Curriculum has come to mean the set of textbooks used for a course or courses, but here we intend the older meaning: the course of study to be followed by all students of the school. The following briefly explains that course and reasons for each part of it.

Students should grow to be pious Lutherans who live in the hope of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. So they attend daily Matins or Divine Service and learn Bible passages, the catechism, and hymns from an early age, memorizing Luther’s Small Catechism by Form 2 (4th grade) as well as committing to memory 35 hymns, more than 60 short Bible passages and several whole chapters of Scripture by Form 10 (12th grade). Of course, God is not relegated to a religion class, but all subjects are taught under the assumption that God is Lord of creation and active in it and all are illuminated by the Holy Scriptures. We teach the older students how to profitably and privately meditate on the Word of God and all students will, at a minimum, read the Bible twice through.

Our first priority is caring for the souls of our students, but students are not just souls or minds. They are also bodies and we cannot neglect the training and discipline of the body. The youngest students are given ample time and space to run, climb, jump, and wrestle at two half-hour recesses each day. They learn classic, active, indoor and outdoor games and some sports. Later, we begin to hone their physical abilities through fencing, archery, dance, and martial arts. Older students are taught calisthenics and running which are practiced daily to maintain health and strength.

Children’s affections are formed by the stories they know, so we teach them a wide variety of quality, classic literature. We also teach them dozens of folk songs and more than 100 poems that point to what is true, good and beautiful. As they grow, we introduce them to the great works of western literature. A student will read and summarize 6 to 10 classic works each year. They also learn the true stories of history. The youngest begin with what is closest to them, American history. They then learn the history of the world from creation to the 20th century, recognizing God’s hand of providence and judgment in the great men and events as well as the small.

Beauty in the fine arts also shapes the affections, so we teach the students musical and visual arts. Each student has both music and art classes to train not only skills in the fine arts, but also an appreciation of and desire for beauty in those arts.

All people, but especially Christians should have a strong grasp of language – their mother tongue primarily, and secondarily other languages that hold the best of what has been thought and said. So we begin by teaching them the orderliness of their language through phonetic reading and spelling. We teach formal English grammar to younger students, followed by formal and material logic. We teach skills of rhetoric in both speaking and writing, beginning in the youngest forms with recitation and adding explicit writing instruction in Form 1 (3rd grade). Older students learn rhetorical skills through classic writing exercises (the Progymnasmata) and begin to master the five canons of rhetoric. We teach Latin beginning in Form 2 (4th grade), expecting all students to become fluent in both reading and speaking. Finally, we add Greek in the upper school.

Students should learn to see and love the orderliness and harmony in God’s creation which are expressed most clearly and beautifully in the mathematical arts. So we teach arithmetic, geometry, algebra and calculus. These courses reflect the classical Quadrivium in the way each deals with number. Throughout each, we teach a curiosity about number itself and learn to see its beauty.

Students should also learn to see the beauty and the intricacies of the natural world, of God’s creation and to wonder at its excellence, complexity, and harmony. The youngest students begin by simply observing, learning to name the trees and the birds and the flowers, learning how nature behaves in its normal course, e.g. What do the trees do through the seasons. They learn this by going outside and looking at, describing, and drawing what God has made. Later we introduce a more academic description of the details, studying botany, zoology, anatomy and earth sciences. Then they learn the basics of physics, chemistry, biology, and astronomy.

All these are not discrete pieces to be assembled together in any way that seems best. They are all intrinsically united, ultimately in Christ. They are also not packets of information to be downloaded, but the means of cultivating virtuous and Godly men and women.

Integrated Literature and History Curricula

Here is an overview of what the children read in each form from A-2, or ages 5-10. This sequence is proprietary and copyright (C) 2018 Redeemer Classical School.

