Repetition is Classical Education!

Repetition is classical education!

I was unsure of how to come back to studying ancient history this year since we spent one school year studying Bible history in 2007-8 and another year studying Creation - Ancient Greece in 2010-11 with a different curriculum than we use today.  Finding some different resources has meant that while we are reviewing periods of history that we have already studied, we are able to look at them from a different perspective or understand events with a bit more depth.  I have found that the children remember stories that we have already read many times from the Bible, but they need to hear some of the stories of other ancient history again to remember the facts.  They understand the stories even more now that they are in or approaching the "dialectic" stage of learning.  Repetition is a good thing and it is the classical way of learning.

I was trained to be a music educator in college and I taught music in schools for 5.5 years after I graduated, until my first child was born.  I still work with choirs at church and sometimes in our home school group.  I have seen how repetition is the best way to teach music!  When we hear music that we enjoy, we want to hear it again!  After we hear a song or a piece of music many times (the grammar stage of learning), we know it well enough to hum along or sing the words.  We start to use it as our own (dialectic stage of learning) when it is not even playing and we can remember that song in our minds.  Then, we are able to teach the tune to someone else (rhetoric stage of learning).

Education is just like learning a song!  If you read or hear a story about a famous person from history, you may become interested and want to discover more about that person.  As you find other books or stories to read, you are building a framework of knowledge about that person, time, or event.  As you are exposed to that topic over and over again, you continue to build upon these ideas in your mind so that the next time you think of that person, you have more information to discuss.

Learning about any subject does not have to be boring when it is repeated!  Use new books, new stories, or new resources.  Find new hands-on activities or pictures to look over.  There are plenty of ways to add information to your studies even as you come back to an era of history that you may have taught your children about before and you might learn something new, too!  I used to be afraid of repeating our study of history, but now I understand that there is always something new to learn, even about events from the past.  With more depth, new information, and fresh perspectives, we can continue the great conversations that began centuries ago.  Repetition is a key to a classical education!

Enjoy the journey of being a life-long learner!
Rachel