DIALECTIC  PROGRAM DETAILS

Highlights of the Dialectic Program

• Grades 7-9 (ages 12-16)
• IEW Writing Lessons—Tour 1- US History based writing lessons; Tour 2- Ancient History-Based Writing Lessons; Tour 3- Medieval History-Based Writing Lessons

Each tour, we use a book that corresponds to the timeline history period. (Tour I – American History-Based Writing Lessons, Tour II Ancient History Writing Lessons, Tour III World History-Based Writing Lessons) All books will be newly updated with vocabulary exercises, quizzes, and literature suggestions for at-home use. Homework, 30 min/week.

Our partnership with IEW gives our tutors and families training on topics such as, “How to grade an essay” and “How to adapt lessons to accommodate struggling and advanced writers in the program.”

• Latin covers famous sayings, roots, first and second conjugations, first declension, irregular verbs, future and imperfect tense verbs: 5 min/day; Tour 1 also covers prayers in Latin (Holy, Holy, Holy; Our Father; Bless us O Lord, etc….)

• Speech gives opportunities for student written presentations as well as the memorization and recitation of four selections from “Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow” from Macbeth by Shakespeare,  the opening lines from A Tale of Two Cities, Don Quixote to Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address” and JFK’s Inauguration Speech; Homework: 2 hrs/quarter.

• Science lab program—Tour III: physical Science. Measuring, dissection, microscope skills, and writing a lab report are all included.

• Fine Arts—Tour III:  Art, Music, and Culture Slideshow-based quarterly seminar introduces students to the development of and relation between art, music, and culture. Art projects develop skills related to the featured artist. Tour III covers Renaissance to Modern Art (Da Vinci, Baroque, Van Gogh, Degas, among others). Tour I covers American Art such as Native American pottery, pioneer quilts, Mary Cassatt, Alexander Calder, and others). Musicians include composers from Handel to Scott Joplin and others.

• Dialectic Seminar is designed to encourage scholars to dive deeper into the Tour Guide in multiple areas and begin to discover the connections between the subjects.

• Timeline notebook will be constructed by the students in class and available for at- home incorporation of additional events.

• Catholic Culture will include discussion, debate, and engaging activities and projects will guide students to learn to think and recognize the good, true and beautiful using church documents. 

• The literature choices have been carefully chosen to promote discussion of historical context as well as demonstrate virtue and morals. Discussion will focus on the Catholic point of view as well as introduce students to literary elements such as plot and character analysis. Tour III selections: Don Quixote, Number the Stars, Poetry, and Macbeth. Tour I selections include Tom Sawyer, and A Philadelphia Catholic in King James’s Court; 
  
• Scholars continue to learn geography of the world including drawing the US map from memory!

Dialectic Schedule

Communications

• Latin 15 minutes
• Composition 45 minutes
• Speech 15 minutes

Fine Arts

• 60 minutes bi-weekly

Science

• 60 minutes bi-weekly

Dialectic Seminar

• History Timeline 15 minutes
• Catholic Culture 45 minutes 3 times per quarter
• Literature 45 minutes 3 times per quarter
• Geography 15 minutes per week

Dialectic Fees

Catholic Schoolhouse Registration Fee: $125.00 (per family)   *$95.00 (per family) early bird
Student Fee: $300.00 (per child)
Supply Fee: $165.00 (per child)
Facility Fee: TBD (per family)  based on number of families to offset rental fees 

We will meet for 24 weeks throughout the 2019-2020 academic year with a break every four weeks.    We will begin September 3, 2019.  Our Winter Break is scheduled December 11,  2019 – January 14, 2020. Our last class is April 28, 2020.  We will have a Showcase and year end celebration on Tuesday, May 5, 2020.

Catholic Schoolhouse is loyal to the Magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church and has received the nihil obstat and imprimatur for all three Tours of our curriculum.

Credit Integration between Chapter and Home

While credits are not typically assigned at the middle school level, we offer the equivalent here as a reference, or assistance for parents of 9th graders who are building high school transcripts.

 English* – 1 credit composition. Vocabulary (included with IEW) and grammar should be added at home to complete your English course. Handwriting and spelling only on an as-needed basis at this level.

Literature* – 1/2 credit literature. Recommended 1 more book per quarter, plus 2-4 papers for full credit.

General science – ½ credit science lab. Recommend completing work in text plus tests for full credit.

Medieval History to Modern Times – Timeline creation will aid in the mastery of World History.

Additional work should be done at home to complete this course. This can either be done with a textbook or by adding living books, discussions, and papers to the timeline.

Religion – Virtue, saints, and some philosophy will be the scope of our discussions in class. While our Catholic faith and culture is woven throughout, we recommend a plan for religious study at home. Catholic Schoolhouse offers an integrated multi-age course, free of charge.

Math – This should be covered entirely at home.

Speech* – Based on a 1-credit course, distributed over the three cycles. Assign 1 credit if all three years are completed, ½ credit if only 2 years.

Fine arts – 1/2 credit art. Add music lessons for full fine arts credit. Add 1 book or report per quarter for full art or art history credit.

Foreign language* – The Latin in CSH is just exposure, and hopefully provides inspiration to motivate your student. This subject needs to be covered at home, either with Latin or another language.

*Subjects that require homework from CSH. Estimated time spent for required homework: Weekly writing assignment, 30 min; memorize speech/Latin prayer, 5 min/day; prepare seminar topics, < 30 min/week; prepare speech, 1-2 hr/ quarter. Read 1 book per quarter for class.