Mapping Out A Liberal Arts High School at Home

I'm a planner. I like to have a plan. I'm slightly obsessed with curriculum research. Lucky for me I'm really also obsessed with a classical education for my kids (and me), which narrows down my potential curricula to research.  The past five years, I've looked at almost everything out there to find just what will provide us with the most richly restful, and diligently delightful education. 

My oldest child is officially starting high school in just four weeks. I have worked the past two years to come up with a solid plan that leaves as little room for discontent, guessing, and changes as possible.  Dr. Perrin outlines some problems with the frenetic pace of high school for a lot of students in this article and urges us to a measured approach instead.  In conference talks over the past two years, I've heard him prescribe his solution (though he's never written another article outlining it), and here it is.  

He suggests that to give our high school students a foundation in the liberal arts, we should do six things only: 

-Mathematics

-Music

-Natural Sciences

-Logic ---> Rhetoric

-Latin

-Great Books

I'm fully on board with this. I can squeeze so many of the things I want into Great Books! It becomes the catch-all. But in all seriousness, this is the basic structure I'm using for my high school plan. 

Mathematics

For math, there's not a lot in a classical education that's different from what you'd find in a traditional or modern education, except for perhaps the method of teaching, and the purpose of mathematics. We're going for depth of understanding, solid quantitative reasoning and real mathematical skill. But we're also looking at math as a language that reveals the mind of God. We're not learning math to use as a tool for production, or to manipulate the world around us. As God spoke the world into existence with language, He holds it in motion with mathematics, which is why these two found the trivium (three arts of language) and the quadrivium (four arts of mathematics) of the liberal arts.  

Now, there's lots of paths to this. My ideal plan is to do VideoText Complete Algebra and then VideoText Complete Geometry over 7-10th grade. This will cover credits in Algebra 1-2, Geometry, Trigonometry and PreCalculus.  I hope to use 11th-12th grade as a year to teach an Economics course, and Personal Finance.  If a particular child needs/wants more advanced math, they can continue in dual enrollment classes to get Calculus their senior year. 

We will also intentionally incorporate books that give glimpses into arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and harmonics as mathematical liberating arts. Some of the resources we plan to use are A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe, Classical Math, Byrne's Geometry, and various reads from this Amazon list I've been collecting titles on. 

Music

For us, this means playing an instrument, music theory, and learning to appreciate great music. Through high school, the kids will continue in either their orchestra classes or private lessons, choir, and listening to great music in our Morning Time/Floralegium. I don't aspire for the kids to be professional musicians. I want them to have music as a creative outlet and be able to use music to know and express themselves in a deeper way. 

Natural Sciences

This is the one that's most intimidating for me. I never had a good science teacher and never caught a love for it.  I don't really understand it or enjoy the intricacy and tediousness of labs.  So this is my one area that I'm uncertain of.  My ideal plan is to do Classical Astronomy as freshman and then continue with Novare sciences: conceptual physics in 10th, biology in 11th, chemistry in 12th. I'm comfortable and excited about astronomy next year.  But nervous about physics after that! I want to get through physics. After that, we may opt for DIVE online classes or dual enrollment classes to finish out their science credits. This greatly depends on what their future plans are looking like. 

Logic--->Rhetoric

I'm just toeing the line on the Classical Academic Press path on this. We have loved all of CAP's products, especially the ones in this track.  The kids will do Formal Logic in 9th with Discovery of Deduction, Everyday Debate in 10th, Rhetoric Alive in 11th, and Rhetoric Alive Thesis in 12th as a capstone project. 

Latin

Latin is probably one of my favorite things to study and teach.  Again we love the CAP products for Latin. Their upper level course, Latin Alive, is excellent. We began it in 8th grade, so they will do Latin Alive 2 in 9th, book 3 in 10th.  There is a reader they can work in over the last two years to keep their interest and skill sharp, while also studying a more modern or other biblical language of their choosing in 11th and 12th grade. 

Great Books

As a family, we've been studying history, geography, and literature on a four year chronological cycle for a long time now.  It has landed my kids in 8th grade studying the ancient world, so for 9th grade they'll study Christendom, about 400-1600 AD.  They will read study the Oxford University Press Medieval World books for history. We will do an online class for literature discussion, reading key texts from the same time period. They will also do some studies in government and philosophy this year with Tapestry of Grace.  Next year for 10th grade, we will use Dave Raymond's American History, our own literature list of concurrent authors, and probably Tapestry of Grace's government and philosophy tracks. For 11th, we'll do Dave Raymond's Modernity, our own literature list, and Tapestry's government and philosophy. For 12th grade, I'm planning to give them the option of going back and studying the ancient world again, or choosing a time period of their interest that will relate to their rhetoric capstone project. 

Here it all is in a nice little spreadsheet. 

	Freshman	Sophomore	Junior	Senior
Math	VideoText Algebra: (Algebra 2)	VideoText Complete Geometry	Economics/Stewardship	DE Calculus
Science	Astronomy: Signs & Seasons	Physics: Novare	Biology (Novare or DE)	Chemistry (Novare or DE)
Logic/Rhetoric	Writing & Rhetoric Books 10-11: Thesis	Writing & Rhetoric Book 12: Attack/Defend	Rhetoric Alive!	Rhetoric Alive Thesis
	The Discovery of Deduction (Formal Logic)	Everyday Debate	Essays in History, Literature, Rhetoric	Essays in History, Literature, Rhetoric
	Poetry & Humanity	Poetry, Plato, and the Problem of Beauty	Poetry, Plato, and the Problem of Truth
Music	Orchestra & Choir	Orchestra & Choir	Orchestra & Choir	Orchestra & Choir
Latin	Latin Alive! 2	Latin Alive! 3	First Form Greek or Modern Language	Second Form Greek
Humanities	History of Christendom & the Church	Dave Raymond’s American History & Govt	Dave Raymond’s Modernity	Antiquity (OR History topic of choice)
	Close Reads: Christendom Thought & Poetry	Close Reads: Revolutions	Close Reads: Modernity	Antiquity (OR Literature topic of choice)
	Government & Philosophy of Christendom	Government & Philosophy of Revolutions	Government & Philosophy of Modernity

To all this we'll add living well. Sports if they're interested, art skills if they're interested, handicrafts, gardening, family read-alouds and art and music in our home, common placing and journaling, being active in church and community service, nature field trips. 

So that's my plan. And I'm hopefully sticking to it.