Forms, not Grades
Over the last century, education has become more and more expensive—public schooling often runs between $12,000 and $18,000 per student per year. It has also become more and more like a conveyor belt on an assembly line—moving students from grade to grade, subject to subject, standardized test to standardized test.
In building the foundations of our model of education, we wanted to do two things:
First, to make education affordable again. It shouldn’t cost over a thousand dollars a month, year round, to educate a single student.
Second, to smash the “conveyor belt” model of modern, industrialized education. Children are persons, not identical cogs to be plugged into a machine.
To these ends, we determined to divide our student body—not into 12 discrete grades of one year each—but into four forms. Each form consists of a cohort of students across a three year age range, with a dedicated teacher for each form. Many subjects are handled with the whole group together. We refer to these subjects as “continuity subjects,” because they can be taught to children of different ages at the same time. For example, you can read an account of the the signing of the Magna Carta to a group of 6–9 year olds, and even though they will each connect with it and understand it on their own level, each will be edified.
Other subjects within the same form are “discontinuity subjects,” which are taught in smaller groups by age within the form. Math is a good example of a discontinuity subject, with the 6 year old student needing a different level of instruction than the 9 year old.
Various forms of this model have been regularly in use throughout history. For example, you may recall reading the Little House on the Prairie books as a child—in which communities built a one-room schoolhouse where all of the children in that community would learn. Often, these schools had only one teacher for the entire group, from the very young through what we would now consider High School. The teacher in this context might spend time working with “Reader Group Two” for fifteen minutes, then set them a reading assignment and move to “Reading Group Three,” but it didn’t require twelve teachers to instruct the class. This model works well for a smaller school like Saint Brendan’s.
In the next section, you will learn the structure and goals of each form, how it works, and then some of the main benefits of this model:
Primary School: First & Second Forms
Primary school, traditionally ranging from 1st through 6th grades (or elementary school), consists of two forms at Saint Brendan’s:
First Form
The first form is a cohort of students ranging from age 6 to age 9—the age range captured in first through third grade in a modern model.
Students at this age excel at concrete learning, but often aren’t ready for more abstract concepts. For example, they excel at learning their ABCs, counting and simpler math, rapidly expanding their vocabulary as they learn new words, and learning the interesting stories from history. However, they often struggle with abstract concepts, such as more complex rules of grammar, higher level math (such as pre-algebra), and the dialectical/logical concepts.
Because of this dynamic, first form students focus on reading, writing, and being read to. As they interact with texts, narrate those texts back (both orally and in writing), they will rapidly expand their mastery of language in a very organic way. At this age, it is far more important for children to gain a sense of how words and sentences work, rather than the abstract knowledge of why it is that way. Later, they will abstract from the text, learning how nouns, verbs, subjects, punctuation, and other grammatical rules work and why. But at that point, they will be learning what they already know intuitively and organically.
This dynamic takes place across many subjects. They will be learning history, theology, literature, and more by way of interaction with the text in reading and being read to.
At the same time, students at this age range are like sponges for information. They are able to memorize astonishing amounts of information. We take advantage of this ability by introducing students in the first form to biblical Greek and Latin as they interact with the Bible. They will learn the alphabets of these languages, alongside basic pronunciation—as well as organically picking up lots of vocabulary.
The way this works is actually very simple: The class will have a growing body of memory verses that they work through together. They will daily recite this verse in English, Latin, and Greek. Again, they will not focus on learning the abstract “why” of the Latin and Greek grammar. They won’t be parsing verbs, learning cases, etc. But they will be organically learning a lot of contextualized Greek and Latin words, since they will have the English translation of the verse memorized.
So in this form, the main emphasis with foreign languages is on what is technically referred to as “fluency.” This is not the same thing as total fluency—like what a native speaker has. It is the ability to pronounce the words in a language properly, even if you don’t understand what they mean. In this way, students will learn a whole lot of Scripture, even as they develop this fluency and vocabulary in two of the most important languages in the history of the West: Latin and biblical Greek.
Second Form
The second form is a cohort of students ranging from age 10 to age 12—the range captured in fourth through sixth grade in a modern model.
