An Introduction to Classical Education:
A Guide for Parents
Christopher A. Perrin, M.Div., Ph.D.
Note: What follows is the introduction to an article written by
CCA's first headmaster.
To download the entire article in PDF format, click on this link:
An Introduction to Classical Education.
This article is available in booklet form by request at the CCA office.
Often, I have spoken with parents who were examining our school, who were both interested and puzzled about classical education. "How does the classical approach differ from what is offered in public schools?" "Are there any other schools doing what you are doing?" "How do your students perform on standardized tests?" After six years, the questions are predictable, but wholly justified. Unfortunately for me, even my answers are now predictable, which is one reason I am writing you. If you will read this before you talk to me (or someone like me) you can spare both of us my stock replies. Secondly, if I put my answers down in writing, I am bound to say something new.
If you are like most, you have probably heard about classical education by means of a friend who either has a child enrolled in a classical school, or has heard a good bit about such a school. You are doing your research, and are either more or less interested. You may have seen a few classes in operation which have raised eyebrows, interest, and many more questions. In any case, you have questions and a good many of you will have put those questions down in writing.
I wish to commend you for your questions, for your thinking. To come with hard-boiled questions is something, as you shall see, that is quite classical. Classical education has a long tradition of asking questions and digging up answers, consulting others, then asking, seeking, and finding once more. It is joining, as one writer puts it, the "Great Conversation." That means reading great books (the classics), studying them, mining them, talking to others about the influential ideas they contain. Whatever else classical education is, it is an ongoing series of questions and answers. So you see why I am glad you come asking all manner of things besides the yearly tuition.
It is a tumultuous time to be living. Institutions, information, customs, mores, and standards are changing rapidly. Choices and options have multiplied; our culture is becoming increasingly kaleidoscopic. Such colorful and rapid change does have its dramatic element and some find it quite entertaining. However, constant change and novelty can themselves grow old, becoming what Thomas Oden calls "the cheap promise of radical newness" which is "the most boring and repetitious of all modern ideas." Many of us are ready to leave the party, go home, and have a cup of tea in a quiet chair. As we contemplate raising and educating our children, many of us have been forced to ask ourselves what we wish to pass on to our children. How do we nurture them in the midst of all the confusion, doubt, and conflict of this modern world? Is there any place of rest and refuge, any place of tranquility and strength?
Education is that vast undertaking of passing on the wisdom and knowledge of one generation to another. It involves discovery, but also instruction; it is cultural transmission. With our present culture undergoing so much flux, it is no surprise to find that education is in a state of tumult too. For the parent looking for a school to aid in this task of cultural transmission, it is often a bewildering affair.
Those of us in classical education are taking our cues from a time before the party began. Our experiences are all similar: we have not found the wholesome food we need in the present; we have been entertained but not fed, amused but not instructed. We have gone, therefore, to another place, not too far off, but still forgotten by most. We have gone back to the well-walked path of the tried and proven classical method of education. It never really disappeared, it just became quite fragmented and diffused, with parts like ruins in modern schools and colleges. It was eclipsed as the reigning model only about a hundred years ago after reigning for over a thousand. Your grandparents are likely to have received something of a classical education.
G. K. Chesterton said that every revolution is a restoration of the recapturing and re-introduction of something that once guided and inspired people in the past. The word revolution is of course from the Latin revolvere or to re-roll or re-turn. A revolution is that thing which going around, comes around again. In a similar vein, C.S. Lewis says that when we have lost our way, the quickest way forward is usually to go home. So we are returning, we are revolving. To put it strongly, we are revolting, and we are doing it by going home.
You have read only the beginning of this article. To download the rest this article in its entirety in PDF format, click on this link: An Introduction to Classical Education