Guidance Now, Independence Later

I'd like to share with you a fragment of forgotten lore I found buried under the hills. Here it is.

Kids are like puppies.

This is true of preschoolers and high-schoolers, and every flavor of child in between. Kids are all like puppies one way or another, some small and cuddly, others large and kind of dumb. What I want to talk about is not that they are puppies and not that we should treat them like puppies, but given that they sure are a lot like puppies, what does that mean for us as parents? In short, it means that sometimes we have to take them by the scruff of their necks.

Example: You've just dropped $1,000 and brought home a puppy from the breeder. It's just about the most darling thing you ever saw. The next day, you begin to train it. You set it out in the front yard, sans leash, and say, "Good boy, now make wise choices. Don't go in the street." 30 seconds later, full of youthful puppiness, it chases the FedEx truck and goes to heaven.

Now that was a bad dog owner. ("Bad dog owner!") What it needed was a leash, a fenced backyard, patience and love, and enforced instructions. Any old dog owner knows that. To get a well-trained dog that makes good choices on its own, you begin by making it do the right thing yourself. Scruff of the neck, and so forth.

Kids are like puppies. We are preparing them for independence, but they are not independent yet. We begin by requiring obedience all the time. We make them do their homework, whether it is fun or not fun. We require them to be respectful and have good personal habits. Then, as time goes on and they approach college, we gradually reduce the decisions we make for them and let them make more of their own. While young, they've been required to buckle down and do hard things, and so now, they're rewarded with well-earned freedoms.

Unfortunately, we sometimes get this backwards. We give children choices when they are far too young with far too little will power, and then when they are older and can do stupid things with cars and girls, we begin barking orders and cracking whips. Then, we wonder why they just squeeze by in college and never call home and visit on the holidays. We are very perplexed.

Kindergarten Is A Grade Level, Too

Too often I hear people describe kindergarten with the misconception that all students do in kindergarten is play and take a nap. In some schools you may find a place where that misconception isn’t too far off. But here at Augustine Classical Academy, that is far from the truth. Kindergarten is the first step in the grammar phase of the Trivium, and it is an important step in laying a solid foundation for success in the Trivium's later stages of logic and rhetoric.

Kindergarten is an important grade and a big step in a young child’s life. Students are not only going to school to learn academics but to also develop social and emotional skills that are just as important as learning to read and write. At the beginning of the year, my job involves a lot -- and I do mean a lot -- of patience! Everything is new to kindergarteners.  They are thrown into this big new school in which they will be expected to advocate for themselves, walk in line, learn numerous routines and procedures, listen and raise their hand, and much more. During the first few weeks of Kindergarten, I spend a lot of time repeating myself and working more on social and emotional development than anything else. These are such key components to their development and overall success throughout the year! Because of this, Kindergarten gives your child a safe place to mature and grow during their natural development as a child, while also being challenged academically. These skills will be developing throughout the entire year, and you will notice a drastic difference between a kindergartener during the first semester versus what a kindergartener is like the second semester. For example, they are maturing, are more independent, and are able to handle their own social and emotional skills at a much higher degree.

I believe ACA stands out as an exemplary school because we do take great pride in the development of our students during the grammar phase. The value of routine, structure, and rigor is what sets our kindergarten program apart from those which believe kindergarten is simply a place where kids go to play. I do want you to know that in saying this, I also know the importance of allowing children to play and be able to use their imaginations freely. That is also very important in their development. After their work is done, I get to spend my afternoons listening to their brilliant creativity in dramatic play scenarios, or seeing their imaginations run wild while exploring with math manipulatives, or through creative art. I believe that because of ACA's rigor and high expectations for them, their imaginations have been given a foundation from which to fuel their own creativity.

I will end by saying that I believe the most beautiful part of being a kindergartener at ACA is that they get to grow and develop while also learning about the love of Christ. It is so beautiful to be able to pray with children, listen to them pray, study God’s word, and play a part in raising them with the standards God sets for our lives. I absolutely would not trade this job for the world! Yes, it takes a lot of patience, repetition, and time, but to be able to influence the lives of such young children, and to be a role model for what Christ is like, is something that I will never take for granted.