Students at this age begin to grow into those abstract concepts discussed above—and so the second form curriculum reflects this maturing ability. Now, as they continue in math, history, grammar, science, languages, etc., they will begin to learn the rules, laws, and orderly systems at work behind what the subjects they interact with.
One of the main tasks of this form as well is to continue to cultivate mastery of words, both written and spoken. Virtually all subjects will include a focus on reading and narration. Students will increasingly cultivate the ability to organize and communicate the ideas and truths they are engaging with throughout the curriculum.
In the same way, they will continue with the pattern of Bible memorization combined with language acquisition, continuing to memorize passages of Scripture in Greek, Latin, and English.
Secondary School: Third & Fourth Forms
Secondary school, traditionally ranging from 7th through 12th grades (or Jr. and Sr. High), consists of two forms at Saint Brendan’s:
Third Form
The third form is a cohort of students ranging from age 13 to age 15—the age range captured in seventh through ninth grade in a modern model.
In this age range, even as students build on the foundation achieved in the primary school years, they are able to understand more complex subjects, truly master abstract concepts, and begin to organize and communicate ideas into a holistic worldview. To this end, students in the third form begin to study the mechanics and grammar of language—including those foreign languages they have been building fluency and vocabulary in since year one. They begin to study logic and dialectics in earnest, working to understand arguments, to deconstruct truth claims and test them against the Scriptures.
Fourth Form
The fourth form is a cohort of students ranging from age 16 to age 18—the age range captured in tenth through twelfth grade in a modern model.
In this final form, students are bringing all of these acquired skills and virtues together. They will become apt students of history, having studied from ancient to modern history three times. They will know how to engage with arguments, truth claims, philosophy, and worldviews with skill and wisdom. They will have much practice in reading well, writing well, speaking well, and thinking well.
Benefits of the Forms Model
Financially Sustainable
Funding a private school in the state of Utah is hard enough. Funding a private Christian school in the state of Utah—where the word “Christian” actually means something—ups that level of difficulty by a factor of about 25.
On the face of it, to fund a private Christian school with 12 grades—knowing that each grade will likely have fewer than 5 students (at least at the beginning)—leaves you with the option of having no school, or having a school with tuition in the range of $1,000 per student per month or more.
But reaching back in our history, understanding the way that our forefathers educated their children, we find that what we do now is neither necessary nor efficient. By dividing our school into four, rather than twelve, major groups, we reduce the overall cost per student radically, making the school both affordable and sustainable.
Teacher-Student Relationship
Rather than having a new teacher each year, students and teachers get to know one another over a period of three years. This allows a teacher to understand each child as a person—to discover their weaknesses, strengths, interests, and more.
Student-Student Relationships
Students likewise develop camaraderie and friendship across a less disrupted time period.
Broader Peer Groups
In class, students spend time interacting with other students across a three-year range. This allows older students the opportunity to exercise natural leadership, to mentor and set the tone for younger students, and for younger students to likewise benefit from a class that is not artificially narrowed to a single age.
It is good for a younger student to experience what it is like to be the “small fish” in a bigger pond, as he graduates from the top age group in one form to the bottom age group in the next. Inversely, it is good for students to experience the dynamic of being the older, more seasoned student within a form. Both of these dynamics are not easily experienced in other school models.
Less Socially Artificial
Is life after high school segregated by grade level? No. Very few areas of life are so narrowly divided up. The workplace is not like this. The college classroom is not like this. The church is not like this. The home is not like this. Most affinity groups are not like this.
As students grow within a broader range of peers, they learn to navigate the world in a less artificial way.
A Historically Proven Method
In many and varied ways, the basic model we are deploying has been the norm in many places and times. This is true of the religious schools of the Medieval times, the courtly schools of the 10th and 11th centuries, the schools of rhetoric in early Rome, the early American colonial schools, the frontier schools of developing America, and more.
You don’t have to have 12 isolated grades to educate a human being. In fact, that is the minority method in history—one that wouldn’t have been remotely financially possible in most eras.