Troubleshooting Charlotte Mason: On Changing Books

What if, after picking the best books to use in your homeschool, your child just whines and complains and insists that he or she just doesn’t like this one particular book? What do you do? Should you switch it out for another book, or should you grit your teeth through the lessons (and expect your child to do the same)?

For this issue, let’s take a look at Miss Mason’s overarching philosophy. In Home Education, she quotes educational giant Pestalozzi and says:

“The mother is qualified,” says Pestalozzi, “and qualified by the Creator Himself, to become the principal agent in the development of her child; … and what is demanded of her is––a thinking love … God has given to the child all the faculties of our nature, but the grand point remains undecided––how shall this heart, this head, these hands be employed? to whose service shall they be dedicated? A question the answer to which involves a futurity of happiness or misery to a life so dear to thee. Maternal love is the first agent in education.”

Here we see that the responsibility lies on the mother to think and choose what should go into the child’s curriculum. And what does Miss Mason recommend when it comes to the curriculum? 

In Volume 6, page 14, she says: 

In the nature of things then the unspoken demand of children is for a wide and very varied curriculum. It is necessary that they should have some knowledge of the wide range of interests proper to them as human beings, and for no reasons of convenience or time limitations may we curtail their proper curriculum. 

Yes, the Charlotte Mason method is a delightful way of learning, and it indeed takes into account the child’s natural bent and capabilities. But it is by no means a child-directed philosophy, where you change and adjust as the child’s whim dictates. 

Many times, a child isn’t interested in something because he hasn’t learned enough about it to be interested in it, and if we get rid of a topic simply because he doesn’t “enjoy” it, we may have deprived him of something that he could’ve grown to like. Or, sometimes it could be that we as the parents are also not interested in the topic, and our children pick up on our disinterest. 

But, even if it’s something that you yourself enjoy a lot, your child may still not like it. The thing to remember is that we don’t decide on topics based on our child’s likes and dislikes, and instead we train them to know that there are things they ought to do, even if they don’t “feel” like it, and we plan their curriculum based on principles and not on possibly changing preferences. 

Another reason for committing to a wide curriculum for our children, and not limited by their interests, is that we don’t know for sure which books will impact them. In Volume 6, page 59, she says, 

This education of the feelings, moral education, is too delicate and personal a matter for a teacher to undertake trusting to his own resources. Children are not to be fed morally like young pigeons with predigested food. They must pick and eat for themselves and they do so from the conduct of others which they hear of or perceive. But they want a great quantity of the sort of food whose issue is conduct, and that is why poetry, history, romance, geography, travel, biography, science and sums must all be pressed into service. No one can tell what particular morsel a child will select for his sustenance. One small boy of eight may come down late because “I was meditating upon Plato and couldn’t fasten my buttons,” and another may find his meat in ‘Peter Pan’! But all children must read widely, and know what they have read, for the nourishment of their complex nature.

Did you catch that? We want to offer them as wide a curriculum as possible to nourish their minds and hearts. So don’t be too quick to switch out a book. Take a look at the big picture, and make sure you offer a wide selection of books that go beyond their current interests!

*Most of this post is an excerpt from our book, Help! I Love CM, But… A Troubleshooting Guide for the Charlotte Mason Homeschool Parent, available on Amazon 🙂