By Carrie Eben, Guest Author Hospitality might not be the first word for many to describe a posture of teaching. My first understanding of the word hospitality was limited to the act of entertaining guests, and if this is one’s only understanding of the word then a negative response is warranted—the role of the teacher is not to entertain her students. However, this is not … Continue reading Teaching as Hospitality
By Christine Norvell, Guest Author I confess. I have asked students to make revisions to their essays. In fact, I may have casually said, “You just have some light revision work,” or “This needs heavy revision.” It sounds flippant to my ears now. Trite. But those comments all beg the same question—what does it really mean to revise our writing? One of my former students … Continue reading Re-Visioning Our Writing
By Albert Cheng, Guest Author Albert Cheng is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Education Reform in the College of Education and Health Professions at the University of Arkansas, where he teaches courses in education policy and philosophy. He is the director of the Classical Education Research Lab, where he conducts research on the effects of classical education on character formation. He is a Senior Fellow at … Continue reading You Should Teach Poetry: Science Demonstrates It
In his collection of poetry on loss and lament, Poet-Priest Malcolm Guite offers the following comparison of the use of a Drone in some forms of music to the experience of Loss in our lives. He says, “[“Drone” is] the word that describes that continuous repetitive sound we hear in some early forms of music, especially the Gaelic lament. The drone of the bagpipe grounds … Continue reading In Assigning Seniors Somber Sonnets
Hello friends! It’s been a while since we have posted articles on here, especially with any frequency, and we wanted to reach out and give you an update. We apologize for the long silence, but we backed off for some good reasons. Why the limited content for two years? COVID-19 had a significant impact on us personally, forcing us into a heavier administrative load at … Continue reading An Update from The Classical Thistle
Most of us in the Midwest found ourselves hiding indoors from winter weather this week. While we curled up beside families and fireplaces, the snow just kept falling. City maintenance trucks rounded our neighborhood repeatedly like cars on a racetrack, but to no avail. With temperatures hovering in the single digits and teens, there was little opportunity for melting, and the snow kept us home … Continue reading Waiting for the Sun
How Do You Plant a Student by Streams of Water? I stand silently near the corner of a third-floor foyer, staring aimlessly out the window. It’s early in the week, only Tuesday, but already my heart is heavy, my mind is overworked, and my body is wearied—I’m fatigued in spirit. I’m praying for peace, for some semblance of sanity in the chaos that is a … Continue reading How Do You Plant a Student by Streams of Water?
One of the foundational aspects of classical Christian education is our commitment to reading the Great Books. But many students, despite an increasing number of them growing up in classical Christian schools, find the jump from what they read in the earlier grades to the Great Books themselves to be a difficult and daunting task. How do we help them take this next step in … Continue reading Four Questions for Reading the Great Books
The first I heard of the potential of someone carrying around a letter from their employer stating that they are “Essential” to the operation of their organization, I thought to myself, “Well, aren’t they special?” Over the past number of weeks, due to COVID-19, companies and organizations have sought to justify their operation (and potential existence) as being “Essential” to the operation of society. From … Continue reading Are you an “Essential Worker”?
Unhurried Wonder By Nathan Carr, The Academy of Classical Christian Studies A favorite scene in the Gospels: “Then he (Jesus) rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. He began by saying to them, ‘Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing’” (Luke 4:20-21). Followed by: “All the people … Continue reading Unhurried Wonder
It’s far easier to wax eloquent about the goals of a classical education than to put those ideas into practice. I find this to be especially true when it comes to art education for children. While idyllic scenes of young children sitting quietly around great masterpieces of art and somehow magically absorbing an appreciation for all things creative sounds wonderful to me, I doubt it’s … Continue reading Fine Art for Children
Illumination and The Mechanical Arts (St. Bonaventure, On the Reduction of the Arts to Theology, Part 7) Sections 11-14 In section 11, Bonaventure moves on from sense knowledge to show how divine wisdom likewise illumines the mechanical arts. Bonaventure compares the mechanical arts to sense knowledge because both deal with the generation and incarnation of the Word, the pattern of human life, and the union … Continue reading Illumination and The Mechanical Arts (St. Bonaventure, On the Reduction of the Arts to Theology, Part 7)
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