What do high school history lessons look like in the Charlotte Mason Method? How do these lessons prepare the students for the rest of their lives? In today’s podcast we are discussing these questions and more to help you give your high schoolers a wide feast of history.
Listen Now:
Charlotte Mason, Volume 6 (Amazon) (Living Book Press – use code DELECTABLE for 10% off!)
ADE Vol 6, Chapt 10 Reading List
History of the American People by Paul Johnson
Land of Hope by Wilfred McClay
From Dawn to Decadence by Jacques Barzun
Story of Mankind by Hendrik van Loon
Edith Hamilton’s Ancient History books:
Book of Centuries at Riverbend Press
Century Charts at Riverbend Press (includes free download option)
Calendar of Events (monthly planner at Juniper Grover)
Episode 112: Notebooks and Paperwork, Part 2
(includes notes on History Tools and keeping track of the chronology rotation)
Video Explaining History Rotations
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
And today we reach the upper end of history lessons. These are forms four through six or high school or ninth through 12th grade, the end of our education before we pursue secondary education. So Nicole, would you remind us of what the scope of lessons is at this age?
Nicole
Sure. History continues to expand, becoming both broader and more deeply integrated with the rest of the curriculum at this stage. Students are reading a lot of history per term at this point, and they’re using more advanced texts described by Miss Mason as “somewhat stiffer” than those used in earlier forms. These books, they remain literary and engaging, but they now demand more of the students reasoning and interpretation skills. At this level, students are typically beginning to make mature connections across subjects.
Instead of studying just one neighboring country now, one change is that students in Form 4, so 9th grade, explore contemporary European history. So that marks the natural extension of what began in Form 2, offering a fuller picture of global events at this point.
Liz
And when you say contemporary, you mean contemporary with the American stream.
Nicole
Yeah, that runs parallel to their own study of their national history.
Liz
There’s just sometimes confusion about that. Thanks.
Nicole
Yeah. The goal is to help students see that their own country’s history is just one thread in a greater fabric of world history. So now we have three established streams, that started earlier, the national, the neighboring, but that is now the broader European and ancient history. Ancient history continues in these upper forms, but it’s now more of a survey. There’s less time spent in the details, but students do still gain a solid grasp of the key movements, the cultures, and the figures that shape the ancient world.
So the current events that were introduced in Form 3 also continue in these years, but at this stage, the connection between the past and the present becomes even more important. And boy, I experienced this with my own kids. As Miss Mason wrote, “this course of historical reading is valued exceedingly by young people as affording a knowledge of the past that bears upon and illuminates the present.” The present matters deeply to the students at this age and this type of study prepares them to become thoughtful and informed citizens. In fact, more than ever, history becomes the organizing center of the curriculum. As Miss Mason observed, “any sketch of the history teaching in forms five and six”, that’s our grades 10 through 12, “in a given period depend upon a notice of the literature set for plays, novels, essays, lives, poems, are all pressed into service and where possible the architecture painting which the period produced”. Just a note, I mean we see that all the way through but it’s even more so now. I mean we just see it enhanced I guess you’d see in these later years.
Emily
Well yeah they add surveys of architecture and art history and music history that they never had before and those are always contemporary with their streams.
Liz
There’s an extra space in the timetable for it.
Nicole
Yes. So really they’re just getting immersed in a rich integrated study of the humanities at this point and history sets the stage and the rest of the feasts gathered around it. It is more demanding work at this level, but it is also very rewarding. And the students leave these forms not with just knowledge, but with insight and a habit of connecting past to present, which I think is very important and meaningful, very thoughtful ways.
Emily
Well, the lesson format for these streams or these forms is they still have the three streams that they have lessons for. Of course, we talked about current events being additional and daily habit, but they have three 40 minute lessons. So the time has increased by 10 minutes. And this is the longest lesson they ever have.
Nicole
Right.
