Latest / The Christian Homemaking Podcast: Simply Convivial with Mystie Winckler / Charlotte Mason Homeschooling Across History | Jennifer Pepito

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Charlotte Mason Homeschooling Across History | Jennifer Pepito · The Christian Homemaking Podcast: Simply Convivial with Mystie Winckler

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Speaker: welcome to Simply Convivial, the Christian homemaking podcast.
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I'm Misty Winkler, homemaker, homeschooling mom of five, grandma,
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and author of Simplified Organization: Learn to Love What Must Be Done.
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Convivial means living a full life together with joy, and that's
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what we want our homes to be.
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My goal is to see as many women as possible become engaged, competent,
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and cheerful Christian homemakers.
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And today I'm joined by another homeschool mom, Jennifer Pepito.
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Jennifer is the host of The Restoration Home podcast, and bestselling author of
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Habits for a Sacred Home, and she's been on the podcast before for that book.
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Her latest book is The Inspired Homeschool: How History's Heroes Light a
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Path Toward Joyful, Confident Learning.
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She's been homeschooling for over 25 years, her seven kids, and, um,
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she's been on many podcasts, and she lives in the mountains where
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she enjoys reading aloud, working in her garden, and watching the sunset.
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So thank you so much for joining me today, Jennifer.
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Speaker 2: Thanks for having me today, Misty.
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What an honor to get to chat with a fellow veteran homeschooler.
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We can call ourselves that.
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I, I didn't think about that, you know?
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For, I, I didn't call myself that for a long time, 'cause
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that would be Cindy Rollins or-
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Speaker: I know.
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â¦ Speaker 2: you know, some of those ladies, but no, I think
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we, I think we've earned it.
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We have grandchildren, so.
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Speaker: Grandchildren, that's the cred right there.
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Mm-hmm.
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And I'm excited about this book because I love biographies, and I think
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biographies are so helpful because they give us those real-life stories
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that help us expand our experience.
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And I also have actually heard people say that homeschooling
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was invented in the '80s.
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Speaker 2: Ah.
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Sorry.
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Speaker: And I'm pretty sure that's not true.
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So now you ha- you have a book, right?
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So is that true or not true?
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Speaker 2: Not true.
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I mean, from my, from myâ¦
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According to my research, Jesus was homeschooled.
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So next time someone says, "Well, what would Jesus do about
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your children's education?"
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Speaker: So how did you, uh, find these different biographies and pick the
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people that you highlighted in this book?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, because history was homeschooled, it was
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actually hard to narrow it down.
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Speaker: Yes.
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Speaker 2: And, and it was so much fun thinking about it and really praying
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about it, because I wanted to highlight people who, whether they were Christians
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or not, who would highlight some of the virtues that we hold dear as Christians.
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And so I, uh, I landed on people like Booker T.
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Washington just had such a, such a beautiful model of a work ethic.
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Mm-hmm.
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Berthe Morisot, an artist, not necessarily a Christian, but highlighted through
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her art just the beauty of motherhood.
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Um, C.S.
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Lewis, who wasn't homeschooled the whole time, but he was, you know, in high school
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he was t- taught in a home by a tutor, not, um, not in a school setting, and then
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his early years was also homeschooled.
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And so, so many people in history were homeschooled, it was really
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easy to find enough people.
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It was harder to ch- to narrow it down and choose.
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But I was, you know, I was kind of writing it with the mind of
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Charlotte Mason's principles.
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And so that was another thing I wanted to highlight is, like, living ideas.
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I highlighted Elizabeth Gooch.
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Uh, habits, I highlighted Benjamin Franklin.
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The atmosphere of home, I highlighted Laura Ingalls Wilder.
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And so it was really fun to look at the Charlotte Mason principles, look
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at, uh, amazing people in history who were homeschooled, and then just lay
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out, like the whole book actually lays out a homeschool plan for people- For
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a more Charlotte Mason literature-based homeschool routine, but it, it makes
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it a lot more approachable and, and hopeful, I think, even because you can
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see how these people with very imperfect childhoods and very imperfect educations
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still grew up and changed the world.
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Speaker: Yeah.
