Charlotte Mason - Liberal Education for All

By Ina Woolcott

"Education is a life; that life is sustained on ideas; ideas are of spiritual origin, and that we get them chiefly as we convey them to one another. The duty of parents is to sustain a child's inner life with ideas as they sustain his body with food." C. Mason

A British educator, Charlotte Mason was born 01/01/1842 and died 16/01/1923. Though her health was not good, she achieved many remarkable feats in her life. She dedicated her life to improving the quality of children's education. Her notions led to one of the primary methods of home schooling. During her life she taught at school with more than ten years at Davison School in Worthing, England. Then she was invited to teach and lecture at Bishop Otter Teacher Training College in Chichester, England, where she stayed for more than 5 years. She developed a Philosophy of Education, "a liberal education for all" that has shown itself to be very malleable. By "liberal," Charlotte had in mind a generous and broad curriculum for all children, no matter what their social class. In the 1800's, English Children's education was in accordance to their social class - the poorer being taught a trade, the fine arts and literature were reserved for the richer class. This philosophy was formulated to work in the public/private or home school environment.

Her experiences made her believe parents would be aided a lot if they understood some basic principles about bringing up children. Following this Charlotte gave a series of lectures, which were later published as Home Education and widely read, becoming a best seller and the first of the 6 books regarded her series. 'Home Education' contains notes from her 8 most popular lectures. The "Parent's Review" is available for reading at the University of St. Martin in England and at the United States Library of Congress. Apparently there are people who are in possession of other sets.

From this the Parents National Education Union (PNEU) was founded, and Mason was Editor of it's magazine, 'Parent's Review'. in 1891, after all this, she began a training school for governesses and those working with children. This was founded as the House of Education, then after her death became the Charlotte Mason College.

Ideas are the essence of a Charlotte Mason Education, though the philosophy does not apply just to education. Mason not once claimed to have devised her methods herself, she said that she had only adapted and merged them. She also never claimed to have completed or finished her philosophy. Her methods include narration and copy-work, fine arts, languages, nature notebooks, a Literature based curriculum instead of textbooks, and real-life applications. She liked to motivate others with new concepts and suggestions, continuously expanding improving, perfecting and adding to her philosophy as she herself learned.

The Charlotte Mason teaching methods became less widely used around the time of the second World War, although there is a small number of original PNEU schools around to this day. The last decade has shown a restoration in interest. With Home Educators being by far the biggest group studying, adapting and employing these principles, new PNEU style private schools are also opening.

Other works of CM include Parents and Children, School Education, Ourselves, Formation of Character, and A Philosophy.