Public education is erasing America's future by killing the Christian beliefs that inspire parenthood.

Children's Crusade: The folly of hoping your kids 'Christianize' public school

The year is 1212. You’re standing on board a ship that’s taking you to Jerusalem. At least you hope it is. You’re exhausted and hungry. You’ve already watched half of your friends and companions die along the way. You’re not really sure any more if this is a good idea, but you still believe in the cause that brought you here — retaking the Holy Land. You are 8 years old.

The Children’s Crusade may not have taken place exactly in 1212, but it did happen in the early 1200s. It’s a common myth that it was an official crusade — the Holy See never authorized it. Rather, it was an attempt by desperate Christian parents to retake the Holy Land from what they saw as godless heathens.

It’s the job of parents to try to control their children’s rate of exposure to ideas that will challenge their fledgling beliefs, while also being diligent about their spiritual formation. You cannot do that if you send your children to public school.

Another Children’s Crusade is happening in public schools today and every day, and it’s being championed by Christianity Today.

Self-congratulatory nonsense

In a recent article, theology editor Stefani McDade encourages Christian parents to consider sending their children to the dangerous heathen lands controlled by the U.S. Department of Education.

“Our daughter is just a toddler, so she’s not in school yet, and it’s possible something in the next few years will lead us to change our minds. But, for now, my husband and I have decided to send her to public school,” McDade writes.

What a load of self-congratulatory nonsense. It’s hilarious that McDade doesn’t have school-age children but is telling you how to navigate your child’s education. Her article is a classic case of thinking you know everything about parenting when you haven’t experienced the majority of it. We’re all perfect parents until we actually have children and reality slaps us in the face.

A mother I know once told me that as your kids age, so do the problems. I have found this to be absolutely true.

McDade tries to muster some authority by recounting her own school years, detailing the variety of schooling options she experienced as a child. She laments how awkward she felt transferring from homeschool in Florida to a Washington state public middle school. “Most of my time in middle school was spent figuring out how to fit in,” McDade wrote. Who didn’t feel awkward during those formative years, much less when you move from one coast to another?

Schools have changed

“While researching this piece, I asked my parents how they had made their schooling decisions each time they moved," McDade writes. "They said they’d weighed the quality of available education against the influence of the local atmosphere — pretty much as most parents do. And it wasn’t until I was approaching high school, they said, that warnings against the 'dangers' of public education really started to influence their Christian circles."

I appreciate the thought her parents put into each stage of her education, but that was 20 years ago. In the intervening time, schools, especially public schools, have gone to hell in a handbasket.

The lions' den

All you have to do is open TikTok, X, or Facebook, and within a matter of minutes you'll see a barrage of videos and posts that tell you what things are really like in the public school system:

Teachers record themselves discussing openly how they plan to sway children from their families.
Teachers proudly displaying their array of flags — BLM, LGBTQ, trans, you name it. And not an American flag in sight.
Chaos in school hallways and classrooms.
Children being assaulted on public school buses.

And what happens to these out-of-control children? Even if they’re sent to administration, likely nothing. They might even return to class with a snack. I taught public school for 13 years. I have stories.

And in the meantime, where are the Christian kids in all of this? Where are the videos of the Christian kids standing up and converting the nonbelievers? I haven’t seen any.

Salt and light?

I don’t doubt the power of God to use all things for our good, but I do doubt the judgment of any Christian parents who continue to subject their children to this kind of environment because they feel like their kids will be the salt and light in the situation. That is putting a burden on children they are not spiritually ready to bear.

Most adults wouldn’t know how to respond to these kinds of situations. And let’s be honest, if this were happening between grown people, the instigator probably wouldn’t be punished either. If you don’t believe me, look up how many violent criminals get a slap on the hand and are sent back into society.

It’s a fool's errand to think that our Christian children can turn the tide of our culture on their own. Christian adults aren’t even fighting the good fight inside their churches.

In a climate in which pastors recite the “the Sparkle Creed” — a blasphemous LGBTQIABBQ spin on the ancient Nicene Creed — wear Planned Parenthood stoles on Sunday, and speculate that Jesus would gladly walk women into their abortion appointments, I’m not sure active hatred of Christians is even necessary any more. The call is coming from inside the house.

Christians in denial

McDade proposes that “recent research has shown that vitriol toward religion generally and Christians specifically has significantly declined over the last decade or so.” I doubt this, given that the Biden-Harris administration is locking up old ladies for praying in abortion clinics and Clara Jefferey of Mother Jones just had a public meltdown because a flight attendant wished her a “blessed" night.

