This blog is for parents in Winchester, MA and surrounding areas, who are interested in finding and sharing information and resources to help our children reach their full potential
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Private Schools
Please share on this thread any Private Schools that you would recommend.
Please include any website or contact info if you have them, and if you would mind if people contact you directly for more information.
Davidson Fellows: This is a scholarship program for any child under the age of 18 who has completed a significant piece of work in mathematics, science, technology, music, literature, or philosophy that has the potential to benefit society. It is run once a year with the deadline for applications falling at the end of March. You can read more about this program at http://www.davidsongifted.org/fellows/.
Davidson Academy: The Academy is a public school located on the University of Nevada, Reno campus for profoundly intelligent students performing at or above the sixth grade level. To read more, please visit www.davidsonacademy.unr.edu.
Here are some additional resources you and your family may find helpful when searching for schools:
Both GreatSchools http://www.greatschools.net/ and PrivateBug http://www.privatebug.org/ can be useful in conducting school searches.
The National Center for Education Statistics http://nces.ed.gov/globallocator/ provides a searchable database for public schools, private schools, public libraries and colleges.
Although it doesn’t directly address education of gifted students, "What Makes a Good School" http://www.cse.ucla.edu/products/parents/cresst_GoodSchool.pdf
and “How to Evaluate and Choose a School” http://ceep.crc.uiuc.edu/poptopics/rankings.html
may address points that serve as a useful guide for your family.
The Parent Resource Specialist http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=318 from NAGC may also be able to provide some information
Anova opens doors in Melrose to gifted, talented students By Jim Haddadin / jhaddadin@cnc.com Melrose Free Press Posted Sep 08, 2010 @ 06:11 PM
The Anova School — a brand new school for gifted and talented children — held its first day of classes on Wednesday, Sept. 8, at its inaugural location at the former Beebe School in Melrose, following an opening celebration one week earlier attended by students, parents, and staff.
The school, which is officially called “Anova: The Massachusetts School of Science, Creativity and Learning,” is geared to offer more flexibility to students who excel in the classroom by allowing them to pursue individual curriculum plans that are tied to academic ability rather than age.
Interdisciplinary learning will also be a focus of the curriculum: A lesson plan on rocketry, for example, might involve designing and engineering a rocket, writing a speech about the rocket, and learning about aeronautics programs in other countries, thus tying together several different subjects.
Each student will also conduct an independent project over the course of the school year, focusing on application of knowledge, innovation, and leadership, such as a science-related project about water quality, and making a proposal for improvements.
The school was conceptualized and founded by Courtney Dickinson, a mother from Winchester, who was looking for educational alternatives for her own two children, ages 8 and 5, when she began to envision the model for the Anova School.
“I worked really hard in the Winchester Public Schools to create a gifted education program, and we made progress, but I realized it really wasn’t going to go far enough fast enough to actually serve the needs of my child,” Dickinson said, “and so I just realized that I needed to invest my time and energy on doing this — that creating a school was the answer.”
Teachers as diverse as students. Students are divided into three multi-age classrooms: one for children in kindergarten and first grade; another for children in second, third and fourth grade; and a third class for fifth- and sixth-graders.
“They have the vision here,” Susan Krusell explained, “and with all of our efforts, you know, I think we’ll get closer than anywhere else that we could try for.”
“All great innovations, and progress, start with an experiment,” Stuart Krusell said. “So yah, this is an experiment, but I think that the core group of people they have — the core group of teachers they’ve hired — and really [their] commitment to the principle of learning at the pace at which you can learn is a basic, appealing thing, so I’m willing to take that chance. I think it’s a pretty safe bet.”
Anova will have four full-time classroom teachers this school year, as well as a number of parents and teachers who will volunteer at the school. Kristen Sargianis, a K-2 teacher, previously helped develop educational curriculum for the Boston Museum of Science’s Engineering is Elementary program, with an emphasis on “inquiry-based learning.”
“I expect that we’ll be twice as large [next year],” Dickinson said. “I expect that we’ll still be here.”
(content condensed) Copyright 2010 Melrose Free Press. Some rights reserved
Sage (in MA) is a school for gifted learners, even within this group, there is a range of abilities. The small class size, especially in the younger grades, makes it easy for the teachers to reach the students at the appropriate level.
In Kindergarten, where students come in at all different levels academically, the teachers take each individual student as far that student can go in their reading and writing. Math at the younger grades, although accelerated, is a bit more rigid and structured. However, by the time they reach middle school they are about three years ahead of what you would find in most schools.
