Grades Program requirements

Our First Grade program requires children should have turned six by June 1st of the summer before the year they're enrolling for. 

We enroll children for our Grades program throughout the year based on space and acceptance into our program through an interview and observation. Applications submitted should be accompanied by a teacher recommendation form.

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Enrollment and Fees

Grades children are expected to be at school 5 days a week from 8:15am to 2:45pm. 

1st and Second Grade: $1000/month

3rd and 4th Grade: $1055/month

*The Supply Fee does not include the instrument cost.

Unique aspects of our grades program

Class teachers accompany a class for seven consecutive years and teach all core subjects. The close relationship that develops between the class teacher and students benefit the child's growing confidence and self-esteem. 

Academic work each day in the grades begins with a 2-hour Main Lesson that addresses core subjects in great depth. Blocks last three to four weeks to provide time for students to fully digest and assimilate the material. Children do not receive homework until Grade 4 and do not participate in testing. Children are rather assessed by their teachers and parents through a series of observations and conferences throughout the year. Each child's personal growth and development is looked at, while considering the whole child - emotionally, cognitively, creatively, physically, mentally, instead of just academically.

Rather than standardized textbooks, students create written and illustrated Main Lesson Books from their teachers' presentations and blackboard drawings. This creative process enables them to "own" their learning and allows the children to experience a subject on a far deeper, richer level than the intellectual one. The opportunity for children to create their own lesson books allows children to connect to their environment on a personal level, giving them a better chance to later retain the information they have learned. Each page of each lesson book is accompanied by a student's drawing, making the lesson book as creative as it is academic.

Between the ages 7 and 14 children learn most naturally through beauty. That's why stories and art are used as teaching vehicles. The stories chosen for language arts and history blocks match closely the developmental stage of the children. For example, stories of saints & heroes and fables appeal to the developing sense of right and wrong of second-graders.

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Curriculum overview

Primary Grades 1-3
Pictorial introduction to the alphabet, writing, reading, spelling, poetry, and drama. Folk and fairy tales, fables, legends, Old Testament stories. Numbers, basic mathematical processes of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Nature stories, house building, and gardening.

Middle Grades 4-6
Writing, reading, spelling, grammar, poetry, and drama. Norse myths, history and stories of ancient civilizations (Rom, Greece, India). Review of the four mathematical processes, fractions, percentage, and geometry. Local and world geography, comparative zoology, botany, and elementary physics.

Upper Grades 7-8
Creative writing, reading, spelling, grammar, poetry, and drama. Medieval history, Renaissance, world exploration, American history, and biography. Mathematics, geography, physics, basic chemistry, astronomy, and physiology.

Specialty subjects

Handwork
Knitting, crochet, sewing, cross-stitch, basic weaving, toy making, and woodworking

Music
First and Second Grade: Singing, pentatonic flute, and recorder.
Third and Fourth Grade: Singing and violin.

Foreign language 
Our Grades students are currently studying Spanish. In the future we will introduce a second foreign language.

Art
Watercolor painting, form drawing, beeswax and clay modeling, perspective drawing.

Movement
Eurythmy, group games; team sports for the older grades.