Kindergarten

Social development and cooperative learning are also emphasized in kindergarten. In particular, acquiring the skills of concentration, courtesy, social habits, classroom habits and spatial awareness are important goals. Story, song, activities and celebrations carry us through the cycle of the year. Within the rhythm of each week, the children engage in these activities: painting, baking, sewing, drawing, and beeswax modeling.

A play-based approach is what kindergarten was before academic testing and homework became the norm in public kindergarten classrooms. However, the way 5 to 6 year olds learn has not changed. Movement, intuition, images, and rhythm are mostly associated with the right side of the brain, and reading, writing, and math are mostly associated with the left side. The right side has a burst of development between the ages of four to seven, whereas the left side develops between the ages seven and nine. At MBCS, reading and writing instruction begins in 1st grade, when children are ready for it and is presented in a way that engages their imaginations and bodies. If children are pushed to read too early they might learn how but research suggests they are also more likely to become disinterested in reading by the age of eight. There are many important skills, social and pre-academic, that kindergarteners need to learn at this age. Play is an important ingredient in all grades at MBCS!

To know more:
The Joyful, Illiterate Kindergartners of Finland
The Worksheet Dilemma: Benefits of Play-Based Curricula
Academic Versus Play-Based Kindergarten
Kids Haven’t Changed; Kindergarten Has

1st Grade

In a similar way, the children first experience the qualities of numbers before learning addition or subtraction: What is “oneness”? What is there only one of in the world? The four processes may be introduced as four princesses who are searching for jewels—Princess Plus always tries to carry more jewels than her pockets will hold; Miss Minus, on the other hand, is always losing her jewels. Stones, acorns, or other natural objects are used to introduce counting. Only after considerable practical experience in adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing are the written symbols for these operations introduced.

First graders enter the world of music through the pentatonic scale. In this scale all the notes have a harmonious sound in any order they are played. Songs are based on seasonal themes; the playing of the pentatonic flute develops finger coordination, concentration, and breath control. Painting in the first grade is intended to give the children an experience of working with color rather than attempting to create formed “pictures.” The children’s feelings for form are encouraged through beeswax modeling and crayon illustrations. In coloring the children imitate the teacher’s work, attempting to draw whole shapes rather than filling in outlines.

2nd Grade

The children see that they, like the characters in the fables, have desires, likes, dislikes, good qualities, and even some of the negative qualities that get those characters (and the children) into trouble. The picture of the saints provided the children with an example of what the human being can achieve when he or she dedicates him- or herself to a higher purpose. The children in second grade begin to see that there are choices to be made in life. They can follow their own desires, for which they see the consequences experienced by the animals in the fables; or, they can align themselves with a higher purpose, and gain control over their “animal” nature, just as Saint Francis was able to tame the fierce wolf.

During the second grade much attention is given to the development of writing skills. The children’s first reading experience comes through reading what they themselves have written in their main lesson books. This may be a short verse that helps them review a letter sound, or perhaps a simple retelling of one of the fables they have heard. In this way the children experience the way written language actually developed over, the course of human history. The learning of arithmetic concepts and skills continues in the second grade through stories and games. The children practice using the four arithmetical processes and explore the nature of place value. Rhythmical counting by ones, twos, threes, and so on provides the basis for learning the times tables.

3rd Grade

The children develop an appreciation of the important work of the farmer in nurturing, cultivating, and protecting the different elements of nature. Experiences may include baking, canning, and an overnight visit to a working farm. The children plant and harvest a small garden at the School.

The study of housebuilding starts with the discovery that our first home on earth is our body. The children learn about many different dwellings that people have built over the course of time and in different parts of the world. The children may work on a small housebuilding project in class.

The children learn the ways that we human beings have developed to orient ourselves on the earth through the study of measurement. The class discovers that ancient peoples marked the passage of time by observing the cycles of nature. They relive the invention of various devises to measure time, and may make their own sundial or water clock. This leads naturally to a discussion of how distance was originally measured by time: a day’s journey, etc. The children learn that modern units of distance measure originated in the human body: the king’s foot became our foot and the king’s thumb width became our inch. Thus the third graders see that “the human being is the measure of all things.”

In the third grade the fundamentals of grammar are taught. Regular reading practice becomes part of the class rhythm; cursive writing skills are strengthened. The third-grade child is ready to experience the full diatonic scale in music.

4th Grade

It is this faculty of conscious choice that the Norse myths strongly echo for the children. The gods of Asgard are portrayed as individuals with distinct personalities; the children learn from Loki the consequences of amoral cleverness and receive a contrasting image from the story of Siguna’s compassion and faithfulness. The Norse tales convey to the children the twin values of courage and sacrifice. Thor faces seemingly insurmountable odds, yet through perseverance is at last triumphant.

The children continue their exploration of the world around them through the study of local geography. They may start by determining the “geography” of their own bodies: front-back, up-down, right-left. The children learn how to find the four points of the compass by observing the sun and stars. They study and make maps of their classroom, the school, the neighborhood, the city, and the state of California. Expeditions by foot and bus around the city help them to consciously link themselves to their surroundings.

The fourth grade curriculum repeatedly emphasizes the importance of human deeds. Thus the study of California history focuses on the men and women who played a part in creating the culture we live in. The teacher attempts to give the children a sense for the world of the first Californians, the Native Americans, including our local Miwok tribe. The children relive the coming of the Spanish explorers, the founding of the missions, and the Gold Rush, which transformed San Francisco from a sleepy little village into a boom town almost overnight. The fourth grade often embarks upon a field trip of several days to give the children a first-hand experience of the Mother Lode or other historic sites.

