Middle School

The Post Oak School does not generally accept outside students into the Middle School: almost all members of the class rise from the Elementary, and usually have attended this or another Montessori school since Primary.

The Middle School serves as a bridge to the conventional high schools that most of our graduates attend: though it shares many features with the younger classes, it is also a distinctive environment.

Adult Academics

The academic program at the Middle School level is rigorous: a thorough grounding in algebra; scientific studies in physics, chemistry, biology; language work in a variety of written forms, with frequent oral presentations; and a comprehensive humanities curriculum uniting some twenty novels per school year with a wide-ranging survey of history, Western culture, and social studies. The daily schedule at this level begins to resemble a conventional school in many respects: teacher specialists for different subject areas, specific classes at specific times, regular homework with graded assignments and tests.

Though the course of studies may resemble more conventional education, the method remains Montessori’s—or even older. Our term “academics” comes from the Academy of the Greek philosopher Plato, where young people learned to think and to express themselves through careful thought and dialogue, within a supportive environment driven less by academic competition than by the quest for knowledge about the universe and one’s self.

In the same way, students in Middle School are working to develop their intellects, not their report cards. The quality of the intellectual life appears in the students’ work: intense seminars that unite the novels they read with both their lives and their studies; research and oral presentations on topics they authentically care about; student-planned trips to important sites that will further illuminate their work in the classroom. As one graduate put it at Alumni Night, “It seemed like real life rather than just preparing for real life.”

The Passage to Adulthood

When does a child become an adult? Under the law, it happens instantaneously. Parents and educators, though, know that maturity is not just something that happens; it is something that develops. Too often, adolescence becomes an artificially extended childhood rather than the training ground for adulthood.

Independence and a sense of responsibility are two markers of maturity. Middle School students must constantly exercise their executive skills: juggling multiple assignments, keeping track of due dates, coordinating efforts in group projects. In an environment where they are engaged with their friends in cooperative efforts, students know that they are valued for who they are and what they can do, and gain the confidence to take on larger challenges outside their initial “comfort zone,” whether that be speaking in front of a group, making cold calls to find the best bus fare, or creating a poster.

In the words of one recent graduate, “Everyone is motivated to learn, and we motivate each other to be self-motivated.”

Authentic Experiences

Adolescents want to see their own role in everything: they are active doers, not passive watchers or listeners. The Middle School divides its curriculum into units of several weeks in length, each culminating in a group experience outside the classroom. To cap their study of urban civilizations, students conduct a week-long study of the City of Houston, researching current problems or human achievements and then reporting on them through a series of site visits. After studying the history and practice of law, students present a mock trial in an authentic courtroom downtown. To complete their unit on archaeology, the class travels to the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center in Colorado to work with real scientists in the Mesa Verde ruins of the ancient Anasazi Indians. A unit on government spurs a week-long class trip to Washington, DC, where students might meet their representative in Congress, sit in on an oral argument in the Supreme Court, and more.

Such activities serve both a social and an academic purpose. Students not only get a first-hand look at adults applying knowledge in real-world situations; but also are given a large degree of freedom and responsibility in planning and arranging the trip. One bus-line agent was shocked to discover that she had just negotiated a group fare over the phone with a seventh-grader; in these and other efforts, young adults, with the support and guidance of their teachers, interact with the adult world in more and more mature ways, safely taking on those responsible adult roles that they long to experience.

And Middle School students don’t just observe others’ communities in action; they work together to build their own. During three separate one-week stays at the Blackwood Land Institute in Hempstead, Texas, students plan and prepare their own meals, engage in construction and maintenance projects on a working organic farm, all while conducting seminars, performing experiments, and completing other academic work. On their own, without television, computers, cell phones, or video games, they find an open arena in which to practice those skills of communication, cooperation, and empathy that are just as important components of adult success as any intellectual skills.

Those community-oriented skills also come into play outside the immediate group of teenagers and teachers. A weekly morning of community service at different agencies around town further drives home the need to take care of others, and brings to their attention the comfortable modern lifestyles that many have taken for granted.

The Next Step

Eighth-graders graduating from The Post Oak School are confident, motivated, life-long learners in high demand at local high schools; 97% have been accepted to their first or second choice of school. Many return, even years later, to participate in our annual Alumni Night—we welcome visitors who want to hear, from the students themselves, the benefits of the full span of Montessori education.