a homeschooler's bleg
As some of you know, my wife and I teach our son Wes at home, mostly, which means that each summer we have to spend a good deal of time planning what we’re going to do in the coming year. He’s headed into the eleventh grade, and while his education so far has given him a sound overview of Western cultural history, we’re concerned that he hasn’t had enough experience digging deeply into particular issues, doing wide-ranging research and coming up with sophisticated theses based on what he has learned. So we’ve decided to organize the coming school year around particular topics with interdisciplinary facets to them, starting in each case with one or two books that will in different ways orient him to the issues. Our focus will be on the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in the West, though any non-Western topics could reach back farther.
So, for instance, one topic will start with Voltaire’s Candide and, probably, Nicholas Shrady’s book on the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755, The Last Day, and will involve philosophical optimism, the “problem of evil” for Christians and other religious believers, and associated topics.
Another unit will involve sanitation and social class in Victorian England. Wes will start by reading Dickens’s Bleak House and Stephen Johnson’s The Ghost Map, and will expand his research from there.
On this side of the Atlantic, we might have Wes read Ellis’s Founding Brothers and Garry Wills’s Cincinnatus — he has already read the Federalist Papers, so it would be interesting to have that in the background.
Or — and? — Uncle Tom’s Cabin coupled with Ann Douglas’s The Feminization of American Culture. Slavery, early feminism — lots of good stuff there.
Ranging further abroad, I am thinking about Simon Winchester’s The Man Who Loved China as an accessible way into both Chinese history and the history of technology, maybe following that up with something on the history of printing and printmaking in China.
All this to say: any thoughts? Recommendations?
UPDATE: Before you ask me about math and science, or upbraid me for my neglect, read this here comment. Sorry for neglecting to mention that in the post itself.
Sail around the world.
— Tony Comstock · Jul 13, 10:34 PM · #
They’re obvious, and you might have already gotten to them — I was introduced earlier — but Emerson and/or Thoreau, and Huckleberry Finn.
I’m not sure if it fits into the lesson plan, but On the Origin of Species is arguably the most important book produced during the time you want to cover.
Some off the top of my head: Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, Thackeray’s Vanity Fair, Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, Carlyle’s Sartor Resartus, Churchill’s The River War, Swift’s An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity, Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack, Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, Lister’s Antiseptic Principle Of The Practice Of Surgery, Veblen’s Theory of the Leisure Class, etc. etc.
— Kristoffer V. Sargent · Jul 13, 10:52 PM · #
I’d say stay away from Emerson and Thoreau for a high schooler — they’re too likely to do damage.
Definitely read Toqueville on American politics.
For Victorian sanitation, how about Dracula?
Does he show an interest in Mathematics? If so, maybe it’s time to expand his instruction past problem-solving into the beauty and art of math. How about Roger Penrose?
Has he studied the World Wars yet? If not, he should. You can teach politics, physics and engineering, logistics, strategic thinking, heroism, cultural evolution, theology — tons of stuff. And I don’t think you can understand 20th and 21st century Western culture — especially European culture — without a deep consideration for the wars (especially World War I)
— Ethan C. · Jul 13, 11:14 PM · #
Tom Brown’s School Days and the whole shift in education that took place during the Victorian period, perhaps touching on Tom Sawyer and Stover at Yale on the way to the present train wreck.
— Tim of Angle · Jul 13, 11:33 PM · #
All I can say is I’m jealous. My high school education was, for the most part, wretched, and when I started college I was a step behind a lot of people who had already read a lot of the major works and had at least some discussion on them. Your son will certainly be well-prepared for a liberal arts college education, if that’s at all what he’s interested in.
My only suggestion is, for the first topic, you simply must read Dostoevsky. The Brothers Karamazov is probably too lengthy to assign in its entirety, but the chapters “Rebellion” and “The Grand Inquisitor” can be read apart from the rest of the book without losing too much. Nobody can bring as powerful a challenge to Christianity as a Christian, and few if any have done so as forcefully as Dostoevsky.
— Jay · Jul 13, 11:40 PM · #
@ jay, i’m not sure dostoevsky’s the right choice. i enjoy dostoevsky greatly, but his novels require a lot of explication for russian history and ideology, and can be a bit of a slog due to the occasional infelicities of his style.
i recommend the count of monte cristo, for no other reason than it’s a lot of fun.
— dth · Jul 13, 11:51 PM · #
dth, they may take some chewing, but I don’t think those two chapters are particularly challenging in the way you’re saying.
Also, AJ said “we’re concerned that he hasn’t had enough experience digging deeply into particular issues, doing wide-ranging research and coming up with sophisticated theses based on what he has learned”
If that’s the idea then Dostoevsky would seem to be the perfect author to read.
