| The Comprehensive Early Childhood Model |
Based on the latest research on child development and national standards, Mt. Carmel-Holy Rosary School's early childhood program equips students with the skills to thrive in elementary school and beyond.
The early childhood program utilizes hands-on learning centers, a dynamic range of teaching and learning techniques, and innovative methods of monitoring children's progress.
Our youngest learners also benefit from the facilities and resources of the school at large: they participate in music, art, library, technology, and physical education sessions each week. They utilize interactive Smartboards and computers in the classroom, and take part in school-wide activities throughout the year (ie. the winter and spring concerts, and field trips).
For more information on the program, including its foundation, features and goals, click here.
All
students in grades 1-8 at Mt. Carmel-Holy
Rosary are on an extended day schedule.
Regular dismissal
time Mondays-Thursdays is 4:00pm.
On Fridays students are dismissed
at 2:45 PM, and teachers participate
in staff development workshops. Extended
Day increases student-teacher interaction
and allows for more in depth lessons.
It also decreases students' unsupervised
free time after school.
Here is what our teachers
have to say about Extended Day:
"Through the Extended Day Program, I have more time to help my
students prepare for the NYS ELA,
Math, and Science exams." 4th
Grade Teacher
"I have more time to reinforce reading comprehension and vocabulary
skills." 6th Grade Teacher
Reading is a top priority at MCHR. MCHR participates in the Accelerated Reader Program, which helps students choose books that fit their reading abilities. Students read books within their level and are given a quiz assessing their retention and comprehension skills. By reading books and scoring well on tests, students move up levels to more advanced books. MCHR rose to
the ranks of Model Reading Schools through Carmel Hill Fund’s Renaissance Learning library program. Over the course of 60 days, MCHR maintained an average percent correct of 91.8% while taking 6,486 quizzes.
Mt. Carmel-Holy Rosary also participates in the Library Connections Program. Through this four year program Mt. Carmel-Holy Rosaryhas been provided with $150,000 in library resources and teacher training. Our library is equipped with more than 6,500 books. Our full time library teacher integrates our library with classroom assignments and lessons. For instance, a curriculum unit on global warming used library, classroom and computer room resources. Through books, the internet, the movies “Happy Feet” and “March of the Penguins,” and a National Geographic website, students mastered the concept of global warming and vowed to give up hairspray and styrofoam cups. They read, wrote and made posters and dioramas on the topic. During the 2010-2011 school year, MCHR's seventh grade class went on a field trip to Philadelphia as a curriculum enhancement.
Mt. Carmel-Holy Rosary recognizes the important role that technology plays in our students' education. As such, MCHR School provides students and teachers with technology tools to bring 21st century learning into the classroom.
MCHR is equipped with a computer lab and computers in every classroom. Such technologies facilitate differentiated teaching to address the variance in student learning styles. Targeted utilization of internet resources and project-based software programs enable students to develop their individual reading, writing and math skills at school and at home. Students also have access to multimedia tools such as digital and video
cameras to develop group projects.
All classrooms are equipped with SMART Interactive Whiteboards. Our teachers incorporate the internet into instruction and create a truly interactive classroom environment in which students play active roles in their learning.
To further drive the integration of technology into our students' education, teachers receive weekly professional development and collaborate with the school's technology coach on a weekly basis. This faculty collaboration has resulted in progressive technology-enriched lessons and projects.
Education Through Music(ETM) makes comprehensive and sequential music education a reality for students at Mt. Carmel-Holy Rosary. All students participate in vocal music and/or violin classes twice a week. These classes teach students the basics of musical performance while integrating music into the academic curriculum. Students give concerts twice a year for family and friends and perform at school and community benefits. Thanks to the success of this program, our violinists were featured on PBS’s Nightly News in the spring of 2008. Through ETM, our students have also performed at highly regarded venues included the Four Seasons Restaurant and the University Club. ETM also brought famed violinist Joshua Bell to MCHR.
