As my children are getting older and my oldest is approaching junior high, I’ve been thinking a lot about literary analysis. I’ve been asking myself what I want to accomplish, and is it really necessary. While my oldest is very language-oriented and thrives on deep conversation about great books, my younger daughter with dyslexia struggles with reading, even the simple task of decoding words she’s never seen before. How on earth do I tackle character analysis and devices and themes with her?
But even with my oldest literature-loving son, I felt discouraged and overwhelmed when it came to teaching literature. Flipping through over 50 pages of teacher notes for history and literature in my former curriculum each week left me feeling completely incapable and, quite frankly, burned out. I knew I needed something different. So I scoured the internet, and I stumbled upon a company that brought everything back into focus and helped me to answer that nagging question of “why should I do literary analysis anyway?” Center for Lit has a number of resources for homeschool parents that makes studying literature not just possible but meaningful and enjoyable. One of those resources that I’ve been using and absolutely loving is Teaching the Classics.
*I received this product for free in exchange for an honest review. All my opinions are my own.*
What is Teaching the Classics
Teaching the Classics from CenterforLit.com is a seminar that provides the teacher with all the tools necessary to lead a profitable literary analysis with any book at any reading level. That alone is pretty amazing! Produced by a homeschool family for homeschool families, the seminar is simple, clear, and engaging as Adam Andrews discusses each element of literary analysis and provides several examples with simple literature readings.
The Teaching the Classics seminar comes with a Teacher Syllabus and 9 DVDs. The syllabus provides notes for the DVDs as well as a list of Socratic questions to choose from as you lead your own discussions. (Socratic questions are simply open-ended questions that begin a discussion.) Setting, characters, theme, style (literary devices), and plot outline are examined and put to use in a series of Socratic discussions covering Paul Revere’s Ride, Riki-tiki Tavi, an excerpt from Tom Sawyer and more.
Most of the DVD discussions run about 30-40 minutes, and while I learned more with each DVD, I also felt capable of getting started with the method after only a couple of the DVD lessons.
How I Use the Teaching the Classics Method
The best way I can describe this method is to compare it to a book club discussion, a good one. While I know I still have a lot to learn and our discussions have room to grow, I was really encouraged and impressed by how quickly I could see results with this method.
In my first attempt, I decided to include both of my older two kids, just to see how it would work with my dyslexic daughter and with different reading levels. As a part of our study of the age of exploration and colonization, I’d already assigned my children to read Gulliver’s Travels. Each child had their own version of the story. My fourth grade daughter had an easy reader version of the tale, while my sixth grade son read a more advanced version. Then, we sat down for our discussion.
(Honest disclosure: My daughter, who has multiple learning anxieties, initially freaked out. Anything new frightens her, and she totally shut down when we first started our discussion—not necessarily because it was difficult, but simply because it was new. She intentionally answered the opposite of whatever her brother said or refused to answer at all. When I noticed her anxiety, I gently pressed on with the discussion and allowed her to merely observe at the beginning. By the end, she lost her fear and was eagerly joining the discussion and contributing some great ideas. I was so glad I hadn’t given up.)
I began our discussion by googling a brief bio of Jonathan Swift and reviewing with them the major history events we had been studying together. They immediately saw why Gulliver’s desire to explore new lands fit with the time period. I thought I would begin by discussing setting, but with each question about setting, my kids were very eager to tell me all about the characters. So I followed their lead; I began asking about the characters, instead.
I asked only a couple of questions for each group of characters. It took a few minutes for my daughter to warm up to the discussion, but soon both kids were retelling the tale, describing characters, relating how Gulliver felt about each group of people, and what parts of the story amused or disturbed them. When we got to the end of our discussion (which took about half an hour), I asked them to tell me what they thought one of Swift’s themes might be in the book. By now, even my daughter was eagerly discussing and pointing out some great ideas for possible themes in his book, and all from simply looking at characters.
Overall, I fell in love with how simple the whole process had been. I was amazed that just a discussion of characters could reveal so much about the book. I was amazed at how much fun the whole discussion was for all of us, even my daughter after her initial fears calmed down. And I was amazed that my child with dyslexia, who had read the story at a 2nd or 3rd grade reading level, could so quickly engage with the questions and ideas. I loved that instead of tearing the book apart, we’d actually threaded the book together.
Perhaps we could do this literary analysis thing after all.
What I love about the Teaching the Classics method
I loved how simple this turned out to be. Each time, we’ve discuss only one or two elements. Maybe one time we talk about the plot and climax. Another time, we’ll talk about the setting or style. I love that I can choose our own stories to read and discuss. The method provided in the seminar can be used with any book you choose. I’ve since used the method with a few other books with my oldest son, including Sign of the Beaver.
I love that every discussion leads back to the theme of the book. It’s not merely breaking the story apart; it’s seeing how the parts contribute to a better overall understanding of the book he’s reading.
I love that it’s teaching my kids to think about the overall ideas that they are reading about, to savor and ruminate on the ideas. In fact, this has actually helped my son in his own narrative writing. He’s understanding that the theme moves his story forward and influences his choices as a writer.
I love that this can all be done simply, without hours of prep and pages upon pages of teacher notes for each story. However, it does work best if I’ve read the book that we are discussing. I did wing it with Dangerous Journey, since I was pretty familiar with the Pilgrim’s Progress storyline, but a rich discussion of theme and style really is better if I’ve read the book.
How I plan to use Teaching the Classics in the future
We are definitely going to incorporate the Teaching the Classics method for our literature study. My son loves the story map diagram used with each story discussion, the structure and predictability of approaching each book in the same way. I’ve also purchased a website subscription to their Pelican Society for more resources and discussions as well as their Reading Roadmaps book, which provides a suggested list of books for each grade level and a spreadsheet of the key story elements for each of those books. Center for Lit also provides Teacher Guides and Ready Reader bundles as well as online classes.
In the few weeks that I’ve been reviewing this, I’ve already recommended it to a number of personal friends. I love it! Center for Lit’s Teaching the Classics is a truly remarkable method that makes literary analysis attainable, for both me and my children, and makes it meaningful—not picking the story apart but bringing the story together for a deeper, richer understanding.
