Lower School

Grades 1 - 4

Core Subjects

Creativity and intellectual curiosity are encouraged within a strong academic framework in the Lower School. All of the programs are enriched through specialization classes in art, library, music, physical education, computer, and French.

  • “Gray shirts” transition to “blue shirts” in First Grade.

    The First Grade program includes field trips, parent involvement, and VIP/Star Students, which helps to develop poise and a stronger sense of self-worth through speaking in front of the class. Learners also experience technology through iPads, SMARTBoards, and weekly access to the computer lab.

    Language Arts

    Our learning day begins with Language Arts. Our Language Arts program is a balanced literacy program. The goal of the first grade Language Arts program is to provide opportunities for your child to become more effective speakers and writers of language and readers of print.

    Fundations

    Fundations is a research-based program for building a foundation for reading and writing. It provides integrated systematic word study, spelling, comprehension, fluency, and handwriting curriculum. This program provides both reading and writing for meaning, understanding, and having fun while learning. We continue with Daily 5 and differentiated reading instruction and Café. Throughout the year, various themes will tie together the Language Arts program to our other areas of study to ensure a well-rounded education for your son.

    Math

    Math is also a morning subject. Our program is the Scott Foresman-Addison Wesley EnVision Math. This program includes four components: 1. Basic Facts and Skills, 2. More Practice, 3. Problem Solving, and 4. Ongoing Test Prep. It is a “hands-on,” success-oriented program that emphasizes manipulatives and problem-solving strategies. This program is also taught throughout the lower school for continuity. For added enrichment, we use the computer for math problem-solving programs, activities and games, and other supplemental math programs are used.

    Social Studies

    Social Studies is a combination of units and geography. We use the Daily Geography Practice and the weekly news magazines Scholastic News and Time for Kids, which keep us up to date with current events. We have special units about the Qualities of the Month, history, people, places, and environment.

    Science

    Our Science program is the Harcourt School Publishers’ Science, Simple Solutions, and the use of Foss Kits. The components are Life Science, Earth Science, and Physical Science. It is a hands-on science series with experiments, activities, and enrichment. We go to our science lab at least once per week.

  • Cross-curricular learning drives the Second Grade education.

    Meaningful highlights of Second Grade are traditional field trips, sponsoring Mother-Son Mass, and celebrating the sacraments of First Reconciliation and First Communion. Technology provided for the boys are iPads, classroom smart board, and weekly instruction in the computer lab using Chrome Books.

    Language Arts

    The reading program is structured by the Daily Five tasks and genre studies. During the Daily Five tasks, teachers confer with learners individually or in small groups. Genre units last approximately four weeks and use various reading strategies including shared reading, guided reading, independent reading, and read alouds. Grammar rules including parts of speech, capitalization, punctuation, and complete sentence structure are taught through skills-based lessons. Reading comprehension is assessed and monitored each week through passages and questions, and each trimester through the STAR Assessment. Students are also encouraged to practice taking Accelerated Reader online quizzes as they complete books on their own. FUNdations teaches the fundamental patterns in written words through direct instruction, games, and dictation practice. Spelling words are given weekly to assess these skills as well as commonly misspelled words for second graders. Cursive writing is taught and practiced throughout the year.

    Math

    The concepts from the interactive enVision Math program are place value up to the hundreds place, money, mental math, two- and three-digit addition and subtraction, geometry, fractions, time, data, graphs, measurement, probability, numbers to 1,000, basic multiplication, and basic division. Math assessments are graded after each topic to instill motivation and ensure success. Students are also assessed weekly on their fact fluency, beginning with addition and moving through subtraction, and multiplication.

    Science and Social Studies

    Three times per week, second graders switch classrooms and teachers for science and social studies. The social studies program is guided by Simple Solutions, history, sociology, geography, and economics. The science curriculum uses Simple Solutions as well as hands-on experiments, activities, and enrichment based on the Next Generation Science Standards to develop processing skills pertaining to life, earth, and physical sciences.

