Key Skills of Learning: Defining Education Series

Key Skills of learning links:

In this episode, I mentioned a few curriculums and resources:

Writing and Rhetoric is an excellent writing program that gets kids thinking- building up to a formal logic curriculum

Classical Academic Press Logic Programs offer many courses on formal logic and debate

Nature Study is an excellent way to build hand-to-mind skills.

Key Skills of Learning transcript:

Your listening to “The Key Skills of Learning” the first episode in the “Defining Education” series.

I am really excited about this new series as we dive a little deeper into what the purpose of education is. Everyone’s core purpose and definition of education are going to look a little different so we are going to look into how Charlotte Mason and Maria Montessori define education. How the classical model of education shaped the way we view it today and my personal philosophy of education gleaned from studying these models of education, speaking with homeschooling mothers who use them to varying degrees, and putting them into practice.

For the purpose of this series, education is split into 3 broad categories. The skills of learning, the love of learning, and moral development.

Today we are going to focus on the brass tacks. The requisite skills of learning. Without these skills, learning is still possible but with them, your world opportunities open up.

The classical model of education was used in Ancient Greek times then again from the renaissance through the early modern era to educate the aristocrats and upper-middle class. One of the core principles of classical pedagogy is trivium. Which consists of three stages of learning: Grammar, logic, and rhetoric.

You’ll notice that these stages of learning are echoed in other philosophies of education as well. In Montessori, they are called “sensitive periods” in Charlotte Mason they are called “Forms”. In a modern education we tried to call them grades but stepped away from the true meaning of following the child and teaching them at the level they are at and just group kids by age and move them up in grade regardless of skill level or maturity.

However, the classical model of education shaped the way we teach our children and think that this concept of children going through phases where they are especially ready for different types of learning stuck because it is based on underlying truths of human development. “Line upon line. Precept on precept. Here a little and there a little until all things are brought to pass. “ and “everything in its season”.

What exactly your child is ready for and when is the tricky part though right?

Well according to a classical model of education children in the grammar stage (roughly elementary school-age kids) are primed to learn FACTS. Geography, memorize the multiplication table, history dates, grammar rules, etc. Their brains soak up facts like sponges and they are thirsty to know more. In a classical model, they use a lot of songs to do help with this memory work. The concept here is that you cannot draw from an empty well. Fill the children up with information so that they can have something to draw from when they start constructing ideas. In the next stage of learning.

When they get to middle school they naturally start pushing back, arguing, asserting themselves, and carving out their identity. This is the time to teach them logic. HOW to form a good argument and how to spot a bad one. They are starting to look at literature with a critical and discerning eye. Pull apart symbolism discusses the “big ideas”. Work through the scientific method to prove their hypothesis. A classical model of education is one of the few philosophies of education that I think really serves this transitional age well. It looks at what a child is naturally inclined to do and builds on those inclinations to help move them from looking at facts to analyzing them to finally forming their own ideas about them.

The final stage in classical education is rhetoric. Where the child knows about the world, knows how to look at things with a discerning eye, and is ready to start articulating their own ideas about it. Here they work on creating their own thesis and support them with logic and fact. They continue to debate and analyze but are now presenting new ideas to be proved against others and specializing their education in areas of interest becoming true scholars. (Similar to what you might see in a Thomas Jefferson Education at this stage only with TJED it is much more self-led).

Now I have the entire podcast to break down what I love about Montessori, Charlotte Mason, and a classical education but I’m going to quickly sum up what I have come to in my own personal homeschooling philosophy.

I have looked at what each idea has to offer and believe that Montessori got it right with early elementary. Child-led, play and discovery, a prepared environment, and teachers as guides speak to me because of the way I have witnessed children at this age learning. As they get older I love so many elements of a Charlotte Mason education. Living books, nature study, learning through REAL experiences, and practical application of learning. As I just mentioned I love that classical education really sees the middle school child and helps transition them from this love of learning phase giving them skills to become scholars as teens and join “The great conversation”.

I pull pedagogy from each philosophy as well as underlying principles. For my family, I have identified the C’s of education as my primary mission in homeschooling my children.

In my home, we cultivate curiosity, creativity, and critical thinking. (Always with compassion). We are always looking at ways to incorporate these principles into our learning but in looking at them through the lens of phases of learning I now see that each of these principles is primely developed at a time when kids are more receptive to them than others.

When they are young, you have a beautiful opportunity to cultivate curiosity by modeling it yourself. Kids are naturally curious and by modeling it yourself you are showing your kids that you don’t outgrow wonder.  You can help them to continue to notice the peculiar and new and ask questions.

