“Your defect is a propensity to hate everybody.” “And yours,” he replied with a smile, “is willfully to misunderstand them.” Pride and Prejudice
1)SENSE and SENSIBILITY: Jane Austen: Character and Human Nature
"Jane Austen doesn't mock them; she doesn't criticize them; she just reveals them." (Biography: Jane Austen)
Literary Society Literature:
Pride and Prejudice, Frankenstein, Sanditon, Jane Eyre
(Even though Frankenstein is a gothic novel from the Romantic period, we chose to read it during the fall).
Pickwick Portfolio Focus:
Regency England
(see more about this below)
THE WELL-EDUCATED MIND BOOKMARKS
We based our year plan on the idea in Susan Wise Bauer's book,The Well-Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had--that a person can educate themselves according to the trivium:
Grammar—learn the facts
Logic—analyze them
Rhetoric—express your opinions about them
I made three bookmarks, one for each stage of reading, according to Bauer's prescription for a classical education.
Here are the front and back of one girl's Grammar stage bookmark. The Logic and Rhetoric stage bookmarks provide provocative questions which forced each reader to discover her own thoughts about each book. This proved to be much more than just a book discussion, but a time to delve deeply into the heart of each book and person.
This was a simple year, with few field trips, but many book discussions which always ended with a tea. I have few photos our actual book discussions.
PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
WRITERS WORKSHOPS AT HOME
Writer's workshops were mini lessons where we learned and practiced writing skills. Some things we learned or reviewed: starting sentences with weak or strong clauses, grammar, punctuation: hyphens, dashes, colons, semi-colons, commas, capitalization, ellipsis, quotation marks, parentheses, apostrophes, run-on sentences.
Write out paragraph with mistakes Sometimes I wrote a quote for the day on a whiteboard, with deliberately misplaced or omitted punctuation, and misspelled words. The girls took turns correcting one error at a time until the paragraph was corrected.
I gave the girls page from the newspaper and asked them to highlight a certain part of speech. These were some easy ways to review grammar.
PICKWICK PORTFOLIO
One of my dreams for the year was to form our own Pickwick Society and have the girls write and edit editions of their own Pickwick Portfolio. The name is taken from the society that Louisa May Alcott wrote about in her novel, Little Women, which was patterned after Dicken's Pickwick Papers characters. We showed the Little Women movie clip of the Pickwick Society at our opening day, and explained what their own Pickwick Portfolio could be like.
This is our paper inviting the young ladies to write articles for the Pickwick Portfolio.
At one point there were supposed to be four families of girls in this school year with us, and the four mothers adopted the names of the four gentlemen in the Pickwick Papers, which were also adopted by the four March daughters: Mr. Pickwick, Mr. Tupman, Mr. Snodgrass, Mr. Winkle. In the end, Mr. Winkle left our group, but the rest of us kept our names. I was Mr. Pickwick, though I still haven't read the book!
Each girl was given the opportunity to edit and publish the Pickwick Portfolio. Some of the skills learned or practiced were: typing, editing, computer literacy, graphic design, and analyzing. (The editor was not required to revise another student's writing unless there were glaring punctuation or grammar errors).
The editor collected and compiled the submitted articles and advertisements, and added quotes and anecdotes to fill in the spaces. Then she printed the portfolio and handed out individual copies at our society meetings.
Each member eagerly awaited reading the Pickwick Portfolio, and seeing her name in print! Here are a few examples from the Regency edition, volume II.
The GETTY VILLA and NEOCLASSICISM
The Getty Villa was the perfect field trip during our study of Jane Austen. Regency England was enamored by classical Greece and Rome. After the discoveries in Pompeii the English adopted classical hairstyles, clothing, and architecture. This is the first page of one of our lessons on neoclassicism before our trip to the Getty Villa.
First we got a group photo, then the girls split up with their Journals of Discovery to explore the Villa on their own.
One classical-neoclassical style we noted was the melon hairstyle...
...which Emma Thompson as Elinor Dashwood showcases throughout the 1995 Sense and Sensibility film.
Giselle and Katy in the shadow puppet theater.
The girls enjoyed making drawings of the statues and taking notes in their Journals of Discovery. I loved hearing about Autumn and Giselle's discoveries in the museum and gardens that day. It's great to take teenagers on field trips so that we can all explore together and apart.