— Jay · Jul 13, 11:59 PM · #
Guys, I appreciate the suggestions, but think topics rather than books. Topics that would allow for interdisciplinary exploration.
— Alan Jacobs · Jul 14, 12:12 AM · #
Oh, and Ethan: we’ll be doing the 20th century next year.
— Alan Jacobs · Jul 14, 12:13 AM · #
And — sorry for not getting all this into one comment — I tend to think that Karamazov is better saved for the college years, but I’ll take the recommendation under advisement.
— Alan Jacobs · Jul 14, 12:15 AM · #
Have you considered the opening of Japan in the 1850s-60s and perhaps the early stages of its modernization? The time-frame is about right, it’s relatively bloodless, and there are many facets. There were of course the internal and external political dynamics (southern samurai and the imperial court allied with the British against the Tokugawa and the French) and the subsequent development in East Asian trade, technology and international relations, and of Japonisme in Western arts. As an aside, the transmission of Western learning, especially of science, into Japan via the Dutch, before the opening, is a fascinating story.
— Bob · Jul 14, 01:19 AM · #
I’m jealous too.
Ghengis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Weatherford may go back too far for you, but it is a great entry into Asian and Chinese history, and has wide ramifications in ethics, technology, the meaning of civilization, and many other things. Highly recommended.
If you want to do history of technology you could start at the beginning with Guns, Germs and Steel by Diamond and end up with the sanitation and class topic. There’s a lot of interesting stuff that interweaves technology, economics and social development. Brad deLong has written a lot of interesting stuff in this area – you could get some pointers from his blog.
When you get your final list, post it for all of us to see, so we can complain about what you left off.
— peterg · Jul 14, 01:20 AM · #
I agree that Karamazov is better for college, but the “Rebellion” chapter might be a really good fit for the Christian ‘problem of evil’ topic.
I liked Greenblatt’s comparing and contrasting of “The Faerie Queene” and Marlowe’s Faustus in two chapters of Renaissance Self-Fashioning; as an approach to ‘modern’ ideas of space/time, identity and values it worked really well for me at 19. Maybe teamed with some Shakespeare and some history?
— Rortybomb · Jul 14, 01:40 AM · #
Ah! Topics then…
Worldview and Lifeview. Chiaroscuro. Method. Faith and Doubt. Science and Religion. Wisdom and Intuition. Narrative and Chaos. Hope and Resignation. Family and Ambition. Power and Form.
— Kristoffer V. Sargent · Jul 14, 02:29 AM · #
Old and New, Knowledge and Ignorance, Morality and Self, Rich and Poor. And that should cover it.
— Kristoffer V. Sargent · Jul 14, 02:34 AM · #
That’s wild. i just now finished writng an artcle for 2nd graders about the history of bathing. The Broad Street Pump and Victorian London was part of it. Bathing is an amzing subject. As a contrast to Victorian London you could also look bathing during the centuries of plague in Europe. Washing was out of style then it was the church plus the beliefe in miasma. They though washing opened the pores to sickness. Then imperial Rome. Those huge aquaducts? For a large part they were to supply the bath houses with water. That’s how important bathing was in Roman life. Their wonderful public baths were the social center of their lives.
On another tangent, I really like this book called “The Living” by Annie Dillard. You could read that book then watch Deadwood and study the growth of towns into cities in the american west. That is like the seed to understanding all of america.
— cw · Jul 14, 03:00 AM · #
I was about to suggest “glory” as a historical and cultural thread at which to tug. But damn, you type that word twice and suddenly it looks weird.
— Matt Frost · Jul 14, 03:02 AM · #
You could study declinism, but none of the sources are as good as they used to be.
— Matt Frost · Jul 14, 03:12 AM · #
Some topic ideas.
I don’t really know anything about your kid and I’m curious what topics he’s come up with for himself.
Asian Incursions into the West. Think the Mongols, the Huns, Zheng He’s expeditions to Africa and (speculated) America, Chinese trading with Venice and the link to the Renaissance, the Black Plague, Slik Road etc.
Fashion Trends and Morality. Find books relating how people dressed in different periods and link it with works on ethics and etiquette at the time. For example how George Washington dressed and the book he supposedly memorized about how a gentlemen ought to behave at all times.
For fun: Bread Baking. Can get interdisciplinary by getting into Maillard reactions, where does fast rise yeast come from, early sources of yeast, pre yeast bread baking, different grains used, differences in glutinous structures, different types of bread bakes through history, the bacteria present in sourdough and how they change flavor and what they do, holy breads such as Challah. That could mix chemistry, history, biology, cultural studies, religion and so on.
