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classical education

Si vis pacem, para bellum
kevikens

I retired from the public school system a few years ago. It had become a nightmare with educational funding going mostly to the least deserving and to dumbing down the curriculum to the least commom denominator. We were reduce to dispensing mental pablum under the title " differantiated instruction". Several other veteran teachers and I have re-created a substantial curriculum and now operate an underground school ( We have.to.  The state would shut us down if they found out we were not following their gender and racial "norms" ). We follow a classical curriculum teaching our students Latin and Greek and Ancient History which has turned out to be the most accurate predictor of what has already transpired in our own time. We teach our students how to take care of themslves and to see the world for what it is, not what we would like it to be. There is nothing new under the sun and those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it.

Nov 17


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  • PonyXpress
    Nov 17
    Et tu?
  • mudmama
    Nov 17
    There's a whole world of stories outside those of "dwg" dead white guy western culture. Until we include those stories and include them in our vision of the past we are doomed to repeat it. For a more wholistic vision of education please visit enkieducation.org - btw they manage to provide differentiated education without labels or turning history into "pablum"
  • kevikens
    Nov 17
    Those dead white guys of the Classical World created the notion of questioning reality in a coherent schema,just what we are doing here in a language that is 60% Latin and 10% Greek. Which one of your multi cultural civilizations has produced an impact comparable to that of the Classical World ?
  • kevikens
    Nov 17
  • mudmama
    Nov 17
    kev, I have a classical education - took latin and greek in high school. It doesn't make my education well rounded or more relevant. The most relevant class I took in high school was world religions because it opened up my eyes to a whole host of older (and other) cultures and the idea that wisdom was the domain of westerners. In university I continued mining this vein of history from other perspectives. There's a whole world outside the history of wars and conquests that detail a lot more relevant information on how to survive the superthreats. Midden piles are more important than battlefields. Comparable cultures? Persian (Arabic), Hindi, Mandarin Chinese rich diverse and just as far reaching. In an era of globalization it's short sighted to exclude the vast majority of the world's people in your concept of "culture".
  • mudmama
    Nov 17
    sorry, that should read NOT simply the domain of westerners.
  • mudmama
    Nov 17
    BTW there is a wonderful look at a truly classical education in the book a "Thomas Jefferson Education" have you read it?
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