The Columbus Dispatch

Catholic academy revives classical approach to learning

- By Shannon Gilchrist

In a world that's pushing everyounge­r children toward engineerin­g and science, and handing them gadgets to learn with, one tiny private school in Whitehall is purposely moving in the opposite direction.

Mater Dei Academy (Latin for "Mother of God") does have computers, but only on the teachers' desks. Computeriz­ed whiteboard­s hang in the classrooms, but they aren't used constantly — more often it's the dry-erase boards or

individual paper workbooks.

Mater Dei’s method of teaching, called the classical approach, is what Curriculum Director Mary Amorose calls “countercul­tural.” It’s a systematic method, first of memorizati­on and then learning to reason, and it was used widely for hundreds of years.

“It works,” Amorose said. “The Founding Fathers learned this way. ... It teaches you to think, which is what I liked.”

The K-8 Catholic school, which has rented space for the past 46 years from Whitehall’s Faith Lutheran Church, has always been traditiona­l. It was founded, in fact, as a reaction to changes from the Vatican in the 1960s, including allowing Mass in the vernacular, that caused some turmoil. Mater Dei is independen­t from the Roman Catholic Diocese of

Columbus.

Amorose said she has always liked the idea of classical education but was motivated to finally make the switch after attending a convention in Louisville last summer on the topic. She said hundreds of school officials attended from across the nation, many from small private schools like Mater Dei.

At 8 a.m., the student body — 19 children in shirts and ties or plaid jumpers — convenes in the lunchroom. Wednesday morning prayer consisted of three decades of the rosary. Henry Wilson, 8, first led the “Hail Mary” chant in English, but halfway through, 12-year-old Megan Brown took over: “

...” Each classroom has a photo of the pope and a small font of holy water by the door. Religion classes are taught daily. The school will take students of any religious persuasion, as long as families understand that the Catholic faith is emphasized, said Camille Wolf, admissions director.

First- and second-graders stood for recitation, naming the continents, oceans and U.S. time zones. Henry giggled wildly when he got the last time zone correct: “Mountain!”

“At this age, memorizati­on is what they’re best at,” Wolf said. “Their minds are little sponges.” They learn grammar and phonics, read informatio­nal texts and memorize facts. The secondgrad­ers start learning Latin.

Though it’s about as far from a STEM school as it can get, all Mater Dei students learn “rigorous” math, Amorose said, and science lessons that gradually build on the history of science and the scientific method.

By third and fourth grade, children are able to process the more-nuanced themes of mythology and fairy tales.

By the upper grades, they move into literature that teaches morals. The older children are reading “The Hobbit” by J.R.R. Tolkien and “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” by C.S. Lewis.

On Wednesday, seventhand eighth-graders reviewed the fall of ancient Greece for an upcoming test. Five students laughed and corrected one another and asked questions.

Picking up the Latin has been rough going for the older kids, who didn’t start it in the earlier grades. “At first, I did not like a second of it,” said Lauren Milliken, 14. “I guess I didn’t have a good attitude about it. ... Now it’s fine.”

Wolf predicted that the STEM craze in education will fade in a few years. “Technology is moving way too fast for the curriculum,” she said.

The school tries to be as little beholden to government as possible, Wolf said, including not accepting state private-school vouchers. The tradeoff is that it isn’t constraine­d to state learning standards and testing.

Mater Dei charges $4,200 a year for one child, but gives a discount for multiple children and caps tuition at $5,700 per family.

Nineteen students is a little too small to be sustainabl­e, Wolf said, but she called it a “building year.” In the past, Mater Dei has taught up to 60 children.

“At this age, memorizati­on is what they’re best at. Their minds are little sponges.”

—Camille Wolf, admissions director

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