Sources of color in art. How did current acrylic paints get made. Where do they get the color of red for candies? Where did they get the color blue in Renaissance times for color of Virgin Mary’s robes. How are printer inks made? Where did they get gold color for Byzantine paintings?
That’s probably enough I imagine. I’m excited for you and your son, this kind of learning is truly fascinating. Whatever topic you choose, I encourage, as an extra assignment, to take your learnings and update or write an article for Wikipedia. Also, some people like to keep a blog of their insights and data collections on a complex topic to share with others. Then you’ll be in training for being a good curator of information – good skill to have for college.
— Eric Arias · Jul 14, 03:17 AM · #
I’ve taught Wu Ch’Eng-En’s amusing MONKEY (that’s the name of Arthur Waley’s translation and abridgement of The Journey to the West), a “folk novel” from China that is quite appealing. I have a several-page study guide which you’re welcome to request.
— Extollager · Jul 14, 03:17 AM · #
Topics? The history of perspective in Western art. The persistence of a Gnostic sensibility (e.g. in Helen, in Bronte’s Jane Eyre). The eclipse of the original sense of fairies/elves as perilous beings, their diminution, and their “rehabilitation” by Tolkien. The romanticization and the reality of opium in Coleridge, de Quincey, Poe, Thompson, et al. The motif of the supernaturally abducted girl or woman, from Prosperpina through J. M. Barrie’s “Mary Rose” etc. Attempts at communitarian renewal in literature (e.g. The Blithedale Romance, by Hawthorne) and history. The poetic and Renaissance-Platonic exploitation of the Classical gods when they were no longer believed in (see Lewis in Spenser’s Images of Life, and works he refers to). The American polarity of rugged individualism and self-realization (Krakauer’s Into the Wild) vs. community- and home-life as center of gravity (e.g. Erid Brende’s better Off). The Four Loves in literature: affection in classic stories of family life such as Charlotte M. Yonge’s, or even affection for pets; friendship (e.g. Huck and Jim); eros (Anna Karenina, Jane Eyre); charity (the Gospels), etc.
— Extollager · Jul 14, 03:37 AM · #
How about Manifest Destiny and American Exceptionalism? Perhaps start at a mid point and work backwards, then forwards.
I haven’t read anything to compare with Evan S. Connells “Son of the Morning Star” which deals with Custer and Little Big Horn. This book sings but I don’t know if I can adequately describe to you why (or how it moved me) except to note the dense scholarship, the novel narrative structure, the life that is breathed into Custer, Crazy Horse, Benteen and the rest through the biographical sketches, and the dread and beautiful brutality of the battles, and the wider context of late 19th century native policy that is described in its pages.
As a general overview of America’s expansion through warfare over 500 years, you could try “Dominion of War” by Fred Anderson and Andrew Cayton Its broad-brush discussion of the French-Indian wars, Manifest Destiny and the western expansion, and the civil war is structured around well-crafted discussions of Samuel De Champlain, Washington, Jackson, and Grant as archetypes of the impulses driving the expansion. This is good stuff indeed although the book is nowhere near perfect, and the last third does not hold together nearly as well as the rest of the book as the sections on Douglas MacArthur and Colin Powell lose momentum and didn’t do it for me; but the beginning is inspired.
Then jump forward and read something on the history of the annexation of Hawaii. Try “To Steal a Kingdom” by Michael Dougherty – it’s not in the same league as Morning Star and is somewhat polemical, but is still a good read and a quick introduction to this particular injustice. Then maybe on to the Phillipines but I dont know any titles off-hand to cover the turn of century better than Dominion of War.
— Jono · Jul 14, 03:43 AM · #
I read Crime and Punishment for 10th-grade English, quite happily. And you can get him to watch the movie of the Brothers K, with Shatner as Alyosha. As for topics:
1) Analysis of the reasons for the Russian emancipation of the serfs, possibly in compare/contrast with the freeing of the American slaves.
2) Analysis of the origins of World War I.
3) Analysis of paths toward democracy; Jacksonian democracy, British reform from 1832 to 1885, Bismarckian managed democracy.
4) Analysis of the motives for abolitionism, religious, military, and economic – Eric Williams to William Wilberforce, Quakerism, Adam Smith, and the French Revolution.
5) Related to the above: a unit on the Haitian Revolution.
— Withywindle · Jul 14, 03:49 AM · #
Well, good luck, nonetheless.
— Kristoffer V. Sargent · Jul 14, 03:59 AM · #
The Red Badge of Courage would be a fairly standard choice, which would touch on the Civil War.
Book 3 in Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States by Joseph Story (at least the first few chapters if you don’t want to assign 1000+ pages) is also something that I think is a VERY important read. The federalist papers and the Constitution itself is a skeleton, Commentaries is the meat. “Nature of the Constitution – Whether a Compact” in particular is a great chapter.
