Academics
Curriculum Overview
Truthful to our mission and with the desire to provide a fertile ground for our gifted students to excel, the curriculum at Sage differentiates itself from the traditional curriculum by these criteria:
- The content of curricula focuses on and is organized to include more elaborate, complex, and in-depth study of major ideas, problems, and themes that integrate knowledge within and across systems of thought.
- It allows for the development and application of productive thinking skills to enable students to re-conceptualize existing knowledge and/or generate new knowledge.
- It enables our students to explore constantly changing knowledge and information and develop the attitude that knowledge is worth pursuing in an open world.
- The curriculum encourages an exposure to, selection and use of, appropriate and specialized resources.
- Through the curriculum, we promote self-initiated and self-directed learning and growth.
- Lastly, our curriculum provides for the development of self-understanding and the understanding of one’s relationship to persons, societal institutions, nature, and culture.
Well-Rounded Student
The curriculum at Sage balances all disciplines – math, humanities, sciences, arts (visual, music, and performing), physical and health education, and languages. Each of these disciplines is taught from a unique perspective, dividing it into three pillars that continue to grow and spiral as our students progress through the grades: Content, Skills, and Big Ideas/ Driving Questions.
Throughout the grades, our curriculum models how to create and develop connections across topics and/or across disciplines, through the practice of STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) and interdisciplinary units, or long-term projects. From the teachers’ perspective, these programs require elaborate and collaborative planning, and at the same time, create a sense of unity and a collaborative purpose. From the students’ perspective, these opportunities engage students in active problem-finding and problem-solving.
