Ideas matter. And wrong ideas have led most American schools down the wrong path in recent decades. As a parent, you should learn about these ideas and how we can overcome them to make schools places where all students can thrive. For the curious parent ready for a deeper dive, watch this 7 minute explainer:
Three bad ideas:
1. Matters of right and wrong are up to each individual.
2. Knowledge is not important.
3. Students will learn to read “naturally” and don’t need phonics instruction.
At Monticello Academy, we believe:
1. Values like respect, integrity, service and friendship, and work should be taught and reinforced both at home and at school.
2. Knowledge is the good stuff! Schools should purposefully and systematically build students’ background knowledge, especially their understanding of history and culture.
3. Students need a systematic curriculum of phonics to become fluent, confident, joyful readers.
Did you know that most schools don’t have a knowledge curriculum? They have a skills curriculum.
What does that mean?
It means that they don’t have a plan for teaching students many of the things we expect students to learn in school, like history, literature, and the arts. Instead they focus on the bland “skills” called for by state standardized tests.
Instead of teaching great books, they teach kids to read and answer questions.
Instead of wrestling with big ideas, they practice using “context clues” and other skills on the state test.
Instead of learning about the great eras and achievements of human history, they learn vague “social studies skills” that might sound smart but are actually curiosity-killers, like this one from the 3rd grade state standards: “Evaluate key factors that determine how a community develops.” (Huh?)
How We Solve It
At Monticello Academy, it’s different. We have a content-rich curriculum, with history as its backbone and infused with literature and the arts. When you ask your child, “What did you learn at school today?” instead of the typical shrug of the shoulders–“I don’t know….we did some worksheets”)–you’re likely to hear enthusiastic responses:
“We learned about the Egyptian pharaohs!” (1st grade)
“We learned about when when the British burned the White House in the War of 1812!” (2nd grade)
“We learned about the Black Plague!” (4th grade)
“We learned about the Reign of Terror in the French Revolution!” (6th grade)
In every grade level, starting in kindergarten, we strategically building student knowledge of U.S. and World history and geography, classic works of art and music, and great works of literature.
Results
But what about those all-important tests? With an emphasis on rich content knowledge, our students actually outperform other students–even on skills tests! Monticello students, in fact, score the highest of all students in West Valley City on a test of reading skills.
The great thing about putting knowledge at the center of a curriculum is that research shows that knowledge is actually one of the most important foundations for strong academic performance.
Check out this article from the Atlantic Monthly about why the skills-based, test-driven approach to education has been counter-productive.
Conclusion
So why don’t more schools focus on knowledge?
For one, because it’s hard.
What knowledge will be taught? There’s so much of it, and deciding which facts to include or leave out can be difficult (and contentious). At Monticello Academy, we use the Core Knowledge Sequence. For over thirty years, a diverse body of educators and scholars, led by E.D. Hirsch, have organized a body of knowledge–the things we would expect a patriotic and knowledgeable American to know–into topics for each grade level. This allows our students to gain knowledge in a coherent, chronological, and unforgettable way.
Our knowledge-rich curriculum is a key part of our mission to give students the foundation they need to succeed in all areas of academics and life.
Utah recently released its school report cards for the 2022-23 school year. While we will never put test scores above character education and a well-rounded, history-rich curriculum, it is great to see our kids ranked #1 among West Valley City schools on the state’s measure or students reading on grade level.
Why do our kids do so well? It’s not by accident!
Since its founding in 2006, Monticello Academy has bucked the trends in education, and that’s been for the better!
For a few decades, most schools used a “whole language” approach to teaching reading. In this approach, kids are expected to gradually pick up reading through mere exposure to literature. While this might work for spoken language, written language is different–especially when we have this beautiful thing called an alphabet!
Monticello Academy has always taught reading using phonics, which equips students to know how all the letters and letter combinations produce different sounds. With our systematic phonics curriculum, students get the tools they need for reading to be easy, fluent, and fun. With the mechanics of reading firmly under control, they can focus on the joy of reading and finding deeper meaning in the text. Scientific research now overwhelming proves that phonics-based instruction is superior to other methods. (For the fascinating story of how American education dropped the ball on the best way to teach reading, we highly recommend this podcast.)
With this solid foundation in how to read, our students soon progress to reading classic literature, from the Wind in the Willows in third grade, to the Iliad and the Odyssey in sixth grade and George Orwell and Leo Tolstoy in eighth grade. Students engage in college seminar-style discussions around great books and are also challenged to become independent readers by discovering authors and book series they love. Students regularly visit our well-stocked library, and we challenge them to become “Minuteman Readers” by reading multiple books across different genres each year (and the vast majority of them do!).
Having the highest reading scores in West Valley City is a nice validation that what we’re doing is working, but the main reward is seeing our students thrive in a culture of reading!
At Monticello Academy Highbury in West Valley City, despite our great academic results, we don’t tell kids that they’re smart.
You might wonder, why not? Won’t that give them confidence?
Actually, it’s almost the opposite.
Stanford scholar Carol Dweck has studied how children’s beliefs about intelligence affect their behavior. Some children believe that we can grow our intelligence through hard work (which is true). This “growth mindset” results in resilience through failure and a willingness to work hard and grow. Other children (and many adults!) believe that their intelligence is fixed. This “fixed mindset” leads people to try to protect their perceived status by avoiding failure and challenges.
