CHAPTER 3

Natural Structure

"For we let our young men and women go out unarmed in a day when armor was never so necessary. By teaching them to read we have left them at the mercy of the printed word. ..They do not know what the words mean. ..they are a prey to words in their emotions instead of being the masters of them in their intellects. " -Sayers

"When a child utters his first word there is no need to prepare anything special for him, since his prattling is heard as a sound of joy within the home. But the work of tiny hands which are the first stammerings of a man at work require 'incentives to activity' in the form of objects which correspond to his desire to work. " -Montessori

The difficulties caused by the 'lost tools of learning' having been lost are perhaps most apparent in the fields of mathematics, science, engineering and technology. Having both experienced the difficult process of rediscovering those tools by ourselves in order to earn degrees in these areas, we had no doubt that Dorothy Sayers' essay contained excellent educational insight. As homeschoolers, we set out to devise a P-12 curriculum for our children that would spare them from encountering the same difficulty. As we progressed we began to use various manipulatives, and in observing our children, realized the value of hands-on learning. We began to tailor the curriculum to include a number of these beneficial materials.

In the due course of time and research we encountered the writings of Dr. Maria Montessori. We were excited to find that her method confirmed much of what we were doing, and delighted to discover that there was a Catholic educator from whose work we could proceed. The method she described fit perfectly observations of our own children. We had already noticed that our children would concentrate intently on certain activities, asked to work on "days off" and showed a definite preference for simple and realistic items over children's stylized or exaggerated materials. Dr. Montessori's writings told us why. The activities and materials they preferred were similar in nature to some of those she described in her method. For example, in her first year of preschool, Lizzie loved to trace over letters we had written for her. She loved this work so much that we had to make copies of master worksheets in order to keep up with her demands for "more letters".

She did not, however, care for bought workbooks with lots of pictures and activities that really were not "to the point" of forming letters. Although we did not know it at the time, she was essentially performing the same task accomplished in tracing Sandpaper Letters over and over with the fingers. We knew we had found what we were seeking.

In implementing several more elements of the Montessori method in our homeschool, we began almost immediately to see results resembling Dr. Montessori's description. The concentration, repetition, calm and preference for work over play were apparent in a matter of days, and the speed with which the children "took to" the work was amazing. When Eddie was beginning his sensorial work, we ordered a hooked mass set that came fitted in a wooden block as an inexpensive substitute for the cylinders. When they arrived, the smallest weight was missing and we called the company to explain. By the time the problem had been explained, we had to tell them we would keep it anyway and arrange for a new set to be sent. Eddie had discovered the "cylinders" and begun using them, exactly as he should, without any demonstration. He would not let go of them!"

We knew Dorothy Sayers was right, as was Dr. Montessori. We were faced with a dilemma. How could these apparently incompatible works be combined? Dorothy Sayers' curriculum is often interpreted as very structured and regimented. Dr. Montessori's method relies on flexibility, free choice of work with subtle guidance and limits, and proceeding at the child's pace. They seemed on the surface to be almost diametrically opposed.

Convinced that there was a solution to this problem, and looking carefully below the surface of both, we began to realize that some critical elements were shared. Both rely heavily, classical education in the division of the Trivium and Dr. Montessori in the sequence of work, on the natural development and interests of the child. Both also claim as one result the ability to learn on one's own. Looking at them from this perspective we realized that they could indeed be combined, and in fact complemented each other perfectly. Dorothy Sayers' outline provided the overall framework, while Dr. Montessori's method provided the day-to-day detail. In reality this is simply an extension of the Montessori method which, when closely examined, reveals a pattern of free choice within limits. Dorothy Sayers provided us with the content and Dr. Montessori with the method of our curriculum.

This brings us to the final requirement for what ,we now call Natural Structure. In the late 1980's we were introduced to homeschooling by an doctoral dissertation advisor and professor when we were living in Worcester, Massachusetts. He and his wife were homeschooling their children and we were impressed by both homeschooling and the children themselves. We decided then that homeschooling is an excellent educational option.

Ten years later we were homeschooling and became convinced, for religious reasons as well, that it is the best option for our children. Natural Structure had to work in the homeschool. In the next chapter we will explain how and why it does. For the moment we will consider the 'what' and 'what not'.

Dr. Montessori showed in her work that a rigidly structured educational environment which forces the child physically and mentally into unnaturally controlled behavior is counterproductive. It can cause a number of behavioral deviations which "normalized" children do not display, some of which are so common that they are considered to be normal behavior in our culture. It must be noted that, perhaps in response to this discovery, an error of the opposite extreme has appeared. There is a school of thought which claims the child should be allowed freedom without limits. According to this theory no action or behavior of a child is to be considered wrong. His behavior should not be checked nor his choices limited for any reason save physical safety. This completely contradicts Dr. Montessori's teaching, which emphasized free choice within limits.

