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Entering the Childhood Years
Childhood begins as children enter Kindergarten. The entrance into this new magical time includes new observations and integration of skills and experiences. Children begin to lay down habits of learning during this time including the value of paying attention, having a positive relationship to reading and writing skills, developing their own voice and ideas, listening to the ideas and opinions of others, and trusting that their ideas will be heard and that they have a place in a community. Our elementary classrooms have a maximum class size of 14 students with two teachers which provides the individualized attention that allows students to stay engaged and continually challenged in the classroom.
At The Q, we value giving students the opportunity to participate in all four Art mediums including: Visual Art, Theater Art, Musical Art and Movement Arts. The arts are used to develop understanding in many classes and is also taught to develop the skills connected to the specific art medium being presented.
We serve students who are creative thinkers, who love learning but might be bored or unchallenged in traditional class settings. We work with each student to support their next step and we strive for all students to feel that their perspectives and ideas are heard and appreciated.
Kindergarten
The kindergarten journey prepares our budding learners by cultivating independence, appropriate classroom behavior and active listening through the learning of schedules and routines, in a multifaceted learning experience.
In Language Arts, they go on storytelling voyages with books like My Father’s Dragon, The Velveteen Rabbit, and Winnie the Pooh, and The Heartwood Hotel. Their oral comprehension, independent reading skills and phonological awareness, are practiced through engaging activities with fairy tales like Aesop’s Fables.
In the world of Numbers, they turn into mathematicians developing their counting skills, cardinal number sense, and pattern recognition through hands-on tasks. Our young scientists investigate the sciences of botany through community garden projects, geology through rock explorations, and paleontology through dinosaur fossil hunts.
Students develop awareness and understanding of community through meaningful projects, like interviewing members of our school community and venturing out into our neighborhood to explore the local parks and post office.
Art and clay allow for their creative expression to blossom and physical activities such as gymnastics and roller-skating provide opportunities for them to strengthen their coordination, balance, and perseverance.
Our little linguists learn Spanish through song and activities that touch on the fundamentals of language. This multifaceted learning experience provides our Kindergarteners with a new toolbox of experiences, knowledge, curiosity, and confidence to embark on their first grade adventures.
Kindergarten Experiences
First Grade
Our first grade adventure begins with establishing protocols that encourage independence, confidence, and strong interpersonal skills within a collaborative learning environment where the students, parents, and teachers are all involved in the learning process.
Our readers journey into worlds like Stuart Little, The Mountain that Loved a Bird, and Dinosaurs Before Dark, deepening their comprehension of written text while learning to form and express their own thoughts. In Numbers, our math explorers take on basic arithmetic to develop their computational skills through games and hand on activities.
In Writers Workshop, our novice writers begin to strengthen their foundational narrative and instructional writing skills, while strengthening their fine motor abilities. In our Peoples strand, we travel across the Atlantic Ocean to Africa to explore great environmental activists from different countries who have made significant contributions to the world. We blend our Peoples unit with theater, creating immersive learning experiences that deepen students' understanding of the cultures we study. Students retell the inspiring stories of prominent African activists like Wangari Maathai and Isatou Ceesay through tableaux performances.
Our first grade scientists conduct experiments and explore topics like biomes and electricity, creating crystal flower gardens, making lemon batteries, and turning milk into plastic—fostering their curiosity and critical thinking skills along the way.
Our first grade artists express their creativity and further develop their fine motor skills through ceramics, while team sports and games enhance physical coordination, communication, and sportsmanship skills. Throughout the year, first graders gather tools and knowledge in preparation for the second grade chronicles.
First Grade Experiences
Second Grade
The second grade chronicles follow a curriculum and philosophy designed to enhance skills like focus, perseverance, and collaboration, while also supporting and emphasizing the importance of community and self-awareness. Second graders continue to be immersed in tactile learning experiences that are set up in varying forms; large group meetings, partner work, outdoor activities, home learning tasks, and individual projects.
In the realm of mathematics, our number explorers continue to develop their number sense by exploring 2-digit computations, comprehension and mathematical thinking through story problems and hands on math projects.