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At a time where they didn't ha- they couldn't buy a box
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curriculum set, but they had-
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Speaker 2: And probably for the good.
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Honestly- Yeah.
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â¦ probably for the better.
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Speaker: Which was one of your surprising favorites?
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Is that, is that possible to narrow down?
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Speaker 2: Probably Blaise Pascal, actually.
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It was soâ¦
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You know, I'm not, like, I'm more of a history and literature buff.
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Um, my children, you know, were really well-educated in the
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humanities, and probably I could have done better in, um, math.
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And so, you know, Blaise Pascal was a mathematician and a scientist, and
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really had a lot of m- maybe natural genius that way, or natural bent.
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Like, his dad was trying to delay math instruction, which I've read a lot of the
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Blue Doran's work, and they also- Mm-hmm â¦ recommend delaying math instruction.
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And so his dad was trying to delay that, and Blaise actually started on
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his own, you know, trying to figure out mathematical and geometric equations.
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And the other thing that was so interesting about him is just
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his, his mom was actually gone.
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He was, uh, hi- his mom had passed, and so his dad, on his own, had
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the ideal of wanting to give his children a better education.
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So kept them home.
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This was, I don't remember the dates, but I think it was, like, France maybe
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1700s or, you know, a, a while ago.
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And so there were probably other options for a boy of a decently middle-class
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family, but his dad felt like homeschooling was the best for his kids.
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And, uh, and just, you know, really- Um, really worked to find
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the best opportunities for his son.
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And that was inspiring as well, you know, just to see a father put so much interest
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and care into the education of his son.
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And then of course, Blaise Pascal is a genius, but he's the one who came up
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with Pascal's Wager, which is basically if you, you know, if you believe
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in God, what do you have to lose?
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If you don't believe in God, you have everything to lose.
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And so, you know, just hisâ¦
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He was so smart, such a, such a scientist, such a mathematician,
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and yet also such a man of faith.
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And so that was probably the most surprising andâ¦
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'Cause all, some of them were obvious.
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Like, I've loved Elizabeth Goudge's writing for years.
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We're doing a book club study of one of her books in the Restoration Home
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community because there, out of her novels, there are so many beautiful,
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deep lessons about family life.
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Uh, C.S.
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Lewis.
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Joan of Arc is one of my heroes, and I write a whole chapter about her.
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But Blaise Pascal wouldn't have been an obvious love of mine, and
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yet I, I grew to really admire and respect him and his family for
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the way that they, um, raised him.
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Speaker: That's a great one.
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That's amazing.
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I didn't realize any of that, so that's awesome.
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I know a couple summers ago, I read the big, thick Eric
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Metaxas biography of Bonhoeffer.
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And when it's explaining his childhood and his mother She was homeschooling them.
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Like she, again, was intentional.
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She knew what she wanted her children to have.
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And it was describing like her priorities in poetry and singing.
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I'm like, she did morning time before it was aâ¦
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Like, it doesn't have to be a thing or a curriculum program.
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You're like, "These are our priorities.
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This is we're, what we're gonna make time for in our life and in our family."
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And intentional families have always been doing that.
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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And which, which is what we're called to do in Deuteronomy.
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You know what I mean?
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Yeah.
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We're called to these things, teach as you walk, as you rise up, as you lie down.
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And so it's such a fallacy and a real travesty, honestly, for Christian families
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to be handing their children over to a godless state to raise and inculcate.
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Like, throughout history, great men and women were raised on, b- by their
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parents on God's values and word.
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Like, um, Alfred the Great, I have a children's picture
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book about Alfred the Great.
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He's another one who united the kingdoms of England, taught his people the Bible.
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You know, there's probably still, like, pagan outliers at that time
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in history, and yet he united them around the word of God.
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But it started with his mom teaching him the word of God.
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And so I think we underestimate, like we overestimate the power of standards
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or a boxed curriculum or a trained teacher, and completely underestimate
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the power of our own love for God, our own love for virtue, and our own,
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uh, passions in teaching our children.
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Speaker: Yes.
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So true.
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So who is this book for?
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Who, who would benefit the most from it?
