2012 we successfully cajoled our archaeological colleague Dr. Sue Fisher to join us as she expanded our Latin program and then expanded our Classical literature offerings with her Muse series. Since then, we’ve added Prof. Baty (literature including AP/writing/rhetoric), and then Dr. Johnson (logic and more) who stepped in right after the sudden tragic passing of Dr. Haggard (logic/philosophy). Prof. Powell came on board last year to expand our Latin program further. Regan Barr (beloved teacher of Witty Wordsmith/Barbarian Diagrammarian) also directs our 8 years of Classical Greek plus Greek history, and Philosophy. I (Amy Barr) direct the large Latin program (also 8 years and expanding) plus Roman History.

The Lukeion Project has offered semester classes since 2006. As we now begin our 17^th year, we have had over 3000 (close to 4000) students, 100 blogs, hundreds of semester courses, and at least a thousand workshops. We’ll never win awards for fame nor size, neither breadth of influence nor endowments. We’ve labored to keep standards high (despite direst pressure to drop them low) and to keep tuitions low (despite direst need to increase them). We work without the safety net of government support nor impressive private capital. Our few faculty and staff are dedicated, humble, and talented beyond measure. there will never be enough thanks nor money to truly pay them.

Our rewards are less earthly and more eternal. Like Aristotle getting gifts from Alexander the Great, our former Lukeion students send back crates of greatness. Their lives have now spread into the stars at NASA, into the lights of Broadway or Carnegie Hall, into the classrooms of Ivy League schools, into excavations, laboratories, and libraries as doctors, lawyers, writers, scholars, linguists, dancers, artists, and (perhaps best) as moms and dads who delight in educating their own children whom we hope to teach—in turn—in the years to come.

The poet Horace (Odes 3.30) expressed our hope most fittingly in 23 BC:

exegi monumentum aere perennius

regalique situ pyramidum altius,

quod non imber edax, non Aquilo inpotens

possit diruere…

I have built a monument more lasting than bronze,

higher than the Pyramids’ regal structures,

that no consuming rain, nor wild north wind

 can destroy… 

For the Love of Literature:

Why Spend an Entire Semester on Tolkien?

By Randee Baty with The Lukeion Project

This spring, the Lukeion Project will be offering an entire semester on the literature of J.R.R. Tolkien. There's still time to register. Many of our students enjoy Tolkien as their fun, leisure reading, and some may wonder
whether his work deserves time spent in academic study. Will prospective colleges take that high school english credit seriously? Over 30 prominent colleges and university in the United States, including Rice, Rutgers, Purdue, Villanova, the University of Chicago, Harvard, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill all think it deserves enough study to either give Tolkien’s writings a complete course of their own or have made them a prominent part of classes on either epic literature or medieval literature. Many others have had seminars or workshops on his writing, and many of those are at the graduate level. The University of Texas at Austin and Cal State, Northridge have given class time and study to this prominent author. Oxford University, Tolkien’s long time scholarly home, offers all types of classes on the writing of Tolkien.

When literature teachers talk about why we study literature, we mention ideas such as “universal truths,” “studying the human condition,” beauty of the language,” and “enduring effects on the reader.”  We can talk about themes, aesthetic qualities, symbolism, and characterization. We discuss how literature can put us in the shoes of people we will never meet, take us to places we can never go, and gives us both sympathy and empathy for others. The list of what great literature brings us is almost endless, and all of these can be found and studied in Tolkien’s writings without doubt. But they can be found in other authors also, so why does Tolkien merit this type of study? Here are my ideas on that subject.

J.R.R. Tolkien was not just a author of extraordinary fiction, but a preeminent literary scholar and critic. His essay “The Monsters and the Critics” changed the direction of studies and criticism on Beowulf for scholars ever since its publication. Seamus Haney, the former Poet Laureate of Ireland, praised his scholarship on Beowulf and other scholars have called his work “the most important article ever written about the poem.” His study of Beowulf strongly influenced The Hobbit as well as his other writings. Beowulf is a standard text for any college literature class because it is the first epic we have in English, and Tolkien’s study and scholarship on the poem are worth studying.

