The Trivium or "3 ways of thinking"
A deep understanding of the Liberal Arts (the foundation for the Classical movement) is rooted in the Trivium and the Quadrivium. The Trivium consist of three foundational thinking skills while the quadrivium incorporates arithmetic, astronomy, music, and geometry. The goal of the Trivium is to take students a mile deep and an inch wide, rather than a mile wide and an inch deep.
The Grammar phase, for any subject, is where concrete foundational knowledge is built. It is then utilized in the Logic phase; the puzzling/critical thinking stage where students begin to reason and ask "why." Finally, the Rhetoric phase is the outpouring of all student's have gained during the grammar and logic phases, through writing, speaking, music, and art.
Traditional models of classical education adopt this three-phase model, but children are expected to be at a particular stage by a certain age. This is where education becomes formulaic rather than individualized. At ARROWS we see the Trivium as thinking skills rather than stages of development. The advanced five-year-old can be challenged to think more deeply, and the struggling nine-year-old can be given more time for concrete understanding.
Once these thinking skills are developed, a student can launch into a life-time love of learning, essential to navigating the world in which we live.
