This episode of the podcast focuses on what Bible lessons look like in elementary school. You’ll learn how often and for how long Charlotte Mason Bible lessons last at this age, how to teach the lessons, and we will share some of our favorite resources with you.
Listen Now:
Charlotte Mason, Volume 6 (Amazon) (Living Book Press – use code DELECTABLE for 10% off!)
ADE Vol 6, Chapt 10 Reading List
Scripture Journals (ESV and CSB options) on Amazon or here
Bible Art Resources:
- Bible Picture Portfolios
- Bible in Art: New Testament, Richard Muhlberger*
- Bible in Art: Old Testament, Richard Muhllberger*
Bible Atlas Favorites:
Bible: Forms 1-2 Lesson Breakdown
Episode 128: Form 1 Bible Immersion Lesson
*For OOP (out of print) or hard to find texts, try BookFinder.com
Emily
Welcome to A Delectable Education, the podcast that spreads the feast of the Charlotte Mason Method. I’m Emily Kiser and I’m here with…
Liz
…Liz Cottrill…
Nicole
…and Nicole Williams.
Emily
We are working our way slowly through Chapter 10 of Charlotte Mason’s Volume 6 all season long and we invite you to read along with us. The link to our reading schedule is in the show notes.
So last week we started our series on Bible lessons in a Charlotte Mason curriculum and today we’re going to focus in on what those lessons look like in forms one and two, or grades one through six. Elementary school. So Nicole, would you share what portions of the Bible children cover at these ages?
Nicole
Yeah, so in the Old Testament this journey begins in Genesis and it moves forward with selected stories from Exodus, Numbers, Deuteronomy…Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings. And in this chronological sweep of the Old Testament narrative, children then learn about the patriarchs, the exodus, the wilderness, the conquests of Canaan, judges, and the early kings. So they’re really getting a lot of it. The PNEU programs, while they have just very small changes to them, like they stopped at this verse rather than this verse, it really was a set rotation. But we do have a rotation of this that you can access. We’ll link to it in this episode.
Also to note that forms one and two, so that’s six years, families would have to cycle back through again. So this is a three-year rotation for these students and they would go back through again.
Emily
Well, and Old Testament is actually even four, right? And they cycle through.
Liz
So it’s a little different. Four for the old, three for the new.
Nicole
Yeah.
Emily
And with that, not every student is going to begin with Genesis, right? They’re just going to jump into the –
Nicole
Yeah, you have a younger, you know, now your child is in third grade and you have a first grader coming up, they’re just going to jump in where you’re at as long as everybody’s moving forward.
So in the New Testament, these students, Forms 1 and 2, would cover the Synoptic Gospels. So they would have Matthew, Mark, and Luke, along with the first eight chapters of Acts. So it usually was about a year for each one of these – Matthew, and then Mark actually got combined with Acts; it’s short. And then Luke was the next year and then the cycle begins again, so you’re going back through. Nothing is rushed here in these lessons, but the stories are chosen kind of deliberately so not everything is included. There are omissions made which I’m sure you’ll talk about.
So this is from the creation to the early church that the children are using to start their Bible education, getting very familiar with.
Emily
And she specifically said narrative portion. Like, you when we get to those genealogies, we’re not reading those.
Nicole
Right.
Emily
And some of the more very scandalous stories that are included in the Bible are not covered in their Bible lessons for school because the children are narrating them.
Nicole
Right. Right.
Emily
OK, so just before we go on, I just want to remind our listeners, we’ve talked about this in previous episodes, but volume six is not a comprehensive how-to teaching manual that we wish it was, right? And so we are also, as Nicole’s just pulled from, like you’ve been going back looking through the programmes, that’s how we developed our Bible rotation that we put on the website. And so it’s a summary. It’s just not comprehensive. And so there are some details that she doesn’t talk about at all that we’re going to see in the programme. So we need to remember that she is referring her readers of volume six to the programmes. And so that’s what we have done for you.