Tolkien’s own areas of study included Philology (Greek and Latin), Old English, Middle English, Norse Mythology, Medieval Literature, Anglo-Saxon Culture and Literature, and several others. Philology was his main interest and his strong scholarship in this area permeates all the writings he published. In studying Tolkien, we are given access to one of the finest minds in the development of languages that has ever published. 

In the course of his studies, Tolkien, along with E.V. Gordon, translated Sir Gawain and the Green Knight from Middle English. His translation is the most well-known and used translation of that Medieval Classic. He also began The Fall of Arthur, a Arthurian legend written in alliterative form, using Old English meter and based on Medieval legends. 

In studying the work of Tolkien, students are exposed to elements of all the interests Tolkien studies throughout his long and distinguished academic career. This includes the history of the Ango-Saxon culture as many of his creations, such as the Riders of Rohan, are based on Anglo-Saxon history and society, and the mythologies of many different countries, not just the Norse mythology that he was known to have loved. Germanic myths and legends also figure prominently. 

While many fan publications exist over the writings of Tolkien, a scholarly, peer-reviewed journal is also published. Tolkien Studies, published by the University of West Virginia Press has been publication since 2004. 

Students spending a semester with Tolkien will have the opportunity to analyze poetry, do close readings on narrative passages, delve into independent research on such topics as portrayals of Anglo-Saxon culture in Tolkien’s writings, and write character analyses. They may write word studies, comparative literature papers, or philosophical essays. The possibilities are endless, and the work can be rigorous while still being appealing for students.

If you are looking for an English or literature class that is highly academic while fun and engaging, think about a semester of Tolkien studies. 

“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you
don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”

Do You Need Latin Before Learning Greek?

By Regan Barr with The Lukeion Project

At a recent homeschool conference, we were approached by a mother whose daughter desperately wanted to take Classical Greek. Another exhibitor had told her that she shouldn’t take Greek until she’d had several years of Latin. The daughter was devastated! She wanted to read Greek literature, not Roman!

The cynical side of me believes that this poor advice came from someone trying to sell a Latin curriculum, but perhaps there are those who truly believe that all languages start with the study of Latin. It’s certainly true that the study of any romance language will profit from a healthy understanding of Latin grammar, syntax, vocabulary, and morphology, but Latin is in not a prerequisite for the study of Classical Greek. Here are some reasons why your student doesn’t need Latin to start Greek:

Chronologically, Greek is attested much earlier than Latin and is therefore not derived from it. The earliest written Greek, Mycenaean Linear B, dates to around 1450 BC. It used a combination of syllabic and pictorial characters rather than the Greek alphabet used from the Archaic period until the present. In 1952, Michael Ventris and John Chadwick deciphered this script and demonstrated conclusively that Linear B was truly Greek. In comparison, the earliest known Latin inscription, the Praeneste Fibula, is from about 650 BC, 800 years later. This inscription on a piece of jewelry simply records the name of the craftsman and the name of the owner. The Iliad and Odyssey were produced a century before this earliest known Latin inscription.

Greek uses a different alphabet than our own, and that is not necessarily a bad thing. If you or your student were the ones pouring over Tolkien appendices and learning to write in Dwarven runes, Greek could be right up your alley! Just as the strange alphabet can be intimidating to some, it can be intriguing to others. When Greece was plunged into its Dark Age at the end of the Mycenaean period, writing and the Linear B characters that went with it were forgotten, but the language continued to be spoken. Written Greek would reemerge in the Archaic period using phonetic characters borrowed from the Phoenician alphabet that are still used in Greek today. Homer and Hesiod wrote in this re-invented alphabet, and many students today enjoy the novelty of it.

Latin and Greek are both highly inflected languages: word forms change to reflect the role they play in a sentence. In this regard, however, Greek is no more confounding than Latin. In fact, Greek has fewer declensions and cases, and roughly the same number of tenses (discounting the rare future perfect in Greek). Studying either Classical language will connect new synapses in a student’s brain and force new logic into their thinking.

