What is the Classical difference?
Developmental and age-specific learning, which follows the Trivium stages:
Grammar
Young children’s minds learn language, rhymes and memorize well, so this Grammar or Primary stage includes memorization in each subject.
Logic
Middle school students are inquisitive and naturally argumentative, so this stage develops their ability to reason and discern truth.
Rhetoric
High school students want to talk, so this Rhetoric stage teaches them to present their ideas persuasively, listen to opposing views and to work in teams.
Time-tested method and content
Classical Christian schools develop skills to equip students to be lifetime learners by teaching students that every subject is comprised of certain defining facts with an orderly organization of the information, and a concise and persuasive way in which to present the acquired material.
This method of instruction has been in use for hundreds of years, and is the means which produced most of history’s great thinkers; it is the new “old-way” of educating students with a long history of success.
Graduates are familiar with: reading • writing • Latin • logic • math • science • rhetoric • fine arts
This results in gracious, knowledgeable, and thoughtful men and women.
Christ-centered curriculum
Classical Christian schools teach all subjects based on the principle that God is the Creator of all that exists, and therefore all knowledge is interrelated and points back to Him. Biblical standards of conduct are applied in all arenas of school life, acknowledging that Jesus Christ is Lord of all.
The schools acknowledge that God has given parents the responsibility for the education of their children and that the schools instruct those students under the parents’ delegated authority. Most graduates remain faithful to Christ even through college and have a heart to serve others.
Academically rigorous
Students are capable of achieving much more than is commonly thought, and therefore classical Christian schools have high expectations for student learning. Students learn to love the subjects that their teachers love and cheerfully follow the godly example of their instructors.
Students with a classical Christian education experience the personal satisfaction that is inherent in mastering a difficult task.
Nurturing community
A classical Christian school is a community of parents and teachers who share a commitment for teaching children to love learning and growing in godliness.
Smaller class sizes ensure that teachers know their students and are better able to serve them individually.
Students know they are loved and not just another face in the crowd while openly manifesting deep appreciation and respect for their parents and teachers. Time tested method and content.
“Is it not the great defect of our education today that although we often succeed in teaching our pupils ‘subjects’ we fail lamentably on the whole teaching them how to think? They learn everything but the art of learning.”