The Veritas Approach to Literature
Reading great literature is an important part of a child’s education at Veritas. Reading literature that has endured the test of time, the classics, is important for many reasons:
- Books create warm emotional bonds between adults and kids when they read books together.
- Books help kids develop basic language skills and profoundly expand their vocabularies.
- Books are interactive; they demand that kids think. Fiction and nonfiction books widen our consciousness.
- Books develop critical thinking skills.
- Books develop and nourish kids’ imaginations, expanding their worlds.
- Books let kids try on the world before they have to go out into it.
- Books help us to understand ourselves, to find out who we are.
- Books help children and adults to open up, to move beyond self-absorption and connect to other people.
- Books answer questions.
- Books create questions.
- Books provide the opportunity to share cultural experiences.
- Books entertain and offer a great escape.
- Books inspire us to dream.[1]
Children love learning from the rich stories of the past. At Veritas, they will learn to love language and expression, they will understand the art of storytelling. Children who are immersed in good literature as young children develop creative minds and an enjoyment of lifelong reading. Who doesn’t remember Charlotte’s Web, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Tom Sawyer, and The Chronicles of Narnia with great fondness?
Kindergarten and first grade start slowly and build as students mature. By second grade, they’ll read about 10 books a year. Most are children’s classic literature. Veritas’s comprehension guides are used to teach children how to read for comprehension, fluency, learn how to discern the plot, who the characters are, and much more. Most of all, literature courses inspire a love of reading. Fun, hands on projects are used to help inculcate such a love.
The literature program is enhanced by students’ accelerated mastery of language through studies in Latin and Grammar and Writing. These advantages translate into reading books earlier than many of their peers and before many educators think possible.
This benefit is further leveraged as they move beyond grammar school and into studying the Great Books through the Omnibus curriculum.
When you think about it, literature, even for the young student, is much more than just reading.
“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” – Dr. Seuss
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