Once the children have a foundation of facts and skills, they can then play with them and explore new ways to put them together. “Creativity is intelligence having fun”. What I love about my son’s math program is that it teaches him how to SEE math in new ways. It requires a much deeper level of understanding to “play” math and helps develop his creativity. Children of all ages can be creative but creativity really blossoms once they have some experience under their belt.

In order to criticize you need to really understand something first. Developing critical thinking goes hand in hand with creativity but is also the more disciplined approach to learning. If kids are genuinely curious, willing to be creative, and have the experience practicing those things they will naturally be drawn to improve their work through learning how to pull it apart and put it back together better. This scholarly drive comes more with maturity and practice.

I’ll do entire episodes on the C’s of learning one day but today I want to talk about the Key SKILLS of learning. These are not the overarching principles that I’ve just touched on or even the core subjects that kids should study. No these are much more basic than that.

I’ve always been fascinated by autodidacts. Those who have taught themselves independently of others based on their own desire to learn and ambition to figure out how. To some degree post-college, I found myself to be one. In homeschooling communities, we often call this work scholé a mother’s quest to continually learn and grow. Unschoolers are especially drawn to this model of learning.

Here I think you need to ask the question what would it take for my child to be able to flourish if they wanted to study something independent of me? Because to some degree isn’t that the goal? Don’t we want our children to be lifelong lovers of learning? To be constantly curious and always growing?

Once we give our kids the key tools of learning you open doors for them. They can better track down the rabbit trails of their curiosity. They can better express their creativity. They can better analyze the information they are presented with.

There are many soft skills and character traits that play into this that I will discuss in more detail in the moral development episode but today I am going to focus on the concrete SKILLS that kids need to learn. With these their options are limitless.

Are you ready?

Okay, let’s start with the 3 Rs. Reading, writing, and rhythmic. Yes, I just did that. Does that make anyone else cringe? Only one of them is actually an R and when referencing education it’s ironic that they chose that pneumonic device to remember them. However, that doesn’t make them any less essential. If even the most illiterate can refer to the importance of the 3 R’s that’s saying something right?

Reading, writing, and math are the foundation of all other learning. If your child can read then they can read about anything. If they can write then they can express their ideas and explore new ones. They can record their observations and take notes on the knowledge of others. They can BUILD on their education. Math is everywhere. Math is beautiful and important. Not just for math’s sake but for the sake of science. If your child wants to understand the world around them, they can only go so far with reading before they need to have a mathematical understanding. I LOVE physics. However, I didn’t get far enough in math in high school to take the science class, and honestly, it broke my heart a bit. I love chemistry but my chemical education hit the same wall. Reading fills your mind with ideas and curiosity and math and writing allow you creativity and critical thinking to build on that understanding.

It is for this reason that in my children’s early education their formal lessons focus almost exclusively on developing these SKILLs of learning. We do a lot of other read alouds, play, exploring and touching on other topics and ideas through unit studies but I make sure that even on the hard days these skills do not get skipped because they are foundational to all other learning. As I work to keep that spark of wonder alive in my kids I want to equip them to explore it themselves as they grow and develop.

I don’t think I’ve said anything too controversial yet. So give me a minute. Most people would agree that reading, writing, and math are key skills of learning then quickly move to add other core subjects into this category like history, science, and art. These are wonderful and important subjects but I am going to refute the fact that they are key skills. They are the subjects that we explore with the physical skills of reading, writing, and math. I will discuss these and other subjects further in the love of learning episode, but I wanted to stop the train we all jump on when we hear reading, writing, and math. We are not following the tracks of public education. We are taking a moment to step back and ask “What do my children NEED in order to learn?” What they need is the ability to learn unencumbered.

With those three skills alone they have the world open to them but I am going to take this a step further and say that with the next few skills they are able to fast track their learning to higher ideas.

If your children can read, write, and do math well then they score high on the SATS to college all their dreams come true. Give or take.

If your child understands logic, how to research or fact check, can memorize things, has a hand-to-mind connection, and articulate their ideas… well that’s a child that can change the world. So Let’s dive into some other concrete skills that will set your child’s education apart and help propel them to higher learning.

So let’s break these down.

