Our Students
Middle school at FSC consists of students in 7th and 8th grade. At this unique and often tumultuous developmental time in their lives, students require a thoughtful and supportive educational environment. Close contact with innovative teachers who enjoy taking an active role in the lives of their students and helping them form close relationships with their peers, helps to ease the emotional pressures of early adolescence. Regular “chats” provide an opportunity for students to talk about internal and external conflicts, share feelings, and discuss teenage issues such as bullying, peer pressure, etc. in a safe and respectful environment.
The Curriculum
FSC’s progressive middle school curriculum includes a rigorous academic program which incorporates essential organizational and critical thinking skills and emphasizes proactive learning. Students attend most classes in multi-age groups, allowing both grades to work together. History and English are integrated into our social studies core, blending a yearlong study that alternates each year so that a student never repeats the same curriculum. Students work individually and also in small groups. Group projects allow students to engage socially, intellectually, and creatively with their peers, exchanging ideas and working together to find solutions to issues and conflicts that may arise within the group.
Science includes hands-on experiments utilizing the scientific method, as well as note taking skills, reading, learning science facts and vocabulary, and applying learned knowledge to applicable integrated social studies projects.
Math is integrated whenever possible into our social studies but is also taught separately using math textbooks. Our 7th grade students take Pre-Algebra and our 8th grade students take Algebra 1.
All students have Spanish four times per week. 7th graders take Spanish A and 8th graders take Spanish B.
Physical Education is a very important part of our middle school program. Our students participate in Physical Education four times per week on our three-acre P.E. field. Our P.E. teacher focuses on stretching, cardio-vascular health, teaching games and physical skills, teamwork, sportsmanship, and helping children learn the importance of exercise in their lives.
Music and Production
Middle school students have music once per week and have the option of joining our school choir if they wish to do so. FSC’s music program is based on Orff-Schulwerk, a combination of singing and percussion instruments. As many of our middle schoolers have been playing these instruments for several years, they play a variety of complicated and enthralling instrumentals at our community Sings.
Every year the middle school students choose a Production to perform for the school and outside community. Along with our Production teacher, students select a play in September, audition for parts, spend the year rehearsing, preparing costumes, sets, lighting, advertising, programs, etc. In May, the students perform the Production on three separate evenings. All students are included in some aspect of the Production.
Field Trips
FSC’s middle school students embark upon regular curriculum related field trips throughout the school year. Additionally, they usually take two lengthy field trips (3 to 8 days) per year, one of those trips is usually a community service related trip, and the other is a curriculum related trip.
Assessment
Our middle school students participate in student led conferences with their parents and teachers twice yearly. In addition to sharing projects with their parents and showing parents their portfolios, students sit down with their teachers and parents to discuss their progress and learning goals. Parents are also given a written narrative assessment that reflects individual student progress. Although grades are not given at FSC as a means of assessing student progress, we do record semester letter grades for students in 7th and 8th grade, which are kept in their files and used for the purpose of high school applications.
Community Service
At FSC, community service is a core value throughout our school. As our middle school children grow and mature, they are able to grow in their service commitments as well. In addition to local community service projects, which they continue to undertake, middle school students begin to think more nationally about serving others, and sometimes even globally. For example, FSC’s middle schoolers have gone to New Orleans to help with clean up efforts for 8 days, and to Mexico to live and work in an orphanage for a week.