Bless her heart. My fellow Southerners know what I mean.

McDade says she wants her child to experience challenges to her faith while she is still at home and McDade and her husband can “guide her through the pitfalls of our fallen world.”

OK, but your child won’t be at home. Your child will be at school, and unless you also work there and plan to sit in the classroom with the child like a creeper all day, you are assuming the child will come home and tell you everything.

I can tell you from experience that this is not the case. Our oldest child was having some mild problems at our Christian homeschool co-op last year, and by the time he finally told us about it, he was already done and didn’t want to go back. You cannot send your children anywhere and then assume you’ll hear every detail about it at home so that you and your child can have a therapy session.

And if you do, you’d better be prepared — you may have to talk about some things way sooner than you really care to. My hairstylist told me a story of her daughter going to kindergarten here in rural Tennessee and within weeks coming home to ask this question: “Mommy, what’s a lesbian?” I don’t know about you, but I think kindergarten is a little too young to be talking about sexual preferences.

Homeschooled does not equal 'sheltered'

If you think that the way I parent sounds like a sheltered existence, I have another news flash for you: Homeschool children ARE exposed to the world. The world is way more invasive now than ever. You only have to turn on the television for five minutes and children will be exposed to many alternative lifestyles.

I remember a few years ago watching "The Voice" at my parents’ house when a contestant came on stage with pink hair and an androgynous look. My then-7-year-old son asked, “Mommy, is that a man or a woman?” After some gentle back-and-forth, we changed the channel.

How many risque commercials have you seen in the last week? HIV drugs get advertised during prime watching hours. How many inappropriate YouTube commercials have you seen while watching videos with your child? And have you seen any music videos lately? Innocuous activities have been invaded by the endless sexualization of our culture.

There are good people in the public school system. I spent 13 years working in it, and for most of my former colleagues, I have nothing but good things to say. However, when you sign up to work in or attend the public schools, you have to remember that it is a system.

The classroom does not belong to the teacher or to the students who enter its doors. It’s a cog in the machine that is the American education system, and you only have to spend a few minutes on social media to see that machine doesn’t work well.

And if John Taylor Gatto is right, that’s by design. In his works "Dumbing Us Down" and "Weapons of Mass Instruction," Gatto explains that what seems like malfunction to the rest of us is actually intentional.

Duty to resist

Christian or not, if you’re a parent, you have to decide if you’re OK with your kids becoming fodder for a machine that produces an intentionally terrible product. But especially for Christian parents, do not delude yourself that your children are going to change the system. As Jim Rohn says, “You're the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”

In a recent interview with Tucker Carlson, Robert Kennedy Jr. said, “We all have a duty to resist in whatever way is going to be most effective in resisting the tyranny.” If you’re interested in standing up against the machine, homeschooling is the best way that you as parents can resist.

I’m going to keep resisting the tyranny. You should consider it too, Stefani McDade.

6 ways I find balance as a homeschooling mom

On a typical Saturday morning, I’m sitting at my kitchen table surrounded by our school books and planning our upcoming week. To an outsider, I might need to seek help for a book addiction. Such is the life of a classical, Charlotte Mason educator. There are a lot of books.

Planning our days, prioritizing what needs to be done and when is something that gives me great joy — now.

I hate being asked about socialization. It assumes that my children live in a cave, 50 miles from any other human besides their immediate family.

It has taken a while to get here, though. Finding a rhythm to the school part of our days, balancing school work with the rest of running a home, and knowing when we all need to take a break and go do something social has taken a few years to systematize. It’s also taken a major adjustment of my own priorities, which was painful but necessary for our success as a homeschooling family.

A wise person once told me that you can’t plant a seed, then go uncover it every day to see how it’s progressing and expect any kind of success. In other words, when you play the long game, it takes a tremendous amount of faith to believe that what you are doing is actually working, even when you aren’t seeing immediate results.

To increase your faith in your abilities as a homeschooler, you need a plan.

Here’s what works for our family and for me as a person.

Prioritize school time

You have to make school time a priority or your kids won’t.

If you want your children to feel a sense of rhythm to their days, you need to set the tone. This is not to say they’ll gleefully go along with everything all the time, but they’ll know that the expectation is firm. When the time for school comes, and you call everyone to order, they’ll know that you mean it.

Some moms do this by playing a certain song that signals school is beginning. I don’t have a special song, but my kids do know that at 8:30 every morning, they can expect me to call them to our kitchen table for school time.