So I’m going to cover the lesson format. You just gave us the big picture of all of the Bible that they’re going to read in these ages at these form levels. But what do lessons actually look like? Well, Bible lessons are weekly four times a week. She did not do Bible every day. They did two Old Testament and two New Testament lessons each week and they rotate. So we do four out of five days. Charlotte Mason’s students did six days of school and she did Bible on four days but we’ve cut that. And at this age, Bible lessons are 15 minutes long and that includes every part of the lesson that I’m about to share with you.
Also, Bible lessons we see on every timetable that we have, they are the first lesson of the day and that was very intentional on Charlotte Mason’s part. All other parts of the time table would move around. She did math at beginning, math at the end, whatever, but Bible was always first because she thought that that gave the children the idea that the Bible was their most important lesson of the day.
So moving now, so that kind of gives you the framework for the week, but each individual lesson, every lesson, a short passage is read – about 10 to maybe up to 20 verses, but that would be really long. Charlotte Mason in volume one tells us that the passage that we read should cover a whole episode if possible. I know just with my own children reading about Balaam that was a many, many days lesson because we could not get through the whole passage in a single time.
And so each lesson covering that short passage begins with asking the students to recall what the previous lesson was. This is very important. Charlotte Mason talks about it linking the chain to the previous knowledge. We’re pulling that back to our mind and then continuing on. So they really are getting this consecutive knowledge of whatever subject they’re doing at school. So that is the same in Bible.
And then the method really can vary a bit. There is not a system. You don’t have to check every little part off because the passage is going to somewhat dictate what we have to do with it, right? So, Charlotte Mason actually in this part of volume six mentions beginning reading from the commentary where the passage is pictorially treated. If we take that as “always begin every lesson with the commentary”, we’re gonna go, why did she want us to do this? It seems counter to…he’s writing the commentaries that she used, which I’ll share more about in a minute, to the teacher of Sunday schools, right? And this is not even in complete sentences, but I think the key is in that where the passage is pictorially treated. So he is really good at, he’ll say, “close your eyes and picture this” and he’ll give a description of what the setting was or some cultural custom that we would be unfamiliar with. So we’re not reading the whole of the lesson in the commentary, but just those vivid descriptions of setting. And Charlotte Mason in Volume one affirms what I’m interpreting here. She says that occasionally it might be a good idea to read a portion of the lesson. So for some, we just want to have some kind of setup of a lesson to get our children in the framework. Sometimes that could be a map or a picture and it’s not even part of the commentary.
So then the teacher reads the Bible passage, always reading the Old Testament. Sometimes they could read the New Testament for themselves because they’re not skipping verses or whole sections that they might be. But she said it was very important, and this is a habit that we’re going to start with them in these years and they’re going to continue it for themselves for the rest of their education, is the reverent expressive reading of the text because we want to engage them. And so that’s why she would read part of the commentary and set the scene for them so that they’re already imagining what the passage is going to be talking about.
And then the students narrate. And this is the unique thing about Bible lessons. She said in language as close to the Bible text as possible. So we’re training them to deal with the Bible a little differently than their other books they’re going to be doing. Charlotte Mason says, and this is a note from the programmes, it’s on every programme, “in all cases, the Bible text must be read and narrated without interruptions”. So don’t add explanation, don’t do your little sidebars, mom and dad. Don’t ask them questions or anything like that. Don’t let their questions come between the reading and the narration. That has to happen together at this age.
And then at the wrap of the lesson, there’s going to be some discussion. And we want to give the children some new thought of God. So we want to do this…that’s the overall objective, and I’ll talk more about that in a minute. But we’re not preaching at them. We’re not trying to apply this lesson that is so clear in the text to a child who might really need to learn that lesson, right? We want to give them some new thought of God. And those often come from the commentary. And I would say that is the strength he will often bring out. “This is the point to be born in mind” or “impress upon the children this”. And I have been shocked and sometimes I think, that’s dumb, you know? And then that is what gets my child’s attention. And they continually bring that up from there on out. So I think that he truly was gifted and Charlotte Mason did as well.
So the Bible itself should be applying the lesson, the moral lesson to our children, right? We’re not going to be doing that. And if they bring it up and want to discuss it, great. So some discussion at the end. And then in volume one, Charlotte Mason talks about maybe looking at a painter by some masterful artist who is going to give them a reverent idea or just a different picture of it. So that could happen occasionally.
