My Little Robins

Loving and Learning in the Nest

Home Education: Choosing Literature for Your Young Child

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While choosing literature for year 1 of homeschool, something stood out to me: Charlotte Mason doesn't exactly address literature in her first volume, Home Education. As I pored over it to make our decisions, I realized that I didn't see any books specifically for the subject of literature. So, this is one of those cases where I had to infer what would make sense to add in. I didn't consult any other sources, for the sake of simplicity, when creating our curriculum for our first year of official homeschooling. (You can read my other posts in this series here.) 

This had me wondering why she left out literature. Maybe she knew that the human soul is so connected to stories that choosing literature worthy of our little ones' hearts and minds would be something mothers would take very seriously, and enjoy immensely. Or, maybe she just didn't want little kids to read literature at all.

Okay, it's most definitely not that last idea!

You can read the other posts in this series here. 

Choosing literature for our Home Education homeschool curriculum.

​Literature

"Therefore, the selection of their first lesson-books is a matter of grave importance,  because it rests with these to give children the idea that knowledge is supremely attractive and that reading is delightful. Once the habit of reading his lesson-book with delight is set up in a child, his education is--not completed, but--ensured; he will go on for himself in spite of the obstructions which school too commonly throws in his way." Home Education, page 

This upcoming school year, my goal is to help Miss H develop the habit of reading, to secure her education. But, in choosing these literature books, I didn't choose easier-to-read books. I included those in the Reading section. I chose books that are known for their literary quality and ideas. 

Even without mentioning literature as a specific subject, there were a few suggestions that I gleaned from this volume. For example, she mentioned fairy tales, so I chose a well-loved collection of them. She also mentioned Shakespeare, and even though, in her reference it overlapped with history, I didn't see why it couldn't overlap with "literature" as well

Other books I chose because they related to a country we'll study, or are books that we've collected (we got a beautiful copy of Five Little Peppers and How They Grew from my grandmother-in-law last year!) 

Related: How to Choose Living Books

Home Education Curriculum: Literature

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Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know by Hamilton Wright Mabie

Shakespeare's Storybook: Folk Tales that Inspired the Bard by Patrick Ryan and James Mayhew (I chose this because I think it will give my young daughter a good background before reading a story from Shakespeare. I imagine that young children 100 years ago weren't so far removed from the language and culture as our children are now!) 

Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb (I'll read one story from the above book, and one Shakespeare story throughout the whole school year, just to give her a taste of Shakespeare.) 

James Herriot's Treasury For Children- James Herriot

The Family Under the Bridge by Natalie Savage Carlson

All of a Kind Family and/or Five Little Peppers and How They Grew (I just haven't decided yet! I am going to pace all of this out this summer and see if one or two books will be enough!) 

The Courage of Sarah Noble by Alice Dalgliesh

How I chose literature for my daughter's year 1 of homeschooling.

Home Education: Reading Lessons and Resources

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The first, and probably most exciting thing when beginning formal lessons, is, for many, reading instruction. In Home Education, as Charlotte Mason lays out her approach to education for 0-9, she also gives a complete, sufficient method for reading. I have written about this approach before, and how it compares to two modern approaches, phonics and whole language, but today I’ll focus solely on the method that she suggested for a child of six or seven. Since many Charlotte Mason families I know teach the alphabet and some beginning phonics through play during the early years, I’ll skip right to the first reading lesson and give you lots of resources for teaching your child.

In this series of posts, I’m digging into Charlotte Mason’s volume, Home Education, to explain how she urged us to teach each subject. It looks much different than many other Charlotte Mason curricula, but I trust that this volume was Holy Spirit inspired, and this curriculum will suffice for my six-year-old. This felt like a lot to me, especially in a season where I will teach a six-year-old and have two very young children to tend to. I’ve put together a booklist that we’re using, which you can download.

My well-loved copy of Home Education.

Reading Words


"But example is better than precept, and more convincing than the soundest reasoning. This is the sort of reading lesson we have in view. Tommy knows his letters by name and sound, but he knows no more. To-day he is to be launched into the very middle of reading, without any 'steps' at all, because reading is neither an art nor a science, and has, probably, no beginning." Home Education, page 217 

Charlotte Mason beautifully described the process, not steps, of reading lessons using a nursery rhyme that had been cut up word by word. You can do this easily with a computer and a printer. Just type out a rhyme, print it, and cut out each word. I've done this for you, as well as wrote out specific lessons, in my reading printable packs. 

An interesting word from the poem is introduced, and the child's interest is sparked. The word is familiar and he wants to know more about it. The parent then instructs the child to write out the word with his set of letters (I prefer wooden letters!) and then identify the word from the little cut-up rhyme. This is repeated with a clause until the child knows several words, sometimes over the course of a few lessons.

