What Quintilian Can Teach Us About Educating Young Children

Nearly two thousand years ago, the Roman educator Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, usually known simply as Quintilian, wrote one of the great works on education to survive from the ancient world, the Institutio Oratoria, or The Orator's Education.

Written in the first century AD, the Institutio Oratoria consists of twelve books describing the formation of the ideal educated speaker from childhood to maturity. What makes the work particularly fascinating for parents is that Quintilian does not begin with advanced rhetoric. He begins with the child.

In Book I, Chapter 1, Quintilian considers the earliest stages of education. He discusses parents, the language children hear in the home, when education should begin, learning to read, handwriting, memory, pronunciation, repetition, and the formation of good habits.

Although Quintilian was writing in Roman society nearly two thousand years ago, many of the principles found in this opening chapter speak remarkably directly to parents educating their children at home today.

Have High Hopes for Your Children

Book I, Chapter 1 opens with a wonderfully optimistic statement:

"I would, therefore, have a father conceive the highest hopes of his son from the moment of his birth."

Quintilian does not mean that every child possesses identical abilities. In the very same chapter he acknowledges that "there are degrees of talent" and consequently differences in eventual achievement.

What he rejects is the idea that ordinary children are incapable of benefiting greatly from education. He argues that most children are naturally capable of reasoning and learning and firmly denies that there are children who can gain nothing from education.

This is a wonderful starting point for home-educating parents.

We do not need to know at five or six years old what our children will eventually become. We do not need to decide whether they are academically gifted, mathematically inclined, naturally literary, or destined for university. Our responsibility is much simpler. We should have high hopes for them, provide them with a rich education, and carefully cultivate whatever abilities God has given them.

Indeed, Quintilian suggests in Book I, Chapter 1 that when the promise evident in childhood later disappears, this may be due "not to the failure of natural gifts, but to lack of the requisite care."

The responsibility of education is therefore a serious one, but it should also fill parents with hope.

Parents Matter More Than They Think

One of the most striking passages in Book I, Chapter 1 of the Institutio Oratoria concerns the education of the parents themselves.

Quintilian writes:

"As regards parents, I should like to see them as highly educated as possible, and I do not restrict this remark to fathers alone."

It is particularly interesting that Quintilian explicitly includes mothers. He gives examples of educated Roman women whose command of language influenced their children, including Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi.

This is particularly significant for home education.

Parents sometimes worry that they are not qualified enough to educate their own children. They imagine that a teacher must already possess expert knowledge of every subject before teaching it.

Quintilian offers a much more encouraging principle.

He certainly values educated parents, but he immediately adds that parents who did not themselves receive an excellent education should not therefore give less attention to their children's learning. Instead, he says, they should "show all the greater diligence" wherever they are able to help.

This is very close to the philosophy we encourage at Britannia Classical Institute.

You do not need to pretend to know everything. You can read alongside your children. You can learn Latin with them. You can discover ancient history together. You can refresh mathematics that you have forgotten. You can encounter great literature that you never had the opportunity to read at school.

One of the great opportunities of home education is that the education of the child can gradually become the education of the whole family.

The Home Is Already Educating

Quintilian also understood that education does not suddenly begin when a child sits down for his first formal lesson.

The child is already learning.

In Book I, Chapter 1, Quintilian therefore pays considerable attention to the language children hear around them. He argues that those caring for young children should speak correctly because these are the first voices children hear and consequently the first examples they imitate.

He writes:

"It is the nurse that the child first hears, and her words that he will first attempt to imitate."

His explanation is particularly memorable. Early impressions, he says, are like the first flavour absorbed by a new vessel or the first colour applied to white wool. They remain with us.

Anyone who has raised children knows how true this is.

Children imitate pronunciation, vocabulary, expressions, habits, attitudes, and behaviour long before anyone formally teaches these things to them. This is one reason the culture of the home matters so much.

If children see their parents reading, reading becomes normal. If they hear thoughtful conversation, thoughtful conversation becomes normal. If prayer structures the day, prayer becomes normal. If learning is spoken about positively, study becomes part of ordinary family life.

Home education is therefore much more than completing lessons. It is the creation of a culture of learning within the family.

Start Young, But Do Not Force

Quintilian then considers a question parents are still asking nearly two thousand years later.