Second grade story aficionados are immersed in longer chapter books like The Unicorn Rescue Society series. Their reading fluency and phonological awareness is reenforced through interdisciplinary classes like art and theater. The young writers learn the art of introspection through writing about small, meaningful moments and develop their opinion writing skills through writing about their favorite things.
Second graders travel back in time to study the first people who lived on the land we live on today. They are invited into an engaging experience of the tribes we study through the integration of theater, which deepens their awareness and understanding of the stories they read. Their creative expression grows roots in art forms such as ceramics, weaving and theater games, where they have the opportunity to deepen their learning, build their confidence, as well as develop essential life skills such as perseverance, active listening, and collaboration.
The second grade chronicles equip our young learners with the essential tools they need for the mysteries of third grade.
Second Grade Experiences
Third Grade
Third Grade begins a new set of learning expeditions for our young learners. There is a cognitive shift that occurs between second and third grade that allows for a new level of investigation in literature, mathematics, social studies, science, art and more. Third graders are now ready to utilize their reading and writing skills to contemplate ideas more deeply, to discuss history and its relationship to individual experiences, and to build fluency, joy and engagement across subjects.
Our attention to growing and developing community and self-awareness continues. We provide opportunities to work with other classrooms, discuss techniques and problem-solving through collaboration, critique, and creating space for differing opinions. Students go on regular field trips to apply their learning and use projects to build meaningful relationships with one another, their teachers and the content they are studying.
This is the year that our exploration of Numbers becomes a study of Mathematics. We increase the breadth and depth of mathematical thinking with the exciting new areas of multiplication and division taught through hands-on approaches without the use of technology so that children can actually learn to think through a problem with paper and pencil calculations. Students also begin to study Earth Sciences including the study of energy, waves, weather, and the relationship between different matter that are part of this world.
Students are ready to refine handwriting and develop an appreciation for writing longer, more detailed stories, as well as non-fiction observations and descriptions. Our storytelling skills and character development is grown through our strong arts program that integrates theater, music and visual arts.
Social Studies continues to expand understanding of different perspectives and cultures as we learn about the Native Americans of Mesoamerica, including The Mayans, Incans and Aztecs. Students study weaving and storytelling through textiles, building skills that engage their hands and mind together.
We aim to build confidence, while developing essential life skills such as perseverance, active listening, and collaboration. The third grade expeditions give students a connection and joy to learning and prepares them for broadening these skills in fourth grade.
Third Grade Experiences
Fourth Grade
Fourth Graders delve into the mysteries of language, art, social studies, mathematics, and science. They work to share greater detail and emotion in their writing while continuing to practice their grammar and writing structure skills. Students engage in in-depth discussions about texts and different types of literature including novels, poetry, plays, essays, and articles. Discussion circles and book clubs to explore ideas in all learning strands.
We encourage students to become active community members, participating in service projects and presentations as well as supporting members of our school community. We provide opportunities to work with other classrooms, fostering discussion techniques and problem-solving through critique, teamwork, and creating space for differing opinions. Students use field trips to grow a new appreciation for different forms of self-expression, and project-based learning integrates multiple strands, highlighting connections to one another.
In mathematics, students grow a fluency in all four operations - addition, subtraction, multiplication and division - while increasing the complexity of mental math problems to practice problem-solving skills. Students begin a new study of plants and animals, diving into the fundamentals of scientific research and investigation.
Students explore writing inspired from various genres including science fiction, historical fiction, personal narratives, and poetry, while continuing to practice handwriting skills. In social studies, students investigate Eastern traditions and celebrations in ancient Korea, Japan, and China.
In the arts program, theater introduces students to improvisation, character development, and scene creation. In music, students participate in the class choir and are introduced to classical and musical theater styles. Visual arts includes both 2D and 3D mediums, grounded in art history and the joy of experimentation with varied techniques. Students also continue studying weaving and storytelling through textiles.
Fourth graders grow in confidence as they work in varied settings, finding deeper meaning in their learning experiences and content.