Educational Principles That Work Well at Home
About the same time that Pierre Boucher’s father Gaspard brought his family to New France, Ursuline nun Maria of the Incarnation and a young, devout, and wealthy widow, Marie-Madeline de Gurel de la Peltrie Chavigny, met in France to discuss establishing a mission to the native peoples of New France, a mission deeply on the hearts of both women. Pierre Boucher’s family arrived in 1634; Maria and two other nuns established a convent in Quebec City in 1639 under the patronage of Marie-Madeline. Our “On the Traces of Pierre Boucher” tour included a visit to the Ursuline museum there.
To my delight, a regular reader of Daily Encouragement has written to tell me about her ancestors in New France. Among her ancestors are members of the LeVasseur family, talented carpenters and architectural sculptors who contributed to the beauty of government, and more especially, religious buildings in the 1600s. According to the Canadian Encyclopedia:
“Both sculptors participated in the ornamentation of the Ursuline chapel at Québec (1726-36) with its boldly trumpeting angel of the Last Judgement above the pulpit and its classically inspired retable, alive with shimmering saints and robust angels. This magnificent interior in the spirit of Louis XIV is one of the finest examples of wood carving in New France.”*
We did not visit the chapel when we were in Quebec City in August, but we had walked inside and taken a few photographs there in the spring, though with little understanding of what we were seeing.
Last night I found to my delight that I had taken photos of the retable, . . .
. . . the pulpit, . . .
. . . and the “trumpeting angel.”
The Ursuline’s purpose in New France was to teach native girls. They established a school for girls in Quebec City when they arrived in 1639, over one hundred years before the first girls’ school was established in America. In the beginning, the Ursuline school taught many native girls. Sometimes native parents brought their daughters to the school during hunting season so that they could receive an education from the nuns.
Soon French parents in New France began sending their daughters to the school. Pierre Boucher sent his great-granddaughter Marguerite to study there. Over time the school became a prestigious school for the wealthy. It was such a status symbol that parents with more meager means might send their daughters there for only a couple of months, while other girls spent many years there.
I believe strongly in the benefits of linking subjects. From the beginning of our writing for homeschooling families, we have combined subjects in every curriculum we have published. As we toured the Ursuline museum, we learned about educational principles and methods at the school in the 1800s, including these:
- Teachers linked subjects together.
- They worked to help girls understand the world around them.
- They helped girls develop critical thinking so that they could make good decisions.
- They worked to give girls a personalized education.
- Girls could ask to have more instruction in what interested them particularly.
- Teachers helped the girls gain understanding rather than expecting rote memorization.
- Teachers helped girls to appreciate the works of God in Creation.
What a wonderful opportunity homeschooling gives mamas to implement those same principles as they teach their own children, not at a boarding school, but at home.
For since the creation of the world
His invisible attributes,
His eternal power and divine nature,
have been clearly seen,
being understood through what has been made,
so that they are without excuse.
Romans 1:20
*http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/levasseur-family/