So that’s kind of your pieces, you can see it follows a basic structure, but it’s not something rigid that every single one of those has to happen every time. You do not need a picture every single lesson or whatever.
So as far as our lesson objectives, this kind of goes for the whole subject as well as each lesson. But like I said, new thoughts of God, that is the idea that we want to convey to them. We also want them to gain familiarity with the Bible text and its language. And again, that’s why we require them to narrate in language as close to scripture as possible. We also want to interest our children in the geography, the history, and the customs of the Bible, because that really helps us get a good framework for understanding the context of it. And so this is just a slow, methodical 10 verses, you know, about at a time, a slow chewing on the passage. But again, just like you said, Nicole, it’s not here and there and slip shot and, you know, pick and choose. It is a consecutive, she called it the gradually unfolding picture of scripture, right? The whole narrative.
So as far as teacher prep, my advice to you is be ready for this lesson. First of the day, it’s usually easy to like, okay, it’ll get us off on a good footing. But I find it helpful to read the passage and the commentary ahead of time. And the commentary is for the teacher, but there are times we might read a portion of it to the kids. And so from there, I will know, hey, you know what would really get my child’s attention is to find a map of this. You know, we’re talking forces coming from this side of the valley and from this, they’re meeting and having a battle. Like, let’s get an actual map of what this area is. We’re somewhere on a journey. Let’s show how far it is from Canaan down to Egypt or something like that.
But I think most importantly, we need to be in tune with the divine teacher. And I may need to discuss what my kids have brought up instead of what I had planned for the day. And that often happens, you know, and because we are encouraging them to dig into the Bible and relate to it themselves.
So just to wrap up my portion of this, I wanted to share the resources. So these commentaries are by John Paterson Smyth. Charlotte Mason extols them extensively in I believe all of the volumes that she talks about Bible lessons, one, three and six. And it was from these commentaries that she chose which passages to assign. So when we have on our Bible rotation, the passages from the commentary and then we tell you what passage, or what books of the Bible are covered or chapters, it’s not the whole of those chapters. And it’s in the order that Paterson Smyth, which when you get to the Kings is very different than how we would read the book of the kings in First and Second Samuel.
And so this was what was assigned on the program. And you would have to go through the commentary to figure out which passages you were to read. And that was with the omissions that would be made so that we are not dwelling on the things that they’re age appropriately not able to dwell on or cannot narrate, like genealogies. Yeah, just keep that in mind. So go by this. And so, you have to read this as a teacher ahead of time to know our Bible…well, I’ll talk about that in a minute.
OK, this is something that Charlotte Mason talks about having that would be good for children to own individual books of the Bible bound. She talks about that in volume one. I find it really helpful for me to do my lessons using a scripture journal. So this is just the Gospel of Matthew. And I can mark in here. I can highlight. I can write my notes of what I want to bring out or like remember here’s the map…that is how I prep. I actually write it in here but we just are reading this and it’s nice to keep on my school cart just by itself.
We do have or I have created some Bible picture portfolios that coordinate with Charlotte Mason’s Bible rotation for Forms 1 & 2 and do curate some pictures that go along with the stories that you’ll be reading in a term but you could also use a good, well, here’s a two set or a double set. The Bible in Art, here’s the New Testament and the Old Testament. These are by Richard Muhlberger, I believe. Yes, Richard Muhlberger. But there’s lots of other books like that. And so I will often pull a picture and I make a note of that.
So here is our Bible rotation that we have on our website. You can access this for free and we’ll have a link in the show notes. And that just shows you how much was covered in the term, but again, that was assigned from the Paterson Smyth commentary. And then if you really want some help with your lessons, we have gone through and made Bible lesson breakdowns, which coordinate the passages from the Bible. We break them down. So here’s exactly which verses you’ll read each lesson. And we took those from the commentary and also linked to the chapter. So you can prepare that portion.
