What is classical education?

I have only known that classical education exists for a few months now and do not claim to be an expert on the topic by any means. However, this is the model that we are using to educate our children. It is somewhat odd to me that I'm going to educate my children using a model that I am still trying to grasp myself. Odd and maybe a little nerve wracking.

I've read some about classical education and what I have gathered is that classical education refers to the systematic approach to educating, that it is a way of providing a liberal arts education, meaning an education that is for the free man.

The liberal arts education refers to a time period when a man was either free to be educated for the sake of knowledge or enslaved to learn a trade rather than gain knowledge for the sake of having knowledge. The goal today of a classical education then is to educate children to be good citizens rather than to develop a trade for them. The end goal is knowledge, not career. Of course a career will occur (unless of course my girls become stay-at-home-moms), but the goal is knowledge that is good in and of itself (and thus good for girls who might choose to be wife and mother as well). The idea is that this knowledge produces thinking adults that will be able to learn and thus will be able acquire whatever skills are necessary for whatever career is chosen when the time comes.

There are different approaches to how to teach classically. One is a cyclical approach that uses history as a basis for the rest of humanities. This is the route that we are taking. Humanities are language, literature, history, philosophy, religion, and music. With history as the central point, one will learn about each time period and the literature, history, philosophy, religion, and music of that time period. The method we are using will cycle through each section of history three times before the student graduates, each time adding more as is developmentally appropriate. In the beginning memorization is key as the mind is more easily able to do this. As the child grows, he understands more and learns to discuss the topic as one with knowledge about it. The mathematical side of the equation is not left hanging out to dry but is developed in a similar manner in which the child memorizes, understands, and then is able to work out more difficult mathematical and scientific ideas based on the knowledge that has been growing.

My description of classical education probably does not do it justice by any means, but as one who is just learning about it and how to implement it, this is how I understand it.

In my next post, I plan to tell how we plan to and currently are implementing this model in our home.