— Derek · Jul 14, 05:08 AM · #
These are fabulous suggestions, folks — thanks so much for the feedback. I just wish we could do all this stuff!
P.S. And withywindle, it’s not just Shatner, it’s the happy endings: Ilusha lives! Dmitri goes off to America!
— Alan Jacobs · Jul 14, 11:47 AM · #
as for topic I suggest two books in financial history – Ron Chernow’s “The House of Morgan” and John Wood’s “A History of Central Banking”.
— JB · Jul 14, 11:49 AM · #
If you are dealing with the west in the 19th century, I recommend that you cover the revolutions of 1848.
— Lemon · Jul 14, 02:16 PM · #
Alan: I am truly in awe of the project you have taken on.
I strongly endorse the idea of “the history of color” as a great way into a host of topics. That’s my favorite idea from all the suggestions above – a way to learn chemistry, geography, economic history, art history, color theory – all in one topic. And very ripe for teaching research skills.
Some thoughts of my own:
Vienna. The intellectual capital of the late-19th and early 20th centuries. You could study the city from the perspective of political history, ethnography, architecture, economic history, music, geopolitics, and of course read all the great stuff that came out of there. A good bridge for the end of the year – indeed, it could span the end of 11th and the beginning of 12th grade; start the 12th grade year with Modris Ekstein’s Rites of Spring and you’re off and running.
Rome: The Idea of History and the History of an Idea. The 18th and 19th centuries saw the development of the first theories of history – narratives that were not explicitly providential in character. This period is also the period in which modern imperialism exploded on the scene – when London and Paris and St Petersburg and Washington and (they hoped) Berlin could plausibly style themselves as the new Rome. So: start with Gibbon, go through Hegel and end with Spengler and learn how 18th and 19th century Europeans learned about the Roman Empire, how they constructed theories of history using it as the primary data set, and how their own political structures were shaped by those theories (with particular emphasis on the place of Rome in the minds of the American founders and subsequently in 19th century American history).
John Henry Days. Pick a handful of key 18th or 19th century technological innovations and explore how they changed the landscape, the structure of employment, family structure, relative economic power, geopolitical arrangements, even literature. Potential examples are too many to list, so let me just plug the idea of whale oil, since it will give you an excuse to assign at least part of Moby Dick.
For An Age And For All Time: Shakespeare in the 18th and 19th Centuries. Pick two or three plays to read – I’d suggest Hamlet and Merchant of Venice as particularly fruitful – and study them first as plays. Then read key critics from the period: Johnson, Coleridge, Hazlitt, maybe end the English critics with Bradley – but also read Goethe, Freud, Tolstoy. Then read about the history of performance: when people talk about Garrick’s revolutionary influence on the portrayal of Shakespearean characters, they talk first and foremost about his Hamlet and his Shylock, which is part of why I picked those plays. And you can take it as far afield from there as you like – the evolving technology of the theater in the period; the social place of the theater; why the English novel rises just as the English theater falls (not much worth mounting is written between Sheridan and Wilde) and what the English novel took from Shakespeare.
Looking back over these, they sound more like college courses than courses for an 11th-grader, but you know your son’s capacities and hopefully these are useful as prompts to your own ideas.
Regardless, this was a fun exercise.
— Noah Millman · Jul 14, 02:43 PM · #
In the U.S., there is always the old standby regarding the rise of the market economy, but this period is being approached in new and interesting ways. Books in this area are too numerous too mention, but that kind of topic connects with Dickens, but also U.S. reform movements (including anti-slavery), the rise of American feminism, developing economics (which may be too often overlooked for high schoolers), and changes in American religion (Stewart Davenport, a fellow Alabamian ties these together). This period also gives you an additional excuse to read Daniel Walker Howe (not that you need one).
And did you clear the reading of Wills and Ellis with MAN? ;-)
— Randy · Jul 14, 02:47 PM · #
If you’re doing sanitation, the BBC’s Seven Wonders Of The Industrial World episode on the “Sewer King” is pretty fabulous as is the entire series.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Wonders_of_the_Industrial_World
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Seven-Wonders-Industrial-World-DVD/dp/B0006B15JI
— ell · Jul 14, 02:48 PM · #
Years from now, signalling theorists using advanced precious-ometers will conclude that this is the most signalling post ever at TAS, and therefore in all of recorded history.
— tom · Jul 14, 02:53 PM · #
What does it mean to be Western, from the perspective of Russia. Read history about Peter the Great’s reform (and Nicholas I, Alexander II, and Serge Witte, three other figures for whom this issue was key), study Russian art (maybe Natasha’s Dance by Orlando Figes), read some Pushkin and Dostoevsky (maybe The Gambler, an easier intro). You could also look at Russian thinkers like Herzen and Pobedonostev.
