Attention: Core Values of Charlotte Mason 

Hi Victoria. Thank you for your question. It is an excellent one. I believe it is important to understand Charlotte's intention behind a "single reading". Charlotte was not saying to never read a book a second time. She had many books that she enjoyed reading multiple times during her life. What she wanted to do was equip people to be able to turn the full gaze of their minds to the passage (or conversation or object) at hand, and she discovered that a good way to encourage growth in that skill/habit was to increase the sense of importance of each reading. A person who is paying full attention will gain much more out of a reading than a person who is paying partial attention, no matter how many times the passage is read.

@@SimplyCharlotteMason thank you for responding! I really appreciate it, since this is a topic I've wondered a lot about lately. I do understand that Charlotte did not apply her "single reading" principle to her personal/pleasure reading. And I do understand, too, the idea behind concentrated attention during a lesson. What I am wrestling with is the idea that perhaps a student would benefit from full attention AND rereading in a lesson. This is how I read for information - I am fully concentrating but if I come across a dense or weighty passage I will reread it. Maybe I misunderstand the definition of "re-reading" in this context. Perhaps when Charlotte discouraged rereading she meant re-reading the entire lesson due to lack of attention. What I think of as re-reading in a lesson is scanning back over a paragraph or a sentence in order to fully understand what is being read, and then continuing on.

wondering the same 🤭

Hi Erin. This can be frustrating as an educator. If you have multiple children and only 1 is not listening, continue with the lesson and then apologize that the 1 missed out on a great lesson/story. You'll want to make certain there are no visible distractions that are causing the inattention. It is helpful if there are consequences established prior to lessons that the child knows about and if you are certain the distractions are out of the way, those consequences need following through. One possible consequence is that the child needs to go to bed a bit earlier than normal. There have been times that I (SCM team member) have said something along the lines of, "I'm sorry you were not able to focus on the lesson and provide your full attention. Perhaps it is because you need a bit more sleep at night." That kiddo, already knowing that it would be a consequence, then goes to bed a bit early. If he is the only child and is not paying attention, you'll want to make sure there are no distractions and that you are varying the types of lessons. He may need something to keep is hands busy while you read or perhaps standing and pacing while you read may help this particular child. Another tool some families utilize is the large exercise ball. A child can gently rock, bounce, etc on the ball so long as he is not being disruptive and is listening carefully. I find I am able to retain our lessons at Sunday school better if I am able to knit a simple project during class time. If he is not paying attention simply out of disinterest, then I would close the book, discuss the consequence, move to a different subject, and try to come back to the subject later in the day or the next day.

One idea is if you’re reading and they’re not paying attention, you could stop there and ask for a narration. Then if they are unable to narrate, you could either move to a different lesson, or you could continue on reading and see if they are paying better attention. Sometimes the lesson is about developing the habit of attention, not the portion they missed in that few minutes. I think the point is that it won’t ruin their education to miss 10 minutes of a reading, but it can ruin it if we allow them to dawdle and be inattentive and have to read and reread and re-reread every 10 minute reading.

I would say smaller chunks. If your child plays video games, watches television or uses a cell phone for an unrestricted amount of time, they're ability focus and pay attention to things will be limited and small so I would say and plan to do myself (I have had the kids not watch or play or use and have seen they're attention span extremely different) is limit intensely. Obviously it is not all.about limiting but intentionally shaping your child's time in general and including work and play and fixed structure and then heavily restricting or ridding all together of the stuff that makes.attention decrease. I would also say reward or praise heavily the person that can answer the question, that inspired my oldest to start listening during our Bible time. It depends on what motivates your child but in reality, whether it's Charlotte Mason teaching or not, these things are not in a vacuum that just turn on during "school" time. Attention needs to be increased overall and hindurances limited or gotten rid of. I think a large issue is people not understanding that Charlotte's way is really about the kind of person you want to raise it's not just about during things at a certain time and then putting it away.

@@SimplyCharlotteMason thanks for the reply! I've been experimenting with a few things, but the thing that has worked out best so far has been to give my son his own copy of the reading material whenever possible so that he can read along. This has been working out great! He feels a lot more ownership when he has "his book" to read from. He's only 6, so he's not ready to be completely independent, but having him simply follow along while I read or while we listen to an audiobook has been great for helping him keep attention.