"Let us leave the life free to develop within the limits of the good, and let us observe this inner life developing. This is the whole of our mission. Perhaps as we watch we shall be reminded of the words of Him who was absolutely good, 'Suffer the little children to come unto Me.' That is to say, 'Do not hinder them from coming, since, if they are left free and unhampered, they will come." (emphasis added)

Dr. Montessori encountered this problem personally. In one rather amusing incident while visiting a Montessori school, she corrected a child who was behaving in a disruptive manner. The child's mother immediately informed the doctor that she must not correct him, as it was not the Montessori way!

This brings us to an interesting point which we will consider in depth, as it is critical to Montessori and Natural Structure. An attempt has been made to generalize or secularize Dr. Montessori's method ". ..especially in the United States. For here a number of schools use Montessori only as a teaching method. Here also, many people maintain that this is what Dr. Montessori meant. They disregard what she most valued: the contribution the child can give humanity." Dr. Montessori believed that understanding the nature of the child as God created him, and encouraging the development of the child as God planned for him, would result in men who matured and lived as He intended. The religious beliefs of the family must be at the heart of the curriculum. We now see an agnostic or new age 'spiritual component' substituted and an intentional blurring of world religions in the name of 'culture' or 'multi-culturalism'. A New Age, or pantheistic, element is alien to the Montessori method.

The Montessori method, especially in its original form, is unfamiliar to most Americans. Substituting a New Age spirituality for Catholicism may not appear to be all that important to many people. As a society we have long ago unwittingly accepted a theory of education that has its roots in pantheism, the Kindergarten system of a German educational reformer named Friedrich Froebel.

Froebel's theories emphasize play and imagination. The concept of play and imagination according to Froebel versus according to Montessori is also worth looking at in depth. His system greatly influences the education commonly found in our schools, both public and private, as well as most individual's concept of the needs of children. It contains several elements incompatible with the Montessori method. The most important is their diametrically opposed roots, pantheism versus Catholicism.

"Froebel's religious philosophy was very largely pantheistic and Nordic; whereas Montessori's is Catholic and Latin...The German defenders of Froebel against the Montessori system, support their statements by appealing to a pantheistic philosophy. .. It is the breaking down of all distinctions and forms, the flowing together in the universe -soul, body, matter, spirit, you and I, God and man -in one great whole. As opposed to this view, historical Christianity presents a universe with definite and abiding forms, eternally distinct, and distinct from its Creator. The dogmatic teaching of traditional Christianity, with its doctrine of the Incarnation, of the visible Church with its sacramental system, of Heaven and Hell, of spirit and matter, and many others - all combine to form an objective body of truth, external to the individual, hard as adamant, to be taken for what it is, or not at all. The Gospel is essentially the 'Good News,' and news is something which comes from the outside, to be accepted and believed -or rejected. "

Dr. Montessori emphasizes the comprehension of a pre-existing real world, a material reality by which the child is formed and which the child masters. Froebel emphasized a shifting reality in which the child, through pretending and imagination, ignores the material reality and creates his own world. In our culture this fantasy world in which children often live is considered normal and is even encouraged. It is actually behavioral deviation called a fugue which disappears with normalization. Dr. Montessori directly addressed this herself.

"Adults, even though they punish or patiently tolerate the errant and unruly actions of these disordered children, actually favor and encourage their fantasies, interpreting them as the creative tendencies of a child's mind. Froebel invented many of his games to encourage the development of a child's imagination along these lines. ..Toys furnish a child with an environment that has no particular goal and, as a consequence, they cannot provide it with any real mental concentration but only illusions. ..'divided' children of this sort are regarded, particularly in school, as being highly intelligent, even if they lack order, neatness, and discipline."

6 It can be considerably more difficult to distinguish toys from educational materials now than in the past. The advent of educational toys has made a gray area where each product must be evaluated based upon its own features. For example, a recently advertised game claimed to be educational because it helped a child learn to count, despite the fact that the highest number a player would be required to count to was two. It looked like fun and a good way to practice motor skills, but not helpful to learn to count. A toy in this context can be distinguished from an education material by determining whether or not it has a particular developmental goal. If it is used as it was intended, will a goal be achieved, such as color recognition, or improved memory skills? Only if the answer is yes, can it be considered educational.

