The Grammar Stage lays the building blocks for all other learning, just as grammar is the foundation for language.  In the elementary school years, the mind is ready to absorb information.  Children at this age find memorization fun.  So during this period, education involves not just self-expression and self-discovery but also learning facts.  Rules of phonics and spelling, grammar, poems, the vocabulary of foreign languages, the stories of history and literature, descriptions of plants and animals and the human body, the facts of mathematics — the list goes on.  This information makes up the “grammar,” or the basic building blocks, of this stage of education.

The second phase is the "Logic Stage," when the child begins to pay attention to cause and effect, the relationships between different fields of knowledge, how they relate, and how facts fit together into a logical framework.

A student is ready for the Logic Stage when the capacity for abstract thought begins to mature.  During these years, the student begins the study of logic and begins to apply logic to all academic subjects.  The logic of writing, for example, includes paragraph construction and learning to support a thesis; the logic of reading involves the criticism and analysis of texts, not simple absorption of information.  Studying the works of Tolkien and Lewis, we find such eloquence- beauty, adequately recognized, is the contextualization of hope.  Understanding the meaning of beauty, the meaning of holiness, and the meaning of sanctity is built upon the more mundane basics of understanding style, context, and presentation.  

As we embark on this critical journey with our students, we understand the complexity of the classical tradition approach as we work to implement the St. Mary's Way of Catholic Liberal Education.