It is definitely a school that tries to develop not just intellectual skills, but also social and emotional ones. This is especially true in Kindergarten.
Davidson Fellows: This is a scholarship program for any child under the age of 18 who has completed a significant piece of work in mathematics, science, technology, music, literature, or philosophy that has the potential to benefit society. It is run once a year with the deadline for applications falling at the end of March. You can read more about this program at http://www.davidsongifted.org/fellows/.
ReplyDeleteDavidson Academy: The Academy is a public school located on the University of Nevada, Reno campus for profoundly intelligent students performing at or above the sixth grade level. To read more, please visit www.davidsonacademy.unr.edu.
Here are some additional resources you and your family may find helpful when searching for schools:
ReplyDeleteBoth GreatSchools http://www.greatschools.net/ and PrivateBug http://www.privatebug.org/ can be useful in conducting school searches.
The National Center for Education Statistics http://nces.ed.gov/globallocator/ provides a searchable database for public schools, private schools, public libraries and colleges.
Although it doesn’t directly address education of gifted students, "What Makes a Good School" http://www.cse.ucla.edu/products/parents/cresst_GoodSchool.pdf
and “How to Evaluate and Choose a School” http://ceep.crc.uiuc.edu/poptopics/rankings.html
may address points that serve as a useful guide for your family.
The Parent Resource Specialist http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=318 from NAGC may also be able to provide some information
Anova opens doors in Melrose to gifted, talented students
ReplyDeleteBy Jim Haddadin / jhaddadin@cnc.com Melrose Free Press
Posted Sep 08, 2010 @ 06:11 PM
The Anova School — a brand new school for gifted and talented children — held its first day of classes on Wednesday, Sept. 8, at its inaugural location at the former Beebe School in Melrose, following an opening celebration one week earlier attended by students, parents, and staff.
The school, which is officially called “Anova: The Massachusetts School of Science, Creativity and Learning,” is geared to offer more flexibility to students who excel in the classroom by allowing them to pursue individual curriculum plans that are tied to academic ability rather than age.
Interdisciplinary learning will also be a focus of the curriculum: A lesson plan on rocketry, for example, might involve designing and engineering a rocket, writing a speech about the rocket, and learning about aeronautics programs in other countries, thus tying together several different subjects.
Each student will also conduct an independent project over the course of the school year, focusing on application of knowledge, innovation, and leadership, such as a science-related project about water quality, and making a proposal for improvements.
The school was conceptualized and founded by Courtney Dickinson, a mother from Winchester, who was looking for educational alternatives for her own two children, ages 8 and 5, when she began to envision the model for the Anova School.
“I worked really hard in the Winchester Public Schools to create a gifted education program, and we made progress, but I realized it really wasn’t going to go far enough fast enough to actually serve the needs of my child,” Dickinson said, “and so I just realized that I needed to invest my time and energy on doing this — that creating a school was the answer.”
Teachers as diverse as students. Students are divided into three multi-age classrooms: one for children in kindergarten and first grade; another for children in second, third and fourth grade; and a third class for fifth- and sixth-graders.
“They have the vision here,” Susan Krusell explained, “and with all of our efforts, you know, I think we’ll get closer than anywhere else that we could try for.”
“All great innovations, and progress, start with an experiment,” Stuart Krusell said. “So yah, this is an experiment, but I think that the core group of people they have — the core group of teachers they’ve hired — and really [their] commitment to the principle of learning at the pace at which you can learn is a basic, appealing thing, so I’m willing to take that chance. I think it’s a pretty safe bet.”
Anova will have four full-time classroom teachers this school year, as well as a number of parents and teachers who will volunteer at the school. Kristen Sargianis, a K-2 teacher, previously helped develop educational curriculum for the Boston Museum of Science’s Engineering is Elementary program, with an emphasis on “inquiry-based learning.”
“I expect that we’ll be twice as large [next year],” Dickinson said. “I expect that we’ll still be here.”
(content condensed)
Copyright 2010 Melrose Free Press. Some rights reserved
Sage (in MA) is a school for gifted learners, even within this group, there is a range of abilities. The small class size, especially in the younger grades, makes it easy for the teachers to reach the students at the appropriate level.
ReplyDeleteIn Kindergarten, where students come in at all different levels academically, the teachers take each individual student as far that student can go in their reading and writing. Math at the younger grades, although accelerated, is a bit more rigid and structured. However, by the time they reach middle school they are about three years ahead of what you would find in most schools.
It is definitely a school that tries to develop not just intellectual skills, but also social and emotional ones. This is especially true in Kindergarten.