Never discount passion and motivation! A student who yearns to learn something should not be discouraged without good reason. Just as some students long to read Julius Caesar, Cicero, and Ovid in the original language, others yearn to read Euripides, Aristotle, and the New Testament. Passion and desire are half the battle in education; don’t throw that away! We’ve all been forced to sit in a classroom that held no interest to us; don’t force students out of a classroom they really want to be in.

Both Classical languages are equally respected on a high school transcript and each will help you in picking up the other. Once a student understands inflection, cases, morphology, etc., picking up the next language becomes a bit easier. We’re often asked if students should study both languages at the same time. Why not?? Our advice is for the student to begin with the one that intrigues them most, and after a year they can dive into the other one. Chances are good that they won’t need quite as much time to pick up the second one.

In short, if your student has a craving for ancient Greek, feed that craving! It will open a world of exciting and important literature to them, from history and drama to philosophy and faith.

Learn the Rules and Tools for Good Academic Writing

Focus, Development, Organization, Sources, Technique, Editing

 By Randee Baty at The Lukeion Project

    “My teacher just doesn’t like my writing style!” I remember my daughter coming home from college with this complaint about her English professor.

    Most writing instructors and professors don’t care about style, at least not as students think about "writing style.” Those that evaluate student writing for a living have fairly objective criteria for judging a student’s work, whether it is creative, academic, or any other type of writing. Parents and students alike can learn to apply the same criteria to any writing project to see if something is objectively well-written or poorly written.

    Writing instructors, at least the kind most likely to help build strong student writing skills, typically use rubrics to grade writing. If they don’t use a rubric, they have some sort of checklist that keeps them focused on objectively analyzing student writing. Our rubric for research writing at The Lukeion Project has six criteria: focus, development, organization, use of sources, technique, and editing. These guideposts provide clear goals for students to meet without worrying whether the instructor “likes” their “style” or even agrees with their conclusions!

Focus

    The paper should relentlessly focus on the prompt given. For instance, if a student is asked to analyze Moby-Dick, they are not being asked for a biography of Herman Melville. That is extraneous information unless something in Moby-Dick specifically relates to the author’s life. Then the student would need to give enough information to relate those elements together, but not more. Analyze the prompt, know what you are being asked, and don’t stray away from the prompt as you devise your answer. If you do, the instructor will deduct points because of a lack of focus. Well-written papers are focused.

Development   

    Whatever point the writer wishes to make requires evidence or analytical reasoning to back it up. Unsupported statements or claims will not fly in academic writing. If a student says that Julius Caesar was an ambitious leader on his way to becoming a tyrant, he must provide plenty of evidence to support his conclusion. The student can’t, like Brutus and Cassius, simply make guesses about Caesar’s plans. Students should give examples of his behavior and use analysis of his behavior and accomplishments to make their point. Vague thoughts or feelings won’t work. It’s all about evidence and analysis. Whether or not the instructor agrees with conclusions does not matter in the paper’s grade as long as the writer has strong support and evidence to back up the argument. Well-written papers have evidence and analysis to support the author’s point.

Organization

    A good paper will have proper essay structure, paragraph structure, and reasonable progression through the argument being made. The essay needs to begin with an introduction that ends in a thesis statement. Well-developed body paragraphs must follow with relevant evidence. Evidence and analysis must relate back to the thesis statement without getting off track. The conclusion should tie all the evidence together and answer the “so what?” test (your readers should never wonder “so what?” after reading your work).

    Paragraphs should begin with a topic sentence, and everything in that paragraph must relate to that topic sentence. One point of the student’s argument must logically follow the previous point. If a student argues that settling Mars is too expensive for NASA to consider, she shouldn’t follow that conclusion by listing the benefits of settling Mars. Simply following logical thought-progressions will go a long way to improve a good analytical project. Check through the paper to ensure it progresses in an organized manner toward the conclusion. Well-written papers are organized and flow from one point to the next.

