Lower School

Enter the Lower School any morning and you will find the classroom doors open and children gathered in class meetings discussing and planning, painting on easels and sculpting with clay, dramatizing a story, reading books, recording results of investigations, collaborating together on a project. 

Students are encouraged at an early age to become independent learners taking responsibility for their learning and contributing to the learning community.  This is what people see, but what they comment on is the tone, which is calm, focused and engaged with learning, that can only be experienced by visiting the school.

A distinctive feature of the Lower School is the Shared Space.  This award- winning program allows children to express their learning in a variety of artistic forms that build their skill level and demonstrates their understanding of concepts.  Students at all levels present this work in class, beginning in Kindergarten with a simple sharing and by Third Grade developing a project with both speaking and written components.  For Third Grade students, this is a taste of the exhibitions that they will present in middle school.

Literacy begins with read-alouds of well-written literature, which continues throughout the Lower School experience.  Weekly visits to the library nurture a love of story.  The primary goal for beginning readers is to learn how language conveys meaning and understanding. An introduction to letters, their formation and sounds in Kindergarten moves into writing by midyear, it is in this context that many children begin reading.  In First Grade children begin a comprehensive study of phonics to learn the skills of decoding and apply these skills to their writing.  By Second Grade children are solidifying these skills, engaged in reading and writing longer and more complex texts.  Third Grade is when cursive and keyboarding skills are introduced; students are reading and writing at increasingly independent levels. 

The focus of math instruction is on developing a strong sense of how numbers work and using this understanding in problem solving.  Students learn a number of strategies and are encouraged to develop increasingly efficient ones to work through problems.  Math study includes developing facility in numbers and their operations, measurement, geometry, statistics and probabilities.  The TERC Investigations curriculum is a basis for this study, supplemented by teacher developed math work.
 
Social Studies and Science are integrated into yearlong themes of study, with a change of focus each term to help students develop a deeper understanding of the topic, as well as to highlight disciplines within each study – earth, physical and life science, cultural, geographical and historical strands of social studies.  These integrated themes of study are aligned with their development, tapping into the inward nature of five and seven year olds and the expansive nature of six and eight year olds.

Music and art are significant areas of study for our school.  Music is taught twice a week and is based in Kodály philosophy., which focuses on singing and folksongs as the means for young children to learn.  Art instruction introduces children to a variety of media and developing increasing skill in using them.  Daily singing in worship and the classroom as well as daily work in the Shared Space support these core arts.  In addition, weekly PE introduced games and promotes fitness and skills, which can be used daily during Park (recess).