Ambleside Tuesday chats!

I miss the chats we used to be able to have on Yahoo on Tuesday nights. The only thing better than that is meeting with some of these likeminded moms in real life and have a Charlotte Mason or Ambleside Online Book Club! I'm blessed to have that locally. The group has been going on for at least three, maybe four years, now. There is turnover just about every year, as ladies get comfortable with using Charlotte Mason principles in their homeschools. This year's group, however, is more specialized and into the Ambleside Online curriculum. We are now digging deeper, and for that, I am grateful and excited! It shows growth and depth in those hs moms who want to read Charlotte's thoughts and recommendations for themselves...to dig for the treasure on their own, not just read someone else's [often light or incomplete] interpretations of CM's methodologies.
There is something to digging for the information on one's own, and taking it to heart. Charlotte would approve, and called it "The Science of Relations." We can better allow our children to learn this way if we seek to learn this way ourselves.


My group meets once a month to read the Charlotte's own writing, and are currently in Volume 6, Towards a Philosophy of Education.

This past Saturday, we had an extra meeting. We usually meet at Starbuck's. This time, most all the book club ladies came over to my cottage, so we could talk some more about chapter 10 "The Curriculum," and look at CM books and Ambleside Online recommended books. I should have taken a few pictures, but we were all too busy chatting, drinking homemade cappuccino, sharing, perusing the beautiful and quality literature, and talking some of scheduling multiple levels of children. One last friend stayed so we could look up books together online.

We must do this again, and soon. We spent up to six hours together, and could have continued through the night. Some wanted to have a retreat! Sounds profitable :-). I may give it a try!
We'll need plenty of coffee, printer paper, notebooks to write our ideas down, and a copy machine.

I suspect more poetry reading is in order next time. One mom read aloud an example of a composition for a test, written as a poem, by a 13 yo girl. it is found on page 167-68 of volume 6.
Yes, we needed more time, and perhaps a better schedule for keeping rabbit trails to a minimum. It's just refreshing to fellowship sometimes, though we may lose track and not use our time as wisely as we could.

Next time will be broken down into "subject" increments a little better, and questions will need to wait till the end :-). I'll type up an outline for myself, to keep myself (and the group) focused. I don't want it to be too rigid, but not too relaxed and "anything goes" either.

Alright, off to bed, it's going to be a fun week of celebration and extended family in town!