Deb, Link away (as long as you are saying nice things
Although it is sometimes hard to explain the difference, especially to others using “other” “Christian” education, once you see it, you SEE IT! Then there is the process of learning how and developing the habit to DO it. Thanks be to God for the forerunners that labored so diligently in bringing us resources to help us begin on this path.

Lisa @ Me and My House

Thank you so much for your post! Ever since I started home schooling I have been dissatisfied with the different methods/approaches. There are some really good ones and each have good aspects which I used to help make our home education better but some thing always seemed lacking. I could not quite put my finger on it until coming across the Principle Approach a couple of years ago. Even then, it has taken me this time of studying the PA to finally be able to understand what exactly was missing.

My own education in the public school system was nothing but bare, bone facts, passing on from year to year as if it was a competition to “know it all“. Pure memorization for the sake of memorizing and knowing facts made my learning fragmented, incomplete, dark, confusing. It hindered my learning more than any thing. Our home education has been, for the most part, based on “facts/information” with a little more Bible in it but it wasn’t until finding the Principle Approach that I’ve been able to change anything. I still don’t have a problem with memorizing facts when children are younger. I have seen with my own girls memory and retention (and my own) that it isn’t what it use to be so I do think the early years are the most opportune times to *moderately* memorize *some* important things (Scripture, poetry, math tables) and because God does tell us to *remember* certain things. I also think it’s good for brain development BUT the extreme of that, the exclusion of any type of reasoning about the context of the big picture/ideas as if that can only be learned at a later age is not true and it is not the way learning takes place. After a certain point or degree, pure memorization or rote learning seems to be detrimental or limiting the learning process. I don’t have anything scientific, just my own learning experience.

On a very simple level, the Bible is a “whole” with all the fact/information within it. As you said, “Information does not of itself lead to anything but parroting of knowledge. Ideas always apply to information. They are studied out in their very applications.” From my limited study of the PA so far, I’m finding this is exactly what has been missing and what I’ve been looking for. I wholeheartedly agree with you! My RE-education began when I started home educating my daughters some 14 years ago and now I’m going through another RE-education. So this fall, with God’s help and grace, our home education is taking a completely new direction starting with the big picture ideas/Biblical truth/principles/ideas/seeds that the fact/information is a part of and come from. I’m encouraged and excited to see how our year will be. I’ve started my own blog: Principled Heart http://aprincipledheart.blogspot.com/ and I don’t have much there yet. May I link to your post in one of my own and your blog? Thanks again!

Blessings,
DJ (Deb)
http://aprincipledheart.blogspot.com/
http://letawomanlearn.blogspot.com/
http://sevenpillarsbooknook.blogspot.com/

Thanks. The Truth truly sets us Free! Spread the news!

L.