Through detailed study of the forms and habitats of animals (beavers, bats, lions, foxes, etc.) through poetry, through clay modeling, and through play-acting, the children begin to get a feeling for the fascinating assortment of skills and qualities that the animals possess. At the same time, the children begin to see the unique and responsible position they hold as human beings upon the earth.

By cutting up apples, baking and cutting pies and pizzas, and creating parts of a whole, the children are given a visual experience of fractions before forming mental concepts. The children learn to add, subtract, multiply, reduce and expand fractions, and to change improper fractions into mixed numbers.

5th Grade

The study of geography serves to complement the study of ancient cultures. While history leads the children deeper into themselves, geography takes them to the farthest reaches of the earth. Once again, the teacher strives to give the children a sense for the great contrasts between different geographical regions: the North American continent is studied in terms of north and south, east and west, and the human and economic use of the resources in these contrasting places. Geography awakens in the child a feeling of relatedness with fellow human beings living in all other parts of the world.

Beside the discovery of the physical characteristics of the earth is the study of the plant life that grows upon its surface. The children learn that there is order and structure in all that surround them in the natural world. Just as the children at this age have within them the potential for all that they are to become in their later life, so they see that the seed contains within it the mighty oak tree. The children study the monocotyledon and dicotyledon, algae, mosses, and investigate how climate and geography affect plant growth.

6th Grade

The Roman epoch epitomizes in an historical sense what the children are experiencing in their bodies. Of all the ancient peoples the Romans most strongly dominated the physical world. Their cities, roads, aqueducts, the Roman army, and their conquest of the Western world – all these accomplishments match a feeling of omnipotence that the sixth grader has: I can do anything! Yet equally important for the children is the example of how the excesses of the Roman period led to the eradication of native cultures and the fall of the Roman empire.

With the children’s increasing awareness of their physical bodies the time is right for the study of the physical body of the earth. Geology is introduced first in a comparative way. For example, the granite peaks of the Sierras may be contrasted with the worn limestone hills of the eastern United States.

In the sixth grade the children are introduced to concepts of physics. Acoustics comes through observing how music is made; the children discover that they too have a musical instrument within them, the larynx. Optics are introduced through contemplating the qualities of color.

Whereas geometric shapes have in the prior grades been drawn freehand as artistic exercises, the sixth grader learns the mathematical properties of these forms and strives to construct them with great accuracy using ruler and compass.

7th Grade

Historically a similar period of change took place in Western civilization around the end of the fifteenth century .The study of the Renaissance, Reformation, and the Age of Exploration thus echo what the children are experiencing within themselves. The Renaissance was not only an artistic event, but was the beginning of a whole new way of looking at the world. During this time, the principle of learning through observation of phenomena emerged; leading directly to the development of our modern scientific method.

In chemistry the children discover through observation the properties of various substances and the way in which they interrelate. They examine the phenomena of combustion, the water cycle, and the nature of acids and bases. In physics the children study the laws of refraction, reflection, heat, and electricity.

At this age the children are particularly able to look at issues of health and nutrition in an objective way. The class considers those factors that foster health or illness in the human being, including an exploration of how various substances can promote one or the other condition.

In mathematics the basic concepts of algebra and plane geometry are introduced. The children learn how the Renaissance artists used geometric principles to develop the laws of perspective, and practice the application of these laws in their own drawings.

The children learn biographies of great figures who went against the prevailing views of their day in their own search for truth, freedom, and self-expression. Through studying the lives of Galileo, Martin Luther, Christopher Columbus, Elizabeth I, and others, the children find reassurance that in their struggle to become themselves they also can contribute to the world.

8th Grade

As the children become physically and intellectually mature, it is important that they gain a clear picture of history up to the present day. The eighth grade history curriculum covers the period from the Renaissance through the twentieth century. Special attention is given to the emergence of the ideals of human freedom that led to the American, French, and Russian revolutions, and the way those ideals manifested differently in each nation, and to the pivotal role of individuals such as Charles Darwin, in laying the foundation for the modern scientific world view.

The eighth-grade science curriculum seeks to give the children a picture of the human being as a microcosm of the elements of nature. The teacher now talks about the human being in the terms of physical science; the class will look at the way in which the digestive, respiratory, circulatory, and skeletal system, and the various organs of the body cooperate and interrelate.

The study of physics continues in the eighth grade with hydraulics, aerodynamics, and meteorology.The teacher tries to show how the discovery of mechanical principles contributed directly to the development of our modern technological society; for example, how the invention of the steam engine made the Industrial Revolution possible.

In chemistry the children engage in the analysis of organic substances and investigate their role in human nutrition. The chemistry curriculum focuses on those processes by which organic substances are formed (e.g., photosynthesis) and transformed (as in digestion). The children seek to discover how the classical substances of earth, air, fire, and water can be understood and observed in physical processes; for example, in the various influences that create weather or ocean currents.

Algebra studies continue in the eighth grade. The children are introduced to the binary system, which made possible the development of computers. They learn the principles of solid geometry, and actually construct the five platonic solids.

During puberty the children become filled with creative forces. It is the task of the teacher to nurture the forces of inner creativity so that the child becomes the adult who is able to express him or herself to a highest potential.