Form I Recitation & Copywork

2025-2026 Recitation & Copywork

Note that, as with all resources provided here, it is not necessary to do everything recommended. If your family already has recitation pieces planned (poetry, speeches, lines from Shakespeare, etc.), perhaps you will only use one of the recommended quotations below in a school year. In that case, each year of work we provide can last you for three years. Doing work consistently is more important that trying to fit in all the things.

Term 1:

This is the Faith of the Apostles;

This is the Faith of the Fathers;

This is the Faith of the Orthodox;

This is the Faith which has established the universe!

From the Sunday of Orthodoxy, Synodicon (handwriting printouts)

Term 2:

“The best things, the things we treasure most, come through difficulties. If we ignore the difficulties, we are neglecting the true joys.”

― His Eminence, Metropolitan JOSEPH

Term 3:

Every person is the painter of his own life,

And the virtues are the paints for executing the image,

So that we become an “imitator of Christ,”

Through a life of virtue.

excerpt from St. Gregory of Nyssa, On Perfection, 110–11

Printable document of all 2025-26 Recitation pieces here.

2024-2025 Recitation & Copywork

Note that, as with all resources provided here, it is not necessary to do everything recommended. If your family already has recitation pieces planned (poetry, speeches, lines from Shakespeare, etc.), perhaps you will only use one of the recommended quotations below in a school year. In that case, each year of work we provide can last you for three years. Doing work consistently is more important that trying to fit in all the things.

Term 1:

There never was,

And never will be

A place on earth free from sorrows.

The only sorrow-less place possible

Is the heart,

When the Lord is present there.

- St. Nikon of Optina

Term 2:

Never argue.

As soon as you notice you disagree,

Stop talking immediately.

Don’t judge and don’t get angry.

Then it will be good and peaceful in the heart.

- Archbishop Seraphin (Sobolev)

Term 3:

I have often regretted

The words I have spoken,

But I have never regretted

My silence.

- Abba Arsenius the Great

Access a printable document here.