Seeing God in Music

With the coming of the New Year, renewed fervor and resolution abound!  This is the year we’re going to read those books, run that marathon, learn that skill, defeat that bad habit.  These are all admirable goals which (with the exception of the marathon), I would love to have on my year-end “Did It” list.  But as I think about all that could be accomplished and what I really want for myself and my students, one main thought keeps coming back to me—to see more of God in the world He has created and in all that we study each week.  This goal seems to fit well within the subjects of Bible, history, and logic.  But how does it apply to teaching the fine arts?  To be specific—how can we be God-centered when studying music?
 
There are many different ways.  First, the glory of God can be seen through the reflection of His character in music.  One of the reasons I love music is because of the order, symmetry, and precision that it innately possesses within its staves.  Like in reading, each note relates directly to the next to form one continuous line or phrase that fits into the larger whole of the piece.  Nuances of color are created by variations in speed (tempo), volume (dynamics), and even how the music is played (articulation). Each of these elements works together to create the masterpiece that was in the mind of the composer when he sat down to pen the notes of his score.  This mirrors our God, who is a God of order and beauty—working all things perfectly together according to His plan and purpose for His people.
 
Second, the spiritual lives of great composers are cause for consideration.  Men like Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel exemplify lives that were lived to the glory of God—with countless scores composed for use in church and worship settings.  Bach was especially noted for his sincere faith, and he frequently initialed his blank manuscripts with the marking “J.J.” (Jesu Juva—“Help me, Jesus”) and “S.D.G.” (Soli Deo Gloria—“To God alone be the glory”) at the end of his manuscripts. But what about men like Ludwig van Beethoven and Frederic Chopin, whose spiritual journeys followed a different and often troubled path? In the midst of brokenness, God gives grace and giftedness, so that even though they did not immediately intend for it to, their music still reflects the character of God.  God works redemptively through broken and hurting people to bring forth beauty in their creative endeavors.
 
Finally, in looking to God within the staves of the music we study, we are reminded that God is the ultimate composer of the symphony of our lives and of the universe.  Sometimes we see His hand at work, providing exactly what we need just when we need it.  At other times, we can’t see His hand as clearly.  Just as there is variance in mood and tone in music, so too our lives are comprised of dissonant and dark tones as well as bright and joyful notes.  All of these are necessary to shape our character and fulfill His eternal plans.  Whatever our circumstances in life, this truth remains—God is on His throne, and He will accomplish His purposes.  Therefore in each day and in whatever we are learning or doing, let us resolve in 2017 to "fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Cor. 4:18).

2017-18 Tuition Rates

Good news! For the upcoming 2017-18 academic year, tuition rates for all ACA programs (ACP-12th)will not be raised. 

As a component of our business strategy to provide high-quality teachers, small class sizes, and competitive rates, ACA tuition has historically increased 3-5% each year. However, we’re pleased to provide this year of rest and to thank each of you for the continued honor of educating your children. ACA was founded with a commitment to affordability and wise use of resources, and this decision is an excellent example of that commitment. 

God continues to bless ACA steadily, and as we reflect on this Christmas season and the upcoming academic year, let’s remember the important goals we share for our children via the AugustineCampaign and our current Fall 2016 Matching Grant Challenge. Our vision for education is high, and it takes continued robust funding. Would you consider those friends and family members with shared vision who would be interested in helping us meet our rigorous financial goals? To educate the next generation of children for the glory of God and the good of all people, we need tangible gifts from people just like you. 

Thank you for loving your children and supporting ACA so well. May God bless each of you richly this Christmas season.

Developing Gratitude

From Rob Gove, upper school logic and omnibus instructor:

As we head into our Thanksgiving break, I would like to reflect on cultivating the virtue of gratitude in our students, a virtue not just for this coming Thursday, but for every day of the year.