In order for your kids to be ready, you have to be ready yourself and know what the plan is. You need to know what you’re covering that day.

I use a free online planning software called Planboard from chalk.com. I plan one week at a time for my 5th grade and kindergarten students. I have plenty of toddler-friendly activities for my 3-year-old who listens to all the stories but isn’t yet old enough to have her own assigned activities. There are certain toys that only get played with during school time. They are in a specific location in our house, and we rotate through them as the day progresses.

Having set plans for the day lets my children know that I am serious about the expectation that school is happening and that we have goals to accomplish. I keep my lessons short and age appropriate for each child. I push them when they are being lazy, but I also know the signs of them being done for the day. If I’ve overplanned, which does happen sometimes, we can add that to the next day. I leave some wiggle room in the schedule for just such occasions.

Don’t try to do everything at once

We live in a world that glorifies multitasking. For many people, it’s become a way of life to try and do four or five things at once. I think this is a dangerous practice that leads to anxiety and poor outcomes.

As a mom, teacher, and homemaker, I know how overwhelming it can be to have dishes in the sink that need attention, a bill that needs to be paid, and a roast that needs to go in the crockpot, all while you’re trying to read Aesop’s Fables to your kids.

The solution to this is simple. Be present where you are. The dishes in the sink will be fine until school time is finished. If it’s time to fold laundry, then fold the laundry and don’t worry about the math lesson you didn’t finish. Don’t overburden yourself or your children by dividing your attention between multiple activities at once.

If you get out behind and there are home things that really need your attention, then take care of them before you start school. Starting school a few minutes later than the time you set isn’t the end of the world.

Involve your child

It’s tempting to underestimate children. We want to make sure the lessons are really sinking in, and therefore, we end up doing the academic heavy lifting. This is wrong. You can’t actually learn something for your child. You have to let them do that for themselves. Set your expectations accordingly.

One area that I have struggled with in this regard is reading. I suspect my oldest child is dyslexic, so learning to read has been an arduous process.

Until recently, I was doing too many of the readings during school time. As a result, my son was becoming disengaged. He couldn’t remember anything for a narration after reading.

I decided over the summer that for the current school year, we would try something new. I bought two copies of each of our books for the year, one for each of us. He follows along while I read, and then he takes his own turn. There has been an instant turn around in his ability to tell me what he learned after each reading, and he is taking charge by just opening the books and starting to read without me even asking him.

Learning doesn’t just involve books, either. Involve your children in the process of keeping a clean home. Give them chores to do. They need practical life skills, and while they may grumble, they need a sense of purpose and feeling like they are part of the family “team.” This is as educational as any academic subject and one of the greatest benefits to homeschooling.

Balance social time with school time

I hate being asked about socialization. It assumes that my children live in a cave, 50 miles from any other human besides their immediate family.

But there is a small, small kernel of truth to consider in that dreaded conversation: How will your child have opportunities to play with other children?

Homeschool co-ops are groups that meet once or twice a week to provide a variety of activities for homeschool families. Some are academic, while others are mainly enrichment. They come in all sizes and varieties, and more are forming all the time. We live in rural Tennessee, and there are at least five different co-op groups within driving distance of us. I would bet that there are some near you, too. Facebook is the best place to find these groups.

Local libraries often have homeschool meetups as well. The library in our town hosts a weekly game day and a LEGO group.

Our church has an abundance of homeschool families, and there’s a weekly activity at church for those families. If your church has a lot of homeschool families, this is a great opportunity for you to secure play time for your kids.

Don’t sign up for everything

A word of caution, though. I could have my kids in an outside-the-home activity every day if I wanted to do that. This is not what I want for us, though. We are in a period of change this year, having two children officially enrolled in school, and because of this, we have stepped away from the co-op we were involved in for the last five years.

It was not an easy decision, but it was the right thing to do for us. I was feeling stretched too thin because one entire day of the week was taken up by the co-op. If you are finding yourself frayed by the commitments you have outside of your house, do not hesitate to step away. You owe it to yourself and your kids to learn how to recognize when you are doing too much.

Know your long-term goals

The goal of education, for me, is not to make sure my kids know everything by the time they are grown but rather that they know how to learn something, and they don’t hate the process of learning. I want my children to be autonomous, sovereign citizens and lifelong learners. I want them all to know how to run a house, think for themselves, and love God. If I can accomplish that, then I will consider my life well-lived.

