In today’s episode Mystie, Abby, and Brandy discuss rewards and how to connect them to intrinsic rather than extrinsic motivation. *** Don’t forget to register for our annual Spring Training Sessions! This is happening SOON! Our coach this year is Andrew Zwerneman from Cana Academy. Andrew is going to teach two sessions on history. The first session will help us get away from Marxism and adopt a classical view of history. The second session will propose a method for teaching history. It’s...

Our guest today is Andy Patton. Andy Patton has held various roles in healthcare technology and venture capital. As an entrepreneur in the healthcare space, he built and successfully exited his first company. He has also started and currently owns a company in the construction industry. Before going into business, Mr. Patton spent his early career as a high school teacher of Latin, Greek, music, and math. He joined New College Franklin as President of the College in 2023. Prior to that, he...

Our guest today is Andrew Zwerneman. Andrew J. Zwerneman serves as President and Master Teacher at Cana Academy. For 40 years, he has taught and consulted in secondary schools that emphasize classic humanities. For 19 years he headed schools — 2 at the public charter school, Tempe Preparatory Academy in Tempe, Arizona, 17 at Trinity School at Meadow View in Falls Church, Virginia. Andrew has degrees from both Notre Dame AND St. John’s University, and he has authored two books: History...

Today’s guest is Vigen Guroian. Until his retirement in 2015, Dr. Guroian was Professor of Religious Studies in Orthodox Christianity at the University of Virginia. He is now a Permanent Senior Fellow of the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal, Senior Fellow at the Center on Law and Religion at Emory University, Distinguished Fellow of the John Jay Institute, and Senior Fellow at the Trinity Forum. He also is on the faculty of Memoria College online. Most importantly for our purposes, he...

Today’s episode is the third in our four part series on Charlotte Mason’s chapters from School Education that cover the training of physical, intellectual, moral, and religious habits. Today, we’re discussing the training of MORAL habits.  You’re going to love this conversation! *** Did you sign up to do the 5x5 reading challenge this year? If so, you need to join the Sistership as a Sophie membership and get the accountability you need and the support you want. With weekly check-ins and...

Today’s episode is on unit studies and why Charlotte Mason disapproved of them so much. You’re going to love this conversation! *** Did you sign up to do the 5x5 reading challenge this year? If so, you need to join the Sistership as a Sophie membership and get the accountability you need and the support you want. With weekly check-ins and quarterly zoom-style meetups, you will be encouraged to continue in good reading habits as well as get fun advice on which book to read next. Just go to...

It has come to our attention that while we discuss and refer to the Scholé Sisters 5x5 Reading Challenge regularly, we've never actually done an episode on it. Today, we remedy that problem! We discuss the history of the challenge as well as how it works. Today's episode is hosted by Abby Wahl (because Brandy is in the middle of a cross-country move). Her ever-faithful cohost is, of course, Mystie Winckler. To join the 2024 5x5 Reading Challenge, go to scholesisters.com/5x5 and sign up! ...

Today’s episode is our annual Christmas episode. We begin by revisiting the theme of our very first Christmas episode, Don’t Be the White Witch. We continue with a discussion of generosity and tradition-making that you will love. *** Every year, we give our Sophie members a special Christmas gift. This year, our Sophie members are receiving a workshop on book selection that Mystie and Brandy filmed with Dr. Christopher Schlect from New Saint Andrews College. In a world of woke, how do we go...

Today’s episode is the second in our four part series on habits and training. Last time, Mystie, Abby, and Brandy talked about physical training. Today they’re discussing intellectual training, including that most controversial assertion of Charlotte Mason, that attention can be trained. You’re going to love this conversation! *** Have you heard about the ongoing Sophie Mentorship inside the Scholé Sistership? It started on October 23rd and it’s not too late to join! The mentorship is...

Our very special guest today is Jami Marstall. Jami has been homeschooling with Charlotte Mason’s principles, primarily following AmblesideOnline, for the past 17 years. She has graduated three of her four children from the family homeschool and has one high schooler left. Jami loves to read about and discuss educational history and philosophy. She always dreamed of being a professional student and homeschooling continues to be the perfect career to fulfill that ambition. Today’s episode is...

Today’s episode is the annual episode we recorded at the retreat when we were together in real life, which means we have to apologize to you for the sound. You’d think it’d be better in person, but the reality is that a single shared microphone is a questionable idea. With that said, we had so much fun discussing a portion of Edwin Friedman’s excellent on leadership, A Failure of Nerve. You’re going to love this conversation! *** Have you heard about our upcoming Sophie Mentorship? It...

Today’s conversation is the first in a four-part series covering Charlotte Mason’s chapters from School Education on training children physically, intellectually, morally, and religiously. Today we cover physical training — not so much the how as the what and the why. You’re going to love this conversation! *** Have you registered for our fall online local retreats yet? If you are listening to this episode the day it comes out, the retreat is NEXT SATURDAY October 7th! Our annual Homeschool...

