Mission
The mission of the Da Vinci Academy is to develop inspired learners through project-based, dynamic instruction that focuses on the skills and interests of the individual student. Opportunities for creative thinking through visual and performing arts are infused throughout the curriculum.
Vision
The vision of our academy is to encourage the curiosity that is inherent in every student. Together the student, their family, and our teachers will create a classroom experience that goes beyond traditional walls out into the community and our world. Our goal is to infuse the arts into our core curriculum while empowering each student to explore the unknown. We will create a safe environment where every student feels the freedom to try their best. The process of learning is equally as important as the knowledge gained. For it is in the attempt of the new that the learning process soars.
Personalized Learning
How do we personalize learning for each student?
It is no secret that everyone learns differently. To meet the needs of each student, The Da Vinci Academy prides itself on providing personalized learning with input from the student and parents. When creating Personalized Learning Plans, teachers take into consideration a student’s history of grades and past experiences in the classroom as well as assessments that will be given year-round. Our program is designed to allow students to stay on track to meet their individual goals. This may mean accelerating the curriculum or providing a targeted course of instruction to allow students to “catch up” and improve core skills. Our goal is to enable students to take charge of their education and have pride in their accomplishments.
Why Personalize Learning
A personalized learning system that integrates Common Core State Standards is unique. Our model is tailored to the needs and interests of each individual student, incorporates the arts, and provides rigorous and meaningful learning opportunities. Personalized learning is teaching our youth to acknowledge how they learn best while allowing them to set themselves up for success in all academic endeavors. This approach sets high expectations for all students while still honoring and recognizing each child’s unique gifts, skills, passions, and attributes.
Goal Setting
Springs Charter Schools and the Temecula Student Center are dedicated to developing personalized learning plans for each child with the intent to engage each child in the learning process in the most productive and meaningful way to optimize each child’s learning potential and success. While doing this, we will enable the students to make their own goals, not only academically but emotionally as well. We believe when students make goals and meet them they become more successful as they have ownership and buy-in.
Program Elements
At Da Vinci Academy, we implement a child-centered model of teaching and learning that is research-based and field validated. Our core design elements reflect the needs and desires of the families we serve in addition to the latest research and best practices of schools that produce students who consistently demonstrate a keen interest in learning, creativity, and community:
Focus on the Whole Child: In contrast to the curriculum found in a traditional public school setting which stresses teaching and learning in the areas that standardized testing measures can most easily assess, an arts-integrated curriculum develops the whole child: kinesthetic, musical, spatial, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and natural intelligence. At Da Vinci, we challenge children to construct their own meaning from complex ideas and concepts. By acknowledging that students learn and demonstrate what they know in various ways, our instruction allows children to see, hear, and express according to their individual learning styles.
Project-based Curriculum: Our project-based curriculum is structured to allow students to pursue individual educational goals while providing opportunities to collaborate with others on a shared objective. Classroom learning is organized in meaningful, purposeful ways through rich, cross-disciplinary subject matter that corresponds to state standards. Project-based learning helps students develop the character, habits, and skills vital to our 21st-century workforce.
A Constructivist Approach: Our program provides a constructivist environment that differs from a traditional classroom in that our teachers act as facilitators of learning rather than givers of information. Student questioning is highly valued and encouraged, and deep understanding, not imitative behavior, is the goal.
Child-centered Learning: We believe that differences in the way children learn and the paces at which they learn are natural. An education that benefits all children must be adapted to individual learning styles. Teachers respect these differences and provide opportunities for students to be active participants in their own learning.
Learning Through the Arts: The content and skills of dance, music, drama, and visual arts instruction are integrated into other content areas, such as math and language arts. Such integration enhances the learning of all subjects and gives all students meaningful access to the curriculum. While it is important to emphasize that we are not a “performing arts” school, students are encouraged to use their knowledge of the arts to show what they have learned in other content areas.
On-going Professional Development: As part of our commitment to creating a professional learning community, our faculty are afforded time within their schedules for individual and group self-reflection, assessment, and sharing as a structured and ongoing element of our program. In addition, in-house and off-campus professional developments, combined with classroom observations and coaching, help teachers to continually assess and refine their practice.
Personalized Learning: Students demonstrate what they have learned through multiple measures specific to their personal learning style. In many instances, student assessment is designed through teacher collaboration with the individual student.
Conflict Resolution: Our school is committed to creating a caring community that is safe for learning. Tools for conflict resolution are learned and used by the entire school community. They are taught through direct instruction in the classroom, used and reinforced in all aspects of the school.
Community as the Classroom: Our program is founded on a belief that knowledge acquisition requires authentic context and is facilitated through social interaction. The larger goal of our program, however, is to provide students with interdisciplinary learning experiences that utilize community resources to enhance not only academic achievement and develop creativity but also to infuse students with a sense of belonging to a community, responsible citizenship, and service.
Technology: Da Vinci Academy recognizes that technology and innovation are driving advancement in our society at a faster rate than ever before. Instead of favoring a “business as usual” approach to technology in our classrooms, we believe it is imperative that, as a quality educational institution, we reflect on and embrace evolving technologies and new media outlets by incorporating and leveraging them as vital learning tools in the classroom.
Authentic Parent Involvement: Parents and guardians are viewed as partners and their involvement in all facets of school life, from volunteering in the classroom to sharing ideas with school leaders, is valued and encouraged. Parent volunteers are cleared and fingerprinted to ensure a safe environment.
Math Path: Where mathematics, technology, and manipulatives come together to form a state-of-the-art approach to turning students on to mathematics. Our staff envisioned a math program dedicated to mathematical pursuits, including critical thinking, cooperative problem-solving, and meaningful concept development. We want to emphasize the importance of mathematics in school and its applications in the real world by devoting attention and space to mathematics.
Electives:
A variety of electives are offered, kindergarten through twelfth grade, at different points throughout the school year
- Theater Arts– Students will have the opportunity to learn acting, stage production, choreography, and more. Under the guidance of a trained drama teacher, students are offered a variety of duties that go along with a production.
- Art – This may include, but is not limited to drawing, painting, and sculpture. Students will participate in an art exhibit twice a year.
- Music – This may include, but is not limited to percussion, drumline, piano, guitar, choir, and music theory. Students will participate in a concert twice a year.
- Digital Media – This may include but is not limited to photography, website design, podcasting, blogging, videography, and yearbook. Students will participate in various demonstrations of work throughout the year.
Suggested Supply Lists
Note: Parents, in some cases these are generic lists. If in doubt please wait to purchase items. All teachers will be contacting families closer to the start of school with specifics and may request additional items.