Should Christians send their children to public school? Christianity Today says ‘yes’

As public schools have rapidly become infested with left-wing propaganda, more families are choosing to homeschool or go the private route.

Christianity Today argues that this is the wrong decision, as a recently published article argues for putting kids in public schools in order to provide spiritual “strength training” for kids.

“We’ve got someone telling you that public school is totally fine who doesn’t even have their kids in public school,” Allie Beth Stuckey of “Relatable” comments. “You don’t have a firm grasp on what’s going on in the public school system.”

Even in red states and fairly conservative suburbs, parents are finding themselves faced with gender ideology and social justice in their schools.

However, the author of the article in Christianity Today claims that more important than your children’s day-to-day education is taking your child to church regularly.

“Even if it is true that church is more important than the school you go to, I don’t think there’s anyone denying that. So right off the bat we’ve got a straw man there. I don’t think anyone is saying that your child’s school is determinant of their salvation or is the driving factor of their sanctification,” Stuckey argues.

“Church might be more important, what happens at home might be more important, but that doesn’t make your education not important,” she continues.

The article references a study that also appears to refute its own claims.

“Homeschoolers are 51% more likely than public school children to frequently attend religious services into their young adulthood. Students at religious schools had a higher likelihood of frequent religious service attendance, becoming a registered voter, and fewer lifetime sexual partners than public school students,” Stuckey says.

“So she really brushes over the conclusions of the very study that she bases her argument on for sending your kids to public school,” she continues.

The author also argues that she would rather her child have the worldly experiences that public school can offer while the child is under her own roof.

“Your child can still have worldly experiences, can still encounter worldly secular arguments under your roof without being inundated by these arguments for eight hours a day, five days a week, for thirteen years of her life,” Stuckey says, adding, “That is a lot of propaganda.”

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

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7 essential tips for homeschooling kids 5 and under

“Every youth should know something of the flowers of the field, the birds of the air, the stars in their courses.” —Charlotte Mason

There is no greater period of brain growth than the first five years of life. If you’ve decided to educate at home, you may be wondering how to support your children during this magical age. What subjects do you need to teach? How quickly should you pace lessons? Which metrics do you need to hit?

Children are born persons with the capacity for both good or bad, and Charlotte Mason believed it’s up to the parents to help them with the necessary habits to be the best version of themselves.

Don’t recreate public school at home

You may be tempted to follow along with your state’s public school standards, but first, ask yourself this question: If you’ve have unplugged from the system, why would you use the system's guidelines? That’s just recreating public school at home.

Early childhood education has become a race to see how fast a child can learn to read, write essays, and do complicated math problems, often pushing them into tasks that they’re not yet developmentally ready for.

In the last five years of educating at home, I’ve found that learning happens in a much more natural way if children are given the framework for that to happen. With my littlest two children, I haven’t given any formal lessons on things like colors or shapes, and they both knew all of them somewhere between the ages of two and three.

So what do we do, then, exactly? Here it is in a nutshell: We play. We read. We go outside. I use what is around us with minimal supplementation to help my children develop a good foundation for later learning.

Teach reading with low effort, high impact

For reading, I start with the alphabet song and simple flashcards. The set we have probably came from the Dollar Tree many years ago. I show them to my kids and say the letter name. They repeat it. We make games out of it. Then we try to spot letters in the wild.

We recently went to Hobby Lobby, and upon arrival, Stone, my 5-year-old, said “Look, Mom, it’s a whole bunch of B's.” Betsy, my 3-year-old, chimed in, “Yep, that’s B for Betsy.”

I asked Stone if he saw anything else he recognized, and he did. He knew H because that’s the first letter of his older brother’s first name, something he has picked up from watching my lessons with him.

These are low-effort, high-impact ways of working toward mastery of letters before beginning mastery of sounds and words. For those ready to learn to read, I highly recommend taking an Orton-Gillingham approach to reading, such as "All About Reading" or "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons."

Teach math by starting without workbooks

Math is even easier. Learning to count and basic foundations for later math don't require textbooks or workbooks for the earliest years.

Does your kid have a mountain of stuffed animals? Use them for counting lessons.
Do you cook at home? Get your kids in the kitchen with you.
Does your family spend a lot of time outside? Count rocks, sticks, and frogs.

If you find the idea of depending on your own math skills intimidating, I have found the book "Preschool Math at Home"by Kate Snow very helpful for organizing my own thoughts on how to introduce math concepts. The manual is strictly for the parent and gives suggestions of activities that introduce core math ideas in a systematic way. It’s the precursor to the aptly named series "Math with Confidence" — something I desperately need when it comes to teaching anything math-related. If you’re naturally good at math, you may be able to give your children a good foundation on your own.