Logic, as mentioned before when we were talking about the trivium is huge. It’s not only the ability to reason but also to see faulty reasoning in others. To reproach ideas and make sure they can withstand scrutiny and let only the best and truest information from your ideas. It is learning discernment and critical thinking at its finest. The best way to teach a child logic is to use it. I would check out classical academic press to get a curriculum that will teach you (if you were not lucky enough to be private or homeschooled yourself) and your kids’ logic. Then practice identifying fallacies in news articles with current events every day, or memes, or blog posts. Trust me there are logical fallacies everywhere. Especially now in the ’20s. When they write an opinion or persuasive paper our logic is a litmus test for their work. A word of caution though. This phase of learning is for middle school-aged kids because younger kids have not reached a point in their development yet where they can grasp logic and reasoning the same way an older child can. For example, I’ve read that kids as young as 6 can identify sarcasm but can’t see the intended humor until closer to 10. Kids similarly develop their sense of reason around age 8 to a point where they can follow a line of reasoning but not necessarily to a point where they can start to identify constructs of reason like I am referring to here. So, don’t expect too much from your child too soon here. Moral instruction with younger children and consistency with cause and effect. Action and consequence go a long way in getting them ready to develop this key thinking skill that supercharges their learning when they are older. A curriculum I am loving right now is writing and rhetoric because it teaches kids to look at themes and ideas in literature and builds to the logic stage in the trivium while also being just an excellent writing and literature program.

Another skill that comes later in education is knowing how to research or fact check. This goes hand in hand with reasoning, but it is a skill to not only identify false information but also how to identify quality sources of good information. As kids get older and start doing more independent research teach them where to find reliable information. Who wrote it? What was their motive in writing it? Where did they get their data from? Are the statistics accurately representing what is happening or twisted to misrepresent the data? Citing sources in their work is important as it shows that they have done the work to make sure they were using credible sources and allows for someone outside their sphere to check their work. It is a good practice for those looking to go to college, do research as an adult, or even support their arguments in blog posts. Being able to research well ensures that they are internalizing true and accurate information, well represent their ideas, and adds credibility to their work. It is a thinking skill as well as a physical one but key if they want to reach a scholar phase of education. I love learning and learned briefly about citation, quotations, and crediting work in college. However, since I never internalized this as a skill of learning I doubt I’ll ever be able to write a nonfiction book. I remember what I learn but I don’t remember who I learned it from or when or where which makes my arguments weak against someone who can and endangers my ideas as plagiarism.

This is why when you are memorizing something it’s important to not just memorize the content but the source as well.

The next skill is a shortcut. We’ve all heard the phrase “Life is pain, you can choose the pain of discipline or the pain of regret” Well this is how I feel about memorization. I hated it as a kid because I couldn’t see the purpose of it. As a result, I didn’t memorize the multiplication table in 3rd grade. I struggled along until 7th grade when I finally realized how important it was to memorize these facts! I quickly took the time to memorize the multiplication facts and then math instantly became 3x faster and 10x easier! Sometimes it just takes a little perspective. In the grammar stage of the trivium, you are memorizing facts. Filling your brain with knowledge from which to draw later. I know many of us to want to push back on this idea of filling a bucket (as it is a little outdated and lighting a fire sounds so much more exciting) but hear me out here for a minute. How many times have the words of a favorite song, poem, or bible verse come back to your mind and give you solace? How many times have the morals from your favorite fables or idioms come to mind when you are watching the drama unfold in your communities? The worlds we consume become a part of us (which is also why the media we bring into our homes matter) but the words we memorize are truly internalized. I heard a story often growing up about a man who was wrongly imprisoned for several months in complete isolation. His living conditions were deplorable. When he got out someone asked him how he was able to overcome such adversity and his answer was that the poems and the word of God that his mother had him memorize kept him company. They were a fountain from which he drew to keep his mind occupied on a higher plain than the one he lived in. Memorization isn’t just a life skill it is a hack to learning that can fast track your understanding when used strategically. Do I think we need to memorize all of the names, dates, and history of the world? Not necessarily. Look at what you are trying to learn and when it is something that will need to be recalled often and precisely taking the time to memorize it frees up your brain for more creative work. Memorization though is a skill. A fun way to practice it is by memorizing funny poems and verses. Things that are a joy to recall. This way kids can develop their own methods that work for them so that they can deploy this thinking skill when they need it. Kids of any age can memorize things but it is easier for younger kids than adults.

