Friday is for rhetoric! From the get-go, Quintilian is interested in the process of education. If you mess up the process, your outcome is less likely to be good. What is fundamental in education? Let’s see.
Quintilian, and J.S. Watson. Institutes of Oratory. Edited by Lee Honeycutt, 2010. Kindle Electronic Edition. Book I Chapter 1.
From the start, the burden of education is on the fathers. “Let a father, then, as soon as his son is born, conceive first of all the best possible hope of him, if he will thus grow the more solicitous about his improvement from the very beginning” (Quintilian I.1.1). The assumption is that most everyone can learn very well. From the start, people who care for children must use good grammar. Quintilian does observe (Quintilian I.1.6) that better educated parents are preferable, both father and mother.
Quintilian recommends teaching Greek first (Quintilian I.1.12) because the student will eventually learn Latin anyway and because Greek provides foundations of Latin learning. Latin follows afterward, as students need to master their own language (Quintilian I.1.14). Quintilian recommends that children learn from their earliest age, though at different levels and in different ways. It is all right for a student to learn in part, then add to that learning bit by bit.
Writing neatly and easily is a skill of great importance (Quintilian I.1.28). Continuous practice reading aloud is also of great importance. Content should also be of high moral quality (Quintilian I.1.35). This not only instills morality but exercises the memory, which is very important in an orator.
Quintilian, and J.S. Watson. Institutes of Oratory. Edited by Lee Honeycutt, 2010. Kindle Electronic Edition. Book I Chapter 1.
From the start, the burden of education is on the fathers. “Let a father, then, as soon as his son is born, conceive first of all the best possible hope of him, if he will thus grow the more solicitous about his improvement from the very beginning” (Quintilian I.1.1). The assumption is that most everyone can learn very well. From the start, people who care for children must use good grammar. Quintilian does observe (Quintilian I.1.6) that better educated parents are preferable, both father and mother.
Quintilian recommends teaching Greek first (Quintilian I.1.12) because the student will eventually learn Latin anyway and because Greek provides foundations of Latin learning. Latin follows afterward, as students need to master their own language (Quintilian I.1.14). Quintilian recommends that children learn from their earliest age, though at different levels and in different ways. It is all right for a student to learn in part, then add to that learning bit by bit.
Writing neatly and easily is a skill of great importance (Quintilian I.1.28). Continuous practice reading aloud is also of great importance. Content should also be of high moral quality (Quintilian I.1.35). This not only instills morality but exercises the memory, which is very important in an orator.
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