Language Curriculum

The International School of Tucson (IST) divides its curriculum into Contents and Skills (click here to go to the Curriculum main page). We believe that language is a set of communicative Skills, and as a result have relatively few Content areas in our Language curriculum. Contents come from the other Subject Areas; they essentially provide the vehicles for the acquisition, development and practice of the Language's communicative Skills.

These communicative Skills are :

The IST Curriculum has three linguistic mileposts. The first is that the student will have reached linguistic equivalency by the time of entry into Elementary School in the school's target languages, particularly in Oral Communication. Currently these are Spanish and English.

The second is that the student will have reached age-appropriate native-level competence by the time of entry into Middle School in the school's target languages, particularly in Written Communication, and a high level of oral competence in a third language.

The third is that the student will be able to follow a program of university study in both target languages by the time of graduation from High School, which pre-supposes a high level of cultural awareness of the worlds represented by the two languages and thus the focus in the High School is on literary study. The student should also have sufficient competence in a third language as to be able to live and work in the places where that language is spoken.

Pre-School

The IST Pre-School Language Curriculum is a full-immersion Spanish program, with an emphasis on Oral Communication. Students spend the entire day throughout the two-year program immersed in the language, and activities are designed so that students can quickly become comfortable in Spanish and can begin using it themselves authentically. The only exception to this might be where a specialist teacher, visitor or administrator does not speak Spanish and in this case, English will be used.

Elementary School

The Kindergarten year also has an immersion program, and the emphasis moves more obviously to Written Communication. However, in preparation for Grade One, students also begin some reading in English, transferring the skills they have already acquired in Spanish. From Grade One, students spend fifty percent of their day working in English and fifty percent working in Spanish following a "Language A" program in both languages, with a focus on Written Communication. From Grade Four, students learn a "second language" which for most will in fact be a third. (click here to go to a discussion of Languages A / B)

For details on the Middle School and High School programs, please contact the Head of School.

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