When should education begin?

In Book I, Chapter 1, he tells us that some ancient authorities believed children should not be taught to read until seven years old. Quintilian disagrees. He argues that a child's mind should not simply be allowed to "lie fallow" during the early years when children are already capable of learning.

His argument is wonderfully practical. The amount learned at five or six may seem small compared with what can be learned later, but it is still something learned. Small amounts accumulated steadily over several years become significant.

However, Quintilian immediately provides an important qualification.

Young children must not be forced prematurely into work for which they are not ready. He warns:

"Above all things we must take care that the child, who is not yet old enough to love his studies, does not come to hate them."

That balance is enormously important.

We can start early without expecting too much too soon.

A five-year-old can begin reading, handwriting, arithmetic, prayers, stories, poetry, and discussion without being expected to sit at a desk for hours. Ten minutes of attentive study may initially accomplish far more than an hour of frustration.

This is why the youngest pupils at Britannia Classical Institute begin with a deliberately simple foundation. Reading, Arithmetic, Handwriting, Aesop's Fables, Hagiography, discussion, memory, and other carefully chosen activities can gradually establish the habits upon which later education will depend.

The purpose is not to recreate a school timetable in the home. The purpose is to begin gently and build gradually.

Small Things Are Not Unimportant

Quintilian anticipates an objection to all this. Why should someone writing a twelve-book work about the education of an accomplished orator concern himself with such elementary matters as learning letters?

His answer in Book I, Chapter 1 contains an important educational principle:

"Studies, like men, have their infancy."

Everything great begins with something small.

Before the great orator delivered speeches, he struggled to pronounce his first words. Before the great writer composed beautiful prose, he learned to form letters. Before the scholar read difficult books, he slowly learned to read simple words.

Quintilian even points to Alexander the Great. Alexander's father, Philip of Macedon, entrusted his son's education to Aristotle. Quintilian asks why Philip would have wanted one of the greatest philosophers of the ancient world to concern himself with Alexander's earliest education, or why Aristotle would have accepted the responsibility, unless these foundations really mattered.

There is an important lesson here for parents.

Teaching a child his letters is important. Correcting handwriting is important. Listening patiently while a child learns to read is important. Practising arithmetic is important. Correcting pronunciation is important. Helping a child form a complete sentence is important.

These apparently small things are the foundations upon which everything else will eventually be built.

Do Not Rush Reading

One of the most striking parts of Book I, Chapter 1 of the Institutio Oratoria is Quintilian's advice about teaching children to read.

He writes:

"Reading must therefore first be sure, then connected, while it must be kept slow for a considerable time, until practice brings speed unaccompanied by error."

This could almost have been written as advice to parents today.

Accuracy comes before speed.

Quintilian specifically warns against pushing a child to read faster than his ability allows. He says that undue haste results in hesitation, interruption, repetition, mistakes, and eventually a loss of confidence in what the child already knows.

How easily we can fall into precisely this trap.

We worry that a child is "behind". We compare him with siblings. We compare reading ages. We look at what another home-educating family is doing. We become anxious about finishing a particular book by a particular age.

Quintilian reminds us that speed should emerge through practice.

First read accurately. Then read fluently. Speed will follow.

There is little advantage in rushing a child through increasingly difficult material if he has not securely mastered what came before.

There Are No Shortcuts

Quintilian is equally direct when discussing the mechanics of learning to read.

Speaking about syllables in Book I, Chapter 1, he says:

"No short cut is possible: they must all be learnt."

This principle extends far beyond syllables.

Education contains things that simply have to be learned. Children must learn letters and sounds. They must acquire vocabulary. They must learn number facts. They must understand grammatical terminology. They must practise handwriting. They must remember important information.

Modern education can sometimes become uncomfortable with repetition because repetition does not always appear exciting. Yet repetition is one of the principal ways human beings acquire mastery.

Quintilian specifically warns against placing "blind confidence in a child's memory". Important material should be repeated and impressed upon the memory.

There is nothing unclassical about repetition and practice. They have always belonged to serious education.

Handwriting Matters

Quintilian even gives detailed advice about handwriting.

In Book I, Chapter 1, he recommends having the forms of letters cut into a board so that the young child's writing instrument can follow the grooves. The technology is ancient, but the educational principle is immediately recognisable. The child repeatedly follows the correct letter formation until the movement becomes secure.

