Why us?

Teaching and Learning at ASLP

At ASLP, we understand that our most essential and enduring commitment is to provide our families with a rigorous educational system fueled by data where assessment, student learning, and best instructional practices are in the spotlight as the protagonists of the learning process.

We have faced the challenge of current worldwide circumstances by strengthening our online learning system, obtaining excellent results and feedback from our families and students across all grade levels.

Our academic model is built on the pillars of 21st century competencies, with the so-called 4 Cs being at the center of our educational and evaluative process:

1. Content Understanding
2. Critical Thinking and Reasoning
3. Communication and Collaboration
4. Creativity and Effort

These 4 competencies are deeply embedded in how we think, how we teach and learn, the tools we use, and how we live and experience the world:

How We Think:

Development of Higher Order Thinking Skills

• Our students are the protagonists of their own learning and our role as a school is to provide them with scenarios and experiences that foster and promote intellectual curiosity, visible higher order thinking, experimentation and research, intuition, imagination, creativity, the ability to make decisions and successful problem solving.
• Character building through a values-based ethos, based on individualized attention to each student in order to maximize their potential for growth and progress.
• Our Department of Educational Psychology works closely with students, families, and teachers to identify individual learning styles and needs and, when necessary, outlines support strategies in the classroom and at home.

How We Teach and Learn:

We teach and learn through the systematic implementation of research-based effective teaching and learning practices to ensure quality core instruction across all grades:

1. Clarity on, and communication about, the learning intentions and success criteria
2. Student ownership of the expectations for learning
3. Positive, humane, growth-producing Leadership/Teacher/Parent-student relationships
4. Modeling and direct instruction of content, skills, and dispositions
5. Collaborative learning experiences on a daily basis
6. Balanced use of blended and flipped learning
7. Small group learning based on instructional needs rather than perceived ability
8. Spaced (rather than mass) independent practice and application of content

Our essential aim is to ensure that all students learn, through the thorough design of a student-centered environment with:

1. Differentiated & needs-based learning
2. Self-efficacy, engagement, and motivation: problem & project-based learning
3. Multi-tiered system of interventions and enrichment
4. Formative assessment & feedback plan; rubric & self-assessment system
5. Consistent home-school connections program
6. Periodic assessment of affective domain (soft skills impacting learning and achievement)

Tools to Teach and Learn:

We believe that printed resources are valuable and effective tools for teaching and learning, ones that cannot be replaced, but complemented, with the Internet and the use of technology. To ensure effective cross-curricular literacy in all disciplines and a viable dual language system, ASLP counts on updated American and Spanish textbooks, as well as our growing book rooms and library.

Integrated technologies

ICT has become an essential support and enrichment tool in the teaching-learning process. Its curricular integration, with the use of the digital board and the iPad in the classroom, stimulates our students to investigate and improve their creative, imaginative, communication and collaboration skills. They provide a more meaningful and attractive learning process through greater access to information and the use of different devices and tools such as gamification, blended learning, flipped classroom methodologies, etc.

Blended and Flipped Classrooms

Google Classroom continues to be a fundamental academic tool used at ASLP. Before COVID-19, our middle and high school teachers and students used Google Classroom on a regular basis. Currently, this tool is employed across all grades (K-12).

During the school day, the use of educational platforms, digital materials and electronic devices build and improve our students and teachers digital literacy skills. Each Elementary grade has its exclusive number of tablets for daily use, enabling simultaneous and differentiated learning methodologies in small groups. Middle School students have their personal iPads and Upper School students are encouraged to use their personal laptops.

How We Live and Experience the World:

Physical, intellectual, emotional and social development

Intrapersonal skills: self-knowledge, self-confidence, emotional intelligence and autonomy.

Social skills: form and develop healthy relationships, based on effective communication as well as on positive and constructive interactions.

Intellectual skills: positive attitudes and values, responsible decision-making, high academic achievement and healthy mental habits.

Physical skills: benefits of life-long physical activity habits, the value of teamwork, perseverance, healthy competition, and equity in physical education.

Teacher / student relationships

In line with our educational philosophy, teachers are educators in the broadest sense. They not only act as guides and models to build knowledge, but also establish a deep two-way relationship with their students and their peers based on respect, collaboration and communication. This is essential to understand each student as a person and a learner. We study the strengths and areas of improvement in each student and we work together with them to create individualized paths that respond to their needs when solving these challenges. By getting to know their students, teachers are able to enrich educational experiences, provide the support that each student needs, and promote their successful progress at each stage of development.

North American and Spanish Curricula: Intercultural Awareness

We place great importance on developing an awareness of belonging to an increasingly global world that requires respect, knowledge of other cultures and skills in efficient communication, collaboration and teamwork. Throughout the years, we have designed a number of specific programs for each educational stage to address our particular cross-curricular needs and instill intercultural awareness.

Every opportunity is taken to extend English beyond school itself and create communication experiences in real settings. We strive daily to develop their capacities to learn, grow and participate as learners and individuals. We achieve this through:

• Wide range of institutional agreements with other schools in the UK, the US and Canada for living-abroad experiences.
• Short-term cultural exchange programs with schools in the United States.
• Cooperative work projects with students and teachers around the world & involvement in international non-profit projects: M.U.N or Looking for a star.
• Scholarship agreements for our students at American universities.