Instead of just identifying and building each word, the child is encouraged to really keep the picture in his mind. Allow him some time to concentrate on the shapes and order of the letters. 

Read Home Education, pages 214-218

Reading Sentences

Using the same words from the reading lesson, your child can rearrange them into new sentences. Charlotte Mason used the example: 

I like little *kitty,

Her coat is so warm. 

The child starts by putting a sentence together, finding one word at a time as it is told to him. 

I like little kitty. 

Now he can read a sentence! Then, he can make different sentences based on the words he has recently learned-

Warm little kitty. 

I like her coat. 

Kitty is little. 

*I used a modern word instead of the original. 

The words can also be arranged in columns, so your child can practice reading them at random. 

Read Home Education, pages 218-219

Word Building Lesson

Now that the child can read words as a whole, he can experiment with the smaller sounds. Today, this is often called word building. Using the wooden letters, he can spell a word in the rhyme, such as coat. 

By changing the first letter, he can make several other words. 

Moat

Boat

Float

Read Home Education, pages 219-220


Rhyming Words

After learning so many new words, your child actually knows more than he thinks. On a chalk board or white board, he can write rhyming words that he knows. 

Little

Brittle

Spittle


Reading for Older Children

Once your child has learned how to read, he or she should have practice reading aloud.

"He should have practice, too, in reading aloud, for the most part, in the books he is using for his term's work. These should include a good deal of poetry, to accustom him to the delicate rendering of shades of meaning, and especially to make him aware that words are beautiful in themselves, that they are a source of pleasure, and are worthy of our honour; and that a beautiful word deserves to be beautifully said, with a certain roundness of tone and precision of utterance." Home Education

Therefore, the selection of their first lesson-books is a matter of grave importance, because it rests with these to give children that knowledge is supremely attractive and that reading is delightful. Once the habit of reading his lesson-book with delight is set up in a child, his education is--not completed, but-- ensured, he will go on for himself in spite of the obstructions which school too commonly throws in his way."   Home Education, page 229 

My biggest surprise while creating this curriculum for my daughter is the usage of poetry for reading practice. I previously viewed poetry as a completely isolated subject, but I appreciated that it could also be used to help my new reader grow. 

Home Education Curriculum: Reading

All that to say, these are the things I took into consideration when planning a curriculum based solely off of Home Education. Miss H and I have already addressed those first reading lessons, but this is what he did, and will continue to do, for reading.

First Reading Lessons:

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star lesson

Donkey, Donkey lesson

​Little Robin Redbreast lesson

Continuing Reading Lessons:

Reading Literature, The Primer by Harriette Taylor Treadwell

Reading Literature, The First Reader by Hariette Taylor Treadwell

Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobe

Little Bear by Else Holmlund Minarik

Little Pear by Eleanor Frances Latimore

Favorite Poems Old and New: Selected for Boys and Girls by Helen Farris

Additional Poetry for Practice:

​A Child's Garden of Verses

When We Were Very Young by AA Milne

When We Were Six by AA Milne

I'm thankful that you're joining me as I share our Charlotte Mason curriculum! 


The process of a Charlotte Mason reading lesson is pretty simple to follow. I've set out the process here for you, so you can create your own reading lessons, or to simplify, you can pick up my reading printable packs.

Homeschool Bible Lessons, The Charlotte Mason Way

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Bible lessons: the most important lessons. We've incorporated them into our early years homeschool for several years now, so as we begin formal lessons in the fall, I know that I want this time to feel different for Miss H. I want her to feel the importance of these lessons and that she's being entrusted with something big: real Bible passages instead of Bible storybooks.

I've spent some time poring over Home Education to see what Charlotte Mason's recommendations are for formal lessons. While I am positive that Charlotte Mason had much more to say about Bible lessons in her other writings, I am solely focusing on her fist volume now. You can find the booklist I made based off of Home Education, and other posts in this series, here.

Bible Lessons

"The method of such lessons is very simple. Read aloud to the children a few verses covering if possible, an episode. Read reverently, carefully, and with just expression. Then require the children to narrate what they have listened to as nearly as possible in the words of the Bible." Home Education, page 251

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The quote above is what Charlotte Mason called Method of Bible Lessons. In addition to reading straight from the Bible, she recommended using Bible commentaries for these lessons. She specifically recommended these by Canon Peterson Smyth, although some people immediately reject them because they discuss the possibility of old earth creationism. But, because of the passage below, I decided to seek out a more modern Bible commentary: 

"It is quite well to bring before children, in the course of their Bible readings, whatever new light modern research puts in our way; the more we can help them in this way, the more vivid and real will Bible teaching become to them." Home Education, page 250

I chose the MacArthur Bible Commentary for this reason. 