More importantly, Quintilian does not regard handwriting as an insignificant mechanical skill.

He writes:

"The art of writing well and quickly is not unimportant for our purpose."

His reasoning is practical. Writing is one of the principal instruments of study. If the physical act of writing is unnecessarily difficult, it interferes with the expression of thought.

This remains true today.

Children should gradually learn to write clearly, comfortably, and with reasonable fluency. Handwriting should eventually become sufficiently natural that the pupil can concentrate upon what he wishes to say rather than upon the physical struggle of forming every letter.

This is why handwriting has a proper place within the early Britannia Classical Institute curriculum. It is not simply about producing attractive exercise books. Writing is an instrument of thought.

Give Children Something Worth Remembering

One of my favourite pieces of advice in Book I, Chapter 1 concerns the material children are given to copy.

If a child must practise writing, Quintilian asks, why give him meaningless sentences?

He recommends that the lines children copy should:

"convey some sound moral lesson."

Children may remember these sayings even when they are old, and the ideas impressed upon their young minds may contribute to the formation of their character.

This is classical education in miniature.

If a child is practising reading, give him something worth reading. If he is practising handwriting, give him something worth writing. If he is exercising his memory, give him something worth remembering. If he is learning language, place excellent language before him.

Education should accomplish more than one thing whenever possible.

A handwriting exercise can simultaneously develop handwriting, spelling, vocabulary, memory, and character. A passage of poetry can develop pronunciation, vocabulary, imagination, memory, and an appreciation of beautiful language.

This is one reason older educational texts can be so valuable. Their authors frequently understood that the material chosen for an exercise mattered just as much as the skill being practised.

Education Is the Formation of Habits

Perhaps the greatest lesson running throughout Book I, Chapter 1 of Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria is the importance of habit.

Quintilian continually returns to it.

Children imitate what they hear. Errors repeated become difficult to remove. Reading improves through practice. Memory strengthens through use. Handwriting develops through repetition. Pronunciation should be corrected before mistakes become permanent.

Good education therefore consists partly in establishing good habits before bad ones become deeply rooted.

For home-educating families, this should be encouraging rather than intimidating. You do not need to create extraordinary educational experiences every day. Much of excellent education is wonderfully ordinary.

Read every day. Practise arithmetic. Write carefully. Speak properly. Learn good things by heart. Discuss what has been read. Correct errors patiently. Return the following day and continue.

Weeks become months. Months become years. Eventually those small acts accumulate into an education.

Have High Hopes and Build Carefully

Perhaps we should finish where Book I, Chapter 1 begins.

Have high hopes.

This does not mean unrealistic expectations, constant comparison, or anxiety about whether a child is ahead or behind. It means refusing to underestimate what children are capable of becoming when their natural abilities are carefully cultivated.

Quintilian believed that most children possess a remarkable natural capacity to learn. When the promise apparent in childhood later disappears, he argues that this is often due "not to the failure of natural gifts, but to lack of the requisite care."

That places a serious responsibility upon parents, but it should also give us tremendous encouragement.

Our children are capable of learning. They can read demanding books. They can learn mathematics. They can study history. They can memorise poetry. They can encounter Latin and Greek. They can learn to write clearly and speak thoughtfully. They can grow intellectually, morally, and spiritually.

The task of the home-educating parent is not to discover immediately how far each child will eventually climb. It is to give the child the opportunity to begin climbing.

At Britannia Classical Institute, this is one of the principles underlying our approach to the early years. Begin gently. Establish strong foundations. Choose worthwhile material. Develop good habits. Do not rush, but do not underestimate the child.

Quintilian wrote Institutio Oratoria nearly two thousand years ago. Yet the principles he sets out at the very beginning of Book I, Chapter 1 remain remarkably relevant to parents today.

Have high hopes for your children. Take their earliest education seriously. Surround them with good language. Begin learning while they are young, but do not force them. Establish accuracy before speed. Practise what needs to be practised. Give them worthwhile things to read, write, and remember.

Above all, never dismiss the small beginnings of education as insignificant.

As Quintilian reminds us:

"Studies, like men, have their infancy."

The foundations we patiently establish today make possible everything our children may study tomorrow.

A R Hutchinson