Academics at Brookwood
Academics at Brookwood
In addition to the traditional academic areas of focus and an exceptionally strong creative arts program, Brookwood offers a variety of programs of special note. Descriptions of some of those programs follow:
LANGUAGE ARTS
 In a print-rich classroom, young children huddle together over their first “chapter books,” using systematic phonics to decode. Middle schoolers group around computers in the library, evaluating online information for biographies they’re writing. In a circle of tables, older kids reflect on the use of language in Julius Caesar.
 At Brookwood, the language arts engage kids in a constellation of literacy skills. In addition to reading, writing, and the research process, speaking, listening, phonics, spelling, grammar, vocabulary, manuscript, cursive writing, and keyboarding are explicitly taught, and frequently reviewed and practiced. Students value varied literature as windows and mirrors on the world and themselves. They make reader/writer connections in apprenticing themselves as writers to the authors they love. The cohesion of our curriculum comes from our common purpose – to create lifelong readers and highly effective communicators.
Extraordinary programs and facilities support us. In the living room atmosphere of The Dodge Writing Center, kids brainstorm, compose, revise, and present their work. A mobile technology cart with camera-based projector offers access to the internet, multimedia tools, display of written work, digital presentation, and group book sharing – all on the Center’s 8’x10’ screen. A small performance platform with stage lighting and microphone enhance oral interpretation and performance. The Center Director sponsors writing contests, publishes the school literary magazines, and offers both enrichment and support for students and faculty.
, Language Arts Department Coordinator
MATH
The mathematics program at Brookwood provides a solid foundation in mathematical understanding from the very beginning concepts of number and counting in Pre-Kindergarten through Algebra 1 in Grade Eight. We aim to foster confidence in the face of unfamiliar problems, willingness to take risks, and appreciation for math as a tool with real-world applications. Graduates are well prepared for either a typical or advanced sequence of high school math courses.
We believe that children learn math best when they develop understanding of the patterns and principles that underlie numerical operations. In order to do this, they need opportunities to explore math concepts in multiple ways, make discoveries, and share their findings. If you visit a typical Brookwood math lesson, you are likely to see students actively engaged with “hands on” materials, visual models, games, group problem-solving explorations, or computer technology. All of these tools bring greater depth and meaning to paper-and-pencil math as students increase their confidence and skill as mathematicians.
We have recently adopted the Investigations in Number, Data, and Space curriculum for Grades K – 5. For more information about our use of this program, click here.
, Math Department Coordinator
PERFORMING ARTS
The Performing Arts Program seeks to teach all students to be creative and confident young musicians and performers in a multitude of musical styles. Performing is encouraged at every age and ability level, and it is our goal for all students to have the chance to perform in some way, individually or in a group, at one of our weekly School Meetings. All students participate in the Lower School play, Holiday Revels, Middle School Revue, and the Grade Eight musical. Additionally, we have a conscious focus on instrumental and vocal ensembles, and in music classes students receive instruction on instruments provided by the school, including steel drums, Orff instruments, guitars, drums, and handbells.
Private lessons and after-school programs are available for kids looking for additional music and drama experience. Current after-school programs include contemporary combos, jazz/blues groups, drama, and vocal studio for young singers. A third of the school's population currently takes advantage of the private lesson program which offers piano, voice, guitar, bass guitar, woodwind, string, and drum instruction, and we have a varied staff of terrific musical instructors with expertise in classical, jazz, folk, and contemporary styles of music.
Strategically located near the School Meeting House, the Beinecke Family Music Room and the Lower School Music Classroom are specially designed and acoustically treated for large and small ensemble work. Brookwood students have access to a professional recording studio used for individual and group cd projects. Guitars (electric and acoustic), microphones, and amps are readily available for student use. Numerous practice rooms offer dedicated workspace for the school's private lesson and after-school music programs. Our musical staff can offer assistance and expertise in a multitude of musical styles. We LOVE music!
, Head of Performing Arts Department
PERSONAL GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT
PGD is a program designed to promote the personal growth of each student at Brookwood, to encourage the development of good decision-making skills and sound ethical sense, to consider a variety of social and moral issues, to help each student gain an understanding of self and others, and to promote self-respect, self-confidence, and self-esteem. The program has lots of elements, among them a curricular component in Grades Three through Eight, which focuses specifically on non-academic issues. In addition, PGD includes a Buddy Program (Pre-K through Grade Eight) in which older students are paired with younger schoolmates in order to promote principles of community responsibility, sharing, caring, organization, and thoughtfulness. The Advisor Program in the Upper School is also part of PGD, as are a number of service opportunities, the Freedom from Chemical Dependency Program, and overnight class trips are other components of the program.