And finally, we do, this was, think, our very first product. Schedule cards. We have these for each form level and if you want to know how I know Bible is four times a week for 15 minutes. We have these scaled schedule cards. You just cut them apart and they have a timeline so you know, okay, I haven’t gone over my maximum amount of lesson time for this day and helps you build your own schedule. I encourage people to if you have multiple children print those off in different colored paper for each form just to help you not lose your mind.
Liz
Which we definitely need.
Emily
Yeah, mom you’re gonna talk about some common questions people have.
Liz
Yeah because I can hear them even, you know, through the cyberspace here, you know, and I definitely talk to hundreds of moms every year. So I know some of the common hiccups, trepidations, stumbling blocks that we encounter. And one of them, I think, always with Charlotte Mason, is adding to what she says or taking away from what she says to do.
So I have found over 30 years of doing Charlotte Mason, she was pretty trustworthy. And after all her years of teaching, she knew what could be done in the lesson. But one of the common things I think probably the worst thing we do is just to come to this lesson unprepared. And it does not take very much time to read those 10 or so verses and the little short notes that are in the Paterson Smyth commentary. And it makes all the difference with the children. They know when you’re ready and when you’re not.
And another thing I find is just leaving out that whole discussion that Emily is talking about. It is such a rich time with our children and, you know, to read and narrate is a three or four minute process. You have a good 10 or 12 minutes to have conversations that are going to go into their heart and mind for the rest of their life. So skipping that conversation…I think one of the main reasons people often feel they need to besides being unprepared is simply that “all my children are too young to have any theological questions”. Well, I find that the younger they are, the more theological their questions are. Anyway, I just would encourage you never to skip the discussion time at all.
And another common problem I find is that many times a mom feels that, or even the dad, that the dad should do the Bible lesson, you know, for the school because in the family they generally do the Bible teaching or sometimes they’re even pastors. I think it’s wonderful for dads to teach the lesson, but they should kind of understand what her point for this lesson was. It may be very different from the way you normally would teach a Bible lesson with your children.
And I think one of the biggest issues is reading too much, not following the guidelines of the passages she actually offers. So we ignore the things that she omits and we read way too much content to them.
I don’t know. Can you think of anything else that is just a really common stumbling block here?
Emily
One we brought up last week that I just want to reiterate here that these are Bible lessons for school and it is not replaced by devotional time.
Liz
It’s very different likely from what you do in your family.
Emily
I think the other thing is, if you go to a church with expository preaching and you want to align, well, at home, we’re going to study this because we’re doing this in church and it falls outside of the scope that you laid out, Nicole, of what your children would be covering. I think you’re really messing with the whole picture. And we’ve talked about that in the past few episodes, too. And since that may be wonderful to do for your family reading, please go ahead and do that to prepare yourselves.
Liz
Supplemental to school.
Emily
Yes, I think we wouldn’t deviate from the lessons.
Liz
Another thing that just occurred to me is that we have a tendency to say, you know, this commentary was written by someone of a faith persuasion that isn’t mine. And I just want to encourage you, you know, this is not to give all the commentary information that you would get as an adult. And that his purpose really was to help the teacher to bring some vital things out from the passage that’s under study.
Emily
And that’s what you will see. It is very, he was an Anglican pastor, but Anglicans are known for the middle way. Like they are really kind of middle of the road. But he is not deviating into very doctrinal, denominational issues. It is the big teaching, the big idea of Matthew, the big idea of Luke. Well, he doesn’t do one on Luke, but Mark or whatever it is. And remember, you’re not reading it all to your children. So if there’s something in there you disagree with, great. Don’t talk about that.
Liz
That’s why you read it ahead of time so you don’t get stuck.
Emily
But his little descriptive passages in which he says “the point to bear in mind” or “bring this home to the children,” those are the parts to not miss.
Thank you for joining the conversation today. Next time, we are going to look at Bible lessons for forms three and four, which is grades seven through nine, as students go deeper into the Bible as they mature as persons. We have included links to all of the resources that we mentioned today, along with a podcast episode demonstrating the three of us doing a form one Bible lesson. And for the rest of the season we’re inviting you to read along with us. So that reading schedule I mentioned before is also in the show notes. We hope you do as we continue to spread the feast of the Charlotte Mason Method.