The more I read about Charlotte Mason’s philosophy, the more I like it. I’m especially intrigued by the practice of “narration”, having the child tell back what they have absorbed of a passage that has been read to them; but most books I’ve read don’t really go into the nitty gritty details of how to do it. Higher Up and Further In links to an Ambleside online discussion” that really digs into the topic. It’s a very long post, so I want to return to chew and digest at my leisure.
To clarify, he’s not completely unfamiliar. He knows the basics from when he was a kid. But he’s never read it as an adult or studied it. I suspect his knowledge of the Bible is about on a par with your average guy in the pew on Sunday. In fact, if I hadn’t taken a class on the Bible at college and then followed up years later with some self study, I might be in essentially the same place. Catholics have some advantage because we hear quite a big chunk read on Sundays. But that’s no substitute for sitting down to read the Bible outside of mass.
A side note: it seems like many novice readers who set out to read hte Bible from the beginning, he got stuck. After Genesis he’s stopped. It’s been more than a month since the last post so perhaps he won’t even get through Exodus. Sad. That would have been an interesting read.
Thanks for pointing this one out…. it is very interesting to see a viewpoint of a new reader
who is unfamiliar with the bible…
I assume he will go back and use commentaries later to refine his findings…
I liked the part about comparing the relative “sinfulness” of eating swine vs lobsters….
and “why is it ok to eat a goat but bad to eat a camel”…. (don’t eat the beast you rode in on?)