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think any homeschool family, and I think
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also the relatives, the questioning relatives- â¦ of the homeschool family.
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So I think for the moms who are, you know, wanting a guide to help homeschooling,
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a gentle guide that is, um, interesting and engaging and not overwhelming, I
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think it's gonna be excellent for them.
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But also for those, those relatives who are saying, "Well, you know, well, that's
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weird," or, "What about socialization?"
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All those questions, I think, it's gonna be really reassuring for those
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relatives to see all these geniuses in history who were homeschooled, and
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the, the beauty and virtue and treasure that came out of those values of some
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alone time, some deeper thinking, some, uh, some instruction from parents.
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Speaker: Mm-hmm.
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Yeah.
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What, uh, I'm curious, um, did ha- did having access to books,
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that hasn't always been a thing.
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That's kind of, to me, feels like a core of being able to provide an education.
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And, you know, many people were maybe even not necessarily homeschooled
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so much as self-taught because they had access to lots of books.
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Like, lots of books is very core to my homeschool and, and to an education.
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But some of these people were living in a time where there
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really weren't that many books.
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So what kind ofâ¦
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How does that living ideas and access to books and all of
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that play out through history?
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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I think that's such a good question because some of the people who I was
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most impressed with, uh, Joan of Arc, Jesus, even Leonardo da Vinci, possibly
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didn't have a lot of access to books.
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But I think sometimes we are loading our children up with so
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much information, they're actually missing out on divine revelation.
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You know, God is always speaking.
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He, he is a present help in time of trouble.
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But sometimes we're researching ourselves to death and, and doing the
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same thing to our kids, overfilling them with information so that
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they really have no capacity to be still and know that I am God.
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Or to, you know, be the ones who, um, like Moses, uh, you ca- came
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upon a burning bush and stopped and listened to the voice of God.
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And so I think it was really compelling to see that it's not even, like, I think-
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Home schoolers today should be reading aloud to their children, absolutely.
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Like, if you're not reading aloud to your children, you're not really
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passing on values to your children.
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Like, if all they're doing is sitting on a computer doing, you know, teaching to a
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test, you're not really passing on values.
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But it, you know, if, if you are somebody who is reading your- reading the word
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of God and passing on that to your children, that's even better probably
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than reading a lot of other books.
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And, and I love reading books to my children.
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I think we've, we've, you know, passed on a whole worldview to our
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children through the books we've read.
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But I think that it's not necessarily just this amount of information.
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Charlie Mason talks about spreading a feast, but I think sometimes we're
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over-spreading the, the, the feast, and our children also need a little
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bit of time to be quiet and wonder.
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And that was, you know, the genius of Leonardo da Vinci, was that he had
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a lot of alone time to just observe the natural world and pay attention
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to what he saw and ask questions about it and be curious about it.
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And Joan of Arc, you know, she had a lot of time in nature, a
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lot of quiet time, and she had
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You know, I just, I read Mark Twain's biography of her.
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He wasn't even a believer, but he could just see the, the virtue
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and the quality of person that she was, and a lot of that was just
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cultivated in quiet times in nature.
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And, and, you know, being quiet and still enough that when God told her to
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go lead her, her people into battle, she listened, and not just listened,
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but had strategies for battle that experienced generals were am- amazed by
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Speaker: Yeah, I think that's so important, especially now where if we
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have time alone without other people maybe in the same room, we often still are not
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alone because we have our phone, we have- we put noise in our ears all the time.
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And so that kind of quiet time and alone time that you're describing
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is completely different than what even adults, much less children,
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often have the space for anymore.
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Speaker 2: It is true, and it, it's a, it's a tragedy of our day.
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I think it's gonna really cost us as humanity in terms of the creativity
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that comes out, what we produce, that we don't have alone time.
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'Cause, you know, for me, a lot of my best ideas for, you know, Peaceful Press
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curriculum or, um, books I'm writing come on a walk, come when I'm on a hike or, you
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know, they come in those quieter moments.
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And if we, as people are, are constantly listening to music, listening to
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podcasts, and I obviously produce a podcast, I'm glad people listen, I'm
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sure you feel the same way, but there does have to be some time where we're
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just quiet and giving ourselves time to process, and our kids need that as well.