While we all likely have some definition of gratitude (such as "being thankful for the good things in our lives"), it is not necessarily easy to teach our children to practice this virtue. I would like to suggest a few ways we can do this.

As Aristotle explains in his Nicomachean Ethics (which our Omnibus IV students will be reading soon), all virtues are habits, and we develop virtues by repeatedly doing them until they become habitual and automatic. 

So what acts can our students do repeatedly to develop the virtue of gratitude? I propose three: 1) maintaining a cheerful attitude, 2) understanding for what we should be grateful, and 3) giving frequent prayers of thanks. First, we can encourage our students to be cheerful by having a sunny, positive disposition ourselves, by showing them that we enjoy our work, and by encouraging them to do the same. A simple smile directed at a complaining student can go a long way! Second, we need to remind students they should be grateful to God for everything in our lives: even when it seems like something is simply painful, sad, difficult, or "boring", students should be reminded that God loves us and directs all of this for our good. Finally, students need to pray, and they need to pray in thanks. In my classroom, students lead prayer at the beginning of each class. In addition to asking God for help, they almost always thank Him for each other, for the opportunity to come to school and learn, and for all our blessings. It is truly wonderful to hear.

Let's all be grateful this Thanksgiving, and let's help our children to do the same.

Your Brain Is Not a Compute

Teaching is nothing without learning.

If a teacher teaches but students don't learn, there's no teaching.  The students might be bad, they might be lazy, the teacher might typically be effective -- but if the students aren't learning, as a class, then teaching isn't being done. In one ear and out the other, as the metaphor goes. Sometimes, it never even gets in the first ear.

Last year, as ACA's teachers studied Gregory's The Seven Laws of Teaching, The Law of Review stood out as perhaps the most crucial law of all: "Review, review, review: reproduce the old, deepen its impression with new thought, link it with added meanings, find new applications, correct any false views, and complete the true."

That's one of the best places where true teaching happens.  In the review.

Past generations understood the importance of repetition and review. They were the generations of catechisms and widespread classical education. Today, we are the generation of the quick-fix conferences.  We never read a book, and we definitely don't memorize, not with Siri. Fly in a big-name motivational speaker, get tickets to the show, take notes, and you're set.

But that's not the way the brain works, not the way it remembers and learns, whether you live in the 1800s or the 2100s. The brain works by hearing something many times, forgetting it many times, and then finally learning it. People never learn the first time. Only computers do that.

So let's remember this as we consider the way our children are learning or as we help them with their homework.  For example:

• In upper school or high school, when your kids bring home a tough Omnibus reading, they're not supposed to get it all the first time. Do you think your child is a computer? But they are supposed to begin to get the general ideas and the bigger details with second or third readings.  So encourage them to practice reading quickly 2-3 times instead of slowly and carefully just once -- though slow reading has its place elsewhere. The key to reading comprehension is not always speed; it is usually repetition.

• In middle school or logic-stage math, your kids are generally supposed to mess up badly on their first time through a new speed drill. No problem. The only problem comes when they don't correct their mistakes and quit doing any more speed drills. Do you suppose anyone in the world thinks a multiplication table makes sense the first time? Or as my mother once said when I jumped a creek with a horse and fell off and crunched my nose, "Get right back out there."

• In Kindergarten when your kids are wrestling with phonograms and struggling to sound out words, do you expect them to remember how to pronounce "The" after telling them once? Look at that word! Its pronunciation makes no sense at all. No, you sit with them, night after night, and say over and over, "T-H-E says thuh." Night after night, they crash their brains over crazy English syntax, the only possible way they can learn.

• And in preschool, children learn by listening, and listening, and listening, to the same story, the same story, the same story, and by asking you to sing the same song, Daddy, the same song Daddy, the same song, Daddy.

And we roll our eyes and smile kindly at their needs, and then we go out to the car dealership for the seventh time, finally comfortable enough -- knowledgeable enough -- to put down an offer.