Form A

Literature: Classics and Fairy Tales

Classic Literature:

  • Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne
  • Velveteen Rabbit, Margery Williams
  • Ugly Duckling, Hans Christian Anderson
  • The Frog Prince
  • Hansel and Gretel
  • Pinocchio, Carlo Collodi
  • Tales of Brer Rabbit
  • Aesop’s Fables, selected
  • The Red Fairy Book, Andrew Lang
  • Peter Rabbit and more, Beatrix Potter
  • Princess and the Goblin, George MacDonald
  • Billy and Blaze, Clarence W. Anderson

Read-Alouds:

  • Bremen Town Musicians
  • Cinderella
  • King Midas
  • Little Red Riding Hood
  • Snow White
  • The Wolf and Kids, Brothers Grimm
  • The Pied Piper of Hamelin
  • Puss in Boots
  • Rapunzel
  • Rumpelstiltskin
  • Sleeping Beauty
  • Chanticleer and the Fox
  • Paul Bunyan
  • Pecos Bill
  • The Princess and the Pea

World History: Old Testament
U.S History: Discovery to Pioneers

Primary Texts: “A Child’s Garden of Bible Stories,” Arthur Gross (Concordia Publishing); “The Story Bible,” Edward Englebrecht (Concordia Publishing); “Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans,” Edward Eggleston (Memoria Press); “Stories of America, Volume 1,” by Charles Morris (Simply Charlotte Mason).

Read-Aloud and Supplementary:

  • Leif the Lucky, Edward and Ingri D’Aulaire
  • Columbus, Edward and Ingri D’Aulaire
  • Pocahontas, Edward and Ingri D’Aulaire
  • Jamestown: New World Adventure, James Knight
  • Pilgrims of Plimoth, Marcia Sewall
  • Samuel Eaton’s Day
  • Sarah Morton’s Day
  • Squanto, Friend of Pilgrims, Clyde Bulla
  • George Washington, Edward and Ingri D’Aulaire
  • George Washington’s Rules of Civility
  • Winter at Valley Forge, James Knight
  • The Fourth of July Story, Alice Dagleish
  • Benjamin Franklin, Edward and Ingri D’Aulaire
  • A More Perfect Union, Betsy Maestro
  • Paul Revere’s Ride, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
  • Obadiah the Bold, Brinton Turkle
  • Courage of Sarah Noble, Alice Dagleish
  • David and Goliath, Leonard Fisher
  • The Boy Who Drew Birds, Jacqueline Davies

Form B

Literature: Classics and Fairy Tales

Classic Literature:

  • Beauty and the Beast
  • A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
  • Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White
  • Just So Stories, Rudyard Kipling
  • Aesop’s Fables, selected
  • Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
  • Arabian Nights: Aladdin and Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves
  • King of the Golden River, John Ruskin
  • Blue Fairy Book, Andrew Lang
  • Little Mermaid; The Nightingale, Snow Queen; The Steadfast Tin Soldier; Thumbelina; and The Tinderbox, by Hans Christian Anderson
  • The Happy Prince and Other Tales, Oscar Wilde
  • Sarah, Plain and Tall, Patricia MacLachlan (Easy Reader)

Read-Alouds:

  • The Blind Men and the Elephant
  • The Emperor’s New Clothes
  • The Fisherman and His Wife
  • Apple and the Arrow: William Tell, Conrad Buff
  • Saint George and the Dragon
  • John Henry
  • Stone Soup
  • The Little Match Girl
  • Casey Jones
  • Johnny Appleseed, Will Moses

World History: New Testament
U.S History: Civil War to Cold War

Primary Texts: “A Child’s Garden of Bible Stories,” Arthur Gross (Concordia Publishing); “The Story Bible,” Edward Englebrecht (Concordia Publishing); “Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans,” Edward Eggleston (Memoria Press); “Stories of America, Volume 2,” by Charles Morris (Simply Charlotte Mason).

Read-Aloud and Supplementary:

  • Abraham Lincoln, Ingri and Edward D’Aulaire
  • Buffalo Bill, Ingri and Edward D’Aulaire
  • Picture Book of Sitting Bull, David Adler
  • Meet Abraham Lincoln, Barbara Cary
  • Abe Lincoln: The Young Years, Keith Brandt
  • Young Abe Lincoln, Cheryll Harness
  • Go Free Or Die, Jeri Ferris
  • Walking the Road to Freedom, Jeri Ferris
  • John Henry: American Legend, Ezra Keats
  • George Washington Carver, Tonya Bolden
  • A Weed Is A Flower, Aliki
  • Song of the Swallows, Leo Politi
  • Thomas Alva Edison, Louis Sabin
  • Wilbur and Orville Wright, Louis Sabin
  • Marie Curie, Brave Scientist, Keith Brandt
  • Picture Book of Louis Braille, David Adler
  • The Amazing, Impossible Erie Canal, Cheryll Harness
  • When I Was Young and In the Mountains, Cynthia Rylant

