Our Curriculum
At Katy Classical Academy, all students follow a four-year cycle, each studying the exact “slice” of history at the same time.
Year One begins with Creation and ends with the fall of the Roman Empire. Year Two picks up with the fall of the Roman Empire and follows the historical trail through the Renaissance and the Reformation to the French Revolution and the early days of exploration. Year Three resumes with the early American Presidents—such as Washington, Adams and Jefferson—and extends through the Civil War. Year Four starts at the beginning of the 20th century and concludes with current, modern times.
During each year, students study the history and literature of that year concurrently, providing a richer understanding of both the historical events and the works written during that time.
As students progress through the grades at KCA, they have the opportunity to repeat the four-year cycle. In the Grammar (elementary) grades, instruction focuses largely on learning the facts and events as well as understanding the stories of the people of each year’s time period. In the older Grammar and Dialectic grades (the “dialogue” years in middle school), students encounter the years again, but this time, they have a foundation of knowledge in place that allows them to ask and discuss multifaceted and wide questions such as why events occurred or how people could have altered them. In the Rhetoric grades (high school), students delve even more profoundly into the events and literature of each year.
Students’ double-level foundation allows them to relate historical events and literature to current events, debate such ideas, write their own plays, and design independent research studies to further investigate ideas that pique their interest. In this type of 12-year education, students cycle through the four years three times: cumulatively building, strengthening, broadening, and deepening their knowledge each time.
With each instance of the four-year cycle, students will revisit historical topics that they have already studied, but at a deeper level. This approach allows for upper-level students (Rhetoric level) to be able to interact with literature, cultural narratives, and historical figures at a depth that would not otherwise be possible with so much classroom time spent on introduction.
KCA works hard to establish a rigorous and appropriate booklist for each of our grade levels, meaning that students are always challenged. By the time they reach the Rhetoric level, they will be interacting with the original texts of history, such as Plato, Virgil, Martin Luther, Shakespeare, and the American Founding Fathers. For more information about our booklist, please reach out to our admissions team, who would be happy to answer any questions.
For parents with multiple children enrolled at KCA in different grade levels, the KCA models allows for families to all be focused on a single time period in history, regardless of their age and grade. This approach facilities discussion among families at all levels, as well as allows KCA to host events throughout each year that correspond to the time period in history. For example, in Year One, KCA will host a Roman Feast Day; in Year Two, a Medieval feast; in Year three, a “Roaring 20’s banquet;” and in Year Four, a Sock Hop.
