Academics
Carriculum Overview
A St. Thomas More School education provides an academic environment that allows our students to flourish. Our academic program follows the Diocese of Allentown curriculum guidelines and our instructional activities are enhanced by our commitment to the highest standards of student performance. Our students master knowledge and skills that will help them become productive citizens who can navigate their future successfully. Our academic program challenges our students while offering them the support they need to achieve.
The exemplary achievement of our students is influenced by the following characteristics of our school and our program:
We care about the success of all students and we use information technology and learning support resources to ensure that all students achieve.
While providing a strong foundation for skills development, we offer many opportunities to do creative problem-solving activities that enrich students’ learning and develop conceptual understanding.
We continuously analyze student performance to evaluate and improve our curriculum, our teaching, and our learning activities.
Our teachers reference data from multiple forms of assessment to inform their instruction and respond to students’ needs.
Our parents and the St. Thomas More community work with the school in a partnership to reinforce our educational efforts.
KINDERGARTEN
St. Thomas More Catholic School offers learning experiences and opportunities that will assist in developing the physical, social, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual potentialities of the child. Our kindergarten provides an atmosphere that offers children opportunities to seek knowledge while encouraging their continual wondering, discovering, and becoming. This atmosphere includes the experience of a faith community where the children participate in and share life with others in an environment of Christian love. It also includes sharing a message of joy and Good News that the Lord is truly a loving Father. Finally, flowing from the experience with others and encouraged by the message of faith, the children experience themselves as a response to each others needs.
Our full-day kindergarten program provides a strong academic foundation in literacy and math. Language and listening skills are emphasized through phonemic awareness, letter recognition and formation, vocabulary development, grammar and oral and written communication. Through the use of manipulatives, students will represent and compare whole numbers. Students will learn how to describe shapes and space. Also, students will begin to develop the process of problem solving by choosing and utilizing effective strategies they have learned.
MIDDLE SCHOOL
The STM academic program in the upper grades provides our students with a variety of learning experiences with the addition of World Language and a Tech Class in our iLab. We teach children how to leverage the potential that technology offers in a positive environment helping them to be productive digital citizens. Inquiry-based STEM learning happens by doing in the classroom, through hands-on science lab experiences, in the iLab and in the marketplace
Experiences in and out of the classroom by grade:
Sixth Grade students perform in the 5th and 6th Grade Christmas Play in December and travel to Mercy School for Special Learning to enjoy watching their Christmas Play. Students participate in the 6th Grade Science Fair in February. Projects are proudly displayed and all other grades are invited to come and hear about these wonderful projects from the sixth grade scientists. Students also participate in the Lehigh University Science And Engineering Fair in March. In the Spring, students have the opportunity to attend a DeSales University Act 3 Production and also visit J.R. Peters on a Science Field Trip. Students enjoy spending time with their Prayer Partners. Tie Dying shirts and the annual kickball game are the favorites. To end the year, a fun day is spent at Green Acres Neighborhood Park.
Seventh grade students participate in career-centered field trips including trips to The National Museum of Mathematics in NYC, Lehigh Valley Health Network’s Health Explorer’s program as well as a trip to the Lehigh County Courthouse. Students continue to grow their personal interests as well as their leadership skills in clubs such as Student Council, Newspaper, Yearbook, Declamation, MathCounts, You Be the Chemist, and PJAS. Students in seventh grade also look forward to the school dances at Halloween and Valentine’s Day.
Eighth Grade is a year when students have myriad opportunities to engage in experiences based in faith, academics, and service as they navigate their final year at St. Thomas More school. These experiences enrich our students’ preparation for high school and the years beyond the STM setting. Eighth graders grow in their faith and adulthood in the Church as they prepare for the Sacrament of Confirmation. Critical thinking, problem solving, creativity, communication, and teamwork are all fostered in exciting endeavors including, but not limited to, Santa’s Workshop, Math Counts, PJAS, Marian Devotion, the Arts Festival, various field trips related to curriculum content, working with the Central City Project, and numerous time-honored special events and graduation related festivities.
MAKERSPACE
Our STM MakerSpace was established in December 2018 for students in Kindergarten through 5th grade. Through coding, robotics and gadgetry, students use science, math, and engineering to develop computational thinking, creativity, collaboration, problem solving, and divergent thinking.
Activities/Stations:
Learn coding fundamentals (loops, conditionals, events, functions and variables) through challenges using Dash and Dot robots.
Build obstacle courses that the robots need to navigate.
Design geometric shapes given various parameters and then code robots to follow the ‘path’ (math skills: shapes, distances, angles).
Explore force and motion through the use of launchers. Students program robots to launch a ball into a basket from different distances and at different speeds.
Little Bits application provides the fundamental concepts such as circuitry, engineering, physics, art, and design thinking. Hands-on learning through tinkering with inputs, outputs, sensors, and motors to gain tech literacy.
Swift Coding challenges are designed to be a first programming language. These self paced ‘playgrounds’ allow learners to solve puzzles to master the basics using Swift programming language created by Apple.