Lower School

The Lower School curriculum focuses on the development of the whole child as an inquirer, both in the classroom and in the world outside. We teach our students to ask "what" and "why" in a way that demonstrates that they are an essential part of the answer to "how."

The Primary Years Programme:

Encourages international-mindedness in students.
Encourages a positive attitude to learning by engaging students in inquiries and developing their awareness of the process of learning so that they become lifelong learners.
Reflects real life by encouraging learning beyond traditional subjects with meaningful, in-depth inquiries into real issues.

Head of Lower School working with student

In Kindergarten through Grade 5, students explore six units of inquiry each year. These six to eight-week transdisciplinary units are investigations into important ideas and require a high level of involvement on the part of the students. In each grade level, the themes revolve around the following topics:

Who we are
Where we are in place and time
How we express ourselves
How the world works
How we organize ourselves
Sharing the planet

In addition to the critical thinking skills developed through these units, students also learn all the skills necessary to effectively communicate their understandings. Reading, writing, mathematics and information skills are embedded into the entire program. The school also offers exploratory classes in music, Spanish, physical education, art, technology and Christian Enrichment. By blending IB learning and traditional skills learning in the classroom, Lower School students are well prepared to transition into Middle School.

Explore our Curriculum Guide to learn more about how each grade level makes this ambitious Lower School vision come to life. And for more information about our PYP framework explore our IB pages.

Our Programs

Reading

One of the greatest gifts children can give themselves is a love of reading. Starting in the early years, we introduce students to a variety of authors and genres. As they explore their identities as readers, they begin to understand that reading extends their world, both real and imagined.

In order to become skilled readers, students must first become automatic in their decoding and build their language comprehension (vocabulary, background knowledge, etc). As these areas become stronger and begin to intertwine, it results in skilled, accurate and fluent reading with strong comprehension. Students in the primary grades receive explicit instruction in the foundational phonics skills necessary for profecient reading. During literacy instruction, students in all grades have opportunities to build language comprehension as they reflect on rich, content-specific texts modeled through teacher read-alouds and in small groups. In addition to the skills and strategies taught at each grade level, all students receive differentiated literacy instruction to meet their needs.

Using a structured literacy approach, students are provided: explecit, systematic and sequential teaching of literacy at multiple levels - phenomes, letter-sound relationships, syllable patterns, morphemes, vocabulary, sentence structure, paragraph structure and text structure.

Writing

At St. Mary’s we teach the writer, not writing. Writing Workshop begins in Kindergarten, and students in Lower School write often, for extended periods of time, on topics of their own choosing, and for real world purposes. Building on the shoulders of the work completed the year before, the students learn and practice the techniques authors use in information, narrative and persuasive pieces.

Writing Workshop sessions begin with a mini-lesson, in which teachers use explicit instruction to model a strategy that can be used in the students’ writing now and in the future. Group and individual conferences follow, and teachers meet with our young authors to offer specific tips meant to lift the level of each child’s writing. During Workshop, students build their writing stamina with a goal of forty-five minutes of sustained writing by the end of grade 5.

Grammar skills are embedded into every lesson, connecting it to the unit vocabulary and word study features of the week. Students analyze spelling patterns and apply it to their authentic writing tasks.

Mathematics

Mathematics education looks different today. Decades of research on the teaching and learning of math has shown that both a strong conceptual understanding and a knowledge of procedures are essential in developing mathematical thinkers.

The Lower School math program aligns with both the PYP Mathematics Scope and Sequence and the California State Standards. Teachers use Big Ideas curriculum to provide the foundation of math instruction while integrating a variety of manipulatives and other text resources when needed.

Mathematics is taught through five content strands: Number, Shape and Space, Pattern and Function, Measurement and Data Handling. Concepts and skills are integrated within units of inquiry whenever possible to show the real world application of mathematics.

Building a strong number sense is central to our program. Students learn to think and reason flexibly with numbers, to see connections among operations, and to figure mentally. Manipulatives and visual models are used to deepen their understanding, and students learn to explain and justify their mathematical thinking, identify problem-solving strategies, and reflect on the most efficient strategies. Recognizing a variety of paths to solving a problem is as valuable as finding the answer itself. Students also learn how to quickly recall addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division math facts through conceptual learning, fact strategies, and memorization.

Daily math instruction is differentiated to reach all students and taught in whole-group, small group and independent practice settings.