Rationalism, Romanticism, and Religion – Read Faust, Schiller, Hugo, a good history of the French Revolution (I’m not sure which), Rousseau, Kant, Isaiah Berlin’s The Roots of Romanticism, Michael Burleigh’s Earthly Powers, and some scientific works (primary and secondary sources). Comparing Mozart and Classical music vs. Beethoven and Romantic would also be good here. You would obviously know the proper English sources for Romanticism better than I (Scott, Wordsworth?).
Compare the American Revolution with decolonization in Latin America (Haiti, Mexico, and South America). Look at literary portrayals as well as historical accounts to try to discern what distinguishes the two cultures.
Look at the transformation of political relations between the US and Britain from the Revolution to WWI and see how their cultures developed differently. The different experiences of imperialism, industrial revolution, etc. Include some economics.
Look at the immigrant experience – how does one become an American, and what does one lose in doing so, and who is excluded? There are some good histories of immigration, and I think the novels of O.E. Rolvaag are very good at capturing the issues.
If you’re going to look at China, I think Jonathan Spence has a number of books about interesting aspects of Chinese history, and it’s a very interesting subject – from Ming superpower in Zheng He’s time to the cultural exchanges of Matteo Ricci (and issues of religious syncretism that accompanied the Jesuit mission) to the Opium Wars and the Taiping rebellion.
— Zak · Jul 14, 03:41 PM · #
Not sure if this has been suggested already, but how about religious toleration and the rise of modern liberalism? Burke, Locke, and histories of the French and American Revolutions? A couple of social contract theorists, together with the Constitution and the writings of the American founders? Locke’s Letter Concerning Toleration, and a history of the wars of religion? Hobbes on monarchy, and a history of the English Civil War?
— John Schwenkler · Jul 14, 03:55 PM · #
I know you said that you’re going to look at social class in Victorian England, but I think that you could broaden that theme to some of these other books to have him compare class in England and America or the East and the West.
— Betsy · Jul 14, 04:39 PM · #
Sounds like a great curriculum for a college student majoring in the humanities, and as the holder of a degree in English, I“m envious of your son. Sorry if you’ve covered this elsewhere, but is he getting an adequate math and science education?
— Gus · Jul 14, 05:31 PM · #
I agree on the World Wars as an avenue for teaching, well, everthing (to the earlier list I would add public health, medicine, and biology – the Spanish Flu during WWI).
Perhaps The Guns of August as both a great history and as an example of a unique thesis on an old topic, coupled with The Great Influenza?
— Ryan · Jul 14, 05:38 PM · #
For the religion section and the problem of evil for believers you could continue into a more general look at the place of religion in the nineteenth century. Possibly look at the history of geology and the fossils, the Origin of Species and some Newman to provide an intellectual context. Then look at how certain believers dealt with the difficulties that seemed to confront Christianity in the nineteenth century: Tennyson’s In Memoriam, some Gerard Manley Hopkins, Matthew Arnold (or at least ‘Dover Beach’) and finally some of Hardy’s poetry.
On sanitation how about Les Miserables, or Hugo’s 50-60 page digression on the sewers of Paris.
One thing I’m curious about is that while you and your wife are clearly very good at arranging a sort-of syllabus for the humanities are you able to teach science or maths to the level that he wants, or do you need an outside tutor for that sort of thing? How do you deal with the interests he has in learning when they don’t match your own expertise?
Shaun
— Shaun · Jul 14, 05:43 PM · #
You might consider reading about the rise of the penitentiary system in the 19th Century, which combined Protestant thought, American political thought, and social science in some interesting ways, particularly with regard to questions about whether human beings are basically good or flawed, whether presence in or absence from society corrupts human beings (which brings in the Jeffersonian ideal as well), and how criminals could be rehabilitated and reintroduced into society. There is a lot of religion, American politics, urban v. rural questions, and 19th century social science involved.
— Josh · Jul 14, 05:43 PM · #
Jeez, that’s a pretty ambitious plan. Good luck, but don’t forget to leave time for Wes to swim in a river, bike in the country, go with friends to a movie, go out to a dance, and maybe even get laid. You’re only a lad for a short time. Let him take his nose out of the books now and then to get a sniff of real life!
— Dio Genes · Jul 14, 05:44 PM · #
Gus asked the same question I was going to: is your son’s education really this narrowly focused on the humanities?
— Mark · Jul 14, 05:53 PM · #
I would have liked to have been exposed to Aristotle and his different kinds of friendship when I was in high school.