  • Responsibility and organization are the keys to a productive Third Grade academic year. All Third Graders receive instruction from both Third Grade teachers. Language arts is taught by one teacher, while math and science are instructed by the other. Learners receive social studies grades from their respective homeroom teacher. The boys receive textbooks and earn letter grades in all fields of study.

    Third Grade traditions include attending field trips, the BFG Day, and memorizing all of the states and capitals, which culminates with USA Day. Learners participate in weekly formal computer instruction, and they are each assigned an individual Chromebook for daily classroom use to assist in research, writing, typing, and study skills practices.

    Language Arts

    The Third Grade literacy program encourages the learners to develop a love of books and independent reading through the Reading Challenge, the Accelerated Reader Program, and the STAR Assessment. Several class novels are read together, and both fiction and non-fiction genres are emphasized. While reading each novel, learners study the authors, their various writing styles, and their influences. All along, word attack, oral fluency, expression, reading rate, vocabulary, and comprehension skills are practiced. Students learn to write through fiction and non-fiction book reports, journal writing, and writer’s workshop. Students learn to apply grammar into their writing. They practice these skills using IXL, Voyages, and Simple Solutions Langue Arts Programs. After the first trimester, learners are expected to write in cursive.

    Math

    The enVision Math program resumes in Third Grade. New skills and concepts are related to real life experiences for the learners. Addition and subtraction of larger numbers, multiplication and division, geometry, fractions, and decimals are the focal topics of the math syllabus. Hands-on activities are incorporated into daily lessons. This program also provides different difficulty levels for each topic. IXL, a computerized math program, reinforces concepts. Simple Solutions is used daily to introduce and review the Third Grade Math standards.

    Social Studies

    Third Grade social studies focuses on developing nonfiction knowledge and skills in American history, geography, civics, economics, and political science. The course is team-taught by both homeroom teachers. Videos, songs, games, projects, presentations, and map activities introduce and reinforce concepts and vocabulary terms.

    Science

    Science is a daily subject in Third Grade where each boy engages in interesting group discussions and performs fascinating experiments about life, earth, and physical sciences. Learners explore different scientific tools while learning and conducting the scientific method.

  • Fourth Grade prepares the boys for the transition to the Middle School. Increased independence and accountability lead to immeasurable successes at school and at home. One homeroom teacher instructs language arts and social studies, while the other homeroom teacher teaches math and science.

    Being leaders of the Lower School, Fourth Graders experience distinctive privileges from writing with erasable ink pens to leading the Jesse Tree celebration each Advent season. Apple TVs, iPads, and weekly access to the computer lab are essential technology tools used by these inquisitive learners.

    Language Arts

    Various reading strategies through the Daily Five model and novel studies expose learners to guided reading, independent reading, partner reading, literature circles, poetry, and read alouds. Learners challenge their individual reading abilities through book reports, the Accelerated Reader program, and the STAR Assessment. Spellography teaches concepts explicitly, systematically, cumulatively, and enjoyably. Spellography’s humorous games and engaging instruction reinforce multisyllabic decoding skills, develop reading fluency, teach vocabulary using word roots, and strengthen spelling retention. Direct vocabulary instruction improves reading comprehension. The writing program is developed throughout all disciplines. Journaling encourages learners to reflect and imagine, as well as improve specific writing styles. Learners are confident and competent writers through grammar practice, essays, research, and responses to literature.

    Math

    The main objectives of the Fourth Grade enVision Math series are numeration, lines, angles, shapes, understanding fractions and decimals, area, perimeter, solids, measurement, time, and temperature. Simple Solutions is a supplemental program that reinforces concepts such as transformations, congruence, symmetry, probability, operations, and data and graphs.

    Social Studies

    Throughout the entire year, learners delve into geography skills with a variety of methods and resources through class discussions, group work, projects, and special interest books. Migration to the Americas, Native Americans, life in the eastern hemisphere, exploration, the first colonies, and the American Revolution are the social studies units explored in Fourth Grade. Topics investigated in science include body systems, the Earth, the rock cycle, renewable and nonrenewable resources, weathering and erosion, volcanoes and earthquakes, and weather. Learners absorb knowledge of these concepts through FOSS kits which provide enrichment and hands-on experiments.

