PHILOSOPHY OF CLASSICAL EDUCATION

What is classical Lutheran education?

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Classical Lutheran education forms students in mind, body, and soul through Christ-centered teaching and the disciplined study of the liberal arts.

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It joins two commitments:

• Catechesis – forming faith, character, and virtue

• Classical learning – training the mind to seek truth, order, and beauty

 

In this model, faith enlightens reason, and reason serves faith. All learning is ultimately directed toward loving God and serving one's neighbor.

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Education That Shapes the Whole Person

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​At Faith Lutheran School, education is not just academic. It is formational. Because each person is both sinner and saint—broken by sin yet created in God’s image—students need instruction, discipline, and grace.

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We aim to cultivate students who:

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• Have a deep and enduring faith in Jesus Christ.

• Love learning and delight in God’s creation.

• Pursue virtue and cultivate character for a lifetime​​.

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Christ at the Center of Learning

Christian faith provides the lens through which all learning is viewed. Following the Christian tradition of faith seeking understanding, students learn that curiosity, reason, and discovery are gifts from God.

 

Through the study of God's word, students see:

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• Who God is.

• Who they are in Christ.

• How to live faithfully in the world.

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The study of Scripture and the history of salvation thus becomes the source for all Christian virtue and learning.

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Catechesis: Forming the Heart

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Catechesis is instruction in the basic tenets of the Christian faith. This instruction trains students to live as children of God. Martin Luther’s Small Catechism is a simple guide to Christian doctrine intended to help people understand the core teachings of the Bible—the Commandments, Creed, and Lord’s Prayer.

 

Catechesis guides students to:

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• Recognize sin and need for grace.

• Confess the faith with clarity.

• Pray with confidence as God’s children.

• Receive forgiveness and live in repentance.

 

Daily worship and the historic liturgy reinforce this formation, rooting students in the rhythms of the church year.

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The Liberal Arts: Forming the Mind

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Classical learning teaches students to love truth and pursue wisdom.

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The Trivium—How We Learn and Communicate

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• Grammar: building knowledge; learning language, stories, and facts

• Logic (Dialectic): thinking clearly; discerning truth from error

• Rhetoric: expressing truth with clarity, beauty, and civility​

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The Quadrivium—Seeing Order in Creation

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• Mathematics: understanding harmonies of creation and beauty of proportion

• Geometry: exploring structure and order

• Astronomy: observing God’s ordered universe

• Music: uniting art and science through rhythm and harmony​

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These disciplines train the mind toward clarity, attentiveness, and wonder, which ultimately leads to faith.

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A Unified Vision: Faith, Reason, and Virtue

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Our goal is not simply that students know the right things, but that they become the right sort of people.

We strive to form graduates who:

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• Think with wisdom.

• Communicate with grace.

• Act with responsibility.

• Love God and neighbor faithfully.

• Serve their homes, churches, and communities.

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Education, rightly understood, is the formation of the whole person for life in this world and the next.

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*View our complete statement of educational philosophy here.

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