PHYSICAL EDUCATION AND ATHLETICS
 There’s an athlete in all of us just waiting to be discovered. Finding and developing that athlete is what our physical education program is all about. Beginning with our youngest students and culminating with our 6th grade students, we provide a comprehensive physical education program that is designed to help each individual develop an appreciation of the benefits of being physically active. We do this through skill development and individual and team play, and we do it by providing a safe and supportive environment where students of all abilities become more comfortable and confident in taking risks by working outside of their comfort zone. Sportsmanship is taught, modeled, and honored in our program. In addition to the regular physical education curriculum in 6th grade, we provide opportunities for students to experience some interscholastic competition in the sports offered at the 7th and 8th grade levels.
In the 7th and 8th grades, we move from a physical education program to a developmentally appropriate athletic program. We require our students to play either in our interscholastic or our intramural athletic program. By this time, students have been exposed to all sports offerings, enabling them to make informed and comfortable sports choices. In our interscholastic program, we provide two levels (varsity and junior varsity) of competition, each with its own guiding philosophy. Students go through an extensive tryout period at the start of each season. Our varsity teams play a very competitive schedule primarily against high school junior varsity teams. Although winning is an acknowledged priority at the varsity level, we also overtly emphasize teamwork and sportsmanship. Although everyone plays, we do not require equal playing time at the varsity level. At the junior varsity level, our teams play a middle school schedule; the players get more-or-less equal playing time, and the emphasis is on skill and strategy development. Although we are not able to offer everyone’s sport of choice at Brookwood, we do want to honor their interests, so we seasonally provide a sports option which allows a student to both fulfill his or her sports requirement and to leave at the regular dismissal time each day.
 Our Physical Education Department consists of three highly experienced, certified instructors, and our 7th and 8th grade athletic program is coached by a variety of Brookwood teachers who not only have played sports themselves, but also have experience coaching. All coaches are certified in CPR and First Aid. Our facilities include two full-size gymnasiums, 2 fields and an additional practice/recreation area, a pond for winter skating, an indoor climbing wall, and an outdoor ropes course with both high and low elements, and locker rooms for both boys and girls in Grades 4 through 8. We offer interscholastic opportunities in field hockey, boys and girls soccer, boys and girls basketball, co-ed ice hockey, and boys and girls lacrosse.
, Athletic Director
SCIENCE
 Often a group of Brookwood science students ventures beyond their classroom walls to explore our campus and the surrounding areas. They study specimens from and make maps of the Cutler Pond, collect water and soil samples from the Brookwood stream, compare and contrast the school’s wetlands areas with the surrounding woods, create a vernal pond field guide, investigate why salt marshes are among the most biologically productive ecosystems in the world, and examine the critical link between the salt marsh and the ocean. Each grade level focuses on a specific resource to study. Inside, students can be found constructing clay and paper reptiles and amphibians for the Herp Museum, programming Lego robots, using simple machines to build a Rube Goldberg contraption, learning African American and Iroquois cultures through the study of constellations, or discovering how the systems in the human body work and how to maintain a healthy body.
At Brookwood, our students engage in the type of study that promotes both scientific understanding and also develops the scientific habits of mind that can help them to make sense of the natural and designed worlds. The work that students do at each grade level is hands-on and often collaborative; it is built upon observation and problem solving.
Outstanding technology, state-of-the-art facilities, a campus that lends itself to scientific inquiry, and a dedicated faculty support the Brookwood science program. We boast a 1,000 square-foot Science Gym, a kind of gym of the mind dedicated to all aspects of the science experience; 4 science classrooms, each with outdoor access and complementary lab space; our own set of wireless laptop computers; Smartboard technology; and at least 6 different aquatic habitats.
, Science Department Coordinator
SOCIAL STUDIES
 At Brookwood, social studies prepares kids to think. Students question the sources of their information, examine perspectives, and identify bias. When they study Columbus, they read the letters that the explorer himself wrote, rather than just a text book. They identify the groups and cultures of which they are a part, and they come to appreciate the foundations of each. They study maps, and they make them. They compare and contrast. They use evidence to persuade, and they seek it in the arguments of others. Our students make connections. Social studies and history come alive because teachers encourage students to connect their studies with the world around them.
Teachers at Brookwood tap into the rich cultural network of both the North Shore and Boston to complement class work. Students recall witch hunts at the House of Seven Gables. They literally climb inside the globe at the unique Mapparium, part of the Mary Baker Eddy Center in Boston. Older students travel to the Eighth District Courthouse, where they serve as jurors in a mock trial sponsored by the Harvard Law School Trial Advocacy Program. Exciting, relevant, challenging—all attributes of the social studies program at Brookwood.
, History Department Coordinator
TECHNOLOGY
The use of technology as a learning tool can make a measurable difference in student interest, achievement, and attitudes. We believe that it is important to empower children to take an active role in their own learning by giving them the tools for tomorrow. Most importantly, students learn by doing, and the nearly 200 student computers throughout Brookwood make that possible by providing a student/computer ratio of 2:1.