Excellent Sources

  Use sources appropriate to the paper. Always use them in a way that enhances the argument rather than hijacking it. Always cite the sources are appropriately. Appropriate sources offer credibility to the written project, but students struggle to understand what sources trustworthy and which ones are best left out. For example, some hobbyist’s blog or opinion piece won’t offer much credibility but a source written by a person with a proven academic track record as an expert in the topic will be best for a good academic assignment. Check the credentials of the writer so you are only using the best and most reliable expert sources. If you can’t tell who the author is or find out that author’s background in that subject area, don’t use that source! 

Works that are older than about 25 years should be used with caution on many academic topics to avoid using out-of-date information. Only use an older source if you can verify that that source is foundational and formative for an understanding of your subject matter. If you aren’t aware how much more we’ve come to know about most subjects over the last 25 years, you are the perfect candidate to avoid all older academic sources! In that span of time, we’ve gone from email being new and optional to vast libraries of data being accessible at every laptop in mere seconds after a few keystrokes. Most 16-year-old writers can’t appreciate what data-accessibility has done to change the shape of research in the last two decades. Parents, here’s where you get to entertain your student with stories about life before technology!   

Once you accumulate several reliable researchers in your subject matter, don’t let those sources replace the point that you want to make. Quoting extensively from a biography on J.R.R. Tolkien must never replace the argument you were supposed to be making on the influences of Finnish authors on The Lord of the Rings. Quotations or information from any source must enhance what the student has already observed from their reading of Tolkien. Don’t let one (or two or three) sources hijack a paper. An author must always do her own analysis. Too many quotations turn the paper into a wiki rather than an academic research paper and will show the instructor that you are more focused on hitting the word-count rather than examining and analyzing relevant information.  

Part of using sources well is mastering how to cite sources well. Citing your sources is a foundational principle in academic writing but it strikes fear in the heart of student and parent alike primarily due to a lack of experience with citation. The good news is this: methods for citing are set. Students should learn either MLA or APA formatting as early as possible during late middle school and high school. MLA is the most used formatting method in the humanities and by most colleges. Various resources are available to help students learn these methods but writing that doesn’t cite sources will be graded very harshly. Good writing uses sources must support rather than hijack an argument and all sources must be cited whether they are being quoted or employed to supply any relevant data.

Technique

There are several essential writing conventions that young authors must learn, master, and employ evermore. These are the basic rules of academic writing. These techniques are fairly different from casual writing (like this blog) or creative composition. Being aware of these academic writing laws show that the student writer comprehends the task well and is writing skillfully.  These are things that can be objectively graded because good writing uses the techniques expected when one scholar writes to another. Here are a few of the biggies on the list of academic writing laws:

• Always write in third person (he, she, it, they) with no first (I, we) or second person (you) ever appearing in any academic writing.
• Keep writing concise. Use no unnecessary words such as “very,” “interestingly,” “in conclusion,” “furthermore,” or “really.” In fact, simply eliminate 95% of your modifiers and intensifiers. They always clutter and conceal rather than enhance. You might arrive at your word count faster by including them, but your work will be judged more harshly.
• Remove all slang, cliches, or casual language. There’s plenty of room in casual and creative writing for these things. They don’t belong in academic writing.
• Keep the writing in an academic tone while you avoid sounding pompous or pretentious.
• Use the shortest word that fits the sentence rather than the longest word (use “use” rather than utilize “utilize.”). The reader should be able to read without stumbling over difficult constructions or long rambling sentences with too many clauses.

Proofreading

         Employ proper spelling, punctuation, and grammar always. Use proper formatting according to MLA, APA, or whatever format the instructor requires (and remember that everything in a paper is formatted). Edit your work several times before handing it off to somebody else to read. If you really want to catch all errors, have that person read your work out loud to you. No matter how many times you edit your work by reading it silently to yourself, an objective reader will always find areas that need work.

         As you can read, nothing here says anything about “style” per se. Grading for academic work is clear-cut and nothing is subjective or based on mood, whim, or personality. If you get a lower-than-preferred score, it is because one or more of these areas are lacking, not because the instructor dislikes your style. By focusing on these aspects, you’ll be able to objectively help your student--or help yourself--become a better writer.