School Reform at Lunch...

New Village Leadership Academy

The following is a link to NVLA in which you can find out more about their non-traditional school structure: http://www.nvlacademy.org/.

The following are unigue qualities as described by the academy's website. Make sure to click on the link to find out more...

• High priority on academics above all.
• Individualized reading programs. Rather than all children at a given grade level reading the same material at once, our children move forward as quickly as they like.
• Tailored mathematics programs. Children in the same grade have many different levels of math, and extra help or new challenges are provided by additional faculty members.
• Mix of traditional and progressive teaching methodologies. Some subjects at NVLA are taught traditionally with tried and true methodologies whereas other subjects involve open-ended inquiry, projects and multi-media.
• Technology skills and applications are incorporated into the school day in a one-to-one student to laptop program.
• Students are required to demonstrate 100% mastery of a skill before they move on.
• Testing is done in a separate classroom. If a student has not achieved mastery, he or she is gently re-taught until he is ready to move on.
• Mastery can be tested traditionally with pen and paper, but often we prefer to have children demonstrate their understanding by creating models and by applying their knowledge to a real world problem or situation.
• Purpose and Application of knowledge is stressed. We ask, “How would you use what you just read in your life?” We do not ask children to memorize and regurgitate.
  We teach children how to study and how to recognize in themselves when they aren’t learning and how to get back on track.
• We emphasize that children look up the words they don’t know in the dictionary. They then learn exactly what words mean as opposed to “sort of” what words mean.
• We teach children concepts whenever possible with the actual object – right there to see and touch. If this is not possible we use other visuals.
• Both high performance and creativity are encouraged and nurtured.
• Students have Physical Education daily in a vigorous and fun program that develops strength, flexibility and balance along with sports.
• Students take the CTP-4 standardized test (from the Educational Records Bureau and designed to be used in private schools) in the spring for curriculum development and program refinement.
• There is a low-sugar policy at the school.