 Picture a first or second grade student, staring intently at an iBook screen, eight fingers poised over the 'home' keys, oblivious to the commotion in the surrounding room. She sounds out words as they appear and then types them. Impossible? Not with Read, Write & Type, a phonics-based typing and writing program for primary grades developed by neuropsychology experts at the Media Learning Center of San Rafael, California. This unique program, now entering its eleventh year of use at Brookwood, sets the stage for Middle School typing instruction and supports the Lower School reading and writing efforts. It is far and away one of the most popular subjects for our younger students.
After Type to Learn, students move into our keyboarding program that is designed ultimately to enable the students to type without looking at the keys. Beginning in third grade, after students have been exposed to both phonetic and fingering principles in the Lower School, they are given 30 minutes a week to develop and practice their keyboarding skills. By the end of the fifth grade, the class average for all fifth grade students has been above 43 words per minute for the last 6 years, and students keep improving their speed through the writing of homework assignments.
Upon graduating, students have learned basic and advanced word processing techniques, how to use spreadsheets and databases, how to manage information on a computer, develop effective multimedia presentations, manipulate graphics, and use the Internet effectively and in a safe and ethical manner.
In addition to both Mac and PC computer labs, Brookwood has two laptop carts with wireless capabilities, digital cameras, scanners, robotics and many award-winning software titles. The PC Lab is outfitted with MIDI interfaces to piano keyboards to support our music program. Supervised Internet access is available everywhere via our T1 access line. The Eleanor M. DiCroce Library houses an eighteen-computer reference area, online library card catalog, as well as Internet access to more than 25 local town library card catalogs. More than 15 Interactive SmartBoards© can be found in our science department, as well as Middle and Upper School classrooms and Upper School music room. In our multimedia World Language lab, students use digital video, sound editing software, world language websites and CDs to master new languages. Brookwood's website and intranet continue to grow, supporting our students, faculty and parents in addition to providing information to visitors.
While Brookwood strongly supports the use of technological resources in its continuing commitment to children, we believe that it is a balance of teaching and curriculum that directs the most appropriate use of technology in meeting the needs of our students.
, Director of Communications and Technology
VISUAL ARTS
 The art rooms at Brookwood are buzzing with activity, and our halls are filled with the many creations of our budding young artists. Students begin coming to the art room in pre-kindergarten, and they continue their studio art instruction through eighth grade. Our program is sequential in both theory and practice, and all students are exposed to a wide variety of two and three dimensional art forms, such as drawing, painting, printmaking, sculpture, bookmaking, fabric art, mixed-media, graphic design, and ceramics.
Basic art concepts and skills are taught, practiced, and reinforced each year as students move through the art program. Formal instruction is given when a new concept or technique is introduced, yet students are also encouraged to explore and experiment with materials and individual ideas. Throughout all the grades, Brookwood students are introduced to the artwork of various world cultures, past and present. We work collaboratively with other disciplines to make curricular connections and to broaden student understanding of given topics. Field trips to various museums and places of interest are a regular part of the program, as is working with visiting artists each year. In addition to the ever-present display of student art, an all-school exhibit takes place in April to honor and celebrate the creative efforts of each student at Brookwood. For those eighth grade students who have identified themselves as having a pronounced interest in visual art, we offer a special portfolio program which meets for an additional period each week.
 The art program boasts three classrooms/studios, each equipped with appropriate technology, as well as an additional ceramic /clay studio and kiln. A small art library exists in one of the classrooms, and we are also fortunate to have a wood working studio located on the lower level of the Upper School.
Our intention in the Brookwood art program is to develop a visually literate and informed young person who better understands and appreciates what is involved in the making of art. We work hard to create an atmosphere in which each of our student feels encouraged and supported in his or her creative endeavors, and we truly believe that each child is an artist.
, Head of Visual Arts Department
World Language
 Brookwood students begin the study of French and Spanish in Kindergarten. This early exposure to a new language allows students an opportunity to acquire an authentic accent at an age when they are most receptive. Lower School students engage in activities such as songs, games and stories, intended to develop listening and speaking skills. World Language students are introduced to writing in Middle School, where they begin to create their own skits and short, illustrated paragraphs. The Upper School program is designed to cover material typically taught in first and second year high school language courses. Cultural projects are also an important part of the curriculum, and kids might be found celebrating El Día de Los Meurtos or enjoying salsa instruction in Spanish or perhaps making delicious crepes in French.
The World Language Department is fortunate to have its own dedicated teaching space comprised of four classrooms and a 14-station computer lab. The lab provides students with access to digitized tapes, voice recording software, CD/ROM, and a host of relevant Internet games. Brookwood makes an effort to hire language teachers from many different backgrounds, thereby exposing students to other cultures and native accents through personal relationships with their instructors.
, Department Chair, World Languages
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