
Nicole Goyette
Middle School & Upper School Director
(719) 434-3570
What did you learn in school today? Traditionally, most students, and even most educational institutions, have answered this question by referencing the traditional rituals and accouterments of school—classes, essays, tests, grades, and textbooks. Most schools looking at their own internal goals and processes to prove that they and their students have been hard at work. While the “work” of school; assignments and siloed subjects are important and certainly reflect the way learning has always been organized, at CSS we ask our students a series of slightly different questions.
Students select which work to include as an “artifact” in their Digital Portfolio that captures their work in and understanding of one of the following 8 capacities:
Children’s School teachers are more heavily involved in student selections for the portfolios and the number of capacities and artifacts is scaled to a developmentally appropriate level.
While seven of these capacities were created by the NAIS Schools of the Future project, the eighth capacity of service to others reflects our school’s commitment to creating ethical leaders who place high value in being strong citizens in their communities.
Research on student portfolios shows that:
Connecting student learning to the real world, another way our school is preparing its students to be citizens in a dynamic world.
Middle School & Upper School Director
(719) 434-3570
Children's School Division Director
(719) 434-3530