An Example Of A Charlotte Mason Narration

Many of you know that I tend toward the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling, and one of the things that I LOVE about the method is narration. Narration can be tricky for some reason, so I wanted to show you two examples of what it looks like in our home.

This morning I read the short story, The Elephant’s Child by Rudyard Kipling, to my girls.

It is the story of a curious, short nosed Elephant that wonders what the crocodile eats for lunch. He asks all his relatives, but all they do when he asks is to give him a spanking. He runs away to find out for himself and in the process ends up with a looong trunk after a tug of war for his life with the croc. Kipling explains that all elephants from that time forward now have long trunks. 😉

Then I had them narrate back what they remember. Narration is used to help the child process the information as a memory aid. It forces them to think it through for themselves. It also helps prepare them for writing essays someday.

So, today I want to show you narration, at two totally different levels. Hope is younger, and I think you’ll notice that as the child gets older, they are more detail oriented with their narrations. Hope this helps someone. I was always a little confused by the whole narration thing. Enjoy.