Math, Latin, & Glory

It was about two weeks ago. I was sitting in my seat preparing myself for our annual Parent Practicum. Our Homeschool community Classical Conversations holds these every year for us homeschooling parents to learn and gain new skills as well as deepen learned skills that we can use in our homeschools and life. It is a great time. Each year they choose a theme. In the past, there have been themes like freedom, where we completed a diagram of parts of the Constitution and analyzed The Star Spangled Banner. That year changed me and my view of my country and patriotism forever. (In a good way too!) This year, however, I heard the theme would be Latin!?

 

I was really not sure what to think or expect, in fact, if I am honest, my first thought was “how boring” I am ashamed to admit it, but it was. I have repented and changed course so all is well. You might wonder how was it that I came to change course.  Well, first you should know that the only background I have in Latin is the little I am beginning to learn with my children from Latin for Children by Classical Academic Press. I have known that I will have to tackle Latin in a serious way being that I am attempting to classically educate my children. I also know that everyone I respect that speaks into my life about education are HUGE advocates of learning Latin. So I knew there must be something I was missing. Why is it that I did not see how important Latin is? Why could I not apprehend the truth of this? I knew enough to know that all I had to do was continue to wrestle with these ideas and eventually I would get it. So on I pressed, and to my delight the Lord revealed exactly what my heart needed to perceive regarding Latin for me to fall in love!

 

On day one of the Parent Practicum we went over the Latin help Chart we were given and discussed some related grammar concepts. We also practiced a few phrase translations together as a group. It was simple enough and the things we had been learning in our English Grammar class started clicking, where before there had been no clicking!  But! that was not the most glorious part.

 

As the speaker was concluding the Day 1 Latin portion of our learning she said something about the interconnections of Math and Latin. She spoke about them both being very sequential meaning that you must master each baby step before you can move on to the next. I suddenly felt fireworks go off inside. That was it, it is like that. That’s what it feels like to move from glory to glory. I know it sounds weird, but stay with me for a minute. Think of it, each time the Lord instructs me on a thing, I go to Him, usually quite reluctantly, and many times in pain, in other words I go to him in humility, knowing I need him. He restores me and instructs me and I continue this with him until my lesson on that thing is done for the time being. I usually experience quite a portion of  joy because I wrestled through the issue and God revealed himself and his truth to me and it changed me. Soon after that I am back in another moment of humility and in need for instruction in yet another area or more often than I care to admit it for the same lesson he already instructed me in before. Then the cycle continues. Humility in the new lesson that brings me to some level of proficiency in that lesson that in turn produces unspeakable joy.

 

This to me is the perfect reason to study Latin. For heavens sake it is hardly the only one, but it is all about the “one thing needful” (Mary and Martha Story)

 

Let me ask you this. If a person became acutely familiar with the mental pattern of submitting in humility to learn, progressing toward proficiency, and then rejoicing in praise, in something like Math and Latin, would it not cause them to be familiar with the pattern? If this pattern was familiar to a person, do you think that it would make it easier to apply to other areas of their lives? Maybe I am talking nonsense, but maybe there is something there. I am not completely sure about this, but I am sure enough that it has given me a new motivation to work on Math and Latin. Besides the obvious benefits, if there is anything I can do to make my maturing in Christ come more readily then I am doing it. Isn’t that what we as Classical Christian Educators are asserting? Know God and Make Him known. What if the benefits of studying the school subjects did not end with recognizing that God made that thing or this process but actually made it possible to discover tools and patterns that show us more about how to seek Him? Is it not worth it to at least ask the question, especially if the answer is possible and probable?

 

So, what do Math, Latin, and moving from glory to glory have in common for your family?

 

Expanding wisdom, extending grace,

Jen