 Enrichment Classes

  • The METALS (Math, Engineering, Technology, Art, Logic, and Science) program at Stuart Hall encourages collaborative thinking and hands-on investigations that expand our boys' depth of understanding and contribute to their love of learning.

  • Our Lower School Religion program is dynamic and comprehensive. It starts with Old Testament stories that build a foundation for the New Testament. Our boys learn foundational prayers and traditions, and songs. The curriculum focuses on building identity as children of God (First Grade), learning about sacraments (Second Grade), the life of the Church and discipleship (Third Grade) and on the ten commandments and the fulfillment of the law in Jesus Christ (Fourth Grade). Aside from this, the boys go on religion field trips, do special service projects, perform skits, and participate in liturgies throughout the year. In addition, each grade sponsors a mass tied to the quality of the month. Religion meets four times a week for grades 1st - 4th, and is considered a core subject for 3rd and 4th grades.

  • Lower School physical education concentrates on fundamental sports skills such as passing a football and dribbling a basketball. Games of low organization allow for the practice of these skills in a game-like setting. Physical fitness is developed through working at fitness stations and participating in the Presidential Physical Fitness Challenge. There is a fitness activity each class period to support sports skills. Individual fitness records are maintained and names of record-holders are prominently displayed.

  • The Music program offers a variety of opportunities to suit the talent and abilities of students of all ages. Lower school students begin to learn the basics of note reading and counting. They appply that knowledge to playing glockenspiels, xylophones and performing on hand bells. These exercises demonstrate the students' abilities to read musical rhythms, as well as recognize the notes they are playing. Throughout the entire music curriculum, students continue to sing and perform for First Fridays and special programs.

  • Library classes begin with PK3 and continue through our boys' time here at Stuart Hall. Visiting authors on campus bring the book writing process to life for the students. The curriculum includes a portion of library class when the boys are read aloud to throughout their time at Stuart Hall.

  • Lower school visual art students expand their understanding of the Elements of Art as foundational concepts for visual thinking. Meaningful lessons are designed as a means of developing imaginative, narrative, and observational ideas. Art materials, vocabulary, techniques, and processes are introduced and developed in a spiral-type curriculum. Lower school students are encouraged to explore and express their original ideas in 2D and 3D media. When possible, the larger curriculum is integrated along with studying the role of artists and art in our society. Social skills, habits of mind, and respect of one another is emphasized throughout our creative community.

  • Life Skills are taught PK4-7th Grade using the The Choose Love Formula™. The program is based on the profound result of practicing the character values inherent in “Nurturing Healing Love,” which are: Courage + Gratitude + Forgiveness + Compassion in Action.

    These four character values are easy to learn. When practiced, they strengthen the health and resilience of individuals, improve the community and culture of groups and promote a safer, more peaceful and loving world.

  • Stuart Hall is a technology-rich environment. There are data projectors, large screen monitors, and interactive whiteboards in every 1st through 4th grade classroom. A set of iPads can be found in every 1st and 2nd grade classroom; 3rd and 4th grade classrooms each have a complete set of Chromebooks specifically for their use. The boys also attend a formal computer class, where they learn keyboarding, navigating the internet, basic programming, computer history, digital photo and video editing, Lego Robotics, and web design.

  • The world languages program is designed to foster a love of the French language and an appreciation of the French culture and Francophone world. Students take classes twice a week, for 25 minutes. The goals of the French program in preschool are to expose the children to another language and culture and to increase their awareness and respect for cultural diversity. An emphasis is put on New Orleans’s French past and the widespread presence of French in the city to help the students make connections with their lifestyle (Fleur de Lys, la boulangerie bakery, Café du Monde, etc).

“The way to do much in a short time is to love much. People will do great things if they are stirred with enthusiasm and love.”

- Janet Erskine Stuart, RSCJ