Coshocton Classical Conversations group helps home school families

COSHOCTON – Are you interested in home schooling your children or wanting to connect with others who do? If so, there is a group in Coshocton that is here to help.

The Coshocton Classical Conversations home school group recently held a public meeting to introduce the program’s concepts to the community.

“We do home school from the classical approach,” said Jennifer Gress. “The classical model focuses on teaching kids how to learn and when we talk about classical we are referring to the art of learning and the terms grammar, dialect and rhetoric.”

Classical Conversations has programs for students’ age 4 through high school. This year the Coshocton group will be able to offer the foundations program for 4-year-olds to sixth graders and the essentials program for students in fourth grade through sixth grade.

“The biggest part of the group is that you are building a community,” Gress said. “You share information with each other and support each other.”

She explained that each week the students come to class and tutors, moms who go to training and are trained how to teach class, present information that then is worked on for the week at home.

At the weekly meeting the foundations program covers new grammar which is timeline, history, science, math, Latin, English and geography. Gress said they do a half hour of new grammar, half hour of fine arts, half hour of hands on science, and presentations, which are kind of like a show and tell.

“They learn valuable public speaking skills and then the last half hour is review games,” Gress said. “I am the director of Coshocton CC and foundations tutor this year and Khrysti Taylor will be doing essentials in the afternoon. Essentials students learn persuasive writing, discussion, and debate.”

She also stressed that the tutor does not replace the parent.

“The parent is still ultimately the educator,” Gress said. “The program though breaks down information and makes it easy to home school plus they are getting so much deeper information. It’s made a huge difference in the way we home school and the way my kids have been able to absorb information and put it with other things has amazed me.”

She has homeschooled her children, Gavin, 8 and Colton 7, for four years and is starting her second year with the Classical Conversations program.

“We wanted their education to have a Christian foundation and when we found out about the Classical Conversation model it helped us put our vision together and made home schooling easier and fun,” Gress said. “Last year was a blast. We had so much fun and it wasn’t overwhelming at all. I always hear parents say they don’t know if they have the patience to home school, but this makes it pretty easy.”

Anyone interested in learning more about Classical Conversations can contact Gress at 740-294-1884 or visit the program’s website at www.classicalconversations.com.

“I’m happy to help anybody,” Gress said. “It’s a great group and we have some really committed tutors for the program. We also plan field trips and different activities for the kids to do outside of the classroom.”

There are different Classical Conversations campuses throughout Ohio and last year was the first year for Coshocton’s. Gress added that they used to meet at Fresno Bible Church but are hoping to find a place this year in Coshocton. More information on the local group also can be found on its Facebook page – Coshocton Classical Conversations.

Category: Education