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Charlotte Mason was a British educator in the 19th and early 20th Century. She created a unique philosophy challenging the commonly held views of the day, stating that a children was a born person and that they had an innate desire and curiosity for learning. She discussed how we should be providing a feast of ideas to our children. Just as our bodies require a varied diet of healthy food, she said our minds also require a varied and healthy diet of ideas. To learn more Charlotte Mason we recommend reading her volumes, but you can also read more about her philosophy of educastion here: https://www.charlottemasoneducation.org/about/

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This would be best answered by reading her 6 volumes, which we highly encourage and have regular book clubs in which we meet and discuss her volumes as we read through them together. Checkout our calendar for the times on when they meet, otherwise contact us directly and we can let you know when a group is meeting.

Her volumes are free online thanks to Ambleside Online: https://amblesideonline.org/cm/index

Briefly, however, Charlotte Mason's philosophy of education centers on the belief that children are born persons. In fact, that is the first of her 20 principles. She emphasized the need for giving children the very best living ideas. She realized how important it was for children to form relationships with those living ideas directly rather than from a teacher lecturing or a book instructing.

Read all of Charlotte Mason's 20 principles: https://amblesideonline.org/paraphr/par_principles

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Charlotte Mason spread her education among 4 forms based on the British system of education, and over a period of time, two additional forms were added.

To learn more about the forms and what the estimated page count and number of books a student would have typically read in a Charlotte Mason school click here: https://amblesideonline.org/pneu-forms

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Living Books are books that are written to capture the attention of the reader. They require little to no effort on the part of the reader or the teacher to arose interest and provide noble and true ideas. The books are usually written in a narration or conversational style, but always in high quality literary style. The focus is not on imparting facts to the reader but instead imparting ideas and creating relationships with those ideas. Using Charlotte Mason's method of narration after a reading becomes much simpler when the child is given these living books to read. They are excited to read them and tell what they read, creating a personal relationship with those ideas expressed through the books.