The ECS Curriculum
Perhaps the question I hear most frequently from inquiring families is “What curriculum do you use at ECS?”
It’s a fair question. But one that can be laden with assumptions.
Let me start by admitting defining a word like “curriculum” is difficult. One way to think of it is in terms of content: Curriculum is the sum total of what an educational program communicates (through its objectives, textbooks, activities, requirements, culture, and expectations) specifically for the purpose of helping students realize their full potential as God’s image bearers. And such a definition is helpful as far as it goes, but there’s more to it than that. To say “full potential” smuggles in assumptions about the result of education on the lives of our students.
On this classical view, curriculum is the life course a student is set on as a result of their education (and education is not limited to what happens in the classroom). Hence a school may be measured, in part, by the accomplishments of its graduates. What life course did they take after graduating?
This is also a key reason to keep students with us the entirety of their K-12th grade education. Our program is designed around particular aims. To disrupt that program halfway or 3/4ths of the way through thwarts the entire objective and creates instability in the lives of students. It changes the life course on which they have been set, and indeed may set them on a course opposite of the Christian purposes of our program.
So what is our curriculum at Emmanuel Christian School? We follow a classical Christian curriculum.
Let’s start at a very high level: We aim to graduate students who are good people, useful citizens, and faithful disciples. This is the goal of our educational program, and we make decisions based on whether they contribute to meeting this goal or fail to do so. We think the classical tradition, focused on cultivating a student’s soul through the good, beautiful, and true is the best way to do this. This is how we set students on a God-glorifying life course.
Getting more specific, we want students to know God in all the ways He can be known. And we know that God is known through general revelation (Psalm 19, Romans 1) and special revelation (2 Timothy 3:16-17). This requires the use of reason. To use reason well, we need to know and understand the world around us.
This starts with grammar, learning the basic facts and the language of each discipline. We think in language. If we want students to grow into great thinkers, they must master language (or better yet, several languages). To master language requires knowing the rules by which it works. The language of history is centered around stories. The language of math is abstract, centered around numbers. The English language is phonetic in nature, so we teach phonics. Whatever the discipline, grammar school is where students learn the basic facts requisite for further growth and mastery.
As students grow in their mastery of basic facts, and develop as humans, they start to question and seek out the rationale for things. At this point we begin to teach logic, the rules of inference. Logic is both a subject (we can study formal and informal logic) and a way of organizing the knowledge of each discipline (e.g. - addition and subtraction are building blocks for multiplication and division). At this point we start to have students engage in exercises like disputatios, actually getting up and debating ideas in different formats to hone their use of logic and help them reach their full potential as rational bearers of God’s image.
With the basic facts and logic in hand, students are able to express themselves in ways that would not be possible otherwise. They can see connections between art and science, between theology and history, between language and math. This comes together in synthesis, bringing together ideas from many disciplines into a distinct and cohesive whole and expressing those ideas in persuasive ways. This is the art of rhetoric. Yes, oration is a key focus. But rhetoric is not limited to oratory. It also includes writing; writing essays, poems, novels, plays, songs, etc.
As you can see, establishing a curriculum, or setting a life course, requires preparation and planning. Most important is a clear view of the end of all of it. I don’t mean “end” merely as conclusion, but also as purpose.
Our purpose, as noted earlier, is to graduate good people, useful citizens, and faithful disciples. This purpose must be broken down into individual steps that will lead to such a life course. Because all things are created by Christ and in Christ all things hold together (Colossians 1:15-18), we teach accordingly. Our curriculum divides learning into the stages of grammar, logic, and rhetoric. The purpose of each stage is aligned with the overall purpose of education. At the end of the day we want the life course of each student who steps foot in Emmanuel Christian School to honor God through being a good person (3 John 1:11), useful citizen (Romans 13:1) and faithful disciple (John 15:10).
You may read all of this and think “That’s all well and good, but what textbooks do you use?”
Well, any list of texts will merely be a snapshot in time. We change texts from time to time. But as of today (February 13th, 2023) I’ll highlight a few of the major publishers we use:
Abeka - Phonics, handwriting, some Bible
Rod & Staff - Math & science
Memoria Press - Math, some Bible, spelling
Well-Trained Mind - History, some language arts (likely changing)
Reading - Uses a variety of publishers, focuses on the great books such as Mother Goose, Winnie The Pooh, Flat Stanley, Amelia Bedelia, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Federalist Papers, The US Constitution, King Arthur, Stuart Little, The City of God, Antigone, etc.
You’ll notice we have not chosen one publisher to use for every subject across the board. We are aiming at the best in each level/subject. Ultimately it is the critical use of reason that will help students bring all their learning together into a cohesive and coherent whole. And that’s (one reason) why we teach logic.
Hopefully this helps answer “What is our curriculum at ECS?” It’s a big question, laden with assumptions, but crucial to setting a good life course. The curriculum is far more than just a list of classes and their books; and as such it is evaluated in part by what our graduates go on to do with their lives. Hence we aim to graduate good people, useful citizens, and faithful disciples.
