Academic Program
Academic Excellence at Paul Penna Downtown Jewish Day School builds upon and surpasses the core skills outlined in the Ontario Ministry of Education guidelines. Critical thinking skills are integrated into all aspects of curriculum development and instruction. Children gain a deep understanding of subject material and make meaningful connections across subject areas.
Our curriculum challenges students to excel across the disciplines, providing a solid foundation in Math, Science, Social Studies, Language Arts, Arts and Physical Education, Judaic Studies, Hebrew Language and Torah. Through field trips, we take advantage of the unlimited opportunities available throughout the city to make learning come alive.
Our school cultivates an environment where children love to learn, are engaged in their learning, think critically, work both independently and cooperatively, and approach tasks creatively.
Our approach to instruction through integrated units allows us to provide meaningful learning experiences while helping children develop essential skills. We are able to offer our students a broad foundation of knowledge, leading to an understanding of relationships amongst concepts.
Integrated curriculum combines subject areas in order to highlight relationships among concepts. Resources go beyond textbooks, to include a wide range of books, films, speakers, and community connections; student groupings are flexible and dynamic; thematic units are developed around essential questions. Our integrated units bridge concepts between Science, Social Studies, Language Arts, and Judaic Studies, allowing children to make meaningful, interdisciplinary connections through experiential learning.
Students begin each new thematic unit through a period of exploration and inquiry. This offers them the opportunity to discover what it is they already know about a topic, what they might be interested in learning, and where to look for the answers to their questions. As they delve more deeply into a unit, students become aware of links to others areas of the curriculum, as well as connections to their own lives.
The positive effects of curriculum integration are outlined by M. Lipson (1993):
- Integrated curriculum helps students apply skills.
- An integrated knowledge base leads to faster retrieval of information.
- Multiple perspectives lead to a more integrated knowledge base.
- Integrated curriculum encourages depth and breadth in learning.
- Integrated curriculum provides for more quality time for curriculum exploration.
- Integrate curriculum promotes positive attitudes in students.
