Temple Christian Academy

Curriculum

At Temple Christian Academy, we are unapologetically Christian and traditional in our approach to education. For this reason, we use the A Beka Book curriculum, published by Pensacola Christian College, exclusively in our school. A Beka Books provides a child with a God-honoring, high-quality, traditional curriculum. A Beka Book materials have been developed as a result of 50 years of actual classroom experience in Pensacola Christian Academy, one of America’s largest and most respected Christian day schools. Their skilled researchers and writers do not paraphrase progressive education textbooks and add Biblical principles; they do primary research in every subject and look at the subject from God’s point of view.

A Beka Book is developed upon the traditional methodology of ". . . precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:"(Isa 28:10); that is, children must first be taught basic facts in order to proceed on to the higher levels of thinking skills. It is the necessary first step. We would not expect a baby to begin talking in complete sentences when he hadn’t spent some time on the first step of individual words. We would not expect someone to go on to professional athletics that had not spent some time on the first step of practice and drill. The mastery of basic facts is the foundation that all other learning depend on. An excellent foundation in the facts ensures a house of dialectic and rhetoric built on the rock of grammar, of the building blocks of knowledge, of the truth, rather than sand.

Memorizing facts is a tried-and-true method of processing information that is currently out of favor with educationalists, and even many Christian private schools and homeschools. One reason is that many have been trained to dislike it. Memorizing something, after all, does require some effort. However, our dislike (or our children’s occasional dislike) does not make it less valuable. Modern thought is that education should at all times be as much fun as a trip to Disneyland. A considerable amount of effort has been expended and rewriting of curriculum has taken place to remove as much blood, sweat, and tears from the educational process as possible. The problem is that very few things end up being learned with this approach. To quote Thomas W. Harvey, author of a very successful 19th century text, Harvey’s English Grammar:

“Neither the erudition of the teacher nor the exhaustive completeness of the text-book used, can compensate for the lack of intelligent, systematic drill in the class-room.” (Emphasis his.)

The A Beka Book Reading Program has been a success story nationwide for many years because it teaches children basic reading skills using an intensive phonics program, not just a sight-reading program garnished with phonics. Even though books and articles continue to be written exposing the deficiencies of the sight-memory method of teaching reading, almost all reading programs today still use the whole-language sight-memory (or look-say) method. By adding a bit of phonics here and there, many of them give the appearance of phonics, but they do not effectively use the basics of a sound phonics program.

With an intensive phonics approach, even the lower-ability child can learn to read successfully. The intensive phonics approach is taught systematically throughout the kindergarten and lower-elementary curriculum to ensure continued growth in skills.

The A Beka Book Reading Program has been nationally recognized as one of the best reading curricula available. The National Right to Read Foundation, in reviewing the A Beka Reading program related this incident:

In the fall of 1997, second graders at a Loudoun County, Virginia private school, who had been instructed with a well-known whole language program during first grade, were tested with the National Right to Read Foundation's Reading Competency Test. Results showed only three students in the entire class had mastered the basic letter/sound relationships. And those three students had received extensive phonics instruction from their parents. As a result of this startling finding, the principal took immediate action and switched to the complete A Beka language arts curriculum. After just two weeks of this research-based instruction, the teacher said, "They’re finally getting it!"

Dr. Rudolf Flesch, a well known author, readability expert, and writing consultant and author of the now famous Why Johnny Can't Read, had this to say about the A Beka Reading Program:

“The children who are learning to read with this program are certainly blessed and will profit from this firm educational background for the rest of their lives.”

Finally, here is an evaluation of the A Beka Reading Program from one of our own Kindergarten parents:

“Most parents I talk to cannot believe that my 6-year-old is on the same level as their second grader. Temple Christian Academy has an excellent curriculum, a very caring staff, and a wonderful learning atmosphere.”

At present, students in grade 3rd through 12th grade are educated using the A Beka Virtual Classroom program. This outstanding educational program allows students to receive the benefit of having master teachers from Pensacola Christian Academy provide daily instruction on DVD. An on-site teacher is responsible for training students in proper classroom habits, checking homework and class work, grading papers, listening to oral reading, and generally supervising daily procedures. It is the goal of Temple Christian Academy that as enrollment in these grades increases to convert these classes to conventional classrooms with their own on-site teacher.