Wait on writing

Writing is something that will come in time and does not have to be mastered right away, in my opinion. Children’s hands are not capable of holding a pencil correctly, or for very long, until they are older; some experts say as late as 7 years old.

In the meantime, do things that will develop their hand muscles:

Play with playdough.
Paint and color using larger brushes and crayons.
Place beads onto a string.

Anything that works on fine motor skills will be beneficial when your child is finally ready to use a pencil.

Spend time outdoors

Beyond this, since we use the Charlotte Mason approach to learning, I would suggest spending as much time outside as possible. It’s remarkable the powers of observation children will develop when they are connected to nature. My kids regularly go outside and come back with tales of “Mom! Guess what I saw!” We have had in-depth conversations about an ant. They’ve tried to convince me to take in a box turtle. For this year, we’ve adopted a particular tree in our yard, and we are going to catalog its changes through the seasons.

Train habits

Children are born persons with the capacity for both good or bad, and Charlotte Mason believed it’s up to the parents to help them with the necessary habits to be the best version of themselves.

Habit training usually takes the form of identifying a habit that needs addressing and taking concrete steps to steep your child in that habit so that it becomes second nature. Many Charlotte Mason educators say that the first three habits to address are:

Attention
Obedience
Truthfulness

These can all be addressed while in play. The game Simon Says is a fan favorite over here, and it teaches attention and obedience. For truthfulness, play games that require exact facts and retelling, like Telephone.

Read living books

The last recommendation I have is to spend time with quality “living books.” If you’re unsure where to start, my kids love the Beatrix Potter books. The middle child is currently on a steady diet of "The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin" at least once a day. You also cannot go wrong with the original Winnie-the-Pooh stories by A.A. Milne or anything written by Paul Galdone, Barbara Cooney, or Robert McCloskey. "Frog and Toad" may be a show on Apple TV now, but my kids still think the books are superior.

If you need more for all age groups, you can’t go wrong with John Senior’s “1,000 Good Books.”

If you’re interested in learning more about nature study, habit training, and the Charlotte Mason way, I suggest reading Charlotte Mason’s "A Philosophy of Education," or you can find an adapted and more modern version in "A Thinking Love: Studies from Charlotte Mason’s Home Education" by Karen Glass. In the meantime, be encouraged that you are capable of teaching your own children. No one in the world knows them or loves them better than you, and that is enough.

Homeschooling: The Charlotte Mason way

NOTE: This is part 2 of my guide to homeschooling. For part 1, see here.

Things I observed in over a decade of teaching in public high school:

Kids learning something, taking a test, and promptly forgetting it.
Students leaving high school proudly declaring that they’ll never again read a book.
Children spending eight hours a day learning in a series of rooms, sitting in rows, surrounded by strangers, whose home lives and influences you have no idea about or control over.

There are structures above teachers they cannot hope to influence or control, and if the government says, 'You will teach underwater basket weaving four hours per day in every grade or we will cut your funding by half,' then guess what everyone will be learning next year?

Sounds pretty awful, doesn’t it? Because it is. It’s also the reality of public schooling today. I fancied myself to be different from other teachers in that I didn’t just open a textbook and start teaching on page one. I tried to tailor my teaching to the abilities of my students as best I could. I incorporated real-world experience as often as possible. I took them outside whenever I could find a reason to go.

But it didn’t matter, because the reality is, it doesn’t matter what a teacher’s personal philosophy of education is. There are structures above teachers they cannot hope to influence or control, and if the government says, “You will teach underwater basket weaving four hours per day in every grade or we will cut your funding by half,” then guess what everyone will be learning next year?

There’s a better way to learn. It’s more natural, and it is what I believe most people would gravitate toward if left to their own devices.

Who is Charlotte Mason?

Charlotte Mason is a name that means a lot to some people and is completely unknown to others. I have taken to calling her the godmother of homeschooling when I talk about her. To say that Charlotte Mason’s ideas changed our family profoundly is a great understatement. So who the heck is she?

Charlotte Mason was a British educator and philosopher who lived at the turn of the 20th century. Her educational philosophy literally spans six volumes of writing, but you don’t have to read all six volumes, because her method comes naturally.

Looking back on the most profound educational moments of my life, I see Charlotte Mason’s reflection in them all. I studied history in college, and most of my classes were round-table discussions of books we had all read ahead of time. We were, in fact, narrating — a core concept in a Charlotte Mason education.

