Lower School Academics
At Keith Country Day School, Lower School academics provide the learning blocks students will continue to build on throughout their school years. Knowledge acquired in the Lower School in language, math, and technology will prepare them for Middle School and beyond.
From preschool throughout the Lower School, students at Keith learn the literacy skills and strategies that provide the foundational knowledge they will draw on in years to come. Each year, your child will build on their reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills, transferring them into mathematics, science, and social studies, as those texts become increasingly complex.
By third grade, students will be exposed to a variety of fiction and non-fiction sub-genres, such as narratives, informative texts, persuasive texts, and prose. They will be immersed in non-fiction reading, research, and writing. They will also present brief oral reports, providing continued development of their communication skills. As they progress through the Lower School, they will be able to demonstrate reading comprehension by summarizing information, formulating questions, and drawing conclusions.
They will hone their writing skills through the planning, drafting, revising, and editing of narratives, explanations, and reports. By fourth grade, they will generate hypotheses, make inferences, support opinions, confirm/refute hypotheses, compare and contrast relationships, formulate conclusions, and debate their interpretations. Throughout, they will gain the confidence and skills that comes from a private school education in Rockford.
At Keith Country Day School, math education begins in preschool. When children play in the sandbox, cook applesauce, and complete a puzzle, they are engaging in activities that allow them to develop the thinking skills used in daily life. Counting and cardinality, operations and algebraic thinking, and measurement and data are important learning skills for creating a strong foundation for mathematics. As your child progresses through the lower grades, they will continue to build upon those skills developing an understanding of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, whole number relationships, linear measurement, and geometric shapes.
By fourth grade, they will have developed expertise in the critical areas needed for success as they advance to the Middle School, Upper School and college. From writing and interpreting numerical expressions to developing fluency with addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division to developing fluency in measurement systems and understanding concepts of volume, they’ll gain the knowledge they need to prepare for the future.
The ability to understand and effectively leverage technology is crucial for children growing up today. At Keith, we understand the importance of using technology across all areas of learning and giving students access to the tools and knowledge they need for success in school and beyond. Beginning in preschool, your child will learn the basics of computer operations and etiquette, as well as how to use software to express their creativity.
Our kindergarten students build upon the computer basics using games to enhance their keyboarding skills and navigating to websites to extend studies in other school subjects, such as math and Spanish. As they progress through the lower grades, they will integrate language arts and technology skills to write and publish their own stories and use email to write letters. Students will learn to use tools like google drive, google forms, spreadsheets, presentation software, digital photography and digital art.
As they learn, they will continue to enhance their research, presentation, and digital storytelling skills while integrating technology with math, social studies, language, and art. Always maintaining a focus on safe and ethical use of technology, your child will learn critical thinking skills needed to evaluate and judge online resources and use the Internet safely and responsibly.