What Does She Know?

To get an idea of what your seven year old should know, read "The Lost Tools of Learning,"  an essay by Dorothy Sayers.  (Google it- it's online)

Generally, she should know TONS more than you think or can even imagine.  

When our son was in first grade at the parochial school many years ago, we were dismayed at the total lack of content in the religious ed program, so we got the Baltimore Catechism  and started working with him in the evenings (This whole program is premised on not having a TV in the house, since it fractures the attention span of children) for about twenty minutes.  This was coupled with reading out loud lives of the saints, which makes the Catechism come alive-not three page stories, but whole books.  

Anyway, at one point I remember that he knew something on the order of 18 questions and answers about the Mass as a sacrifice, but the totally mind-boggling thing was  that so did his four year old sister who had been listening in to our sessions.  Young children love to memorize things.  The more they memorize the better they like it, and this includes four- year- olds. They are in what Sayers calls the Poll-parrot stage.  It isn't at all a question of making them memorize anything, but of giving them the opportunity to do so.  

There is a terrific animus against the Baltimore Catechism among older clergy, I think because they were required to memorize the BC when the Poll-parrot stage was slipping away, and because it was not a thing of joy, but of work and tests and displeased parents and teachers if they did badly.  

There is another way, based on presenting it much earlier, and not demanding memorization, but celebrating it.

Going INTO first grade I am convinced that our daughter knew more- far more- about her faith than the eighth grade graduates of that school.  To give you an idea, she knew virtually all of her prayers in English and Latin, including the Salve Regina.  

Again, this is very do-able, and not based on having especially gifted children.

Did this pay off for our children?  At ages 32 and 30 they still practice the faith, and next month our daughter makes final profession as a Carmelite.