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Our Schoolhouse curriculum has grown from years of hands-on teaching, observation, and real classroom experience. The programs we use have been thoughtfully created, adapted, and refined with children over time—giving us a collection of tried-and-true learning approaches that are engaging, meaningful, and built around how children actually learn best.
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Below is a look at the curricula and learning systems currently used throughout the Schoolhouse. If you have questions or would like to better understand how these programs come to life each day, we invite you to schedule a tour and see firsthand how learning is implemented within the Schoolhouse.
Elementary School
Whole Schoolhouse
BRAVE helps us explore family values, character, personal responsibility, courage, resilience, relationships, and the choices we make in community. Through stories, discussion, play, and real-life application, children have opportunities to think about who they are becoming—not simply what they know.
Foundation before Automation
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SORA was created for a pivotal moment in childhood and in our world: technology is no longer the future. It is already shaping how information is found, understood, and shared.
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SORA strengthens the abilities children need before that world begins answering questions for them. Through curiosity-driven research adventures, children learn how to wonder, observe, ask meaningful questions, draw from what they already know, search books and trusted resources, compare information, notice contradictions, discuss ideas, examine evidence, and form thoughtful conclusions of their own. At its heart, SORA protects the space between a question and an answer—the space where curiosity lives.
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Rather than developing the habit of immediately reaching for technology, children develop the habit of investigating first. They learn to remain curious, questioning, discerning, and comfortable not knowing yet. SORA builds the foundation for children to grow into independent researchers and free thinkers who know how to seek understanding, evaluate what they encounter, and form ideas of their own in a world increasingly shaped by automation.
Elementary School
Kinder - 3rd Grade Ready
Freedom M.A.T.H. Landscapes is a hands-on mathematics journey designed to meet each child exactly where they are and help them build forward from there. Through short, one-on-one games with a teacher, children uncover and strengthen the foundational pieces of math that may still be missing—one meaningful concept at a time.
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Inspired by the meadows, creeks, groves, and ridgelines of Santa Cruz, learning unfolds as a landscape to explore. Children travel along trails, reach new landmarks, revisit ideas when needed, and gradually connect small pieces of understanding into a strong mathematical foundation. Instead of rushing toward the next grade level, Freedom M.A.T.H. Landscapes gives children the time, play, materials, and guidance to truly understand what comes before it.
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Math becomes something they can touch, build, discover, and travel through.
3rd-6th Grade
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For grades 3–6, learning begins each morning with our Mind-Rise Program, when minds are fresh, curious, and ready to engage in mathematics, language, reading, and writing.
Our core academic curriculum is built around spiral review: small, manageable pieces of learning that return again and again throughout the week, each new concept building naturally on what came before. Monday through Thursday, students revisit important skills, strengthen understanding, and continue adding new layers of knowledge without being rushed through a single unit and expected to leave it behind.
Our spiral review is designed to cover the California Standards for third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grade across the course of the year while allowing children to progress at the level that is right for them. Instead of learning simply because the calendar says it is time to move on, students are given repeated opportunities to practice, connect, apply, and truly understand what they are learning.
When a student demonstrates readiness to move beyond a level, the teacher uses both written and verbal assessment to look at understanding before determining the next step.
With class sizes of no more than 10 children, our teachers are able to know each learner closely, notice where support is needed, recognize when a child is ready for greater challenge, and provide the kind of attentive guidance that is difficult to create in a large classroom.
The result is a curriculum that grows with the child—building strong foundations, returning to important ideas often, and helping each learner move toward the next level with understanding and confidence.
7th - 12th
Our 7th–12th grade program becomes increasingly individualized as students grow, balancing strong academic foundations with greater independence, personal interests, and preparation for what comes next.
In 7th and 8th grade, students continue building core academic skills while exploring history through an integrated, hands-on curriculum that brings important events, documents, ideas, and civic understanding to life.
Beginning in high school, each student’s academic path is thoughtfully tailored to the individual. Coursework is planned around the subjects and credits needed for a complete high school transcript while also considering the student’s strengths, interests, pace, and future goals. Families receive guidance in developing an appropriate academic plan and choosing the resources and coursework that best support that student’s path.
Because every high school journey can look different, we are happy to explain the planning process, transcript requirements, and available academic resources in greater detail during a tour or family consultation.
We believe in educational freedom, where the whole child is our focus. We teach emergent curriculum, which means through observation and conversation, our teachers develop curriculum that the learners are showing interest in. We are not a traditional school, yet our passionate teachers have come from a traditional background and never looked back. Our program helps develop critical thinkers, build interest in literature, cultivate creativity, and acquire life-long social-emotional intelligence.