— Brad · Jul 14, 05:54 PM · #
Good questions about the math and science: we farm those out to tutors and the educational co-op I mentioned in my earlier post. Wes will be doing physics this year, after chemistry and biology the previous two years, with a good deal of lab work. In math he’ll be moving into calculus. I didn't mention those because we don't have any decisions to make regarding them.
I just wish we could do more than a fraction of these excellent recommendations. I’m going to ask Wes to read through these comments and tell me the topics he’s most interested in pursuing.
— Alan Jacobs · Jul 14, 06:17 PM · #
I’ve taught James Boswell’s London Journal, 1762-1763 to college sophomores a few times and it always gets a rave response. Students really love that text. It’s great for the themes of the social history of London, gender and Scottish vs. English identities. The young Boswell is a really amazing character to observe in action. In general, coming of age memoirs work really well for bridging history and literature and also getting students interested. Another great example would be Vera Brittain’s Testament of Youth (1933).
— Scott · Jul 14, 06:19 PM · #
For consideration with 19th century sanitation: Urbanization and the rise of the metropolis. Class and industrialism/capitalism, moral panics (sociology); the rise of statistical thinking (mathematics); germ theory (science/biology); topography of city and country and their flows (geography); late nineteenth-century theories of degeneracy and atavism (a warning against pseudo-science; also good for history and sociology); stories about the same, whether fiction (literature) or nonfiction (history). Jack the Ripper’s crimes and the reaction of press and populace to the same gives you a good way to introduce and explore the gendered spaces/experience of the city as well.
— wasistweimar · Jul 14, 06:23 PM · #
“I’m going to ask Wes to read through these comments and tell me the topics he’s most interested in pursuing.”
Wes! Globe Theater made of popsicle sticks + Sculpey diorama of the Broad Street Pump!
The better you do, the more they expect.
— Matt Frost · Jul 14, 06:26 PM · #
Stop crippling him for life.
— Piotr · Jul 14, 06:52 PM · #
You’ve got five kids, Frost. Isn’t corrupting them a full-time job for you?
— Alan Jacobs · Jul 14, 07:12 PM · #
Alan, how about Futility as a topic. He could read Schopenhauer’s philosophy and Thomas Hardy’s The Mayor of Casterbridge, or if not Mayor, then Tess of D’Urbervilles.
— Alex Silva · Jul 14, 07:26 PM · #
Oh, and add Ecclesiastes to the above on Futility, of course.
— Alex Silva · Jul 14, 07:28 PM · #
I am working on My Masters in Education and double majored in Anthropology and History as an undergrad. I want to sit in on your class and listen to discussions. I will do all the readings and homework. I hope your son realizes what an extraordinary education he is receiving! The dumbing down of America has resulted in this type of classical education becoming very rare. What language(s) is he studying? I especially like the book, “The Man Who Loved China”. I might recommend some early anthropologists such as Malinowski, Levi-Strauss, and Boas to fit in the time period suggested and as a bridge from Western history and culture to non-Western.
— J. Smith · Jul 14, 07:33 PM · #
Awesome suggestions all.
To add to the sanitation/class in Victorian England theme, you could broaden to the 19th century city, which would pick up the urban developments you and others have already mentioned. A great novel would by Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South, which you could look at as a serial in Charles Dickens’s Household Words, since Dickens focused so much on urban issues in that weekly magazine. You could also fold in the ideas of transportation and the criminal class—Robert Hughes’s chapter on who got transported to Australia in The Fatal Shore is a great discussion of both class issues and the 18th and early 19th century legal system. I’m also passionately fond of Tobias Smollet’s Humphry Clinker, which takes the reader on a grand tour of England and discusses a whole range of urbanization issues including sanitation and the adulteration of food. You could then look at tenament housing in the US. You could also look at conduct manuals such as Isabella Beeton’s Book of Household Management. In addition to your suggested unit on Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Laura Ulrich Thatcher’s Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History has a great chapter on Elizabeth Cady Stanton that covers a lot of the ground you seem to want to address in that unit.
— Lindsy · Jul 14, 07:43 PM · #
I just discovered your blog. I’ve often wondered, how do home-schoolers handle the social piece of their children’s education?
— Mike Tracy · Jul 14, 07:45 PM · #
This is kind of a universal question but I think of particular interest in the late teens: the nature v. nurture debate. If you study Victorian society you’ll get a good dose of the idea that grooming is the foundation of greatness. Perhaps read Shaw’s Pygmalion to solidify. Then you can contrast it with a maybe Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.” I also like to throw in some contemporary non-fiction, perhaps “Outliers” by Malcom Gladwell about how extraordinary people really start to achieve. I think the point would be to have a dual discussion on the following topics: How much of a person’s ability is inherent and how much of it is a product of their environment? Is the solution to a problem the “great man” theory or is it about creating processes and structures?
