Bowditch, Dabney, and Developing Critical Thinking Skills

My 12 year-old son and his 10 year-old sister and I are currently reading Carry On Mr. Bowditch, by Jean Lee Latham, together. Seeing as how my two children just mentioned are brother and sister to six elder siblings, you can readily imagine, I trust, that this current reading of Bowditch on my part, “ain’t my first rodeo.” It is actually my third or fourth rodeo in that regard, if you only count the times I’ve read the book with my kids, as opposed to without them, that is. But who’s counting anyway? Suffice to say I’m very familiar with the book and its contents; whereas the two youngsters above-mentioned, not s’much. We’re currently in the process of correcting that unacceptable defect.

We read a number of book titles by as many authors together, my kids and me – my kids and I. They do most of the reading, while I do most of the critical listening, instructing, correcting of mispronunciations, and so on and so forth. One of the things I flatter myself I’ve gotten pretty good at over time (although there is always room for more improvement) and with each successive reading, consists in helping them along in developing their critical thinking skills, since our standing rule is that we never read a book “for the sake of it.” Now, I’m careful in my choice of wording in the previous sentence because I don’t believe “teaching” critical thinking skills, as one often hears the notion expressed, is possible in any case. But I’m not here to argue semantics, so I’ll not elaborate on the point for the time being.

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I’ve written before of our family’s interest in astronomy. I own a nice, moderately sized reflector telescope that, on clear nights with stable atmospheric conditions, yields very crisp, stunningly detailed images of some of the most interesting objects in the vast universe visible from this mortal coil of ours. As with our reading sessions, our less frequent sky watching interludes – few and far between as they tend to be – present many excellent teaching & learning and developmental opportunities. If, that is to say, the teacher (yours truly, in this case) knows his subject and subject matter well. One aspect of the teaching and learning experience in these sessions that reaches beyond the sharing of mere knowledge of facts and the building of vocabulary, is the aforementioned assistance in developing critical reasoning skills.

Studying the planet Jupiter with my kids is among my most enjoyable pastimes, and is among theirs too. Or, so they tell me. As I’m sure y’all know, in addition to its beautiful cloud belts and the raging super-storm – known affectionately to us earthlings as the Great Red Spot – perpetually making its never-ending circuit around the planet’s apparent surface, Jupiter also boasts four large moons, visible through small telescopes, that appear at the eyepiece as points of light like just so many distant stars. Given that they are in fact moons, or satellites, and not stars, each travels in its own orbit around their massive gaseous host.

The moons in question are not always visible from our line of sight; depending on the date and time of viewing, one or more of them will be, or will become, (temporarily) hidden from our earth-bound view. When these occurrences happen to coincide with our occasional viewing sessions, my question posed to the kids is, “what happened to the other moon(s); where’d it/they go?” This will prompt at least a couple more trips each to the eyepiece to get a better look, and a lot of “deep thought” during and in between.

Since their astronomical knowledge is necessarily very limited and their critical thinking abilities equally underdeveloped, the first conclusion their minds almost invariably come to that they offer in question form is, “it’s behind Jupiter?” Which is a pretty good answer and certainly one possibility. But it isn’t the only possibility. You can perhaps readily imagine the nature of the conversation that ensues following the giving and receiving of that “pat answer.”

When pressed for an explanation as to what makes them think the moon (or moons) in question is hidden from our view on the far side of its giant host, they will, at length, reveal that it is the only possibility their minds can conceive, although not in so many words. The other possible answer that will not occur to their minds without a little help is simply that the moon(s) in question is actually at a position in its orbit this side of (i.e., within our line of sight) the planet, and that its reflected light, previously so visible against the backdrop and blackness of what appears to be empty space, is therefore washed out by Jupiter’s all-consuming brightness or luminosity. When this alternative possibility is introduced to them, the question then naturally arises of how one can know, if in fact one can know (one can), which answer is the correct one during the particular viewing session in question.

Now, this all takes time and quite a bit of patience, y’all. But if you want for your kids to develop their God-given abilities to think critically, and eventually independently so, you have to engage them in these sorts of conversations, and thereby help them along in developing skills in thinking and reasoning “outside the box” – the box in which their limited understanding has heretofore held their mind’s eye captive.

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As of this writing, we’re at chapter 14 in Bowditch. Two chapters back (ch. 12), we read of our main character, 21 year-old Nat’s, first sea voyage to Bourbon aboard a New England merchant vessel named the Henry. Prior to sailing from Salem, the Henry’s home port, our story informs that the owner of the ship, a prominent and well-respected man of the city named Dr. Elias Derby, called a meeting at his office between himself and two others. Namely, the Henry’s newly chosen captain for the upcoming voyage and our Nat. Here we take our narrative up moments after the meeting begins:

“Nathaniel,” said Dr. Derby, “Captain Prince is commanding a ship of mine – the Henry – on a voyage to Bourbon. He agrees with me that you’d make an excellent clerk.”

Just like that! Not a word about the trouble with Gibaut! Nat tried to sound as cool and collected as Mr. Derby. “I’d like to ship as clerk under Captain Prince, sir.”

