The School's curricular perspective, which we refer to as knowledge-based constructivism, is positioned in a framework that allows student learning to take place in real life. It is learning-centered, focusing on essential questions and related themes and concepts. Essential questions devised by teachers but also generated by students are set in the context of personal relevance and academic perspectives.
In Kindergarten through Fourth Grade, the foci of a child's learning experience are found in mathematics and science, culture and society, communication arts and technology, and wellness and fitness. In Fifth through Eighth Grades, curricula are more rooted in distinct academic disciplines, so that a student will study history, science and technology, mathematics, language arts, fine arts, and wellness and fitness. Discipline-based course content is, however, often sequenced to coordinate curricula among distinct academic approaches, which culminate in a variety of integrated student projects.
One of the primary considerations of The School's educational program is that in the lower grades students first learn integrative habits of mind, which when they enter the upper grades of The School they naturally apply to more rigorously attended disciplines. We hope that this two-pronged approach will help students answer many important questions, such as "What is worth knowing?" "What content is important from each discipline?" and "How do we know what we know?"