On a completely different note, there are two books about the history of mathematics that I would highly recommend just to balance the liberal arts part. It changed the way I think about math and what advanced mathematics is about. They are both by Simon Singh and are really page-turners (really!): “The Code Book” and “Fermat’s Enigma.” It explains so much of what we see on a daily basis. There is also a PBS documentary based on the Fermat’s Enigma book.
— Stacy · Jul 14, 07:52 PM · #
Has your child mastered the appropriate levels of organic and organic chemistry, biology, physics and mathematics?
The various reading projects you describe don’t sound particularly demanding and there will be plenty of time in his or her college years to load up on humanities/social science reading.
But if s/he starts behind in the sciences, that is very difficult to make up.
Just my opinion.
— tde · Jul 14, 07:58 PM · #
For 19th century cities, social order, hygiene, I suggest Mayhew’s “London Labour and the London Poor”. For American history, I’d suggest “How the Irish Became White”, a study of the nexus between the construction of the notion of a “white” “race” and the construction of American identity. You might also want to look at Tecumseh as an exemplar of First Nations resistance in the early 19th century.
— John Spragge · Jul 14, 08:15 PM · #
How about some science?
— Rachel · Jul 14, 08:25 PM · #
Re: the problem of evil and the Lisbon earthquake, i recommend Susan Neiman’s “Evil in Modern Thought” which is a wonderful read and full of engagement with Voltaire and Leibniz on the Lisbon Earthquake. Also, regarding the relevance of theodicy to the modern globalized world order you shouldn’t forget James Wood’s essays in TNR and the New Yorker, most recently here: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2008/06/09/080609crbo_books_wood
— Giles · Jul 14, 08:42 PM · #
Needs more salt.
— Max Emerika · Jul 14, 09:00 PM · #
I would suggest having at least one topic focus on Asia, since your son already has “sound overview of Western cultural history” it seems remiss to ignore the tremendous benefits to be gained from an in-depth comparative analysis of Western and Asian cultures/traditions. I would start with examining traditional Chinese ideas RE: the cyclical nature of life (T’ao-te-Ch’ing comes to mind) and parallels with the “dynastic cycle”. Follow that up with “Man who loved China” (for all the reasons you mentioned), God’s Chinese Son by Jonathan Spence (Taiping Rebellion, as an example of the effect Western thought had on the Chinese during the 1800s), and finally a section from Guns, Germs and Steel or The Rise and Fall of Great Powers by Paul Kennedy to explore why the “power” of the West overtook that of the East; this is an excellent way to explore the transition from the classic/medieval world to the modern world, and the accompanying redistribution of power heavily in favor of the West. I can’t think of anything that is more important to an understanding of the forces shaping our world today (rise of the BRIC countries, legacy of colonialism, environmental issues, etc).
— Jon · Jul 14, 09:15 PM · #
Life is short. Too short. Enroll him in a school.
— Mike · Jul 14, 09:21 PM · #
I love the variety of comments! (“Stop crippling him for life” is my favorite — I can’t tell if it is totally ironic, given the incredible depth of your son’s education, or totally ignorant. Genius!)
The sanitation topic is a fascinating one, and something I have worked on myself. I highly recommend locating, at your nearest college library, the series Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism, published by Gale. Check the topic index — one of them is on sanitation, and it should give you a good set of representative primary texts as well as some secondary materials to help fill out your study. It’s more oriented toward college students, but a motivated HS junior should do well with it.
If you can’t locate this, feel free to contact me (blog = redseahomeschool.wordpress.com) and I get at least some of that info to you in MS Word format. (Why yes, I did write the Gale entry, but they own the copyright.)
ps — how dare you not explain how you education your son in math and science! ;)
— ShaunMS · Jul 14, 10:04 PM · #
That’d be “educate your son” — can’t have anti-homeschoolers telling me my typos make me unfit for facilitating my kids’ education.
— ShaunMS · Jul 14, 10:07 PM · #
Has he studied critical thinking/symbolic logic? Has he studied not the history of philosophy, but philosophy itself (contemporary metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, etc.)? I’d strongly recommend the Teaching Company’s courses (http://www.teach12.com/teach12.aspx?ai=16281) philosophy of mind, philosophy of religion, free will, questions of value, and philosophy of science.
Philosophy specializes in subjecting the most basic questions to searching logical scrutiny—and really gives someone a skill set they can apply throughout all domains.
