Thursday, January 23, 2014

A Review: A Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a Generation of Leaders for the Twenty-first Century

A Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a Generation of Leaders for the Twenty-first CenturyA Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a Generation of Leaders for the Twenty-first Century by Oliver DeMille
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I put off reading this book too long, long enough to form my own educational philosophy that was paradoxically a mix of two major styles: unschooling and classical education. I thought I was pretty weird for feeling this way, but the child-led, delight-led nature of unschooling just rang true... and so did the conviction that understanding the classics could create a new generation of renaissance men and women. I had believed these two philosophies to be in opposition to each other, despite both of them ringing true in my heart. Imagine my delight when I realized what Oliver DeMille was proposing: a marriage of unschooling (what he calls freedom education) and classical (an obsession with learning from the greats in every field through history). A common wealth school is being created for homeschoolers in my area and I'm very excited for my four boys and the strong mentors they will have available to them.

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