Curriculum

Milton follows a very successful approach for teaching Hebrew. Students in Early Elementary learn to identify and form Hebrew letters, practice correct pronunciation of consonant and vowel sounds, and acquire vocabulary related to transportation, home, family, and more.

Hands-on Learning

• Students create a family photo album to better understand Hebrew vocabulary during a unit on families.
• To reinforce transportation vocabulary, students build cars, planes, and boats out of modeling clay.
• Students also create models of their own homes out of a variety of materials, which helps students identify objects in the home and associate them with the correct Hebrew word.

Students gain an understanding of concepts related to the chagim (Jewish holidays) and Shabbat. They hear and appreciate Torah stories, participate in tefilah (prayer), and recognize the customs and values of Jewish life.

Hands-on Learning

• Students make their own Haggadot (the Jewish text that sets forth the order of the Passover Seder) for Passover and use their own Haggadah during a Kindergarten seder (a ritual service and feast that marks the beginning of Passover).
• To reenact Torah stories, students dress in costumes and create sets and props representative of biblical times.
• During every chag, students create a symbol of that holiday to take home and share with their family – from a honey jar for Rosh Hashana to Elijah’s cup for Passover.

In language arts, we focus on the printed word and the relationship between letters and sounds. Teachers use literary elements, such as plot, theme, character, setting, and tone as starting points for analyzing and discussing literature. We also dive into reading comprehension, spelling conventions, grammar, punctuation, specific genres, making inferences and predictions, and identifying the author’s message.

Hands-on Learning

• Milton students write their own plays with the intention of weaving valuable messages and values into their scripts.
• Students read their own published works aloud to the entire community at our annual Author’s Tea.

Milton’s mathematics curriculum is carefully designed to build and expand a student’s mathematical proficiency and understanding. Our goal is to build powerful mathematical thinkers. Students use concrete, real-life examples that are meaningful and memorable as an introduction to key mathematical concepts. Teachers use multiple methods and problem-solving strategies to strengthen students’ proficiency and accommodate different learning styles.

Hands-on Learning

• Students apply their knowledge of 3D shapes and coins to design and create a cash register that is used as part of the multi-disciplinary Kindergarten theater project.
• Students link math to their study of climates by planning a trip to a location of their choice, while focusing on a budget, calendar, and travel logistics.
• When studying time, students build analog clocks out of recycled materials.

Students gain observational skills and make new discoveries in nature and in the classroom. They study concepts in physics and engineering while keeping a focus on tikkun olam (repairing the world) and taking care of the Earth through composting, recycling, and gardening.

Hands-on Learning

• Students visualize speed, acceleration, and friction by constructing different size ramps that make balls and miniature cars travel faster and farther.
• Our teachers take students outside where they plant seeds, observe their growth, and learn about the life cycle.
• By assembling paper helicopters, our students grasp the power and importance of gravity and other forces of physics.

Our social studies program defines what it means to be a part of a community. Students learn to value kindness, friendship, and leadership through historical examples like Martin Luther King, Jr. and past presidents of the United States. Our students begin to understand a sense of place by learning about climates and how climate affects life in different regions of the world. Students learn Jewish values like derech eretz (thoughtful conduct), tikkun olam (repairing the world), and hachnasat orchim (welcoming guests) to embed these values into our community.

Hands-on Learning

• Students create a classroom job chart where they fulfill the daily duties of the classroom and learn community responsibility.
• When learning about the role of U.S. presidents, our students write a story about what they would change if they were president.
• Using a Design Thinking approach, our students invent specific homes, clothing, and jobs for different climates.

Students develop phonemic awareness and how to properly form numbers and letters. They begin to attain the mechanics of writing from the basics of how to grip a pencil to learning to write for genres. Through practice, students gain confidence in punctuation, capitalization, spelling, and grammar.

Hands-on Learning

• Students write their own fantasy stories about animals they have studied in Rock Creek Park.
• They write their own biographies for a Milton version of “Playbill” magazine.
• As part of their lesson on different types of sentences, students practice writing sentences that are exclamatory, declarative, and interrogative.