The Charlotte Mason method

Charlotte believed that education is “the science of relations” and “an atmosphere, a discipline, and a life.” She also believed that children are “born persons” and are worthy of the respect and responsibility due to them as such. So what does that look like in practical terms?

First, you do not water things down. You do, however, provide age-appropriate-sized “bites” of whatever is being studied. You spread a wide “feast” of knowledge. Art, music, math, foreign language, Shakespeare, Plutarch, history, geography ... all of these are key components of a Charlotte Mason education.

Lessons are, however, kept short and use living books instead of dry, boring textbooks. Learning revolves around experience and narration — written or oral retelling of what one read or observed.

My 9-year-old has read Shakespeare this school year but only three plays, never all in one sitting, and sometimes using puppets to keep the characters straight.

Charlotte emphasized time in nature as integral to a successful education. Children were not expected to understand nature simply by reading about it. Children needed to go out and look at what the world is doing on a day-to-day basis.

In our family, my sons go outside and then they come in and tell me all about their adventures, like how the plants are changing or animals they saw. I try to go with them on longer walks about once a week, but I also encourage them to go out on their own.

Eventually, I will start having the oldest keep a nature journal, either physical or digital, but for now, I am loving his narration of the seasons and the small day-to-day changes he notices.

I know we are fortunate to live in a rural setting with plenty of nature available to us, but I have read many mothers' accounts of doing nature study at a local park, in their tiny back yard with a single plant in a flower pot, or using their apartment building’s rooftop as a place for a garden. It is doable, even though it might be different for your family.

Charlotte Mason encouraged children to be outside in all types of weather, but she also lived in Ambleside, England, where it was never 100 degrees with 100% humidity, either. So no, we don’t implement that part with 100% fidelity in our house, because our family circumstances are different, and I am a huge weenie who cannot tolerate heat.

Habit training is also a key part of a Charlotte Mason education. Charlotte Mason understood that children are not being raised, men and women are. Believing they are born persons, it is important to help children form good habits early because habits are being formed every day, whether for good or bad. This idea makes parenting more proactive, instead of reactive.

I am still very much a student of habit training, but that’s one of the most beautiful parts of a Charlotte Mason education: Mom gets to learn new things, too.

When we began homeschooling, I started looking for ways to bring all of the elements that I felt public school was lacking into our days. I wanted art and music and orderliness and nature to be a part of what my children experienced. At the time, I had no idea who Charlotte Mason was. Through a series of divinely inspired events, I do now.

The changes I have seen in my children, and in our life as a family, have been profound. My boys go outside and re-enact the Battle of Hastings, or they’ll come traipsing through the house pretending to be Robin Hood and Prince John. My baby daughter is so in love with books that we read 20 a day sometimes, and they are mostly all quality stories that inspire the imagination and uplift the spirit. My husband and I have reignited our own passion for reading. We have all discovered classic literature that we likely never would have read had we not chosen the Charlotte Mason path for our family.

You may be thinking this sounds like a lot of fairy-tale nonsense. Like I’m some sort of Snow White, cleaning my house with forest animals and teaching wide-eyed children who are always rapt with wonder. When you’re still thinking in the “public school way,” Charlotte Mason’s ideas will sound completely alien and perhaps unattainable.

But underneath that, I know what you’re thinking. Because every good parent understandably wants a quality education for his or her child, you’re wondering when we actually “learn.” The answer is: all the time. Learning happens every single day.

It happens in ways you will not see coming when you start. And you won’t have to manufacture it. You will present real, quality materials and experiences to your children, and they will tell you how they have put it together for themselves. It will be meaningful in ways that textbook learning just inherently is not. Think about the books you love. Unless you are profoundly weird, I would bet money that the books you love most are not textbooks.

If that doesn’t convince you, then think about what you want the long term to look like. To quote one of my favorite podcasters Tyler Mahan Coe, “There’s a difference between handing someone a $20 bill and handing them a treasure map.”

Charlotte Mason Resources

Charlotte Mason’s way is a treasure map — her methods will give your child the tools and desire for lifelong learning. If this sounds at all like what you want for your family, here are some resources to help you get started.

