Curriculum Overview

One of the chief interventions in Saint Martin’s educational program is the inclusion of all aspects of a student’s life in the curriculum. From the organizational structure of the student body, to labor on the farm, work in the kitchen, prayer, academics, and even to the unscripted social interactions of the students themselves, every aspect of life at St Martin’s is part of the education. This is one of the reasons Saint Martin’s is exclusively a boarding school: every moment, task, and class is an opportunity for developing the intellect, growing in virtue, and increasing one’s faith.  Academics are, however, the central discipline around which the life of the school takes shape.

While our academic curriculum is the product of much reflection, research, and discussion among our faculty members and our Board of Advisers it is not, and likely never will be, entirely immune to revision. Each year the faculty will review the curriculum with the purpose of correcting deficiencies and capitalizing on strengths. 

These charts represent an outline of the curriculum .  

9th Grade Curriculum
Main LessonTrimesterTopicBooks
Letters1MythosThe Bible, Ovid's Metamorphoses, Grimm's Fairy Tales, Norse Mythology, Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream
2Greek LettersHomer: Iliad and Odyssey, Aeschylus: The Oresteia, Seven Against Thebes, Sophocles: Oedipus Rex, Antigone
3Roman LettersOvid: Metamorphoses, Virgil: Aeneid, Shakespeare: Julius Caesar
History1Prehistory to the HebrewsCode of Hammurabi, Story of Sinuhe, Epic of Gilgamesh, The Bible: Genesis; Exodus; Kings, Western Heritage Reader
2Greek CivilizationHesiod: Works and Days; Theogony, Thucydides: History of the Peloponnesian Wars, Pericles Funeral Oration, Plutarch: Lives, Western Heritage Reader
3Roman CivilizationLivy: History of Rome, Tacitus: Annals, Julius Caesar: Gallic Wars, Western Heritage Reader
ReligionAllFundamentals of the FaithCatechism of the Catholic Church
ScienceAllNatural HistoryJean-Henri Fabre: Selections
MathAllAlgebra I / Applied Mathematics Schneider: A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe; Making Math Meaningful
LanguageAllLatinVarious
PracticumAllConstruction Trades
10th Grade Curriculum
Main LessonTrimesterTopicBooks
Letters1Rome and the IncarnationShakespeare: Titus Andronicus; Antony and Cleopatra, Augustine: City of God, Dante: Inferno
2Medieval IDante: Purgatorio, Beowulf, Malory: Le Morte D'Arthur,SirGawain and the Green Knight, Shakespeare: Henry V
3Medieval IIDante: Paradiso, Boccaccio: Decameron, Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales, Cervantes: Don Quixote
History1Roman Empire to Late AntiquityThe Bible: Gospel of Luke; Acts of the Apostles St Athanasius: St Antony of the Desert, Martyrology, Western Heritage Reader
2Early Middle AgesBede: History of the English Church and People Western Heritage Reader
3High Middle AgesBradford: Great Siege of Malta, Aquinas: Summa Theologica, Bonaventure: Journey of the Mind to God
ReligionAllChurch History and The LiturgyJackson: Nothing Superfluous
ScienceAllEarth Science / BiologyVarious
MathAllEuclidean and Non-Euclidean Geometry Euclid: Elements
LanguageAllLatinVarious
PracticumAllConstruction Trades
11th Grade Curriculum
Main LessonTrimesterTopicBooks
Letters1Study Abroad - ChristendomThe Song of Roland, Parzival, Bolt: A Man for All Seasons
2Early ModernShakespeare: Hamlet, Goethe: Faust, Milton: Paradise Lost
3Late ModernDickens: A Tale of Two Cities, Hawthorne: Short Stories, Twain: Huck Finn, Dostoevsky: Crime and Punishment
History1Christendom in EuropeAnanda Coomaraswamy: Christian and Oriental Philosophy of Art, St. Benedict: The Rule
2Reformation to RevolutionLuther and Erasmus, Bacon, Copernicus, Descartes, Newton, Robespierre, Republic of Virtue
3America: Founding to Civil WarCrèvecoeur, “What Is An American?”, J. Edwards, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” Declaration of Independence, Washington, “Letter to the Hebrew congregation”; Constitution; Federalist Papers; Lincoln: "House Divided Speech"
ReligionAllPre-theology: Logic and Intro to PhilosophyBoethius: Consolation of Philosophy, Plato: Dialogues, Aristotle: Categories, Analytics
ScienceAllChemistryVarious
MathAllAdvanced Mathematics: Algebra II / PrecalculusVarious
LanguageAllLatinVarious
Practicum1Study Abroad
2Construction Trades
3Construction Trades
12th Grade Curriculum
Main LessonTrimesterTopicBooks
Letters1ModernConrad: Lord Jim, Steinbeck: Grapes of Wrath, O'Connor: Short Stories
2LyricHollander: Rhyme's Reason, Corn: The Poem's Heartbeat, Various Lyric Poems
3World LiteratureSt-Exupery: Little Prince; Wind, Sand, and Stars, Czeslaw Milosz: The Witness of Poetry; Poems, Bernanos: Diary of a Country Priest
History1Modernity: WWIChurchill: The World Crisis David Jones: In Parenthesis American Heritage Reader
2Modernity: WWIIChurchill: The Second World War, Keegan: The Second World War American Heritage Reader
3Totalitarian Ideology and HumanityGustav Herling, Worlds Apart; Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Martin Luther King Jr., Papal Encyclicals, George Orwell: Animal Farm
ReligionAllIntro to TheologyPieper: The Four Cardinal Virtues, Faith Hope and Love; Aquinas: Summa Theologica
Math and ScienceAllPhysicsVarious
RhetoricAllRhetoric and CompositionVarious
LanguageAllLatin / Elective GreekVarious
Practicum1Construction Trades
2Construction Trades
3Financial Management