Clear Lake Classical recently ran the fall edition of their newsletter, and I was honored they would accept an excerpt from one of my articles on classical education. Want to see the full newsletter?! Sign up here!

Another painful conversation. Another hurting set of parents.

The mother of a bright 6^th grader looked at me, mournfully. “We just want school to make sense for where their lives are going,” she said. “If they come on [the family farm],” her husband added, “I don’t want [my child] to have spent years in school learning something different than who we are every day in our home.”

Education should “make sense.” Learning ought to help our kids “be who we are every day.” I’ve heard these concerns voiced, emailed, and prayed for many, many times.

Yet for many families, there is a growing concern that education has been disconnected from what we want for the next generation. Do the hours spent in various classes actually prepare young minds for the skills they will need? Do the values they pick up – on the playground, in the lunch line, or on the bus –  shape them into the godly adults we pray they will become? Growing up in Minnesota, and now living in Iowa, it is easy to see that Midwest families value education that integrates knowledge and values that will be practical for our children’s future. Continue reading →