Dr. Montessori refers to children who have a great abundance of toys as 'pampered children.' These children were first encountered in Europe and America. They did not immediately respond to the materials as the poor children had, and they had very little ability to concentrate. They would fight over the materials then abandon them almost immediately. In each child, normalization began with one particular material which captured his attention and allowed him to calm himself and proceed to other materials. In our very affluent society this difficulty in beginning can appear in children that are not considered, by American standards, to be wealthy. If sparking an interest is difficult, do not give up. Sooner or later one of the materials will capture your child's interest. "There are spiritual difficulties connected with prosperity which explain why the words of Christ strike home in every heart: 'Blessed are the poor in spirit!... Blessed are they who mourn!'".

This aspect of play and imagination takes some consideration for the homeschool. In the Montessori classrooms where normalization began, usually after a few days of chaos, the child's toys were at home and unavailable. Even when a small selection of toys was made available until no longer chosen, the large number of toys belonging to the child was still unavailable. We found our best solution to the immediate availability of too many toys was to allow one to be chosen to take into the classroom and the others made unavailable until later in the day. We soon saw that the toys were quickly forgotten as work began. Another solution might be to have a small basket of toys as one of your displays. This is a very difficult limitation to impose since we haev all been led to believe that a child needs an abundance of toys. Dr. Montessori found that too many possessions can become a spiritual obstacle, even and especially for a child. St. Teresa of Avila and St. Francis of Assisi would heartily agree.

Dr. Montessori's method was deeply rooted in her religion. She wrote several books over the years regarding religious education. It seems obvious from all of her writings that this was most important to her, not just as a subject area, but as something which must permeate education as it permeated her writings and her life. Specific books on the teaching of religion include The Child in the Church, Life in Christ, The Mass Explained to Children, and The Opened Book. E.M. Standing, her long-term friend and collaborator, who two years after meeting her converted to Catholicism from the Quaker religion, described her as a combination of scientist and mystic.

We can glimpse the fruit of her faith in his descriptions of her as a doctor and lecturer. He tells us of a time when she was called to a very poor home where twin infants lay dying. Sizing up the situation immediately, she lit a fire in the fireplace, sent the mother to bed to rest and began feeding and caring for all of them herself until all were well. Mr. Standing makes it clear that this was her normal manner of treating indigent patients. As a lecturer, her students would comment that she inspired them to be good; they found spiritual stimulation in her lectures.

Religious education, especially the Mass, was an integral part of her schools. She specifically stated that Raphael's 'Madonna of the Chair' should be prominently displayed in all classrooms where her method was used, and the wheat grown by the children in their small gardens was used to make altar breads. Mass was celebrated for the children in a child-size chapel. Her last public statement was a message to be read at the inaugural meeting of the Catholic Montessori Guild in England. She died the next day.

Perhaps one of the surest signs that something is of God is opposition by evil. So abhorrent was Dr. Montessori's work to the Nazis that they ordered all of her schools closed and had her burned in effigy, over a bonfire of her books, in Berlin and Vienna. At the time of the Spanish Civil War, her life was in danger because of her Roman Catholic Faith and her writings on religion. With the help of the British government she barely escaped to Holland.

Is it any wonder that in our country, where God has been expelled from school, that the essence of Montessori would become corrupted? Dr. Montessori believed good would come of her work if the original principles remained firm. Even in her lifetime, she was concerned about the directions in which those who misinterpreted her work in this country were taking her method. She responded to the possibility of corruption of her method by retiring into study and meditation. We must do the same in order to implement her method well.

Having clearly seen the need for the primacy of the spiritual aspect in this method, we now move on to some specifics. We will begin with the daily work in Natural Structure, which is work accomplished by the Montessori method.

It will be helpful at this point to study one surprising, from the traditional educational point of view, aspect of her method. This particular aspect clearly demonstrates the fact that the child's natural, or spontaneous, development does not always progress as we have commonly been led to believe. In Montessori education phonetic writing (spelling by sounding out, e.g., 'snac' or 'snak' for snack, or 'sox', for socks) , not simply of letters but of whole words, not copied or traced, precedes reading. We will begin at the level of the use of Sandpaper Letters (see Figure 20), which the child uses to lightly trace a textured letter cut from sandpaper while hearing or pronouncing its sound. The following excerpts from Dr. Montessori's works clearly explain why and how this came to be.

"A child who looks at, recognizes, and touches the letters as if he were writing is prepared at one and the same time for reading and writing. ..The muscular sense is the most highly developed in childhood. Writing is therefore very easy for children. ..The process involves motion, which is always present and easy for him. Writing develops easily and spontaneously in a little child in the same way as speech, which is also a motor translation of sounds that have been heard."

"This was the greatest event to take place in the first Children's Home. The child who first made the discovery was so astonished that he shouted out loud: 'I've written, I've written!'. ..It was only after some six months that they began to understand what it is to read, and they did this only by associating reading with writing. They watched my hand as I traced letters on a piece of white paper and came to realize that I was communicating my thoughts as if I were speaking. As soon as this was clear to them, they began to take the pieces of paper on which I had written something and carry them off to a corner and try to read them."

