Classical Education Model

Classical Education Model

Classical education has inspired great thinkers beginning with the Golden Age of Greece and the Roman Empire

It influenced great kings and reformers of the Middle Ages and philosophers and artists of the Renaissance. It galvanized the Pilgrims and our Founding Fathers in their determination to build a new government. Today, we see the influence of the classical education in every academic discipline including science, politics, mathematics, art, and astronomy.

The school is classical in methodology, as distinguished by its embracing of the Trivium ( a three-pronged approach to learning: grammar, logic, and rhetoric) which coincides with the God-Given stage of development in a child’s brain.

The Grammar Stage

Young children (grades K-5) are adept at memorizing large amounts of information using chants, songs, and rhythmic verse. The youngest in this group can recite a book by heart while the older among them can rattle off verbatim whole parts of their favorite movie. The grammar stage makes great use of this natural ability to give children a firm foundation of facts in math, phonograms, natural history, geography, science, etc. The students are given information, much of which is retained for a lifetime.

The Teacher as: Instructor

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The Logic or Dialetic Stage

As a child matures (grades 6-8), he/she becomes naturally adept at argument (which is why pre and early teens begin to question authority). In the Dialectic Stage children learn the ins and outs of formal logic. Logic enables them to assimilate the facts they learned in the grammar stage into a more thorough and cohesive understanding of their subjects arranging their thoughts in a rational and meaningful way. Students are taught how to reason through their questions and come to understand that disagreement need not be disagreeable. 

The teacher as: Coach

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The Rhetoric Stage

Students have now honed their Socratic skills of asking questions and questioning answers, enabling them to engage the dominant ideas of past and present cultures. The goal of classical Christian education is not to just graduate students with high GPA’s, who attend the best colleges and universities, or who pull down high-paying jobs (although this form of education produces such students). The crowning jewel of classical Christian education is raising individuals who impact their generation and generations to come with the knowledge, understanding, and wisdom found in the Gospel of Christ.

The Teacher as: Mentor

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