“Clerk – and second mate,” Prince growled. “I never carry idlers on my ship! Between ports, a clerk isn’t worth the hardtack to keep him alive.” He turned to Dr. Derby. “Anything else, sir?”

Mr. Derby leaned back and matched his finger tips. “Just this, Captain Prince – which I tell all my masters – everytime they sail. When you’re off soundings, you’re on your own. I’ve given you suggestions for trading when you reach Bourbon. But when you get there, you may find that my suggestions aren’t worth the paper they’re written on. You’ll use your own judgment. There are only two things I expressly forbid. You’ll never break a law of any port you enter. And you’ll never – never enter into slave trade.” He leaned forward, gripping the arms of his chair. “I’d rather lose any ship I own than to have it become a slaver! There is no excuse that I’d accept. Even if a slaver attacked you, overpowered you, and ordered you to carry a cargo of slaves – even that would be no excuse! You’d go down fighting, but you wouldn’t turn a Derby ship into a slaver!”

Before Nat knew what he was doing, he clapped his hands. “Good for you!” Captain Prince stared at him. He felt his face get hot.

A frosty twinkle touched Mr. Derby’s eyes. “I’m glad we agree, Nathaniel.” He stood. “Well, gentlemen, I believe that is all.”

Captain Prince and Nat left the office together. Prince clapped his hand on Nat’s shoulder. “Glad you’re sailing with me, Nat.”

Bowditch, pg. 100-101

At this point in the narrative, as with numerous others before and after it, their reading is interrupted to start up a conversation with the kids about what this all means. They usually conclude rightly on matters that readily occur to their minds. e.g., that the ship’s captain of the story is apparently less enthusiastic than Nat about the owner’s strict prohibition against involving his ships in the African slave trade. But, as with our potentially washed-out planetary moon above described, they require a little nudge in the right direction in reasoning out what the more subtle hints contained in the narrative imply. And part of what they imply in this case is that our good doctor’s moral inhibitions against the infamous slave trade are not as commonly shared amongst his New England ship owning peers (not to mention Captain Prince’s New England peers of the era) as one might hope, or like, or have previously been led to believe.

Let us momentarily join in consultation with Dr. Dabney concerning the very subject matter:

The share of the Colony of Virginia in the African slave trade was that of an unwilling recipient; never that of an active party. She had no ships engaged in any foreign trade; for the strict obedience of her governors and citizens to the colonial laws of the mother country prevented her trading to foreign ports, and all the carrying trade to British ports and colonies was in the hands of New Englanders and Englishmen.

In the replies submitted by Sir William Berkeley, Governor, to certain written inquiries of the “Lords of Plantations,” we find the following statement: “And this is the cause why no great or small vessels are built here; for we are most obedient to all laws, while the men of New England break through, and trade to any place that their interest leads them.” The same facts, and the sense of grievance which the colonists derived from them, are curiously attested by the party of Nathaniel Bacon also, who opposed Sir William Berkeley.

When they supposed that they had wrested the government from his hands, Sarah Drummond, an enthusiastic patriot, exclaimed: “Now we can build ships, and like New England, trade to any part of the world.” But her hopes were not realized: Virginia continued without ships. No vessel ever went from her ports, or was ever manned by her citizens, to engage in the slave trade; and while her government can claim the high and peculiar honour of having ever opposed the cruel traffic, her citizens have been precluded by Providence from the least participation in it.

Dabney, A Defense of Virginia and the South, pg. 25-26

Dr. Dabney goes on to reveal, a few pages further on in his book, that this illicit trade was continued by New England shippers virtually right up to outbreak of hostilities in the WBTS. And in another place, Dr. Dabney solemnly warns Southerners against the mistake of allowing our conquerors to teach us a perverted account of history in this regard and others. Our jobs, as parents and primary educators of our children, is to make sure this doesn’t happen to them, as in so many cases it has happened to us in our generations, even if, or when, purely by omission.

In lamenting the ongoing black v. white race war we are subjected to in our generations, one of my younger brothers once confided in me that, in spite of his admiration for our Southern forbears in most things otherwise, it was nevertheless “stupid of them to bring blacks over here to start with.” To which I quickly cured him of his ignorance on the subject, laying blame for the infamous transatlantic slave trade squarely where it belongs. Astonished by what he’d just learned about the subject for the first time in his life, he then exclaimed, “See, that is what pisses me off; the schools don’t teach that to our kids!” But as I further explained, “No, they don’t. And, moreover, they’re never going to teach that history to our kids. … That is up to you and me, brother, like it or not.”

Like my brother above-mentioned, you too can be pissed off (and rightly so) that the schools teach your children and grandchildren a perverted view of history; but being (justifiably) pissed about it won’t change a thing in and of itself. If you want them to know the truth of the matter, then it is up to you to teach it to them. They won’t of course be ready to chew on or digest the strong meat of a Dabney for some time to come, but you can do it by other means such as those described above until they are. And while you’re at it, help them along in developing and honing their critical thinking skills. After all, who else do you expect is going to do it if you don’t – the truthful teacher fairy?