I was asked to give a list of books that might help a parent understand that different philosophies. HOW COULD I POSSIBLY CHOOSE WHICH ONES?! Every. single.book. that I have read has helped to shape my homeschooling views. There are hundreds of books on the methodologies. I decided to pull books that I thought the most informative.
1. Homeschool Bravely. This book is new. It will ground you and help you to think about your WHY before digging into your HOW. I gleaned a lot from this little book, even 8 years into homeschooling.
2. Amusing Ourselves to Death. This was written in the 1970s and is a must read for a Mom like me who loves tech. I think it’s a great grounding to see our current culture in a new light.
3. The Call of the Wild. This movement is huge right now. I don’t particularity agree with her premise (I am currently researching what “childhood” actually means from centuries prior vs. the unfounded assumptions in the book). This is great to hear directly from the founder of this movement that you probably have heard your friends participating in. As a side: note: this method is not “Christian” at its core, although many who do W+F are. Be prepared to not get encouragement from Bible passages and the majority of the quotes come from non-Biblical people (including an Islamic scholar).
The author does a wonderful job giving 2-3 page summaries of the main philosophies out there.
4. Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning. This is a Classical Method approach, but could be mixed with Charlotte Mason, the way it’s written.
5. Classical Me, Classical Thee. Written by the daughter of the Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning book, she goes into more detail. Also, this is more about the method in general, not just homeschooling.
6.Consider This. Charlotte Mason. Although there are probably better, more interesting reads, this one is short and gets straight to the how and why of the CM method. It was daunting to me to know Charlotte wrote volumes of books on her method. This book isn’t an end all. If you read it and it resonates with you, then it would be best to read from CM herself (early 19th century language can be too floral for me sometimes).