WHY JOIN LEAP@MS51?

We believe youth deserve an education experience beyond just day-school to explore and gain a competitive edge in the 21st century. Communities have been noticing the applications for high schools, colleges, and jobs have become more competitive than they ever were, and many youth are not prepared for the next step. As such, we want to prepare our youth for future opportunities, and to help bridge the learning gap that has been a growing concern for families.

At LEAP@MS51, we strive to build a positive learning environment to enable young minds to grow, expand, and explore new skills. We blend 3 educational frameworks into our activities: Project-Based Learning (PBL), Social-Emotional Learning (SEL), Self-Directed Learning, and Career & Technical Information (CTE). Each of these frameworks structure our classes and transform our activities to provide a well-rounded and powerful experience for our youth. 

In addition to the educational frameworks, we also believe discovery, choice, and exploration is an important aspect to introduce youth to areas of study that may potentially become lifelong interests and skills. We provide a trimester schedule, which we call a "cycles" - and within each of these 3 cycles, students are provided more than a dozen different activities to choose from, and can select up to 6 different activities per cycle and up to 18 different activities by the end of the year!

Students will be provided opportunities to build upon new or existing skillsets as they complete their 6th- 8th grade with LEAP.  Each student will have their own virtual portfolio link for each of their individual projects across different activities. By the end of the year, links will be compiled into a complete virtual portfolio for a “foot-up” on their competition as they grow into young adults!

WHAT IS PBL, SEL, SDL, AND CTE? WHY ARE THEY IMPORTANT?

PBL, SEL, SDL, and CTE are educational frameworks that have been determined to be effective in encouraging educational growth in children. We integrate many of these elements into activities to provide a well-rounded, powerful program for our students.

PROJECT-BASED LEARNING (PBL)

Project Based Learning is a teaching method in which students gain knowledge and skills by working for an extended period of time to investigate and respond to an authentic, engaging, and complex question, problem, or challenge. -pblworks.org

PBL remains an important framework among all of our classes, as it studies have proven it is among the best ways to help students retain learning. By intentionally blending in PBL practices, LEAP@MS51 administration helps ensure activities are hands-on, fun, and engaging for youth. 

SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING (SEL)

SEL is best defined as an integral part of education and human development. SEL is the process through which all young people and adults acquire and apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes to develop healthy identities, manage emotions and achieve personal and collective goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain supportive relationships, and make responsible and caring decisions. -casel.org

As SEL has become an integral part in education, we continue to blend in SEL practices to ensure we provide the support students need to properly regulate themselves and their emotions. LEAP@MS51 runs in a slightly more intimate setting compared to day school, with a staff-to-student ratio of 15 students per teacher as opposed to NYC DOE's 30 students per teacher. We want to help students develop more than just academically, but also personally and emotionally.

SELF-DIRECTED LEARNING (SDL)

Self-directed learning describes a process in which individuals take the initiative, with or without the help of others, in diagnosing their learning needs, formulating learning goals, identifying human and material resources for learning, choosing and implementing appropriate learning strategies, and evaluating learning outcomes. -Malcolm Knowles

SDL is an important process in which students learn to become truly independent learners. We believe learning is a life-long journey. As we encourage our youth to learn new skills, we also want to empower them with the skills they need to learn further their own educational career.

CAREER & TECHNICAL EDUCATION (CTE)

CTE provides academic and technical instruction in the content areas of agriculture, business and marketing, family and consumer sciences, health sciences, trade and technical education, and technology education. -nysed.gov

CTE is an area that is normally applied to High School Education - however, we also believe that we can never get too early of a head start! We build in CTE elements into select activities where students have shown promise in certain areas to extend their classroom knowledge beyond just theory, and finally be able to put things into practice! While CTE topics may not apply to all activities, we implement CTE practices in activities where they can reach for real-life, hands-on learning opportunities. 

All in all, we'd love for the program to "wow" you! This is about the youth we serve, and we sincerely hope your child(ren)'s work and progress will "wow" you even more - consider registering today!