APPROACH TO LEARNING
HOW DO WE SUPPORT MASTERY-BASED LEARNING?
CONTENT
Our approach to content is personalized
• Each student’s education will be developed and shaped by the student, working with our team.
• Whenever it will be possible, the education experience is going to be customized to the student’s academic path and pace.
• We want to leverage blended learning as an important tool in an effective personalized strategy
CONTEXT
Our approach to context is project-based.
Students will learn best when their school experiences have context and are connected to their lives and global affairs. Real-life, augmented, and virtual contexts. Students will spend half their time at TLS learning through projects, often of their own design informed by their Independence Level. All projects will be interdisciplinary. All projects will be connected to goals within the Graduate Profile (character strengths, cognitive skills, global citizenship, creation, purpose, independence, foundational fluencies, & deeper learning concepts).
CONCEPTS
Our approach to concepts is based in Inquiry and Mastery.
Meaningful inquiry gives direction to student projects. Concepts, “the big ideas,” are explored through inquiry arcs. The inquiry connects knowledge from core skills to context and concepts.
Inquiries will be geared toward solving real-world problems. Students will develop the skills to create meaningful inquiries themselves. Learning and advancing through our curriculum happens when each student is going to fully master target objectives, concepts, and skills. In most schools, time spent learning is constant while the quality and level of content mastery vary. At TLS, the opposite is going to true: learning time will be variable — but the quality and level of mastery for all students will be constant.
CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT
Our approach to continuous improvement is based in Assessment and the R&D Lab.
The approach to learning will be informed by diagnostic, formative, and summative assessment, goal tracking, and frequent one-on-one conferences with teachers, and review of data from online tools. Qualitative and quantitative assessment data is to be shared with students and parents on an ongoing basis and during student-led parent-teacher conferences.