Today's post comes from guest author Christina Valenzuela, a Chesterton enthusiast who writes about Chesterton's diagnosis of where modern education has failed and his prescription for how to reform it.
Inspired by this article? Want to learn more? Join us as we endeavor to bring a school modeled on Chesterton's philosophy of education to Massachusetts, and sign up for our Chesterton Book Club on August 10 at 7:30pm!
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If we call to mind the “big names,” so to speak, in education reform of the 20th century, many of us might think of Maria Montessori, Jean Piaget, or perhaps E.D. Hirsch, Jr. The large-looming literary figure of one Gilbert Keith Chesterton doesn’t readily come to mind; however, Chesterton had a great deal to say about his perception of the state of modern day education, and it seems there are two primary points which cause him alarm.
First is the tendency to divide and sub-divide subjects so they are treated in isolation of one another, rather than a united body of knowledge. “Everything has been sundered from everything else,” he wrote, “and everything has grown cold. Soon we shall hear of specialists dividing the tune from the words of a song, on the ground that they spoil each other. . . This world is all one wild divorce court.” (1)
Second is the modern day tendency to disregard theology and philosophy as belonging to the body of “Truth.” The absence of these topics in classrooms not only severs the student from a wealth of cultural literacy which is needed in order to properly interpret and understand other subjects (notably, history!), but it also cripples the child’s ability to acquire a true education. Without being taught how to question and reason rightly, or to consider whether supernatural premises are actually real, students are never given the road map to inquire about whether
such-and-thus “facts” in common educational subjects are actually true, good, or valuable information upon which to base our own actions. In 1907, Chesterton wrote: “It is typical of our time that the more doubtful we are about the value of philosophy, the more certain we are about the value of education. That is to say, the more doubtful we are about whether we have any truth, the more certain we are (apparently) that we can teach it to children.” (2)
We can thus deduce that if Chesterton were to found a school, it would be the sort of place in which children were taught that all of life is wrapped up in this process of education: or perhaps more accurately– the formation of the mind, which is also the formation of the human person. In order to ask, explore, and answer the important questions of “Who am I?” and “Why am I here?", children need to see themselves both as heirs to a great treasure-trove of knowledge and
responsible stewards of Truth for the future.
When children are given this sort of framework, they can see themselves as persons intimately intertwined with their fellow humans (past, present, and future!), the entirety of the natural world, and Truth which exists beyond mere facts and figures. Having established the proper premises, rules, and boundaries, children are then set free to explore the land of learning with reckless joy
and abandon.
Rather than a “city on a hill,” we could say that Chesterton might call such a school a “home on a cliff.” He writes in Orthodoxy that “Catholic doctrine and discipline may be walls; but they are the walls of a playground. . . We might fancy some children playing on the flat grassy top of some tall island in the sea. So long as there was a wall around the cliff’s edge they could fling themselves into every frantic game and make the place the noisiest of nurseries.” (3)
In taking this substantial patron as its model, a Chesterton Academy stands as a sign of jovial contradiction in a topsy-turvy world. By rooting rigorous academics in the universal foundations of Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, children are not only taught to locate themselves on the “map” of both salvation and human history, but to understand how to navigate that map through the journey of life – and to do so with the freedom to see it all as sacred play.
Footnotes:
(1) What’s Wrong with the World, p. 152
(2) Illustrated London News, Jan. 12, 1907
(3) Orthodoxy, p. 152.
Cover image:
Nikolai Astrup, Summer and Playing Children, Oil on Canvas, 1913, Bergen Kunstmuseum. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
About the Author:
Christina Valenzuela is the owner and creative director of Pearl & Thistle, LLC, where she offers a unique blend of theology and science to bring better body literacy to Catholic families and parishes. Her first major publication, The Language of Your Body: Embracing God's Design for Your Cycles, is scheduled for release with Our Sunday Visitor in 2024. Christina holds an undergraduate degree in Philosophy and Theology from the University of Notre Dame as well as a Master's Degree in Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School. She is a life-professed member of the Lay Fraternities of St. Dominic and resides with her husband and four children outside of Boston. Learn more at www.pearlandsthistle.com.
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