Hannah Whitall Smith, mother to seven, speaker, suffragist, and author, wrote The Christian’s Secret of a Happy Life in 1875. I found her timeless wisdom to be refreshing, challenging, and grounding to my soul that teetered on the fulcrum between the eras of modernism and postmodernism.

We are shaped by the ideas that are seeded in us and the relational air that we breathe. And we are continuously exhaling ideas and relational air which those around us will inhale. The question is “What’s in the air?”

How do we inspire and support a sense of caring, duty, thankfulness, and sacrifice? How are the influences of our modern world misdirecting our youth? As a teacher and a parent I have to ask myself, “How am I contributing to the problem?”

As we choose to walk the pilgrim path to Christ and our true home, we often wonder. What is my calling? What is God’s will for my life? We may even fret and worry and become anxious, because we don’t seem to have an answer, or the answers come too slowly for our liking.

In education, as in every human endeavor, there exists the possibility of erring to the left and erring to the right. We live in an age in which the responsibility of adults to be intentional and diligent in the formation of children’s habits is largely forgotten.

For us and our students, the element of beauty, order, offering one’s best, the achievement of accuracy, respect for others as they view or use the work, perseverance, joy in accomplishing something of quality and durability, and other similar benefits are seen in doing quality work. To develop this habit, it is important that we hold high expectations for our children’s work.

Fondly do we consider the two presidents whom we honor this month. As young men, both were brash. But they allowed life to season them, and being humbled, they became humble. And, by the end, worthy of admiration.

The brain is plastic. It molds, changes as we learn. Though lacking the benefits of modern technology, one hundred years ahead of her time, Charlotte Mason recognized the importance of neuroplasticity.

As an Ambleside teacher, we often discuss our “paradigm shift’ – from textbooks, grades, and stickers to “living books,” “narrations,” and “habits.” It’s difficult, for many of us. We’re not just learning about a method of education; we’re learning again how to learn.

When a child whose relational guidance system is malformed, such that he doesn’t recognize certain behaviors as being inappropriate or hurtful, it is important to make the distinction between two different kinds of disobedience: Defiant Disobedience and Supra-conscious Disobedience.

As an Ambleside teacher, we often discuss our “paradigm shift’ – from textbooks, grades, and stickers to “living books,” “narrations,” and “habits.” It’s difficult, for many of us. We’re not just learning about a method of education; we’re learning again how to learn.

There is little, if anything, that brings such sweetness to the soul of devout Christian parents as their children’s allegiance to the risen Savior King. And few things are so harrowing as the prospect that one’s child might abandon Him, who is the Source of all life and goodness.

On January 1, 1842, Charlotte Mason was born. We at Ambleside Schools are eternally grateful to her for teaching us through her own living books and ideas, one of the most important of which is the view of a child as a whole person. From the beginning, she has inspired and influenced our sacred work of educating children, and we honor her today for the beautiful legacy she left us.

The world has two kinds of people, the disappointed faithless and the disappointed faithful. Since the time of Adam and Eve, the world has disappointed, and, when left to itself, the world will always disappoint. Christmas is the story of God decisively breaking into history on behalf of the disappointed faithful.

Let them grow up, too, with the shout of a King in their midst. There are, in this poor stuff we call human nature, founts of loyalty, worship, passionate devotion, glad service, which have, alas! to be unsealed in the earth-laden older heart, but only ask place to flow from the child.

During a visit to the National Gallery of Art, we had the privilege of learning from Dr. David Gariff, a senior lecturer at the Gallery. We walked among and reflected upon a dozen Nativity masterpieces.

In melodious repetition a larger harmony came forth, instruments and voice proclaiming the God who is God of all comfort beckoning to his people. Handel makes skillful use of “word painting,” a technique by which the music reflects the literal meaning of a song.

In 1978, my mother and father had started a Christian school in India called The Calcutta Emmanuel School. Originally, they had no intention to start a school. My father had a counseling center and there were always poor children playing outside on the street and making so much noise. It drew his attention, and the school became an answer to the needs of these children.

I had before me a six-year old’s rendering of a giraffe. There was a tinge of grace in the play, the picture, and the presentation. Such graces shape the heart of a child. Such graces make for a hint of Christmas every day.

When we think of relationships, we usually think of those persons whose lives have touched our lives – family, friends, and co-workers. As important as these are, we must expand our vision.

All that we encounter, abundance and scarcity, joy and suffering, the beautiful and the ghastly, become meaningful in our sacrifice to God; it all becomes our offering.

Those with the habit of being grateful have eyes to see and ears to hear the many gifts that are daily given. Yet, is there ever a day when we cannot find some excuse for ingratitude, anxiety and dissatisfaction? But, what is the fruit of this bad habit?

This week, across the United States from ‘sea to shining sea,’ our Ambleside School communities are taking a pause to reflect and honor our country’s veterans as we do each year.

Rarely do we see transformation in one simple step, and never have I seen it without tension.  We can use that tension and decide that what we left behind was left behind us.

