Academics — Frostig West
“Frostig is a treasure. Because of the specialized instruction, my boys now love going to school, are responsible and diligent about doing their homework and take pride in their work.”
Frostig Parent
The academic program at The Frostig School is built on the philosophy that children learn best in an environment that is predictable, calm, and attuned to their individual learning styles. We adhere to the California Common Core standards and implement a variety of evidence-based instructional strategies for all academic content areas.
We enrich our curriculum and instruction with other programs, methods, and materials to ensure that our students are successful. Classes are limited to eight students and are taught by two teachers, one taking the lead in delivering instruction while the other provides support for the students.
With the 4:1 ratio between students and staff, Frostig teachers can individualize each student’s learning plan to maximize the attention and support they receive throughout the school day.
English Language Arts
Frostig is committed to improving each student’s reading fluency and comprehension. One of the specific supplemental programs that we utilize is the Wilson Reading System. This structured literacy program addresses the needs of our students who struggle with decoding and encoding words, which impacts their reading fluency and comprehension, as well as their writing and spelling skills.
Our reading specialist helps to oversee the implementation of this program and provides additional 1:1 instruction for students who need an additional layer of support to develop their skills. In addition to the Wilson Reading System, many of our teachers have been trained in Lindamood Bell’s Visualizing and Verbalizing strategies to help build our students’ reading comprehension skills.
Along with reading fluency and comprehension, the English Language Arts program also strives to enhance students’ writing skills by focusing on grammar, sentence and paragraph structure, and the overall conventions of narrative, expository, and persuasive writing.
Mathematics
Our math program focuses on the multi-sensory math approach, using manipulatives to transform abstract math concepts into concrete, hands-on experiences that deepen comprehension and build confidence for our students. We combine skill-based instruction to ensure that students are mastering foundational skills with grade level content taught with accommodations and scaffolding to ensure success.
Frostig’s teachers focus on building numeracy and computational skills in our elementary classrooms, expanding those skills into fractions, decimals, ratios, and pre-algebra in our middle school classrooms, and then finally conquering algebra and geometry in our high school classrooms.
To support our high schoolers in algebra, we spread the class over two years to allow for additional review and more time to master key algebra concepts. Finally, recognizing that our students need to navigate everyday math skills such as managing money and telling time, our high school students also participate in a Consumer Math/Independent Living Skills class that focuses on financial awareness and implements real-world math and problem solving skills.
History and Science
In history and science, we try to incorporate hands-on activities whenever possible to help the topics come alive for the students. In science classes, students have constructed and erupted volcanoes, conducted osmosis experiments, and extracted their own DNA from a saliva sample.
In economics, the students participate in a mock “Shark Tank” activity in which they create a product, pitch it to the “sharks” (impersonated by Frostig staff members), and try to gain “funding” for their projects. In US history, students have worked collaboratively to write a “Classroom Constitution” to establish rules at the beginning of the year and have written personal “Declarations of Independence” in which they declare themselves independent of a societal issue they believe needs to change.
In world history, students research other countries, focusing on their history, culture, and government to create projects that share what they’ve learned with their peers. Frostig believes that approaching history and science through fun, engaging, and hands-on activities allows students to develop greater understanding of our world and its history and to see the application of key concepts in their everyday lives.