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And I think, you know, as homeschoolers, sometimes we think,
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"Oh, no, there's not enough."
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Like, I know people will do, like, a Peaceful Press day of curriculum, and
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it's so fun, and they're so engaged, and they're like, "But maybe I'm not doing
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enough, and we need to add on some extra curriculum so that we're doing enough."
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But what about just giving your children time to think about what you
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read and what they learned that day, and see what comes out of them having
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a little bit of time to process?
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And I think to some degree, it's almost aâ¦
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It could be partly a theological argument because, you know, we- the Bible
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says we're made in the image of God.
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We're image-bearers, but I think sometimes we're still looking
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at ourselves and our children as unredeemed, as before the redemption,
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before the restoration of all things.
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And so then we don't trust that they'll be up to any good if
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they are doing, if they're having a little bit of personal time.
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Do you know what I mean?
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Theyâ¦
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And, and this is- and I'm not talking personal time on a computer, 'cause
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that's not the same thing at all.
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I'm talking, like, a little bit of free play in the afternoons.
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Like, Charlotte Mason recommended that children have the greater part of their
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day spent outdoors in free play, and, you know, that was hard for us in our family
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with a lot of children, a lot of chores.
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We had a little farmstead.
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But there's gotta be a few hours a day where your children are able
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to just play out what they learned.
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We don't have to copy the public schools.
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They're not turning out good products.
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Like, they are burning out kids so that by the time they graduate, they really have
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no ideas of their own and no curiosity.
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And this, the world we live in right now with, with AI, an
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information-based education is not the main thing because information
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is just too easy to get really fast.
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What would be more important is cultivating virtue and critical thinking
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skills and emotional intelligence and a relationship with God.
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Speaker: So true.
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I know I remember just, like, watching my kids when they were in those younger
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years, and if they were outside and their play, like, ended up incorporating
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things that they were learning and reading about, like, how muchâ¦
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And, and that did happen.
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That is actually normal.
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But you need the space for that to happen and the time for that to happen.
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But that is so much more valuable to them and such a better use of time than any
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kind of directed craft project I could have come up with to help make it fun.
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It's like it, they didn't need a, me to have a creative craft project
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to make it fun and relatable.
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They needed the ideas, the stories, and then time outside.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think it's so important for parents to pay attention
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to that because, you know, the core of a Charlotte Mason education is that
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you read and your children narrate.
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But often in those early years, their narration's gonna be a little stilted.
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Like, they're not gonna be able to give you a full written
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picture of what you read, but they probably will be playing it out.
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You'll probably, if you take a moment to observe what they're playing,
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they're probably actually retelling the story very well in their imaginative
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play and making a lot of connections.
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This is why, you know, even teaching history through literature, like,
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your children reading about pioneers and then in another lesson learning
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about, um, Davy Crockett or Abraham Lincoln living in a pioneer cabin.
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Like, the connections and the understanding of where they came from,
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the understanding of the, of the life, the worldview of that time is going
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to be so much clearer to them if they just have also some time to process.
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Speaker: Mm-hmm.
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Yeah, and it's out- outdoor play also.
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Like, some of those stuff would come out in their DUPLOs.
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Like, what are they making with the DUPLOs in the afternoon or
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drawing, where it's just, it's up to them, and they're, they areâ¦
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It's that processing.
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And we can't do that for them, but they need the space for that.
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So where can people find your book?
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Speaker 2: Yeah.
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Um, if you go to inspiredhomeschoolbook.com,
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you can find the links to order on any of the book sites.
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And I had some pre-order bonuses up, a free planning workshop, a master
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book list, and I'm gonna leave a few of those up for people who are
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purchasing while it's available to ship.
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Speaker: Awesome.
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All right.
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So go grab your copy while some of those bonuses are still available.
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The Inspired Homeschool, How History's Heroes Light a Path
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Toward Joyful, Confident Learning.
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Thank you so much for joining me today, Jennifer.
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Speaker 2: Thanks for having me, Misty.
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What a fun conversation