It is impossible to overstate the importance of this habit of attention. It is …”within the reach of everyone and should be made the primary object of all mental discipline.” — Charlotte Mason

By Education is a discipline, is meant the discipline of habits formed definitely and thoughtfully, whether habits of mind or body.

In a moment, these three simple words shed a better light on a year’s work of daily lessons and nurturing and mending relationships.

In the Gospels we find a code of education summed up in three commandments: take heed that ye offend not––despise not––hinder not––one of these little ones.

What does community look like at Ambleside? A good start would be to look at Charlotte Mason’s “Science of Relations;” right relationships to God, self, others, and ideas.

Charlotte Mason evokes several principles in her call for children to serve: Service is a deliberate work; service widens one’s sympathy; and service involves self-sacrifice.

Charlotte Mason speaks of the family read aloud as a habit, 1-2 evenings each week for an hour. There are few stronger family bonds than this habit of devoting an occasional hour to reading aloud.

While there are many aspects to maturity, there is none as important as the nature of one’s relationship with God.

Education is the science of relations, relations with saints and sinners, the past and the present, earth and sky, art and craft, work and leisure. Still, there is more. Nothing matters so much in the making of a man or woman as his/her relationship with God.

For Ambleside students in the home and school classroom, the handwork lesson is a time of rest, contemplation, joy and accomplishment. Emphasis is placed on the skill to be learned rather than the project to be produced.

As another school year begins, parents and teachers take stock of the daunting privilege of nurturing the inner lives of children; sowing seeds today, in the hope of fruit tomorrow.

How often it is that we go through life missing the simple pleasures. Our focus is on ourselves; our thoughts, our plans and our concerns–failing to hear the joy around us. Charlotte Mason reminds us to be fully present and to listen. Miss Mason’s idyllic picture of being “in the fields on a spring day” is far from the reality of most 21st century lives. Although being in the fields on a spring day, or most days for that matter, would do us all good.

How often it is that we go through life missing the simple pleasures. Our focus is on ourselves; our thoughts, our plans and our concerns–failing to hear the joy around us. Charlotte Mason reminds us to be fully present and to listen. Miss Mason’s idyllic picture of being “in the fields on a spring day” is far from the reality of most 21st century lives. Although being in the fields on a spring day, or most days for that matter, would do us all good.

How often it is that we go through life missing the simple pleasures. Our focus is on ourselves; our thoughts, our plans and our concerns–failing to hear the joy around us. Charlotte Mason reminds us to be fully present and to listen. Miss Mason’s idyllic picture of being “in the fields on a spring day” is far from the reality of most 21st century lives. Although being in the fields on a spring day, or most days for that matter, would do us all good.

An understanding of the meaning of must, moved by ought, a heart stirred by that which a person owes to another, that which a person is bound by natural, moral or legal obligation to pay, do, or perform.

How often it is that we go through life missing the simple pleasures. Our focus is on ourselves; our thoughts, our plans and our concerns–failing to hear the joy around us. Charlotte Mason reminds us to be fully present and to listen. Miss Mason’s idyllic picture of being “in the fields on a spring day” is far from the reality of most 21st century lives. Although being in the fields on a spring day, or most days for that matter, would do us all good.

How often it is that we go through life missing the simple pleasures. Our focus is on ourselves; our thoughts, our plans and our concerns–failing to hear the joy around us. Charlotte Mason reminds us to be fully present and to listen. Miss Mason’s idyllic picture of being “in the fields on a spring day” is far from the reality of most 21st century lives. Although being in the fields on a spring day, or most days for that matter, would do us all good.

We endeavor that all our teaching and treatment of children shall be on the lines of nature, their nature and ours, for we do not recognize what is called ‘Child-nature.’ We believe that children are human beings at their best and sweetest, but also at their weakest and least wise. We are careful not to dilute life for them, but to present such portions to them in such quantities as they can readily receive. 

An understanding of the meaning of must, moved by ought, a heart stirred by that which a person owes to another, that which a person is bound by natural, moral or legal obligation to pay, do, or perform.

We often talk of ideas in the classrooms at Ambleside, but what about the ideas in our homes? We want our children to love learning, but does our home life foster this love? Charlotte Mason says that every parent holds their breath when they hear that their children take direction and inspiration from all the casual life about them, and that even the parents’ words and ways form the starting point from which he develops.

As another Memorial Day is upon us, we remember the men and women who died in combat, gave their lives, this year, and years past.

In the six volumes of her Home Education Series, Charlotte Mason speaks of joy over 270 times. This is not surprising, for the consistent experience of joy is essential to a child’s well-being. Through experience, parents and teachers know how difficult it is to help the sullen child move forward. Ms. Mason would take it a step farther, arguing that “The happiness of the child is the condition of his progress.” Thus, “his lessons should be joyous and that occasions of friction in the schoolroom are greatly to be deprecated.”

“An idea is more than an image or picture; it is, so to speak, a spiritual germ endowed with vital force—with power, that is, to grow, and to produce after its kind. It is the very nature of an idea to grow: as the vegetable germ secretes that it lives by, so, fairly implant an idea in the child’s mind, and it will secrete its own food, grow, and bear fruit in the form of a succession of kindred ideas.”