Curriculum choices

This is not a complete list but enough to give you some ideas:

Ambleside Online (This is the curriculum we use, though with our own timetable.)
Mater Amablis (Catholic-flavored Charlotte Mason)
Simply Charlotte Mason (I am currently reading through all of the "Laying Down the Rails" materials. I need help habit training two headstrong little boys and a little girl who is bent on world domination.)
A Gentle Feast
Beautiful Feet Books
The Alveary

Podcasts

"The New Mason Jar"
"Simply Charlotte Mason"
"A Delectable Education"
"Modern Miss Mason"
"The Charlotte Mason Show" (Season 7, episode 6 is a particularly good interview with Leah Boden.)

Books

"Modern Miss Mason" by Leah Boden (This one is a particularly good place to start, I think.)
"Know and Tell: The Art of Narration" by Karen Glass
"For the Children’s Sake" by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay
"Mere Motherhood" by Cindy Rollins
"Mother Culture" by Karen Andreola
"A Charlotte Mason Companion" by Karen Andreola
"A Charlotte Mason Education" by Catherine Levison
"More Charlotte Mason Education" by Catherine Levison
Charlotte Mason’s six volumes (But don’t try to read these straight through. It’s a LOT.)

A version of this essay first appeared on the Unprepared.life.

Want to homeschool? Read this first

My road to becoming a homeschooling mother was weird. I loved public school. After college, I taught at the high school I graduated from, and I was deeply involved in school life.

Josh and I got married and had our first son five years into my education career, and in my mind, he would just go to public school. I imagined that he would love learning and books as much as Josh and I had. If you’re a parent, you’re probably laughing right now.

Do not try to recreate public school at home! It does not take eight hours a day of desk work to educate your child. Most states only require a few hours of instruction every day.

As we approached school age, I knew in my gut that I wanted my children to be educated at home. After we made the commitment to homeschool, I am sure that the people who knew me at the time thought that either I had been brainwashed or I was going insane.

You may be feeling the call too and asking yourself, “Now what?”

While my former profession does help in some regards, do not feel like you need to run out and get an education degree to teach your child. You don’t. Here’s what you do need to know to get started, though.

How do I homeschool without going to jail?

First things first: legal stuff. You must know what the laws are in your state, both to comply with the law and so you’ll know when someone is asking more of you than is legally required.

That sounds intimidating, but you have help. The Home School Legal Defense Association is an invaluable resource, and it offers a simplified, state-by-state breakdown of homeschooling laws. Pay close attention to details and deadlines. You cannot be too careful in this area.

In many states, your only option is to register as a homeschooling family with your local school board, and you will be responsible for supplying whatever documentation the school board requires, including curriculum choices, medical records, and grades.

Here in Tennessee, we have an option called an “umbrella school.” You register your child with the umbrella school just as you would with a private school, but most umbrella schools don’t offer any classes. Instead, for a nominal annual fee, the umbrella school helps you handle the paperwork. We go through Aaron Academy (Taylor Swift is an alumna). Another option in Tennessee is the Farm School.

Look for similar options in your state, as they’re well worth the money. We pay Aaron Academy $80 per year, and the only paperwork we have to submit is grades at the end of every semester.

How do I choose a curriculum?

After legally registering with your state, then you have to choose the curriculum you’ll use to teach your children. Coming from the public school side of the fence, I thought I had a pretty good idea of how many curriculum options there are in the world. I was so wrong. Prepare for overload, as there are thousands of curriculum options.

Cathy Duffy is an invaluable source of information about various curriculum options, and I would have been lost without this in the early days of our homeschool journey.

Some of the most popular homeschool curricula:

Many of these are Christian-themed since most homeschoolers are Christian. While we’re Christians, we don’t use these — we follow a road less traveled. We’ll discuss that in a future post. But secular curricula aren’t difficult to find.

The upside is that you can hand-select the curriculum for each subject to meet your child’s needs. Be aware that some states are particular about curricula, so again, dig into the details. Thankfully, neither the state of Tennessee nor Aaron Academy care much about what curricula we use, so we’re free to choose what we want.

The downside is that you can waste a lot of money on an expensive curriculum only to discover that your child doesn’t respond to it at all. For example, we did Saxon math for three months when our son was in first grade. He hated it, so we switched to Singapore math.

Many homeschoolers have this problem, which is why curriculum fairs exist. Homeschoolers meet up to buy, sell, and trade curricula. They’re a great option to browse, preview, and buy at a discount, if money is tight or you want to sample a few things before settling on what works best.

This, to me, is one of the most incredible parts of homeschooling. I can change what I need to when I need to. If you try a curriculum and don’t like it, as long as it’s not a no-no with your state, ditch it and try again.

How do I fill up a school day?

