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Intermediate School (Grades 3-5)

An Intermediate School science class walks to Indigo Lake.

Children who know how to learn, know how to succeed.

Like creativity and leadership, learning is a skill that must be practiced. Differing from most private elementary schools, Old Trail teachers present material in ways that become an experience, and these experiences deeply embed knowledge in students regardless of their learning style.

Teachers collaborate to ensure they capitalize on opportunities for cross-curricular connections so that students learn concepts from multiple angles. Because students are fully engaged in the material, they learn more deeply, they ask and answer their own questions, and they see knowledge as something that can be discovered, not just bestowed.

Intermediate School students identify native plants in Outdoor Education. 

Frontier Day at Hale Farm is a culmination of Grade 3's year-long social studies curriculum adventures. 

Grade 4 students test weather vanes they created as part of their study of weather in science. 

The year-long 'Social Entrepreneurship: Project 345,' ends with a marketplace, where all Intermediate School students sell handmade items to benefit an NGO.

Each year, Grade 5 students visit Cuyahoga Valley Environmental Education Center for an immersive, three-day trip.

A study by the American Psychological Association shows that “positive student-teacher relationships have been shown to support students’ adjustment to school, contribute to their social skills, promote academic performance, and foster students’ resiliency in academic performance.”

Our curriculum appeals to the special characteristics of this age group.

Mutually rewarding, respectful and trusting relationships with family members, teachers and, increasingly, with peers are extremely important. Children at this age begin to enjoy planning and more complex games and are more product and goal oriented. They gradually develop the ability to apply learned concepts to new tasks.
  
We give students much-needed opportunities to share thoughts, perspectives and reactions. While initial thinking is concrete, they begin to think logically and symbolically, and their best work is usually done in small pieces. Our teachers offer the support children need at this age to complete long-term projects and study for tests.

Intermediate School science students at Indigo Lake.

Intermediate School Curriculum