Charlotte Mason also said that children should know many stories from the Old Testament, and a Gospel or two by the time they are nine. 

"By nine they should have read the simple (and suitable) narrative portions of the Old Testament, and, say, two of the gospels." Home Education, page 248

Because the heart of our faith is in Jesus, I think we will put a little more emphasis on the new Testament, reading an entire Gospel this year. 


Home Education Curriculum: Bible

From the Bible

Genesis

Matthew

Bible Commentary

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible- This was published in the 1600's, so it is definitely not modern!

J Paterson Smyth's Bible Commentaries, available here.

John Macarthur's Bible Commentary- This is the modern commentary that we will use.  We'll from the others as well since they're in the public domain.

Not all of the Bible Commentary will be interesting and appropriate for a six-year-old, but I am personally excited about all that I'll learn through it!  

You can get the complete book list by subscribing above. 

Home Education: A Charlotte Mason Curriculum from Volume One

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For years, I've been eager to start those infamous formal lessons, but as soon as Miss H turned six, I felt myself shrink back a little, like a groundhog from his shadow. I didn't want to let go of these beautiful years, this quiet growing time. And, since I still have two boys who will linger in the early years for much longer, I wasn't sure I wanted an intense curriculum that my little ones would be completely excluded from. So, I spent time praying about our curriculum choices, and do you know what occurred to me? 

Charlotte Mason laid out what formal lessons should look like in Home Education. I don't necessarily need to consult other curricula, I need to consult that volume. I don't need to copy her PNEU school schedules, I need to narrow in on what she said about home education. There are Parents' Review articles, schedules, letters, tributes....there is so much I could pull from. But her first volume is enough for this mom who wants to cherish these little years. 

I spent some time in Charlotte Mason's first volume again, this time paying closer attention to what she said about formal lessons. Using those recommendations, I put together a curriculum for Miss H, one that I think will delight her, and allow her brothers to listen along. 

A friend asked me how I made choices in certain areas, and the answer, every time was, "Based off of Home Education." I didn't consult any other resources, although I will most likely base the schedule off of what I was familiar with as a teacher. 

Some Surprises

A few things surprised me as I set off to make a curriculum from Home Education. Some of these things offered a huge sigh of relief. I am going to go through, topic by topic, in other blog posts, which I will link to below. But for now, here's a quick summary of what surprised me: 

  • Science- I had so often heard that we should wait for science until closer to junior high, but Charlotte Mason recommended reading a science book with children ages 6-9. I know my husband, and Miss H, will be ecstatic about that. 
  • Geography- There's often a debate about whether or not to start with the history of our own country, at least in America, because of America's relative babyhood. But in this volume, she recommended reading about famous people from history rather than chronologically going through an entire nation's history. 
  • Integration- In my mind, I so often viewed all the different subjects of a Charlotte Mason education, but in this volume, she doesn't include so much separation between areas. She mentioned reading Shakespeare for history, literature for geography, poetry for reading lessons, etc. This to me feels like that I didn't need to pick so many books, because the areas will overlap. 
  • "Judicious skipping"- Homeschool moms often look for books that are virtuous and contain nothing offensive, which, because of cultural differences is sometimes hard to do. I appreciated how Charlotte Mason recommended "judicious skipping" when reading some books aloud to young children, because it took the pressure off of picking  a perfect book. It's okay if some of the content is not appropriate for a six-year-old, because we can skim over it instead of sharing it with them. 
  • Copywork- Copywork is mentioned at the age of seven. I always assumed this was a right-off-the-bat sort of thing, since so many consider copywork sufficient for handwriting practice. 


Home Education Curriculum 

With these things in mind, here are the choices that I made for our curriculum. I hope to follow this framework for future years, at least until we have another little one entering into formal lessons. As you've probably gathered by now, I view Charlotte Mason's recommendations as possibilities instead of requirements, so there were a few areas that I had to make adjustments because of book availability and appropriateness. 

Bible

Genesis

Matthew

The MacArthur Bible Commentary by John MacArthur

Reading Practice (We've done some of these already!) 

Charlotte Mason Reading Lessons

Reading Literature- The Primer by Harriette Taylor Treadwell

Reading Literature- The First Reader by Harriette Taylor Treadwell

Frog and Toad Storybook Treasury by Arnold Lobel 

Little Bear be Else Holmlund Minarik

Favorite Poems Old and New: Selected for Boys and Girls by Helen Ferris

Little Pear by Eleanor Frances Latimore

Literature

Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know by Hamilton Wright Mabie

Shakespeare's Storybook: Folk Tales that Inspired the Bard by Patrick Ryan and James Mayhew

James Herriot's Treasury For Children- James Herriot

The Family Under the Bridge by Natalie Savage Carlson

All of a Kind Family and/or Five Little Peppers and How They Grew (I just haven't decided yet! I am going to pace all of this out this summer and see if one or two books will be enough!) 

