Learning for life
Curriculum
Explore and Investigate, Consolidate and Connect
The curriculum at Glentree Academy is fuelled by the natural curiosity that children exhibit. Children share ideas and experiences, and develop a sense of community and discipline through interactions with nature, people, objects and the environment.
They explore and investigate, consolidate and connect what they learn, ponder over and question it, and then demonstrate their learning in multiple ways. Teachers have many roles too: they are facilitators, learners, guides and mentors.
We follow an Integrated Curriculum based on NCERT (National Council of Education Research and Training) through CBSE guidelines.
The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught as that every child should be given the wish to learn.
― John Lubbock
What is LFL Curriculum?
A frog that has got caught in a well jumps high up to come out of it. It tries in vain until it has jumped enough number of times. Ultimately, it manages to escape out of it. This is an old tale which all of us have heard at some point in time with numerous variations. But, what strikes me is the effort by the frog and the ultimate result. It’s fair to say that the frog ‘learnt’ what to do to jump out of it. I believe that the same frog may take lesser time to jump out having ‘learnt’ the trick if it gets caught another time in the same well. If an animal with such a small brain can ‘learn’, one may easily gauge the power of the ‘Human brain’ and its capacity to ‘learn’.
I believe that our Education System with its multiple stress on ‘core’ subjects has compelled us to believe that if we do not score marks, we have not learnt or that we are ‘poor learners’. It is rather sad that we attribute the level of learning to marks scored in assessments. How do we score marks for skills like ‘learning to cycle’ or ‘learning to wear a shirt’? What would be the parameters for such an assessment? Is it not weird that we have no scale to measure the extent of skills learnt in school? ‘Learning for life’ is a much-used phrase with a deep meaning, which we may rarely analyze. If we study a ‘subject’ or a ‘topic’ to establish its understanding for a lifetime, no test or assessment can challenge us. This is the main aim of Glentree Academy’s in-house curriculum called LEARNING FOR LIFE CURRICULUM (abbreviated as LFL).
The next question is what is there in it to offer this kind of learning experience. The different approaches to learning a single concept ensure that all kinds of learners find a place and mode to learn a ‘subject’ or a ‘topic’. LFL encompasses detailed lesson plans which direct teachers/facilitators to deal with topics with a lot of approaches as well as variety in formative assessments. More importantly, schools and teachers forget that while they deliver the ‘regular curriculum’, there is also a ‘hidden curriculum’ that includes behaviour, emotions, life skills etc. which shape the personality of every child. LFL carefully and consciously incorporates lesson plans for emotional development, life skill development through multiple programmes like theatre, dance, music, robotics, sports, karate, taekwondo, yoga besides the regular academic programmes. All of these are blended in the curriculum and are clearly structured with exclusive lesson plans for each of the grades from 1-10, ensuring an all-rounded learning experience. Richness in the learning experience I am sure will guide students to discover the most comfortable ways in which they can learn, transforming them into ‘great learners’ for life.
