Breadcrumbs

Middle School

What distinguishes our Middle School? Joy. Comfort with discomfort. Novelty. Intellectual curiosity. Metacognition. Challenge.

If you walk through the doors of our Middle School building, you will see students and teachers engaged in learning pursuits together, bright and happy interactions between classmates, and vigorous learning opportunities that challenge our students to think, synthesize, critique, listen, draw conclusions, solve problems, and much more.

We place students in developmentally appropriate yet challenging situations where being uncomfortable is expected and celebrated as an opportunity for growth, and where trying new things like an instrument, sport, club, or learning experience is safe and encouraged.

By helping our students think about themselves as learners and communicate their reflections to the adults who care deeply for their development, we hope to place them in a strong position to be agents in driving their own school success.

 

Middle school students pitching a tent.
Middle school students learning how to play the clarinet.

We aim to help our students know themselves as learners and appeal to their burgeoning sense of independence by providing leadership opportunities through our student council, service learning, advisory, club, and after-school programs. As the leaders of their own parent and advisor conference, we expect our students to reflect on their learning, their strengths, and their challenges.


By the end of eighth grade, our students’ strong sense of self built through challenging learning experiences, independence fortified by giving them voice, and resilience reinforced through trying new things, sometimes failing, and getting back up again provides them with a strong foundation to be successful in high school and beyond.

Curricular Highlights

Advisory Program. Through small-group lessons, team-building exercises and one-on-one time with advisors, the Middle School advisory program helps students to become positive leaders, make healthy decisions and advocate for themselves and others.

Sixth Grade Capstone Project. Students conclude their sixth grade year with an interdisciplinary project that draws on topics from the Math, Social Studies, Science and English curricula—with a focus on service learning—to address real-world problems such as food insecurity.

Tilapia farming. Seventh grade students engage in a year-long aquaponics project, raising fish in hydroponic beds to model a low-maintenance system that can be replicated in other countries that are lacking a regular protein source in their diet.

Meet our Middle School Director

Academic Program

Explore Our Middle School Program

Teacher and two students hold class with google meet. Teacher and students in respective homes.

Penn Charter launched its Distance Learning Plan in March 2020, marking a community-wide pivot to new forms of teaching and learning.