St. Catherine students enjoy specialist classes in the following subject areas:

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Music 

Music classes are tailored to the academic level of our students. Everyone is encouraged to sing and play instruments and to learn music from many settings around our country and the world.

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Art

​The St. Catherine School art department has always stressed art making as a process where critical thinking, problem solving, experimentation and reflection are fostered. We also have a lot of messy fun! Students can see their art work displayed around the school, in Victoria Hall and in our online art gallery. 

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Physical Education

Through a variety of traditional and non-traditional sports, games, and functional movement activities, students learn about fitness, motor skills, nutrition, and bones and muscles.

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Spanish​

Preschool and Kindergarten

For Preschool and Kindergarten Spanish, we mostly focus on getting the students introduced and excited about learning a second language! We use Sing 'n' Speak Spanish which uses puppet skits, art projects, and songs to teach new vocabulary and help contextualize the language.

 

Grades 1-5

For grades first through fifth, we use Sonrisas Spanish I and II. The curriculum spirals meaning so that it can be used to reinforce language learned in the previous years with a little extra add on for each year. Both Sonrisas I (first and second) and Sonrisas II (third through fifth) use songs, visuals cues, storybooks in both English and Spanish, and art projects to help build more Spanish vocabulary and to begin working on grammatical structures.

 

Grades 6 and 7

For grades sixth and seventh, we use Sonrisas III books I and II. Book I (sixth grade) reinforces grammar structures and starts to identify linguistic tools students can use to decode meaning in Spanish. Book II (seventh grade) focuses on the cultural aspects of language while reinforcing and building on previous vocabulary and grammar.

 

Grade 8

For eighth grade, we use Somos I, a Spanish I curriculum that teaches through language acquisition rather than memorization. Somos aims to help students learn through comprehensible input and increase their confidence with language output. This curriculum is commonly used in Spanish I classrooms, but even if not, will prepare our eighth graders for high school Spanish.

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