The English program for Grades 4 through 9 is designed to span the large developmental demands of those years. The children need to be nurtured, while being encouraged to venture on their own. Hence a curriculum to support such a task must be both robust and sensitive.

By the time a student has reached the end of Grade 9, the student will have read short stories, poetry, at least two of the ancient classics, plays, novels, essays, and will have written descriptive, narrative, and expository prose, some poetry, and finally analytical essays. One play of Shakespeare is read every year in Grades 7 through 9. Grammar and vocabulary study are continuous through each grade, and whenever possible, the reading is coordinated with the history curriculum.

The means by which these tasks are accomplished differs from grade to grade. In Grades 5 and 6, books are read at home and in class. The details from the stories are reinforced by having the students retell the story, draw pictures, create skits, and memorize passages (especially The Iliad). Much imitative writing is done also in Grade 7. By Grades 8 and 9, the concept of the lecture can be employed. Classroom discussion is expected throughout, the depth of probing increasing as the student gains maturity and draws from an ever enlarging background.

Enrichment in each grade draws from multiple sensory areas:

• Some of the videos: The Thief of Bagdad, The Battle of Britain, The Dustbowl, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, Battleship Potemkin…
• Recitations from The Iliad, from Shakespearean works, Islamic poetry, Emily Dickenson…
• Collateral art produced by the students: drawings, sculpture, creative fiction set to music… expressing themes within the curriculum of a grade.
• Exposure to music of specific time periods: Civil War era, colonial times, civil rights movement…
• Presentation of slides to illustrate artistic themes from mythology, Shakespearean motifs, architecture, specific historical periods and ideologies…