Our guest today is Chad Vegas. Chad is the founding pastor of Sovereign Grace Church in Bakersfield, CA, where he has served since 2006. Chad received his M.A. from Talbot School of Theology. He also spent nearly two decades in public school education as both a teacher and Board Member. He has been married to Teresa since 1994 and they have 2 children. Chad is the co-author of Missions by the Book: How Theology and Missions Walk Together, available at all major booksellers. Our conversation...

Today’s conversation is all about curriculum. What does it mean to say that curriculum can be a crutch? Is that a bad thing? What does a healthy relationship with curricula look like? You’re going to love this conversation! *** Have you registered for our fall online local retreats yet? Our physical hostess kits are just about sold out, but digital hostess kits are still available. Our annual Homeschool Essentials retreat always takes a deep dive into one aspect of homeschooling. This...

Our guest today is Kara Hughes. Kara is a Christian homeschooling mama to 5 children – a toddler, and then a 4th grader, 5th grader, 7th grader and 9th grader, all of whom use AmblesideOnline. She loves reading and hiking, and especially the two together when she can get them. Kara is also the librarian at a homeschool curriculum library, and is trying to reteach herself piano, convince her piece of desert to grow something, and actually finish a knitting project someday. Today is the second...

Today is the first of our two summer episodes. In this one, Mystie, Abby, and Brandy wax philosophical about this year’s retreat topic: time. *** Are you ready for the annual Scholé Sisters Online Local Retreat? Our annual Homeschool Essentials retreats always take a deep dive into one aspect of homeschooling. This year’s topic is TIME, the most essential part of homeschooling of all! We cannot wait to spend time with you all on Saturday, October 7th so mark your calendars! Early bird...

Our guest today is Renee Shepard. Renee was one of the fortunate few to be homeschooled back when that wasn’t really a thing. When she had her own children, she wanted to provide an even better education for them. That drove her to a study of classical education, and over the last ten years she has been homeschooling her children while staying a step ahead of them as she completed her Masters in Classical Christian Studies at New Saint Andrews college. She has been teaching the progymnasmata...

Our guest today is Brent Pinkall, author of the fabulous new book, Redeeming the Six Arts: A Christian Approach to Chinese Classical Education, which the Sisters cannot recommend enough. Brent Pinkall is a Lecturer of Rhetoric at New Saint Andrews College. Before joining the NSA faculty, Pinkall taught rhetoric at a classical Christian college in China for more than five years. He has also taught at various public universities in China, including Lanzhou University, Lanzhou Jiaotong...

Today, Mystie, Brandy, and Abby attempt to straighten out one of the biggest misunderstandings in the Charlotte Mason world: masterly inactivity. The term is constantly misused, so they start off with definitions. But keep listening because they'll go into detail on how exactly this concept can be applied to real life. You’re going to love this conversation! *** Are you ready for this year’s spring training? It’s going to be amazing!! We’re calling it Dead White Guys. A common attack on...

Today's very special guest is David Hicks. Does the famed author of one of the bestest books EVER, Norms and Nobility, really need any further introduction? Well, what you may not know about him is that he spent thirty years of his life in private education, serving as head of school for a number of schools across the country, and culminating as Chief Academic Officer for Meritas LLC, which owned and operated private college prep schools around the globe. David and his brother Scot did an...

Our guest today is Toby Sumpter. Toby pastors King’s Cross Church in Moscow, Idaho. He and his wife Jenny have been married over twenty years and they have 4 kids, one of whom has recently flown the coop. He is a co-host of the CrossPolitic Show and author of Blood-Bought World and No Mere Mortals. He holds a Master of Arts in Theological Studies with an emphasis in church history, and he teaches high school civics at Logos School. Today’s episode is a little different because it’s not...

Our guest today is Jason Barney from the Educational Renaissance Podcast! Jason serves as the Principal of Coram Deo Academy in Carmel, IN. In 2012 he was awarded the Henry Salvatori Prize for Excellence in Teaching from Hillsdale College. He completed his MA in Biblical Exegesis at Wheaton College, where he received The Tenney Award in New Testament Studies. In addition to his administrative responsibilities in vision, philosophy and faculty training, Jason has taught courses in Latin,...

We’re discussing GRIT today. What is grit REALLY? And do kids need grit? DO moms need grit? And if we need it … how do we get it? You’re gonna enjoy thinking through these questions. *** Have you joined the Scholé Sistership yet? In January, we kicked off our annual 5x5 Reading Challenge. It is not too late to join us! All you have to do is head on over to scholesisters.com/join and sign up for the Sophie plan and in addition to a replay of our big kickoff webinar, you will get tons of...

Is real education necessarily religious? And if so, where does that leave modern claims to a secular education? These are the questions we raise in today's episode. *** Have you joined the Scholé Sistership yet? In January, we kicked off our annual 5x5 Reading Challenge. It is not too late to join us! All you have to do is head on over to scholesisters.com/join and sign up for the Sophie plan and in addition to a replay of our big kickoff webinar, you will get tons of accountability, book...