In the six volumes of her Home Education Series, Charlotte Mason speaks of joy over 270 times. This is not surprising, for the consistent experience of joy is essential to a child’s well-being. Through experience, parents and teachers know how difficult it is to help the sullen child move forward. Ms. Mason would take it a step farther, arguing that “The happiness of the child is the condition of his progress.” Thus, “his lessons should be joyous and that occasions of friction in the schoolroom are greatly to be deprecated.”

History, literature, archeology, art, languages, whether ancient or modern, travel and tales of travel; all of these are in one way or other the record or the expression of persons; and we who are persons are interested in all persons, for we are all one flesh, we are all of one spirit, and whatever any of us does or suffers is interesting to the rest.

When Charlotte Mason discussed the spiritual life in relationship to ideas, she identified spiritual life as the life of thought, of feeling, of the soul, of that which is not physical. This very human life needs food, and “this life is sustained upon only one manner of diet: the diet of ideas — the living progeny of living minds.”  She uses this framework—the spiritual life is sustained only by a diet of ideas—to answer the perennial question, “What manner of schoolbooks should our boys and girls use?”

We know now that authority is vested in the office and not in the person; that the moment it is treated as a personal attribute it is forfeited.

The Gospel accounts of the Lord’s Passion, death, and Resurrection have, over the centuries, inspired countless master artists. Such works reveal the artists’ skill and creative inspiration. They also invite a profound sharing in the mystery of Christ’s dying and rising, made present for us in Lenten liturgies. Such artistic masterpieces are visual reminders that Good Friday and Easter Sunday are not distant theological abstractions, but events that forever transform human history, and our own daily existence, if we allow it.

Why is a ‘method’ of education more important than utilizing a ‘system’? In “Home Education,” Charlotte Mason says our tendency in educating children is toward a system — which is ‘alluring’ because it is successful in achieving precise results. But we are educating children – and children are persons, individuals, image-bearers of God – who thrive on relationship. She proposes the idea of a method of education instead.

A great power has been placed in the hands of parents and teachers, the power to enthrone the King, to induct the Priest into the innermost chamber of a child’s heart. There is no greater service to be done for a child, no greater gift to be given a child. For what does it matter if a child gains the whole world but loses his soul?

The work of Christ establishes us as belonging to community, and this shared belonging is foundational to the experience of the Father. We are to be both participants and instruments of belonging, the kind of belonging that creates joy. Charlotte Mason calls this need to belong the “desire of society” and places it among the desires that are both primary and universal.

Children are made for God. They are drawn to God; possess a spiritual capacity for God. Often, they are graced with a spiritual insight which would astound the adult.

We know now that authority is vested in the office and not in the person; that the moment it is treated as a personal attribute it is forfeited.

Most of us tend to think in terms of the primacy of individual choice in selecting the ideas which are held and those which are rejected. In fact, the dominant ideas which have the greatest impact upon us are caught not taught. They are “in the air” and breathed in, either from the society at large or particularly significant individuals.

Here is an astounding possibility, if we would believe it, the awakening not just of one soul but of an entire class, not a class of the gifted (socially, financially, intellectually) but rather a class of those who lacked the usual “advantages.”

From the time of its founding, Ambleside Schools International has affirmed the Nicene Creed as its statement of belief.

The aim of Ambleside Schools is student growth, and one of the distinctives is that student growth is not measured by grades.  

In the light of our God, our Father, Savior and King, and the Spirit given to us; may we all begin anew this January.

Bringing up children well, even on Christmas, especially on Christmas, requires a measure of reflection and intentionality.

The Pilgrims defined daily living in relationship with God; He was ever before them, the primary thing for them; lives sustained in Him and through Him.

Life is so much better when not striving – more delightful… and a far freer, richer connectedness with others.

For our sake, and even more for the children’s sake, let us not be counted among those who wail and gnash their teeth, for we are on a sacred journey.

We are creatures of desire. Every day we want, wish, crave, fancy and yearn for a multitude of diverse things in a multitude of diverse ways.

The first article of a valid educational creed – “children are born persons” – is of a revolutionary character.

Like a master medieval embroiderer, God has woven luminous strands of glory into the fabric of existence that consecrate all of existence as a sacred mystery.

Let us pause today and every day, to give some time to our continuing education by thickening a relation with some real person and some real thing.

A mother knows how to speak of God… with all the evidences of his care and love about her and his children.

Foreign language instruction at Ambleside Schools follows a “series method” created by François Gouin.

What if the power that raised Jesus from the dead is present now to transform a life? How would such a transformed life appear?

Being your teacher has been my greatest joy and privilege. We did the work, together, and it was good to be me here with you!

If while young a person learns skills to recover from a troubled heart, they will be better prepared to face the troubles life brings.

The ability to manage emotional distress well and stay one’s best self is a learned skill.

It must be remembered that every child is unique and responds to adversity uniquely.