Signature Academics

STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics) learning is infused in our educational approach, with knowledge expanded through interdisciplinary projects at all grade levels throughout the year. This approach fully engages students and promotes critical thinking, problem solving and resourcefulness. Students learn by doing; for example, designing and conducting experiments in a laboratory environment and employing design-thinking principles to solve real-world problems. Of course, our small class size translates directly to more time on-task.

Because mastery underpins advancement, skills and knowledge are embedded across the curriculum and in future disciplines. For example, the sixth-grade science program requires measurement and data collection, while seventh grade geography includes a major unit on demographics and economics, with students conducting statistical studies of African nations. All of our students use their knowledge of measurement and geometry in woodshop, a required program in fifth through seventh grades.

Executive Functioning (EF) encompasses a set of skills everyone needs to accomplish goals. It’s the capacity to plan, organize, self-manage, and a host of other abilities that are key to success. We foster these essentials from N-8 in developmentally appropriate ways, including:

The RCDS World Language Program comprises two threads: four years of a modern language — French or Spanish — and a two-year capstone course in Latin. The basis of Romance languages, Latin enhances the study of French, Spanish and English. Since the Roman Empire greatly influenced the Western European tradition, the study of its culture gives students greater insight when studying the language, literature, art, history, law and government of both European and American countries.

As children gain listening and reading skills, we nurture their ability to express themselves with the written word. Using the same conventions of written language that they learned to decode words, students are concurrently encoding words, learning about grammar and finding their voices through a variety of writing experiences. Daily journal entries in response to prompts, crafting stories through Writers Workshop and playing with poetry in the lower grades make way for an Upper School education that balances direct instruction in grammar, spelling, and vocabulary with daily journaling, as well as the crafting of opinion pieces, formal essays, and presentations. As part of our writing program, we provide cursive writing instruction, which has benefits that include enhanced cognitive and motor development.

We don’t wait until eighth grade to ask our students to do a major research project. For example, fifth graders participate in “Genius Hour.” Inspired by Google’s policy of allowing employees to dedicate 20% of working hours to their own pet projects, we encourage students to explore their passions and identify a related particular need. They then research and develop solutions and present their project to a panel of adults and peers. For their Endangered Species Project, sixth-grade students research a threatened species and identify the environmental pressures that contribute to the animal’s plight. They identify solutions and present their research to the grade in a culminating showcase.

Each day, students in grades 5-8 have designated time to meet with their advisors. There are practical goals, with each student working on a major character and academic goal each year. And there are the unspoken goals of developing self-advocacy and self-reflection and comfort working with adults. Students benefit from these caring relationships, another aspect of the strong community feeling at the school.