Our curriculum is based upon the proven Orton-Gillingham approach. The multi-sensory component of Orton-Gillingham allows our teachers to capitalize on each student’s dominant learning modality while delivering instruction that will also strengthen their other learning pathways.
This type of instruction is often used for reading remediation, but is effective for all students due to its flexible and individualized structure.
• Classic Academic curriculum taught with Orton-Gillingham based instructional strategies, aligned to Pennsylvania Academic Standards and Common Core Standards
• Continuous structured practice and immediate corrective feedback to develop automatic recognition skills
• Flexible skill-based grouping within each class; 6:1 student-to-faculty ratio
• Teacher looping in two-year cycles in grades 2-3, 4-5, and 7-8.
• Extended school day to accommodate remediation
• Use of assistive and instructional technology integrated into the school without developing dependence
• Makerspace, 3D Design, Art and Physical Education
• Martial arts program as a supplemental means of developing focus, discipline, and character-building
During the 1930s, neurologist Dr. Samuel T. Orton and educator and psychologist Anna Gillingham developed the Orton-Gillingham Approach to teach students with dyslexia to read. Since then, researchers and educators have continued to develop this approach.
The approach uses structured, explicit, multi-sensory strategies to teach students basic phonemes, or sound units. Students learn how to blend them together for reading, and how to segment them for spelling. Instruction advances gradually, in a student paced manner, so that students learn all meaningful units of language, including prefixes, roots and suffixes. This enables efficient decoding of all words within the English language. A hallmark difference of the Orton-Gillingham Approach from traditional reading instruction is that language elements are taught individually and instruction does not progress until mastery is achieved.
Using visual, auditory, and tactile-kinesthetic modalities, the Orton-Gillingham Approach employs the teacher as diagnostician. The teacher, or language therapist, uses each lesson to diagnose then prescribe the language elements that have yet to be mastered.