The Research
One of Dweck’s studies is summarized here (and here) by cognitive scientist Daniel Willingham:
“In one experiment, fifth-graders worked a set of 10 problems and all were told they had done well. In addition, some were praised for their intelligence (‘You must be smart at these problems’), whereas others were praised for their effort (‘You must have tried hard on these problems’). Yet others were given no further feedback. The children were then given the chance to select problems that were described as easy (and which they’d probably get right), or problems they’d learn a lot from (even if they would not ‘look so smart’).
“The results were striking: children praised for their intelligence chose easy problems—they wanted to succeed and worried about looking unintelligent. Children praised for their effort chose difficult tasks because they wanted to learn. And when given a choice between discovering how other children performed on the problems or learning new strategies for solving the problems, the children praised for their intelligence wanted to know how others performed. Children praised for effort, in contrast, wanted to learn new strategies.”
How We Build A Growth Mindset
As a school that tries to promote a growth mindset (in ourselves as well as our students), we…
Teach students about growth mindset and brain plasticity. Students need to know the amazing and empowering fact that our brains and our intelligence can grow with effort!
Avoid “fixed mindset” labels. If a student does well on something, we don’t tell them they’re “smart” (Natural conclusion: If I don’t do well on something, that must mean I’m not smart.)
Praise effort! “Wow, you must have worked hard on that.” “I love how you took your time to think through that part of the problem.”
Never try to sell something to students by telling them it’s easy. I once heard a teacher tell her students, “Don’t worry; this activity will be easy.” Wait, does that mean students should worry if something is hard? No! We should dig into hard things with enthusiasm, not worry! We don’t want easy. We want challenges! Besides, what if it’s actually not easy for a student? How will they feel then?
Conclusion
We are a school where we promote the joy of challenging ourselves and celebrate hard work. In our classrooms, then, instead of, “Wow! You got that right! You’re so smart!” we hear things like:
“This assignment is a challenge! I think you’ll enjoy trying to figure it out.”
“Look at these end-of-year results! I am so proud of your hard work.”
As a parent, finding the right kindergarten for your child can be a challenging task. You want a school that provides a well-rounded education, an excellent reading program, and flexible options for your child’s schedule. Monticello Academy, in West Valley City, is the best charter school in the area for kindergarten, and here’s why.
Top-Tier Reading Program
At Monticello Academy, we believe that reading is the foundation of academic success. Our reading program consistently ranks among the top in the state. Last year, Monticello Academy was the #2 ranked kindergarten in Salt Lake County in student reading growth. For seventeen years, we have used a research-based systematic phonics program that is so effective the State of Utah passed a law to require all schools to adopt these methods.
Kindergarten reading levels at the beginning of the 2022 school yearKindergarten reading levels at the end of the 2022 school year
Well-Rounded Curriculum
We believe that a well-rounded education is essential for a child’s development. That’s why our curriculum includes not only the core subjects but also art, music, and computer science. We believe that these subjects are critical for developing creativity, problem-solving skills, and digital literacy, all of which are vital for success in the 21st century.
Flexible Options
We understand that every child’s needs are unique, and that’s why we offer both full-day and half-day options for kindergarten. This flexibility allows parents to choose the schedule that works best for their child and their family. It also helps children ease into the school environment at their own pace, ensuring a smooth transition into elementary school.
If you are interested in learning more, click Schedule a Tour above or click on Apply Now, as applications are accepted year round. For the 2024-25 school year, applications will open in November of 2023.
Monticello Academy is excited to announce that next school year, 2022-2023, the school will be offering the option of full-day kindergarten for parents and families at both the West Point and Highbury campuses.
All parents will be able to choose between full-day kindergarten or half-day kindergarten. The half-day program will focus on math and reading. Kindergartners who already demonstrate academic preparedness for first grade may also have the option of a half-day program focused on art, music, history, and science.
We look forward to having many of our kindergarteners on campus for the full day next year!
Monticello Academy in West Valley City, Utah, received its end of the year data from 2021, and–regardless of the pandemic–students saw incredible growth. Seventy-eight percent (78%) of students in first through third grade were making typical or better progress in reading by the end of the 2021 school year and the school’s scores were the highest in West Valley.
When comparing the results to other schools in West Valley, Monticello Academy finished five percentage points ahead of the next closest school and over ten percentage points higher than the Granite School District schools. Monticello Academy is a public school that is tuition-free.
The Best Reading Curriculum in West Valley City
In English, Monticello Academy, builds a love of reading through an emphasis on both independent reading and a study of classic works of literature. From the earliest grade levels, the curriculum is designed to prepare students in West Valley City for advanced high school programs (such as AP classes), with an emphasis on both foundational reading skills (systematic phonics instruction) and critical thinking and writing. Click here to see Monticello Academy’s curriculum maps for K through 8th grade in West Valley City and learn more about what students are being taught on a daily basis.
Monticello Academy, in West Valley City, Utah, starts students off with phonemic awareness, which is the ability to identify and manipulate individual sounds. From there, students move into basic code, which teaches students the basic alphabet–short vowel sounds and consonants. Lastly, students explore advanced code, diving into the sounds of multiple letters, one sound with multiple spellings, or multiple pronunciations behind one spelling.
The early reading curriculum offered to students in WVC gives a systematic exposure all of the phonics rules students need to know to become fluent readers. But the the reading curriculum is not just dry, disconnected reading skills. We use rich content from history and literature to make reading meaningful. Students engage in discussions and debates about the content they read, making reading come to life. The failure of typical schools to provide this rich background knowledge is one of the reasons most schools are failing out kids.
West Valley Campus Tours
If you would like to learn more about how Monticello Academy is helping students in West Valley City learn how to read, be sure to schedule a tour below to take a look at the school.
