Middle School Program

The Middle School offers a curriculum designed to provide opportunities for adolescents to be self-confident and gain self-knowledge, to belong to a community, to learn to be adaptable, to be academically competent and challenged and to create a vision for their personal future.

The student-centered environment, where the teacher is a facilitator for meaningful and challenging work, enourages active, self-directed learners in the class, school, city and global community.

General Academic Goals - All Middle School Students

The curriculum includes a variety of aspects to enable the student to become self-disciplined and individually motivated academically. This curriculum includes the following:

—learning how to develop strategies

—personal learning plans

—activities for learning economic independence

—activities to foster interdependence

—activities that value all nine intelligences and a variety of learning styles

—long-term cooperative learning projects

—communication and active listening exercises

—development of time management skills

Electives

All Middle School students have the opportunity to explore alternative course work outside of the general curriculum. The following are areas of current study:

1. American Sign Language and Spanish

a. fundamental skills

b. history of the language

c. career opportunities

2. Career Education/Service Learning
For two weeks out of the school year students volunteer to work with local vendors or the elementary school. Students are evaluated on the following:

a. job performance

b. cooperative attitude

c. ability to focus on task and carry out instructions

d. ability to work within a group

e. initiative

3. Computer Science
Each student will be exposed to a variety of computer science work including:

a. working knowledge of how to use the Internet

b. basic elements of composition using Microsoft Word

c. file saving, editing, and deleting

d. improving typing skills using a cd typing instructor

e.f. storage capacity

g. processing ability

4. Speech
Each student will be required to produce and present approximately five speeches per cycle. Students will be able to:

a. present relevant information in required time span

b. present information from memory using few prompts

c. communicate information accurately and thoroughly

The Iowa Test of Basic Skills is administered yearly to monitor progress.