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The Bishop Walker School is committed to providing all of our scholars with academic programs that not only ignite their intellectual curiosity but also expose them to ideas and themes critical to their development as student leaders.

Academics: The Highest Standard of Scholarship

CURRICULUM

Our teachers have created a hands-on, engaging curriculum that integrates established, research-based curricula with a well-rounded, supportive learning experience.

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All BWS academics are aligned to national and professional learning standards. BWS works to ensure our students are able to compete scholastically with their peers in both independent and public schools in the region.

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READING & LANGUAGE ARTS

Wit & Wisdom® by Great MindsCurriculum:

  • Builds strong readers, writers, speakers, and listeners through rich, grade-level texts

  • Develops reading comprehension, vocabulary, writing, and critical-thinking skills

  • Builds knowledge across literature, history, science, and the arts

  • Encourages thoughtful discussion, questioning, and evidence-based communication

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SOCIAL STUDIES

Social Studies Essentials by Discovery Education

  • Explores history, civics, geography, economics, and culture by asking essential questions such as “How?” and “Why?”

  • Builds critical-thinking skills through primary and secondary sources, discussion, and investigation

  • Strengthens literacy through reading, writing, vocabulary, speaking, and listening

  • Connects the past and present through multimedia, hands-on activities, and real-world experiences

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MATH

Eureka Math²® by Great Minds

  • Builds deep conceptual understanding alongside procedural fluency

  • Develops problem-solving, critical-thinking, and mathematical reasoning skills

  • Uses models, manipulatives, and real-world contexts to make mathematical concepts meaningful

  • Encourages students to explain their thinking and engage in mathematical discussion

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SCIENCE

Mystery Science and Project Lead The Way (PLTW) 

  • Engages students in inquiry-based, hands-on investigations of real-world scientific phenomena

  • Builds curiosity and scientific thinking through observation, questioning, experimentation, and discovery

  • Introduces STEM through collaborative activities, projects, and real-world problem solving

  • Applies science, technology, engineering, and math through designing, building, testing, and refining solutions

Grade Overview

Early Elementary (K–2)

Maximum of 16 students in each class; K–2 classrooms have a lead and assistant teacher

  • Hands-on, engaging instruction designed to build strong foundational skills

  • Phonics, spelling, handwriting, and writing development

  • Social Studies units explore identity and community, citizenship and government, geography, history and traditions, and economics

  • Students learn to ask questions, examine information, discuss different perspectives, and make connections between their lives and the world around them

  • Science and STEM learning emphasizes inquiry, investigation, experimentation, and real-world problem solving

Upper Elementary (3–5)

  • Literacy focus: comprehension, fluency, vocabulary

  • Writing and grammar instruction

  • Increasing complexity in math

  • Making connections to real-world events and phenomena

  • Writer's Workshop

  • Social Studies units: States of the Union, Branches of the Federal Government, U.S. land formations, Ancient Greece, Colonial America and pre-Columbian cultures, the Revolutionary War, westward expansion, the Civil War

  • Science units explore life cycles, traits and heredity, ecosystems and environmental change, weather and Earth's systems, water and natural resources, sound and waves, forces and energy, and space science

ASSESSMENT VS. TESTING

It is critical to Bishop Walker's mission to provide the structured support necessary to develop each scholar's unique gifts. Instead of high-stakes testing we use data to create adaptive learning plans for each student, which is critical to preparing our scholars for middle school and beyond. Using the NWEA MAP Growth assessment three times each school year, teachers and BWS leadership are able to ensure  that all students are acknowledged, celebrated, and that their needs are incorporated into instruction consistently.

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