Form 1

Classic Literature

Novels:

  • Peter Pan, J.M. Barrie
  • Little House on the Prairie, Laura Ingalls Wilder
  • Farmer Boy, Laura Ingalls Wilder
  • Mary Poppins, P.L. Travers
  • Caddie Woodlawn, Carol Ryrie Brink
  • Courage of Sarah Noble, Alice Dagleish (Easy Reader)
  • The Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling
  • At the Back of the North Wind, George MacDonald
  • The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis
  • Swallows and Amazons, Arthur Ransome
  • Bambi, Felix Satten

Short Stories:

  • Gulliver’s Travels (selections), Jonathan Swift
  • Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • Rip Van Winkle, Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • The Boy at the Dike
  • Wonder Book for Boys and Girls, Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • Tanglewood Tales, Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • American Tall Tales, Adrian Stotenberg
  • Classic Myths to Read Aloud, William Russell
  • Gilgamesh the King Trilogy, Ludmila Zeman

World History: Ancient
U.S History: Discovery to Pioneers

Primary Texts: “Story of the World, Volume 1,” Susan Wise Bauer (Well-Trained Mind Press); “Ancient Egypt and Her Neighbors,” Lorene Lambert (Simply Charlotte Mason); “Famous Men of Greece,” John Henry Haaren (Memoria Press); “Famous Men of Rome,” John Henry Haaren (Memoria Press); “A Child’s First Book of American History,” James Earl Miers (Beautiful Feet Books).

Read-Aloud and Supplementary:

  • Eric the Red and Leif the Lucky, Barbara Schiller
  • First Voyage to America, Christopher Columbus (Santa Maria log)
  • Of Plymouth Plantation, William Bradford
  • Paul Revere: Son of Liberty, Keith Brandt
  • Pyramid, David MacAulay
  • Tales of Ancient Egypt, Roger Lancelyn Green (selections)
  • Cleopatra, Diane Stanley
  • Seekers of Knowledge, James Rumford
  • Riddle of the Rosetta Stone, James Cross Giblin
  • Children’s Plutarch, F.J. Gould
  • City, David MacAulay
  • The Great Wall of China, Lenard Everett Fisher
  • Archimedes and the Door of Science, Jeanne Bendick
  • Herodotus and the Road to History, Jeanne Bendick
  • Athanasius, Simonetta Carr

Form 2

Classic Literature

Novels:

  • Heidi, Johanna Spyri
  • Robin Hood, Howard Pyle
  • The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
  • The Prince and the Pauper, Mark Twain
  • King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, Roger Lancelyn Green
  • Stories from Don Quixote, James Baldwin
  • The Railway Children, E. Nesbit
  • Penrod, Booth Tarkington
  • Stories of Fairie Queene, Mary MacLeod

Short Stories:

  • Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
  • A Cricket in Times Square, George Selden
  • Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White
  • A Door in the Wall, Marguerite D’Angeli
  • Canterbury Tales, Barbara Cohen

World History: Medieval
U.S History: Civil War to Cold War

Primary Texts: “Story of the World, Volume 2,” Susan Wise Bauer (Well-Trained Mind Press); “Famous Men of the Middle Ages,” John Henry Haaren (Memoria Press); “Trial and Triumph,” Richard Hannula (Canon Press); “A Child’s First Book of American History,” James Earl Miers (Beautiful Feet Books).

Read-Aloud and Homework:

  • Viking Myths, Ingri and Edward D’Aulaire
  • Viking Tales, Jennie Hall
  • Foxe’s Book of Martyrs
  • Castle, David MacAulay
  • Joan of Arc, Diane Stanley
  • Cathedral, David MacAulay
  • Adam of the Road, Elizabeth Janet Gray
  • Gregor Mendel, the Friar Who Grew Peas, Cheryl Bardoe
  • Abraham Lincoln Grows Up, Carl Sandburg
  • Turn Homeward, Hannalee, Patricia Beatty
  • Narrative of the Life of Stephen Douglas
  • Amos Fortune, Free Man, Elizabeth Yates
  • Teddy Roosevelt, Rough Rider, Edd Winfield Parks
  • Riding the Pony Express, Clyde Bulla
  • The World at Her Fingertips: Helen Keller, Joan Dash
  • Louis Braille, Margaret Davidson