HEORIES of education spring up all over the place. It’s really easy to make educational plans for your children. Putting them into practice is the challenge.
As a young adult I came across evening courses in Thomistic Philosophy. Suddenly here was a window into a world of scholarship I hardly knew existed despite over a decade of tuition in Catholic schools. My determination to homeschool my own children was strengthened. Imagine what you could achieve if you learned this stuff from the start!
Aiming to teach something I had only just scratched the surface of myself proved to be challenging. The sort of teaching that appealed to me as I approached the age of 20 was a long way from something I could use for younger children.
Perhaps you can imagine my enthusiasm when news came of a Philosophy Camp under the auspices of the local Priestly Fraternity of St Peter apostolate. Several days of classes mixed with sport and recreation.
Daily Mass is included. As Frank Sheed writes in his book Theology for Beginners “No book on doctrine will teach you as much as the Missal – provided you bring some knowledge with you.” If you can’t get your children to a similar camp, then F J Sheed’s books go some way to help fill in the gaps.