Emily
So that now they have three of those a week. And also, students are generally working independently or with siblings within the same level. Even Charlotte Mason mentions that in her volumes that they’re doing most of their reading independently at this age. So they still begin even if they’re working independently. Hopefully it’s a habit by now. My husband does this actually. Every time he opens even a read aloud he’s always like remember what was happening last time. And this should be an ingrained habit in their life to recall what was going on in the last lesson, what they learned, and bring that forward to their current reading.
And it’s still a single reading and at this age they’re doing mostly written narrations, again, it’s at least two written narrations per day. But also, their narrations are now deepening too, because they should be very naturally applying more of their thoughts and their opinions to their written narration, right? Bringing their own personality to the material. Whereas we don’t see that as much earlier. I think they’re really prepared for that now.
And also that they’re making connections, not just with their own knowledge, but between their subjects that they’re reading. And again, what you were saying about all of those other adjunct subjects that really tie into the history that is so important. They should be making those connections between these different subjects.
And then afterwards, after their lesson, after they’ve done the reading and narration, there should be some discussion. That can be with their siblings or their classmates if they’re doing these lessons in a group, but hopefully with parents and teachers as well. And we do need to make time to do that, even if it’s not at the end of that exact lesson. Students were even given the instruction, usually in literature, but to read a passage and then two days later write their narration. So they’re being able to be stretched to recall what they had previously been reading by a couple of days. So we can have these discussions at a later time.
The time tools that they’re using, they’re continuing their book of centuries, of course, because that is something that they’re supposed to be doing for the rest of their lives. And they’re including in there all of the streams of history that they’re studying, as well as their Bible history as well. And again, this is not a timeline in a book. It’s more like a nature notebook where the student has autonomy over deciding what they want to include in their notebook. Many drawings of artifacts that they’ve either seen in museums or read about or looked at a picture of.
And they also continue to keep their calendar of events about the current events that are happening. That information is not going usually into the brick of centuries right now because we don’t have enough time, distant perspective, to know really what are the significant things, right? So they have a different thing for that.
And then they make one to three century charts all through their last, so it started in form three, so the last half of their education, they’re doing one to three century charts per year, depending on the quantity of history, it coordinates with their modern history stream.
So the objectives for their lessons are the same as in earlier forms, to develop a living interest with history and to establish relationships. Charlotte Mason sums up our goals. And I just want to read this quote, it says, “it is a great thing to possess a pageant of history in the background of one’s thoughts. We may not be able to recall this or that circumstance, but the imagination is warmed. We know that there is a great deal to be said on both sides of every question, and we are saved from crudities and opinion and rashness in action. The present becomes enriched for us with the wealth of all that has gone before.”
So our teacher prep at this level, we’re not doing the lessons entirely with our students anymore, but Charlotte Mason did admonish us to have an understanding sympathy with our students. And I would encourage you to read your students’ books. Maybe it’s not pre-reading exactly before the week, but to continue reading along even on your own time, because we need to have that ability to discuss these ideas with them as they are forming their opinions, and we’re not part of their daily lessons usually.
Okay, so stiffer books, guys. Here are some that we like to use. Paul Johnson’s A History of the American People. It is a definitely more in-depth book if you look at the quantity of text on these pages. And they are really not going to have a lot of time for any biography reading. This is, they’re pretty much only in the spine or the general overview type book.
We have another one that’s newer called Land of Hope. This one is a little harder to use in the earlier rotations of history because there’s just such a little bit written so you really would have to supplement it with hopefully a primary source or other biography at that level.
And then for European history From Dawn to Decadence because of course the rotations are a little different and I would encourage you to go look and watch the video that I recorded about how the history rotations work and what quantity of time is studied each year. But forms four through six, their modern streams are only going back to 1500. So this book goes from 1500 to 2000. And it is a stiffer book, but really excellent. And I think, you know, there’s going to be a lot of things your kids aren’t familiar with, and that’s okay, but there are going to be a lot of things they are familiar with, and they’re going to get the big ideas.