FRANKENSTEIN
This was the only photo I took from our book discussion and tea. Larissa and Katy added some Halloween makeup, though all of us agreed the novel was not frightening at all.
THE HUNTINGTON
My girls and I spent random days exploring, drawing, and writing at the Huntington.
We split up to explore, but I occasionally ran across the girls and took pictures. Giselle is drawing her favorite, Artemis.
It was peaceful days like this that made me fall in love with this school year.
Another candid shot as Giselle spent a quiet time reading in a garden.
Autumn drawing...
...a bust of the Bard in the Shakespeare garden.
I went off to my favorite spot--the mausoleum.
Ahh! Another lovely day at the Huntington!
SANDITON
Reading Austen's unfinished Sanditon was a new experience for all of us.
During the discussion the girls shared what they hoped would be the real ending of the story.
Ending with a tea was always a fun part of the meetings. Some of the girls enjoyed making Regency-style foods for our teas.
We also had fun experimenting with Regency-style coiffures...
CLOSING DAY
SENSE AND SENSIBILITY COMPONENT
JANE EYRE BOOK DISCUSSION
This is a page from my journal of discovery. On the bottom left of the page is a needle case I made for everyone. Jane made a needle case for her niece, so...
Suzanne always set a beautiful tea table.
The girls never talked about dress colors, but they all matched splendidly!
Giselle and Haley performed some piano pieces for us, like Lizzy does in Pride and Prejudice.
This was a wonderful component, and now the girls were ready to move into Victorian England and big, puffy dresses!
This was one of the most memorable school years for Autumn and Giselle and me. It was a great one for Autumn's senior year.
THE YEAR RATIONALE (adapted from the preface of the Great Books of the Western World)
A liberal education is a freeman’s education. It is the birthright of every person in Western civilization to read an take part in the Great Conversation of Western ideals, by reading, understanding, and discussing great books. “The reduction of the citizen to an object of propaganda…is the greatest dangers to democracy.” It is therefore our duty to read and understand great books which will “give us a standard by which to judge all other books,” and in so doing we promote the betterment of humankind and preserve our freedoms.
The backdrop of the year was Jane Austen’s English Regency period and Charles Dickens’ Victorian period, and a literary society to promote better reading and writing.
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This was the heading I created for every paper I shared with the girls this year. I took the silhouettes of Austen and Dickens and had them face each other.
I chose the layout above because it reminded me of the frontispiece in Dickens' Cricket on the Hearth. I love the fantasy that unfolds above the head of the woman and man. This made me think of Austen and Dickens scribbling away, and their tales looming in their imaginations overhead.
That frontispiece was also the inspiration for our year mind map. Karen drew our school year mind map, and I painted it with bold Regency colors..
YEAR PLAN
I took old illustrations from some Austen novels and inserted our info to make our school year papers beautiful. This is a more complete mind map.
The has four components--1 mini component and 3 major components.
Mini Component: THE LITERARY ACADEMY
1)SENSE and SENSIBILITY: Austen section
2)A TALE OF TWO CITIES: Dickens section
3) PERSUASION:Student project
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Classical education is based on the three lower levels of the liberal arts: grammar, logic, and rhetoric. These were our 3 organizers for each component, which are encapsulated in a quote by Sir Francis Bacon:
Reading maketh a full man,
writing an exact man, and
conference a ready man.
(More about this in the next post)
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This year was geared toward high school girls, so the other families from the WWII year left our group this time. In the beginning there was Suzanne and me and our daughters.
I really wanted my friend Tammy and her girls to school with us so that Giselle would have some friends her age. But a few years before this Tammy told me that EPIC Adventures looked like too much work. I strategized to see if I could get her to join us. At first I invited her family to join in our book discussions, not the complete adventure. She was interested in that, and I got to work to try to entice her into the theme. Hehe!
I put together an enticing moms planning day to share with Suzanne and Tammy the big picture. By the end of that day Tammy was ready to go home and make Regency dresses, which she did! She wholeheartedly schooled with us in every adventure after that until her girls graduated.
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GETTING READY
Each family planned and sewed Regency costumes before school began so we would be ready for our big opening days together.