We have chosen to detail this particular aspect of the method to emphasize the importance of proceeding with work in the order natural and spontaneous to the child. This natural progression is no less important in high school than preschool. The material becomes more complicated, but the method does not change. Please realize that the child's natural method of working is not always without some unexpected difficulties. For example, when the children began to try to read books, they tore out pages to take to a corner to try to read as they had the slips of paper on which Dr. Montessori wrote. Reading material needed to be provided for them in this form.

Another important aspect of this way of teaching is free choice of work. Of course, this does not mean that you must let your child do as he pleases, free to decide that he doesn't care to learn his multiplication tables or his catechism.

It does mean that your child is free to choose from whatever work you decide to make available at any given time. If he is not progressing in an important area over a period of time you may have to make his choice for him, but this should be very rare. At some time you may find yourself facing a situation where your child has to complete a specific amount of work in a given time, but you decide you really do not want to force. A good balanced solution can be to insist work be done daily, but allow as much freedom in when and where and how it is done as possible.

So what do you do? How do you teach in a Natural Structure homeschool?

"'Wait while observing.' That is the motto for the educator. Let us wait, and be always ready to share in both the joys and the difficulties which the child experiences. He himself invites our sympathy, and we should respond fully and gladly. Let us have endless patience with his slow progress, and show enthusiasm and gladness at his successes. If we could say: 'We are respectful and courteous in our dealings with children, we treat them as we should like to be treated ourselves,' we should certainly have mastered a great educational principle and undoubtedly be setting an example of good education. "

"By his passive attitude he [the teacher] removes from the children the obstacle that is created by his own activity and authority. The children can thus become active themselves. The teacher is satisfied when he sees them acting by themselves and making progress. Without attributing anything of this to himself he can be inspired with the thoughts of John the Baptist: 'He must increase, but I must decrease."'

It can be hard to believe this is all that is needed, but in essence it is. You have already been doing this for your child since he was born. You observed him, and when you saw that he was ready you helped him to take his next developmental step. He learned. He walks and talks and feeds himself. You didn't do it for him, but you helped him to do it himself and you prepared an environment that invited him to grow. Natural Structure is the next natural step in the journey you began together long ago. You will simply need to demonstrate how to do the work, make the work available for him to use at will and be there to guide and to encourage.

The classical part of Natural Structure is the framework supplied by Dorothy Sayers. Through the second grade basic skills are mastered. Beginning with the third grade, the Trivium of classical education begins.

It provides the material to be contained in the work you make available to your child. Each part of the Trivium has its own emphasis and nature.

In Part II (Grammar, grades 3-5) emphasis is placed on narrative and lyric works, recitation, memorization and observation. Both prose and verse can be memorized as well as historical lists of dates and events. Geography can include maps, ethnic customs, plants and animals, capitals and major topographic features. Collecting and identifying all types of scientific specimens should be encouraged. It is very important at this level that you remember that these areas of study are not to be seen as 'subjects' in themselves, but as a source of material that will be used when your child begins Part III (Dialectic).

In Part III (Dialectic, grades 6-8) emphasis is placed on essays, argument, criticism, discursive reason and the development of the capacity for abstract thought. Material for essays, logical argument and debate can and should be found in all subject areas.

In Part IV (Rhetoric, grades 9-10) emphasis is placed on appreciation of literature, self-expression in writing, and the ability to speak and write, i.e. express yourself, clearly and well. "The doors of the storehouse of knowledge should now be thrown open for them to browse about as they will."

Grades 11 and 12 begin the study of subjects as subjects, i.e. for their own sake, and constitute the Beginning of the Quadrivium, or work at the level of the medieval university.

As you have seen, Natural Structure combines the classical curriculum and the Montessori method. Natural Structure is not a specific curriculum, although we hope that the one included in this book will be helpful. Curriculum materials were selected according to the following educational criteria and were screened for anti-Catholic content.

1. Format facilitates ability to prepare lessons in Montessori style of free choice and independent work.

2. Content in accordance with classical education.

3. Ability to tailor material/work to needs and interests of an individual child.

4. Easily available or made.

Natural Structure is the education that results when you teach the subjects and content of a medieval curriculum using Montessori's approach to learning.

Figure 8. [shown above]

Religion Table

The religion table (display) includes such items as a crucifix, plastic statues, pictures that can be handled easily, items used in the liturgy, sacramentals and devotional items. A separate 'holy box' (bottom shelf) , Picture Bible and catechism are available for each child. A box of rosaries, scapulars, etc., is also displayed.