Next is the hand-mind connection. So here is where I get a little controversial for those not accustomed to looking at things from different pedagogies but I will argue strongly that this is a key skill of learning. If you have ever heard of multiple intelligences you know that spatial reasoning is one of the main ways human intelligence is displayed and critical in many fields and life functions. Having a strong hand-mind connection is important for driving, cooking, and for those ambitious enough to have careers in surgery, art, mechanics to name just a few low-hanging fruits. Strengthening your hand-mind connection helps you to process information quicker and more deeply. This is why for many of us that taking notes is so effective. It’s not that we are even going to necessarily go back and read our notes but the physical act of writing them that concretes them in our mind. Yes, you say that’s why writing is a key skill of learning how is this different. I’m glad you asked! Writing can be done slowly and laboriously. You can do copy work or rewrite a sentence 16 times but what concretes information in your mind is when you take an idea and express it freely on paper. So when you are listening to a lecture it is forcing you to take in auditory information, internalize it, then transfer that information onto the paper. This is part of the power of narration. You need to know something to repeat it. But it takes a step further because as you write it you are creating a physical memory of that information. This is also true for visual information which is why I am such an advocate for drawing and nature study. Learning how to observe things closely and record that visual information gives your brain just one more tool for processing information. Like music and foreign languages your brain is given another mode of expression and also perception. Luckily this skill of hand mind connection can be developed in many ways. Through drawing, music, lego play, and cake decorating. In the younger years, we call it fine and gross motor skills. In high school, we call it athletics and craftsmanship. Today though while we are talking about concrete skills we are calling it the hand mind connection. The physical skill of being able to express what is in your mind with your hands with detail and skill will set you apart and help you process information more quickly and concretely.

Finally, kids need to be able to articulate their ideas. This can be done through writing and math, but I am more specifically talking about public speaking. Dale Carnegie once said (and I’m paraphrasing here) “A man who can speak well is given all kinds of credit (due or undue) over one who cannot”. You build this essential skill through oral narration, presentations, and conversation. A formal study of public speaking and interview skills couldn’t hurt either. I would strongly recommend that any adult and all teenagers read the book “How to win friends and influence people” by Dale Carnegie not only because it is an excellent book on persuasion. I would say THE book on persuasion. But because learning how to speak in a way that people want to listen to you opens opportunities for new experiences which is my favorite way to learn it gives you credibility and is a key skill of learning the rhetoric stage where you are proving your ideas among other scholars. This skill does not need to wait for high school though. It starts young as little ones learn how to express their ideas clearly through their oral narrations of the stories you just read together or when they tell you stories as you are cooking dinner. Asking for clarification or for them to slow down or speak a little louder helps them naturally fine-tune their speaking voice eventually giving them another tool of expression. I would say that while this interpersonal skill could qualify as a soft skill in many ways it still sits in the concrete skill section because it can be physically practiced and is essential to higher education.

So there you have it. The three key skills of learning are reading, writing, and math. With them, you can learn anything. Focus on those early on and you will be laying a firm foundation for everything else.

As you level up in your homeschooling game if you want to give your kids a tool belt for learning that helps them reach new heights I would recommend starting them young with developing their hand mind connection through play and subjects that cultivate this trait. Especially drawing. Especially in a nature journal- but I may be a bit biased. Having them memorize poetry especially but also key facts that will help them shortcut their learning. Encourage speaking skills as they narrate back what they have learned or share their stories with you. Ask them thinking questions about what they read or use a curriculum like writing and rhetoric that encourages discussion. Point out cause and effect and ask them where they learned fun facts they share with you. Model finding information from quality sources not always using Alexa or google but doing research together in books or on credible websites.

As they get older consider having them formally learn logic, do research papers and cite their sources, continue to develop their hand mind connection. Many kids who have not picked up an instrument or hobby just stop drawing, doing art, and other craftsmanship in their teens. Help them to find an outlet that cultivates this skill. Have them give speeches from memory focusing on eye contact and elocution.

As they develop their logic, reasoning, research, and memorization they will sharpen their mind with these key thinking skills. As they develop their hand-mind connection and articulation through speaking they will have new tools to process and express information in a way that will lend credibility to them as they build their knowledge and confidence.

Whew! This was a heavy episode but I hope you enjoyed the deep dive with me. I would love to hear what you think so reach out to me on Instagram @hatchingcuriosity to tell me what YOU think the key skills of learning are. Did I hit the nail on the head or miss one? Do you think the hand-mind connection is not essential? Let me have it!

Either way, I hope you take the chance to look at your homeschool and feel good bout what you are doing. Most of us DO teach the key skills of learning and as our kids make progress you are giving them the tool belt to learn ANYTHING. Just think about that. If they can read, write and do the math. They can learn literally ANYTHING and if you already bossing the heck out of these key skills I hope that you were able to glean ideas on how to brain skills that will serve them in all their endeavors.

Until next time, as always, stay curious!