Proficiency in reading and writing is paramount to maximizing choices in life. ATLAS students read constantly and write prolifically as part of their work to produce plays.

We explore a range of complex texts including novels, biographies, nonfiction academic articles, newspapers, and periodicals, as well as classical and modern plays. Using the drama tool of text-analysis, students learn to draw inferences and support their statements with textual evidence. Repeatedly reading text aloud during the rehearsal process has been shown to improve fluency, confidence, and comprehension. Memorization of texts helps students internalize language.

Students also engage in mandatory independent reading both in the home and during quiet times at school. They choose these texts autonomously and teachers track their progress.

ATLAS students produce purposeful written work in support of their inquiry. Through writing personal narratives, daily diary entries, dramaturgical research reports, character analyses, poetry, short stories, comparative and persuasive essays, and market research reports for their theatre company, students incorporate writing into their self-concept and develop personal voice. Writing workshops encourage repeated drafting of each text, and a portfolio of writing work is critiqued at the end of each semester. Students also work together to write original scripts based on their social studies curriculum, and adapt a novel into a performance piece.

By connecting their reading and writing to the theatrical process, students are more motivated to persevere in these critical activities and learn to recognize them as central components of most meaningful work.

In order to prepare for high school math and science curricula at competitive high schools, ATLAS students engage in targeted, sequential math and science instruction from a trained teacher and receive additional support from local museum partnerships, technology-based interventions, and community mentors.

7th graders learn to think mathematically, and build upon their foundational knowledge to complete more advanced mathematical operations. They explore ratios and proportional relationships, rational numbers, percentages, and geometry. 8th graders advance their abstract reasoning skills and number sense while exploring algebraic expressions.

Students entering ATLAS with a mastery of covered mathematical concepts will be supported and challenged by individualized projects.

To enhance their stand-alone math curriculum, students connect their design and construction projects to mathematical units of study. For example, as part of their study of ratios and proportional relationships, students build a scale-model of an original set design in their STEM Stagecraft class. When studying percentages, students create a production budget for their theatre company, conduct market research, and present a budget narrative and report.

Learners and their families deserve direct and frequent communication about the learning that takes place throughout the school year. ATLAS students are leaders of their own learning, and facilitate parent-teacher meetings at the end of each semester, presenting their portfolio of work and speaking to their personal challenges and areas of growth. The portfolio model requires gathering multiple products of their learning to demonstrate improvement over the course of the year. In the portfolio, parents see examples of their student’s masterful work in each of the disciplines.

Along with portfolios to document and display student learning, the theatrical productions themselves showcase student work. The public nature of the performances raise the stakes and expectations (both intrinsically and extrinsically) for students and teachers. By watching multiple plays throughout the year, parents witness for themselves the growth their children experience.

Because test-taking is a common means of assessment in most area high schools, ATLAS students will participate in some traditional testing. They take a standardized assessment each fall to serve as both test-taking practice and a means of tracking student skill-mastery and content knowledge in order to guide instruction for the year.  In Math Lab, students take assessments designed by the teacher to track learning.

Each teacher ultimately designs their own forms of assessment and evaluation, using tools such as rubrics and class critiques. They document learning using images, video, journaling, and narrative writing, and they share this documentation with students, colleagues, and parents.

There are many innovative schools within our own region and across the nation that function upon similar core values and beliefs about teaching and learning. While schools across the country prioritize project-based, experiential learning, we know of no other stand-alone middle school using the theatre company model as their foundation for all learning. However, project-based, expeditionary learning schools operate successfully across the nation, and student outcomes (test-taking, college-placement, career readiness, etc.) are extremely strong in these schools. It is our hope that ATLAS will serve as a curricular model for other schools to adopt in the future.

ATLAS students graduate with the intellectual, social, and emotional tools necessary to succeed in any high school they wish to attend. If students are passionate about the arts and aim to attend an arts-based high school, their training makes them very competitive candidates. Students who choose to pursue a traditional high school education are fully equipped to do so, and enter their 9th grade classrooms with high-level critical thinking and communication skills. ATLAS faculty and administrators are in direct communication with families and students throughout their decision-making and application process, providing support and guidance.