— adam · Jul 15, 12:28 AM · #
Wes is a very fortunate young man. And so many good suggestions that I am loathe to add another. But I will. Just a small one! I would only say that if you do settle on Alexis de Tocqueville and his “Democracy in America,” I think you would do well also to have Wes read simultaneously a Prussian’s (Alexander von Humboldt) view of that “other” America (Latin America) through selections from his “Political Essay on the Kingdom of New Spain,” which was published a bit before (some 20 years or so before) de Tocqueville’s classic. Good luck!
— Jimmy · Jul 15, 01:34 AM · #
ShaunMS, since you are being an obnoxious prick, I will go ahead and start with you. How long do you intend to coddle and shelter your children? How long will you pull their strings? I think you understand the amount of damage you could be doing to them by controlling their lives for a long period of time, so I will not ask that. But seriously, there are just as many bad reasons to homeschool (especially when it comes to social aspects) as there are good. Fine enough that you can supposedly do your job, but for how long will you do it for? As long as this blogger, whose motivations for homeschooling I suspect are different from yours? Will it be as effective, even then?
Anti-homeschooling rant off. Anyway…
I’d be more in line with your son learning Eliot’s critical processes if you have not taught it already. If you feel uncomfortable with Eliot, Bloom works just as well, perhaps side by side. Having some critical understanding ahead of college will not only make things easier for him, but also put things such as the “Problem of Evil” into modern context.
— ??? · Jul 15, 02:37 AM · #
Another idea that could encompass 18th and 19th centuries — prison and the law. Henry Fielding (a former judge before turning novelist), Jeremy Bentham (designer of the Panopticon in 1791), Oscar Wilde, Victor Hugo, Dostoevsky’s prison notebooks. Oh, The Beggar’s Opera, too.
There’s a strong tradition of using prison metaphors to describe the middle-class woman as imprisoned in the home (Jane Eyre, anyone? Madam Bovary?). There’s so many ways to go — politics, progressivism, feminism, social history, rehabilitation vs. punishment, solitude vs. lonliness. Individualism vs. alienation. End with Camus!
— ShaunMS · Jul 15, 02:55 AM · #
Wow! Anon 10:37, I am impressed by how much you have figured out about me, my kids, my reasons for homeschooling, and how I do it from my recommendation of a source on sanitation and my suggestion that telling someone they are crippling their kids is an obnoxious comment. I confess, I tend to hang out on sweet mommy blogs, so this marks the first time I have been called an “obnoxious prick” online. I kind of like it.
— ShaunMS · Jul 15, 03:01 AM · #
Ghost Map is a great choice for teaching the history of sanitation and the treatment of disease (in this case, cholera). I would also recommend An American Plague (yellow fever). The impact on early government is interesting and Dark Tide: the great Boston molasses (yes, molasses!) flood of 1919 (industrial accidents and prevention attempts). Good luck with homeschooling your children. My husband and I homeschool our children also.
— mary · Jul 15, 03:37 AM · #
You’re from Illinois, aren’t you? Learn about your own backyard. My own topic of interest is the Black Hawk war of 1832. It has led me to many spots in the countryside of the Great Lakes region, including some not too far from where I presume you live. Tonight after work, a discussion of a historic site in McClean County, where the final big battle of the Fox wars was fought in 1730, led quickly to a discussion of the Ukranian famine of the 1930s, recent controversies in the Baltic republics, slavery and reparations, U.S. population growth in the 1930s, Cuban emigres in the U.S., rule of law, and property rights. And a few days ago while listening on NPR to some of the music Handel composed during his Italian phase, I got to thinking how that was just a few years before the trouble between the French and the Fox people started.
Point being, learn about specific people, places, dates, and events. Even if all the generalizations and ideology you teach/learn about it turn out to be crap, your son will still have the concrete facts. They tend to be interesting, are an aid to thinking abstractly, provide a reality check for abstractions, and provide connecting points that make additional learning easier.
BTW, I have analogous opinions about systematic theology vs biblical theology.
— The Spokesrider · Jul 15, 05:37 AM · #
OK, so where did you find all of these great (albeit opinionated, obnoxious) commentators? I would love more comments with depth as feedback to my blog. Hmmm, maybe my blog needs to have some more depth in order for that to happen!
As a homeschooler who loves post-Industrial Britain with all its loveliness, ugliness and the way it has shaped our world today, my comment is this: Go Wes! Go Wes’ parents! I had to wait until late college years to even glimpse this level of education. Whatever angle you go with (The Mill on the Floss was mentioned? I can’t remember, another good one.) I read that you farm out math to a co-op, sounds like a great idea. Sounds like an excellent education, thank goodness some people are getting one today!
— Angela · Jul 16, 07:30 PM · #
A suggestion —- add Burgess’ ‘Earthly Powers’ to the ‘“problem of evil” for Christians’ segment.
— mats · Jul 16, 09:38 PM · #