But sometimes that is too challenging. And so this is a book that Charlotte Mason actually reviewed herself right before she died, think the year before she died. And she used it in form three. So it’s a bit, it’s not as stiff, but it does work for students maybe who are new to the method, who have not been, you know, immersed in these types of–
Liz
Especially if they don’t have the history of the music and art and poetry.
Emily
And so this is The Story of Mankind by Hendrik van Loon. And this edition, I think was 2013, I want to say. And so it goes, it’s been added to – he passed away, he had revised it himself in the 60s and then a couple other editors continued to write the story of the history that had gone on after that in his style.
And then for ancients, we do like Edith Hamilton’s, this is The Roman way, she has The Greek way as well, that give a survey of the ancient stream. So again, this is a smaller book than the other ones, but you’re only reading, you’re reading this over one year versus this over four.
And then their history tools are, I would encourage you to look at our history tool planner that we have for sale on our website. It covers all of these tools in great depth, has links and instructions in there. But briefly, here’s a look at the book of centuries. This is the one from River Bend Press. This is my own personal one. Here’s some pictures and some things in the chart that I have continued to do with my children.
And then they also have a free download of a century chart template, but it’s just this very simple 10 by 10 squares with thicker lines dividing each decade and the century in half. And they write symbols in here so they can picture a whole century in one page.
And then a calendar of events. This is just what we have used in our house because my kids have Juniper Grove journals and it’s a way to keep it easy, accessible. They know where it is. It’s just their monthly planner. So it has space in each to just jot a couple of notes about events that are happening, but you can use any calendar. You could use notebook paper, et cetera. There’s no prescriptions on how to keep that.
Mom, do you have any other things that are commonly brought up about high school history lessons?
Liz
Well, when you talk about the stiffer reading and the more time…yeah. This is the thing. Yes, the reading is a little more challenging, but they also have longer lessons. So that helps that to work out. And yes, the spines are usually a big step up reading level-wise and the complexity of the ideas that are in those books. And it is a bit of a stretch, but obviously learning harder things is always challenging, and they are gaining some intellectual abilities at this age as well. So they are able to cope with more difficult reading and it gives them a chance to see how much more they can accomplish, you know.
At any rate, I think it’s on our part as the parent to not worry about their possible whining and protest about these things, but encourage them when they feel overwhelmed. Because a lot of us have experienced this maybe when we went off to college, that books were a challenge at first until we got used to that. On occasion, I do think there are sometimes, don’t you, some ancient spines, if you have multiple students that you could combine, for example, a Form 3 child with a Form 5 child or Form 2 and Form 4 sometimes can deal with the same.
Emily
Yeah, if they haven’t had that.
Liz
Right, right. Obviously, we don’t reread books. And also if you have an older student that’s jumping in in the high school years to this whole idea of this kind of history, it’s sometimes worrisome like, they only have two years left, where should I start and things like that. I would just say whatever they have studied the least in the past, maybe is where you want to jump in and then just go right on forward from there for as many years as they have left.
Emily
You know, I just think about the stiffer books, college will not be the challenge that it was for many of us who never were challenged in this way. And really it sets up their…these are adult books that weren’t written as textbooks for high school students. They were written for adults who wanted to continue their education. And so that’s–-
Liz
And they are young adults and they have a lot of energy that some of that could be put mentally as well as physically.
Emily
I just think about moms always worrying that their children aren’t prepared for college or won’t be prepared for college and just looking at a course of this kind of reading. You will be well set.
A wide feast of history lessons is given to feed our students throughout their education. It is wide, but it is also deep with these three cycles through history with concurrent streams allowing us to cover much ground in a short amount of time. So next week we will conclude our history series as we answer the most common practical questions that we hear about this subject. Thank you for joining us as we continue to spread the feast of the Charlotte Mason Method.