The Question–New Book by Leigh Bortins
It is at this point that Leigh Bortins is helpful. She very well knows the challenge facing thousands of homeschooling moms around the country who are educating their children classically. She knows how to start at the beginning (a very good place to start) and keep...
The Liberal Arts Tradition… A Great New Book on CCE Coming Soon
I am glad to be a part of a strong new book on classical education to be released this December. Kevin Clark and Ravi Jain have been working on a pithy book on the philosophy of Christian classical education for over five years, and taken the book through some eight...
The Abolition of Man for Classical Educators
The Abolition of Man--A Review for Classical Educators C. S. Lewis The Abolition of Man was first published in 1947, just two years after the end of the second World War, after a great deal of abolition indeed. Lewis’ book, however, is not about man’s...
A Review of Waiting for Superman
Waiting for Superman (Paramount Pictures) Christopher A. Perrin It is hard to watch David Guggenheim’s documentary Waiting for Superman without leaning into the screen with anticipation and hope, only to droop with disappointment, yes even despair. It is the kids...
Interview with Author James K.A. Smith on Classical Education
Many readers of this blog may recall my review of the book Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview and Cultural Formation by James K. A. Smith who is also an associate professor of philosophy at Calvin College. I like the book immensely, and think that Smith has...
Learning and Leisure: Developing a School of Schole
We Americans have no trouble being busy. American educators are about the busiest people I know. Classical school administrators are usually frenetic. Teachers work so hard for nine months that they truly do need a summer’s rest. How do classical students fare? Well, they need those three months of summer too.
Desiring a Kingdom School: A Review of Desiring the Kingdom by James K. A. Smith
We all have ideals—ideals for a wonderful marriage, the best job, a superb vacation. Our ideals, however, are often fuzzy. What does the ideal church really look like? An ideal government? What about an ideal school?
Making Ideas Stick: How Chip and Dan Heath Rediscovered Aristotle Without Even Knowing It
Every summer I read a few business books. The really good ones are actually filled with insight that not only help me as a publisher and consultant, but also illuminate other areas of the human enterprise. This summer I have found another business book of universal value—Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, by brothers Chip and Dan Heath. Chip is a Stanford business professor and Dan is a consultant and entrepreneur. The book sets out to explore what makes idea memorable and transferable—or what makes them sticky. They proceed inductively, looking at scores of sticky ideas and seeking to discover what traits are common to them all.
Thomas More’s Utopian Education
Thomas More’s Utopia (first published in 1516) has been calling out to me from my bookshelf for a few years now, and I finally heeded the call, took it off the shelf and read it. We keep hearing of Utopian visions of culture and society, and I have been itching to go to the sources the word and the concept. More’s book was also a nice complement to the Huxley’s Brave New World and Orwell’s 1984. So I read it last week.
Review of Wisdom and Eloquence
Last year Crossway published Wisdom and Eloquence by Robert Littlejohn and Chuck Evans, which presented what they term a “Christian Paradigm of the Seven Liberal Arts.” The book is excellent in many ways and has become a choice read for classical educators across the...