Ten O’clock Classics (TOC) provides group violin lessons to our students who wish to pursue violin
beyond the fifth grade, as well as performance opportunities alongside pro
fessional musicians, and educational outings to concerts and events at venues such as Lincoln Center. Thanks to this program, many of our students have auditioned for and received accepted into Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program (MAP), which consists of a two-year core curriculum of private lessons, small and large ensembles, and classes in music theory, music history, and creative musical expression. Students have also been accepted into the Geneva Conservatory of Chamber Music, where they benefit from scholarship support. Students are not only enhancing their musical knowledge and violin talents as they learn classical music at MCHR, they are building new skills. TOC also provides our students numerous opportunities to perform in front of large audiences at highly regarded venues, including the Russian Tea Room and the Rainbow Room.
Students have also been featured on Sirius Satellite Radio, WCBS880, Fox 5 News, and 1010 WINS and in Catholic NY and the Daily News. Students have performed with artists ranging from “Stand By Me” composer Ben E. King to Yankees' star Bernie Williams. Special visitors to the school have included renowned violinist Joshua Bell, American rock band O.A.R. and Goldspot band member Sid Arthur.
Through the New York Philharmonic School Partnership Program, Philharmonic Teaching Artists work are working with grades 3 and 4, building students' understanding of music through the experience of symphonic music.During the program students study musical works, attend live performances, learn to play the recorder and compose music of their own while gaining knowledge ofthe cultural historyof music and a personal relationship to the art of music. Four students receive weekly music lessons at the 92 St. Y through SPP scholarships.
In the 2005 documentary Mad Hot Ballroom, New York City schoolchildren are shown mastering the rumba, fox trot and tango through a unique in-classroom program. Mt. Carmel-Holy Rosary School has partnered with Pierre Dulaine’s American Ballroom Theater's Dancing Classrooms program, and the 4th, 5th, and 8th graders are learning the same dance steps featured in the famous movie.
Twice a week, professional dance instructors teach the students the many complicated steps of the merengue, tango, salsa, foxtrot, rumba and swing. The class not only teaches children physical grace as they learn new dances, but it also refines the participants’ communication, cooperation, and team-building skills. In addition, cross-cultural studies of music, language, and art are integrated into the Dancing Classrooms curriculum.
As in the documentary, all students in the program have the opportunity to advance to a citywide competition. In 2011 the students of MCHR won gold place at the final competition, held at the World Financial Center!
Creative Classrooms is a visual arts
program for all grades. A professional
artist/instructor works
with each
class once a week and students express
themselves through art projects varying
from pastels of their daily commute
to black watercolor silhouettes of
their fellow classmates. Their artwork
has been displayed at various community
organizations, such as the Metropolitan Hospital.
Through the Creative Classrooms Visual Arts Program, students at all grade levels create sophisticated and content-rich art pieces. A professional art educator introduces students to the arts, engaging them in making art and in reflecting on and writing about their creations. The program is a powerful learning tool that provides students with visual, tactile and aesthetic experiences that encourage hands-on learning and critical thinking. In addition, students become familiar with New York City’s world-class museums and cultural institutions through the Museum Visit component of Creative Classrooms. The students’ horizons are expanded as t
hey visit museums around the city and as they learn to observe and analyze art in a museum setting.
Grand Central Academy of Art provides a weekly studio art intensive after-school art program for emerging artists in the seventh and eighth grades. Students in this program study classical drawing principles, create portraits, and draw from sculpture casts of works such as the head of Michelangelo's David.
Through the Taglialatella Galleries' “Artist of the Month” program (bottom left image), students are further immersed into the world of art. DJT Fine Art gallery hosts class field trips to their NYC gallery, supports an art library book collection, and loans the school original works of art. Through DJT Fine Art and Taglialatella Galleries, MCHR students enjoy direct exposure to and interaction with some of the world’s greatest artists and art movements, such as Andy Warhol and Robert Indiana.
