The Art of Logic

Recently I noticed that thinking ability varied among my new students. Some enjoyed thinking more than others. And those that enjoyed thinking had a more enjoyable learning experience. Among other reasons, I knew a key reason that helped explain these differences in thinking ability: some engaged in more activities that required hard thinking than others.

Neuroscience gives us an eternal principle: use or lose it. Engaging in thinking is how we develop thinking. To level the playing field, I suggested activities to my weaker students that would include more thinking into their days, but sadly, these tasks were neglected or not carried with as much depth as I had hoped for.

In answer to this, I am now offering classes in the art of logic, classes that are solely for the purpose of engaging students in thinking to develop thinking. Nature will be the book we’ll use to develop thinking. God has put large ideas into nature, ideas that grow our minds as we search them out. And making nature the object of our thinking also means that students thinking will continue even outside of class. Seeing nature will trigger the thoughts they had in class, and thinking will continue. My aim will have been achieved; rich thinking will have more of a part in students’ days. And more students will become greater thinkers as a result.

There are numerous reasons as to why it is important that we help every student become a greater thinker.

 1.There is safety in thinking for oneself. If we do not help children to think, we are preparing them to rely on others to think for them. And this has terrible consequences in spiritual and temporal matters.

2.God created all to be thinkers. God creates everyone with a mind, and from this simple observation we can conclude that it is not in God’s plan for one man to be the mind for another man. Each man is to use his own mind. All of us are to be thinkers.

3. Thinking is satisfying. There is something deeply satisfying about being able to make observations that lead to sensible conclusions (inductive reasoning) or being able to weave a set of axioms (general truths) into beautiful truth(s) (deductive reasoning).

 There is enough research to help us conclude that there is a general decline in thinking skills today. Many students, at the primary, secondary and university level "finish" their education with little to no improvement in their mental abilities. At this point you may be wondering why this is, but it is not the aim of this post to share the reasons for these poor outcomes in education today. What I wanted to share were the reasons as to why we need thinking young people and what I am doing to help in this direction, and I have done that so here ends this post.

So! You've decided to start a homeschool?

You have reasoned that you cannot keep your children in a system that is not consistent with your faith; that your children must be part of a system that will give them a mind like Christ and characters without fault; Be of good cheer, in God you have wisdom and help.

I have seen that when Gods counsels are heeded, and his people are fervent to do his will, God takes them by his hand and leads them to raise strong children. I have seen this in many families recently but let me tell you about one family and how one of their children is doing under Gods program.

I’ll refer to this child by the name ‘capable child’. Mentally, physically and spiritual, capable child is growing. Capable child is a thoughtful, hardworking and studious young person. And what has shaped capable child to be strong? I’ll tell you what I have observed.

Spiritual development

There is family worship in the home, where capable child also gets to lead out. It seems capable child also has a personal relationship with Jesus. Capable child does personal research in the Bible and can converse with you about Revelation 13 and 14.  And capable child often asks questions after sermons and those questions are met with enthusiastic and patient answers from the parents.

Can you see why capable child is strong spiritually? I believe it’s because capable child’s parents have been investing effort to put Gods ideas before capable child. Faith comes by hearing the word of God. Capable child’s parents are also studious persons themselves, who make an effort to do as they learn from God.

Mental and physical development

Gods’ principles for eating and dressing are followed in capable child’s home. Those principles, capable child has come to love. In the home capable child has duties, and is made useful in cooking, cleaning and gardening, all things capable child has also come to enjoy.

The home is capable child’s school. The parents lead capable child in some subjects and have enlisted me to help with capable child’s learning in Mathematics, English and the sciences. Teaching capable child has allowed me to closely observe how capable child's mind has been developing. And I can tell you that capable child would be any teachers dream student. God has given capable child a retentive mind, and mental ability. Inductive reasoning, deductive reasoning and creative thinking—all forms of thinking needed to excel in mathematics and science—have developed nicely in capable child.

Why is capable child mentally and physically strong? It is because capable child is made useful around the house, and in thinking Gods thoughts in bible study, the mind has been strengthened. Our minds grow in proportion to the ideas we contemplate. Gods’ thoughts being the highest thoughts, our minds develop the greatest in contemplation of them. And to study the bible in the way God intended trains the highest forms of thinking.

At the beginning I said, “be of God cheer, you have wisdom and help in God”. And I want to add that this help and wisdom is in his counsels. Obedience to those counsels in the home, will make the home a powerful school. This is what I hope you have seen in my telling of capable child’s experience.

What Learning Difficult Ideas Requires

Every so often we’ll come across an idea that’s difficult to understand. And what is important to know, is that difficult ideas are like really solid food. What I mean to communicate is that we need to chew on difficult ideas for some time before we can digest them. What we can’t understand immediately, we can after some sometime breaking it down by reflection.

And interestingly, just as walking aids the digest of physical food, walking also helps us digest thought-food, and in this case, one serving of difficult idea. Thinking while walking often helps bring clarity to those difficult ideas.  So, think about that difficult idea during walks and during chores. This kind of reflection and meditation helps the digestion process of the difficult idea.

Today, this kind of reflection is largely missing from our lives. Time alone with our own thoughts is being eroded by devices which promise a never-ending supply of entertainment. Yet it’s this kind of reflection that helps progress in our mental pursuits.