Student-Centered Learning

Confidence, Leadership, Academic Excellence

Derby’s academic curriculum builds from Pre-Kindergarten through Grade 8. Our students learn by doing, using Derby’s classrooms and facilities to explore creative problem-solving. Engaged faculty and cross-disciplinary projects foster the essential skills of innovation, critical thinking, collaboration, and a lifelong passion for learning.

Lower School (Pre-K to Grade 4)

The Lower School years are a time of discovery, creativity, and connection. Curiosity is celebrated, talents are nurtured, and students are equipped with the skills to thrive in the classroom and beyond.

Middle School (Grades 5–8)

With the confidence and skills instilled in our Lower School, Derby students approach their Middle School years with a sense of strength and independence, ready to enjoy learning at the next level.

Nurturing Minds and Hearts

Students at the Center: A Whole-Child Approach

Two young girls stand at a table with a %22Fiji Fresh Water Life%22 display board in front of a gymnasium wall.

Students at the Center

At Derby Academy, our students are the driving force behind every lesson, project, and experience. Student-Centered Learning is more than just a philosophy; it is a constant commitment to balance personalized support with challenging growth, ensuring that every child is met where they are while being pushed toward their maximum potential.

Teaching How to Think, Not What to Think

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Teaching How to Think, Not What to Think

Our faculty are dedicated to fostering classrooms of curiosity and excellence, where students are actively engaged in the process of discovery. We are steadfast in our mission to teach our students how to think. This involves intentional planning, expert facilitation, and age-appropriate questioning designed to encourage students to grapple with challenging material, do the "heavy lifting" of the learning, and build essential critical thinking skills.

Learning Through Experience and Play

A joyful child in a cowboy hat, covered in shaving cream, plays with bottles of shaving cream in the foreground, while a pumpkin and other decorations are visible in the blurred background.

Learning Through Experience and Play

Student-Centered Learning at Derby begins at the earliest ages and evolves to meet developmental needs.

For example, our youngest learners establish pre-literacy curiosity and foundational concepts through play-based and experiential units, such as a cross-curricular fairy tale unit where they experiment with measurement and storytelling. By Grade 3, students define what it means to be an "explorer," choose a historical figure based on that definition, conduct in-depth research, and showcase their learning in a culminating Living History Museum.

Fostering Ownership and Collaboration

A boy in a blue hoodie and a girl in a pink shirt work on a project at a table in a classroom with shelves and decorations in the background.

Fostering Ownership and Collaboration

As students enter the Middle School years, the focus shifts to student-driven work and peer collaboration, sharpening students' minds while building empathy.

Skill Transference: The beauty of our approach is that skills learned in one class are immediately transferred to others. The critical thinking honed in core academics flourishes in arts, athletics, and leadership roles across the greater community.

Center for Teaching & Learning

The Center for Teaching & Learning (CTL) is built by teachers, for teachers, in service of our students. Every educator at Derby is committed to refining their practice. Guided by the mission to Improve both Mind and Heart and anchored by the question, "How do we collectively reflect on our pedagogical practices and transform what we discover into better teaching?", the CTL leverages the expertise of our entire faculty to cultivate a shared growth mindset.

Through distributive leadership, peer coaching, and collaboratively curated professional development, including our Faculty Celebrations of Learning, teachers inspire one another to explore new approaches grounded in evidence-based practice, foster meaningful connections across classrooms and divisions, and make data-informed decisions that continuously improve the experience of every Derby student.

Our goals are unified by the essential question:

“How do we collectively reflect on our pedagogical practices and transform what we discover into better teaching?”

Centering Our Work:

Highest-Quality Instruction

We partner with Department and Division Heads to build communities of practice, support peer coaching, coordinate faculty evaluation and growth, share research-based pedagogical trends, deliver ongoing professional development, and provide faculty grants to enrich curriculum and pursue new ideas.

Curriculum

We collaboratively define Pre-K to Grade 8 learning progressions, scope and sequences, and assessments across all content areas; review and revise curriculum school-wide; ensure continuity of student experience, and engage faculty and campus stakeholders in ongoing curricular development.

Supporting Students

We work to ensure our curriculum reaches every learner effectively. The academic leadership team, school counselors and academic specialists coordinate with classroom teachers to deliver a cohesive, tiered Pre-K to Grade 8 model of differentiated support.

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