St. Michael School adopts Catholic Classical Curriculum

Stonington — St. Michael School is going back to the basics, emphasizing Latin, classic literature and the history of Western civilization, as well as phonics, logic, grammar and memorization.

It’s all part of the school’s decision to begin phasing in the Catholic Classical Curriculum, which was once the norm in parochial schools across the country.

When the transition is complete, it will make the preschool-to-grade-8 school in Pawcatuck the only one in the Diocese of Norwich offering the curriculum. But an increasing number of Catholic schools across the country have been making a similar change with the debate over the Common Core curriculum and some parents seeking a return to more traditional Catholic instruction.

Principal Doris Messina said that while the 144-year-old school already boasts a rigorous curriculum that results in its students typically testing one to two grades higher on standardized testing, it was still looking for way to improve instruction for its 118 students.

“We started looking at how to improve our curriculum, what we could do be different than other schools and what would make someone want to come to St. Michael’s School,” she said.

In announcing the change last week, Principal Doris Messina said the classical method has proven to produce some of the highest SAT scores of any curriculum.

As she reviewed the educational research, she said the benefits of classical education became clear. She said the curriculum would not be a huge change for the school, which was already teaching French and Latin.

“It just seemed like a normal progression for us to go in that direction,” she said.

In announcing the curriculum change last week, Messina said the classical method has proven to produce some of the highest SAT scores of any curriculum.

“It prepares students not just for high school, college or a career, but to become lifelong learners who are informed, engaged and faithfilled members of society,” she said.

Messina said that while students will still learn how to read with phonics, they will progress not with basal readers but the great works of literature from classic nursery rhymes and Aesop’s Fables to varied works such as “Iliad,” “To Kill a Mockingbird” and the writings of Shakespeare.

She said the use of great classical literature and primary sources will “allow students to discern the original intent of the writers and the truths of the documents.”

The curriculum will emphasize language to help develop students’ ability “to think well, write well, and speak well.”

In addition, she said students will be taught to have informed opinions they can back up with facts they have analyzed “and not just go with emotion.”

She explained that instead of the themes of social studies, “history will become history again” as the new curriculum will focus on the development of Western civilization from Greeks and Romans through Medieval times to the present.

“We need to see how history progressed to understand how we got here and why we got here. Then we can ask questions about what to do now,” she said.

In announcing the new curriculum, Messina said, “students will study the great ideas of Western Civilization. Democracy, science, art, and literature will provide the impetus for understanding how the past influences and unifies our culture.”

“We’re losing something by moving away from these things,” she said of the need for a classic integrated liberal arts education made by popular by the Jesuits. “We’ve become a very skills-oriented education system rather than gathering information and analyzing it.”

Messina said she visited a Catholic school in Maryland which uses the Catholic Classical Curriculum and that it was amazing to see fourth-graders with “a spot-on performance” of Antigone while second graders prepared to debate the case of a Roman slave being flogged for being taught to read.

Students will also begin studying Latin in the early grades. Messina said that as the basis of all the Romance languages, Latin is not only beneficial “to the acquisition of these languages but to the teaching of logic, grammar and vocabulary.”

Messina said families who attend St. Michael, St. Mary in Stonington, St. Thomas Moore in North Stonington and St. Patrick in Mystic have been told of the change in case they are interested in their children attending St. Michael.

Messina said there also may be interest from parents of children who are home schooled, as classical education is popular among the group.

Messina said she has discussed the curriculum change with officials from other Catholic schools in the diocese.

“Everyone is looking to see how we make out with it,” she said.

An increasing number of Catholic schools across the country have been making a similar change with the debate over the Common Core curriculum and some parents seeking a return to more traditional Catholic instruction.