Some Perks of a Classical Education

The children and I spend our days in a classical Christian school-- they as students and I as a teacher in English and humanities. This is our fourth year there, and we like it for ever so many reasons.

Back when Will was in the 5th grade, I was delighted and truly impressed with his speech on Junius Brutus during Greco-Roman day. Our 5th grade spends their entire history study on the pillar of our Greco-Roman tradition, and Will owned his role well. He made and wore his Roman toga, but added to it a good amount of Caesar's blood in the form of red paint. His (memorized!) speech was impassioned, articulate, and accurate, and I was sure I was glowing in my seat there in the second row.

After all, a good portion of our 9th grade humanities curriculum has to do with the Greeks and Romans: we go from Homer to Alexander all the way to the fall of the Roman Empire. Currently, I'm waist-deep in The Odyssey: the man of pain has returned to Ithaca, and-- Woe to you, suitors! There will be blood.

So it all seemed especially current when, tonight at dinner, Emma Grace announced that she's been playing Gaia during recess. She and some of her classmates have taken on identities from Roman mythology, and her role as goddess of the earth entitles her to some significant authority. Everett asked her what she does as Gaia, and her answer came quickly, matter-of-fact: "Kill people," she said.

But the best moment of them all might have been the one that came a week ago, when my music-loving Everett came to me where I was folding laundry. "Mom, listen to this," he said. And he proceeded to sing the tune of "Song Number 2" by Blur. But the words weren't the ones that Blur penned. No, they came instead from Everett's 5th grade study of the Trojan War and the tragic ending of King Agamemnon, when he returned after ten years of fighting to find he had an adulterous wife. Everett and one of his friends had made the story fit Blur's song, so the words went like this:

I'm Clytemnestra (do-do... do-do-do-do)
I killed my husband (do-do... do-do-do-do)
It wasn't easy (do-do... do-do-do-do)
But nothing i-his....

I think they've got it.