Do not try to recreate public school at home! It does not take eight hours a day of desk work to educate your child. Most states only require a few hours of instruction every day.

Yes, we sit down and do formal lessons almost every day. But learning also happens all the time in organic ways. Going to the grocery store, for example, is a math lesson, a reading lesson, and sometimes a sociology lesson all in one.

But my kids won’t be socialized!

We hear this all the time from skeptical friends, family members, and online lurkers, but it’s nonsense. My kids go everywhere with me. They’re learning how to interact with everyone in the world — all ages and types. This is also the appropriate response to the questions about “socialization” that your grandmother will inevitably ask.

In fact, I argue that homeschooled children get better socialization than kids in public school. Children in public schools spend their entire day around ... other kids. Who would you rather be rubbing off on your kids: other kids or mature adults?

Not to brag, but everywhere we go, we get compliments on how well-behaved our children are. That always takes my husband and me by surprise because we don’t see them as particularly well-behaved. Part of that is that we enforce standards with our kids, but the other part is that they’re around adults much more than children, so they tend to act more like adults than kids.

Will my homeschool kids get to play with other kids AND how do I teach things I don’t know?

Thankfully, both of these questions have the same answer.

You don’t have to do it all. Look for classes to outsource what you can’t do at home. I cannot draw a straight line with a ruler, so we drive once a week for an art class at a museum. I can teach my kids piano and a few other instruments, but I can’t give them the experience of singing in a choir at home. We are a homeschool family, but we aren’t the von Trapps.

This is where homeschool co-ops — often called “tutorials” — come into play.

Once a week, I take the kids to a school run and operated by the parents of the children who attend. It is held at a large church, so there is a lot of space for different activities. The kids get choir, physical education, a literature class that I wish I could be a student in because the teacher is so creative, and a science class taught by a former engineer.

Homeschool co-ops are a great way to make friends, but they vary in cost and availability, so seek out what’s in your budget and available in your area. Ours costs about $80 per month per child — cheap for a private school — and I offset that cost by teaching a theater class.

Social media is a great way to connect with other folks in your area who are already plugged into the network and can give you more information on what’s out there to fill the gaps. If these types of things just aren’t a possibility for your family, YouTube also has a ton of educational materials and lessons. One great example is John Muir Laws’ drawing lessons, which are absolutely phenomenal for older children and parents too.

What about sports?

Sports are one of the reasons why I hear parents say they won’t pull their kids from traditional school, even if they would like to. Depending on where you are, some states allow homeschooled children to participate in public school sports.

Sometimes, individual districts are free to decide if homeschoolers can try out for the local public school sports teams.

Our homeschool co-op offers team sports: boys’ basketball, girls’ volleyball, and soccer for both sexes. The teams compete against other co-ops and a few private schools. It works much like public school team sports.

There are also recreational leagues and travel teams that can take the place of a traditional school team — if you have the time for them. Our oldest son plays Little League baseball but has also dabbled in recreational league soccer and Junior Pro basketball. In the spring, he’s taking horseback riding lessons, and after Little League is over, he’s taking taekwondo. He has no lack of sports options.

One kid at our homeschool co-op received a full baseball scholarship to college, and he only played travel baseball. If sports are important to your child, there are ways to make it happen.

Also big in the homeschool world are conventions where homeschooled kids meet up for various competitions in academics, arts, and athletics. Our oldest recently attended his first junior convention, where he competed in:

100-yard dash
Basketball
Choir
Chess
Photography
Soccer kick

He also could have competed in metalworking, woodworking, poetry, recitation, and a host of other things.

Thanks to homeschooling and overall resourcefulness, we’re able to give our children the sort of well-rounded education usually available only to the wealthy.

Where do I go for help?

You need a mentor to guide you and help you avoid burnout.

Find people near you with experience who are willing to let you pick their brains and let you ask all the ultra-specific questions you will inevitably have. The umbrella school we use, Aaron Academy, has a whole room full of fairy godmothers who are always able to answer my questions.

Check social media for parent meetings in your area. Find a support network for you and for your family. Make friends with other homeschool families in your area.

Having a group of people who understand the life you’re living and can offer an ear or help you celebrate a win is vital to your mental health. Because your non-homeschool friends and family often won’t know how (or even want) to support you.

There are also lots of ways to connect online. One of my favorite Facebook groups is called Mere Motherhood — it’s a group of mothers who ask questions, get support with issues, and laugh at the silly things our kids do. It’s wonderful and one of the only reasons I still have a Facebook account.