The Courage of Sarah Noble by Alice Dalgliesh

Handwriting

Books 1 and 2 from The Good and the Beautiful

Math

Singapore Math (US Edition)

MEP Math (we'll supplement our math curriculum with this as a teacher friend warned me that Singapore Math lacks a little in building number sense)

History

Pocahontas by Ingri and Edgar D'Aulaire  

The Book of the Indians by Holling C Holling (beware that some of the newer reproductions had major issues. I found an old version.) 

Squanto, Friend of the Pilgrims by Clyde Robert Bulla

Benjamin Franklin by Ingri and Edgar D'Aulaire

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin (with the "judicious skipping" that Charlotte Mason mentioned!) 

Possible Free Read: Sacajawea by Joseph Bruchac

Natural Philosophy

The Sciences by Edward S Holden (astronomy and meteorology) 

Star Stories for Little Folks by Gertrude Chandler Warner

Geography

Baedeker's Travel Guide, China (with judicious skipping) 

Baedeker's Travel Guide, France

​French at A Glance (Phrase book and Traveler's Aid)

Art

(No book has been chosen for this- although we may add one, or we may use Simply Charlotte Mason's art portfolios.) 

Mary Cassatt 

Benjamin West

Recitation

Charlotte Mason listed a handful of poems that children can memorize, but we will choose poems from our poetry book. 

Grammar

Although Charlotte Mason gave some simple grammar lesson suggestions, we will just include grammar by-the-way. CM recommended learning basic grammar concepts like noun, verb, and complete sentences at this age. 

Foreign Language

Talkbox Mom, French (Similar to Gouin's series, where whole, relevant phrases are taught.) You can use the referral code REFVH6Y7G4ITQ for $15 off. 



Surprisingly Not Mentioned in Home Education

Formal lessons for these areas aren't described, but will be added to our morning time. 

Music- Music is mentioned in the part about the early years. It should fill the atmosphere with ideas. But, there are no recommendations for how to teach it outright. So, we will use this book, The Story of the Orchestra, to guide our listening. 

Poetry- As I mentioned above, poetry is not part of her recommendations as a distinct area of learning. Instead, it is used for reading lessons. I imagine that if there are specific poems that fit in with other areas of learning, we will include them 🙂 

Purpose

I put this curriculum together not to be as Charlotte Mason as possible, but to fulfill the need I often find within me to figure things out on my own, so that we are doing something that truly fits our family's unique needs. 

If this curriculum fits your family's needs, I hope that you'll use it and enjoy it. You can print off a free booklist by subscribing above. 

I hope you'll read more about the recommendations in each subject as I continue this series!

Bible

Reading

Literature

Handwriting

Math

History

Natural Philosophy (Science)

Geography

Art and Music

Recitation and Narration

Foreign Language

(There are a few other areas that she briefly touched on. I'll include these in a follow up post!) 


A Charlotte Mason curriculum for children 6-9 years old, based off of Charlotte Mason's recommendations in Home Education

April Instagram Giveaway

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I’m so thankful for this group of bloggers that I’ve gotten to know along the way! We’re joining together to offer a great giveaway that will be active on Instagram from April 2 through April 8th. Here’s what you can find in this giveaway:

I've used affiliate links to share some of these products with you

Rooted Childhood April Collection- You've probably seen me post crafts and recipes that we've made thanks to Rooted Childhood. We LOVE using this in our early years homeschool! Meghann from Rooted Childhood will send one lucky winner a digital download of Rooted Childhood's April collection. 

Born to be Wild Book- Megan from Schoolnest is giving a paperback copy of this awesome book, packed with free outdoor ideas for children. Because of shipping costs, all entrants will need to be located in the US 🙂 

Online Nature Book Club- If you want to encourage a love of nature and of literature, Hide the Chocolate's Nature Book Clubs will do just that! The winner of this giveaway will get to choose a nature book club of their choice. (The House at Pooh Corner would be great for little ones!) 

Butterfly Life Cycle Nature Printables- Tatiana from The Musings Of Mom has these beautiful nature printables that she will send to the winner. 

Planner- The Musings of Mom is also including a Charlotte Mason planner to this great collection of items! 

My Little Robins Shop Credit- $15 in shop credit will be given to the winner. You can choose items for your early years homeschool, or for older children! 

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