I had fun putting the accoutrements together. Karen gave me some of this neoclassical French toile to cover our journals. I was with her in 2001 when she bought this fabric in Amboise, France.
I also sewed one fabric medallion onto our scripture journals.
For our school song I wanted to use the tune of the British patriotic hymn, I Vow to Thee My Country. We wrote most of the words at our moms planning day.
OPENING DAY AT HOME
On opening day at home, we learn the big picture for the year, and invite my children to join me on a wonderful adventure!
We always have fun at our own private opening day.
The girls dressed in their Regency attire while they complete some Writers Workshop activitiesand wrote in their Regency journals with quill pens.
It felt like being in a Jane Austen novel.
The girls loved painting the year mind map with their new Windsor and Newton travel paint sets.
I gave them these paints especially for our trips to the Huntington Library.
OPENING DAY
THE LITERARY ACADEMY
We began planning for 3 families, but then other family joined us, and so we had four families invited to our home for our opening day of school -- the Literary Academy.
Bradley means "broad field", so for the year our home became Broadfield Hall.
We mothers welcomed the new prospects to the first day of the Literary Academy, a two-week, preparation course. Students had requirements to fulfill before they were granted entrance into the Jane Austen/Charles Dickens Literary Society.
I shared the vision of the society--reading, discussing, and writing, along with Journals of Discovery, which were new to Tammy's daughters.
Some of the requirements to join the society: choose a pen name, promise share their writing for print with the group throughout the year, participate in book discussions in a refined manner and constructive focus.
Each candidate was given the requirements, to be completed in 2 weeks.
We completed some of these requirements during our opening day, like the Plot Mountain:
Tammy gave us a Book Confessions Quiz, about our individual reading style. We answered the questions and tallied up answers. Tammy read the answer key, revealing our reading personality types. In one question I answered that I have used a piece of tissue as a bookmark!
We also had an Opening Lines Book Quiz. This was a fun quiz introducing the young ladies to classic novels. They tried to the guess the novel based on just the first lines:
"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." (Pride and Prejudice)
"Call me Ishmael." (Moby Dick)
"Marley was dead to begin with." (A Christmas Carol)
Partway through activities we took a refreshment break. The young ladies brought their personal china cup and saucer, and were treated to their first "tea" of the year.
Suzanne made her English grandmother's scones.
After tea the young ladies pulled out their portable watercolors for an art lesson.
After the art lesson the girls signed a document indicating their commitment to complete the Academy requirements and join the Jane Austen/Charles Dickens Literary Society.
Lastly we took lots of photos:
21st century pose
18th century pose
While writing this blog post I recognized that I didn't have to do anything to help Autumn and Giselle get excited about the year. They were already thrilled and excited to learn! This was a great pre-opening day for all of us!
VISITING THE HUNTINGTON
A highlight of the year was getting a year pass to Huntington Library and Gardens. We went by ourselves and with other families several times this school year.
During the two week Literary Academy we visited this Samuel Johnson exhibit since he was the literary giant of the eighteenth century and a huge influence on Jane Austen. We happened to come here on Johnson's 300th birthday, September 18, 2009.
The girls loved posing in their thematic neoclassical attire with the neoclassical sculptures. They brought their sketching and painting materials and went off to have some truly Austen-type leisure time.
Giselle really fell in love with Artemis, the goddess of the hunt. She found and sketched all her statues at the Huntington this year.
OPENING DAY WITH JANE AUSTEN
After our two week Literary Academy, we all dressed up and met at the Huntington again. Our visitor was Jane Austen herself! I have never seen any school visitor play a historical figure more convincingly than did my friend's daughter, Mary. She was magnificent. She knew everything about Jane Austen, and she had the best British accent!
She congratulated the graduates of the Literary Academy and awarded them quill pens, graduation certificates, and Jane Austen silhouette bookplates.
I've always loved bookplates, and had fun designing these using a frame illustration from an Austen book. They were printed on parchment, and tied with a cameo--the quintessential neoclassical piece of jewelry.
We took photos with Jane Austen, who wore a dress that Amber had made for herself when she attended a Southern California Regency ball a few years before this.
This was the most beautiful, genteel, refined opening day ever!
