The core academic curriculum of The Dearborn Academy is carefully aligned to state standards. Delivery of curriculum is monitored to ensure that required content is delivered through best practices. Teachers work collegially to share and integrate instruction. For example, middle school students receive math enrichment from a teacher who works in tandem with the basic skills math teacher. While middle school students have separate literature and composition classes, their teachers plan units of study together. Middle school science, social studies, and math teachers conscientiously implement strategies to strengthen reading and writing across the curriculum and utilize hands-on, projects-based learning as much as possible. Elementary school teachers share the planning of science and social studies units together and assist one another in the instruction and assessment of leveled reading groups. Elementary classrooms also make frequent use of learning centers. In such ways, the faculty of The Dearborn Academy strives to make learning an integrated, thematic experience.
The Dearborn Academy utilizes a balanced literacy approach. Reading and writing are modeled by the teacher, shared with the teacher, guided by the teacher, and finally released from the teacher to the student as an independent activity. Through such careful scaffolding, students learn to read and write level by level. The writing process is given special emphasis and students are given many opportunities to practice. These approaches are sustained in all subject areas.
Additional strong curriculum support programs offer students many opportunities for learning and relearning. In-house use of the self-paced, computer-adaptive testing series, EdPerformance, enables staff to diagnose particular student needs and identify student gains. Math and reading support teachers can then individualize instruction and reinforce classroom lessons in small-group settings. Other computer-based supports such as Accelerated Math, Reading Counts, and Study Island are likewise individualized, motivational, and aligned to state instruction and testing standards.
The delivery of newly aligned Arabic language instruction aligned to World Standards Benchmarks and Language Arts Content Expectations is a unique and special offering of The Dearborn Academy. Veteran teachers develop daily lesson plans in the alphabet, vocabulary, and grammar of the Arabic language, as well as the geography, history, and culture of the Arabic world. Such instruction is a doorway to the celebration of our diversity.
For students newly arrived from the Arabic world, the teaching of English as a Second Language provides immediate and substantial help in the process of adjustment to a new language and way of life. Further assistance is provided by bilingual paraprofessionals in the classroom, who can coach and re-teach the day’s lesson in English or in Arabic. This friendly combination of the familiar and the new—in a combined bilingual/ESL approach—helps students make rapid and significant progress in acquiring English and a new sense of cultural identity. The staff of the Arabic Department is also taking steps to integrate its instruction with that of core academic teachers, especially to help students learn important thematic concepts through the use of their native language.
The Dearborn Academy computer lab is state-of-the-art, using the latest, dual-platform PC-Mac machines. In addition, the school is equipped with Freedom-to-Learn laptops that are available for projects in the classroom. Laptop LCD projectors and smart boards further enable computer-generated instruction.
This year The Academy implemented a new character education program, Smart Character Choices. By creating an atmosphere of acceptance and safety in the classroom with clear rules and procedures, engaging students in authentic work meaningful to them, and demonstrating the power of individual choice, students can learn the real meaning of discipline—self-control, not teacher control. This program emphasizes the philosophy that genuine learning comes from the inside out.
Your son or daughter will receive a quality, well-rounded education at The Dearborn Academy. We hope to see you there!