Just a quick round-up of ideas and thoughts on reading the classics with your students or in your own pursuit of a life well-read. These practices are also embedded in the language arts courses at Cottage Press.

Lindsay Brigham's recent article at Circe, To Kill A Mockingbird: Compassion Needs Imagination, traces Scout's progress in compassion.

Plutarch, as relevant as ever:

"Boys In a Pasture," by Winslow Homer. Can you smell the grass? feel the heat? hear the bees buzzing? Do you remember the glorious freedom of a long summer of such days stretching out as far as the eyes could see?

In the Art of Commonplacing, Part 3, I mentioned this new habit we are forming in our week.

Now that we have all of the why, what, and how of commonplacing covered, let's talk about when. I urge you to set apart specific time in your schedule for commonplacing. Put at least two commonplace sessions on your weekly calendar.

Now you have all of your commonplacing materials, and you are eager to get started. But wait! First, you need to take a moment to set up your commonplace book.

This series of three posts is addressed to students—of all ages!— based on recommendations in Cottage Press Language Arts and the Commonplace Book Practices at Providence Prep.

As a follow up to Chris Perrin's thoughts on embodied education, I've gathered some inspiration in photos and links for displaying the prints that accumulate over the months and years of Picture Study

A Conversation About Love originally posted January, 2015:

Two passages from my commonplace book; first, this from The Brothers Karamazov:

Keeping a copybook in the younger years is excellent training for many things, one of which is keeping a commonplace book. Principles and practices for copybook and commonplace book have a great deal of overlap, particularly in the selections to be reproduced.

Years ago, when I first heard Chris Perrin talk about the concept of scholé, he posed the question: "How have you practiced scholé in your homeschool?" My Eeyore proclivities surfaced, and I immediately thought of all the ways I had failed to do it. Happily,

I'm honored to to announce that Simply Convivial is hosting a guest post by yours truly today: Teaching Kids to Keep a Commonplace. Thank you, Mystie!

For as long as I can remember, I have copied quotes from books, poems, songs, Scripture. I cannot remember what sparked the idea, but I am grateful that I began this lifelong pursuit. I remember many a day during my teen years, sitting at the desk in my 70s era yellow and orange room, copying lyrics from pop songs.

“She was a woman of practical good sense and strong cheerfulness, She knew that the world was risky and that she must risk her surviving child to it.” Wendell Berry’s arresting description of Nancy Feltner, a woman who had endured unthinkable sorrows.  

The right way to teach literature to young people.

I teach literature to high school students at our local classical education co-op as part of a larger Humanities Curriculum. In this post, I detail the simple template I use to structure our weekly literature studies.

Among many other charms and commendations, books provide most welcoming room decor. Here in our little cottage, book-laden shelves truly do welcome us back home at night, surrounding us with cheerful comfort as we gather together in the evening after supper by the fire.

In the pages of my Commonplace Book, I record a thread of the Great Conversation where Dostoyevsky and Lewis speak in concert about the Golden Rule and how it can be so subtly distorted.

Classical educators frequently talk about the "Great Books" and the "Great Conversation" of the Western tradition. As a newcomer to classical education, it took me a bit to figure out just what these terms meant and why they were so important.