Lower School - Hillbrook School
Source: https://www.hillbrook.org/academics/lower-school
Archived: 2026-04-23 17:17
Lower School - Hillbrook School
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Hands-On and Hearts Open:
Hillbrook Lower School
The Lower school experience
Hillbrook Lower School provides a rich and rigorous experience for students in both academics and personal development. Students are known and respected as learners and information-seekers, and are encouraged to actively engage in their own unique journeys. Our experienced educators guide student explorations and build on their natural curiosity and playfulness - at Hillbrook, learning is a process focused on inspiring new and exciting questions, not just finding answers. Students discover their passions and grow into confident, creative learners.
Each day is an adventure in hands-on activities and project-based learning, with intentional opportunities to connect each lesson to the world beyond the classroom. Foundational academic skills are taught alongside collaborative skills: problem-solving, communication, a positive sense of identity, and empathy. Both our curriculum and our beautiful campus - 14 acres of sunshine, hills, and trees - create an expansive space for our students to take risks, build confidence, and discover who they are, both as individuals and as a cherished part of a kind, inclusive community.
Journey
Hillbrook's Lower School program helps children develop a strong sense of self as an individual and as a member of a diverse and thriving community. Our daily learning is joyful, active, and collaborative; research and best practices in education guide us toward a whole-child approach with student curiosity and interest at the heart of our days.
Vision
Students of all ages need to be equipped with skills in communications, critical thinking, collaboration, and creativity to adapt to any challenges that they face. With a curriculum that balances academic rigor with social-emotional learning, Hillbrook students build the skills they'll need for a future we cannot yet imagine.
Community
Hillbrook’s mission and vision serve as the foundation of our Lower School program. From JK through 4th grade, from the classroom to the playground, all students learn and live out our Core Values -
be kind, be curious, take risks, be your best -
as we strive to help each student reach their highest potential in school and in life.
Signature Programs
PASSION-DRIVEN ACADEMICS
Social-Emotional Learning in Lower School
THE HUB
REACH BEYOND BLOCK
Beyond the Classroom
Hillbrook's Lower School program p
rovides a rich and rigorous experience for students in academics and personal development.
Lower School learning is an adventure every day - joyful, active, collaborative, and driven by student questions and curiosity along with research and best practices in the field of education.
Hillbrook's best-in-class educators are dedicated to developing each child’s highest individual potential with a whole-child approach - an intentional practice of academics alongside a skills-based approach to community and self. Our teachers and specialists strive to truly know each child as a learner, community member, and individual, in order to provide right-fit challenges and meet each child where they are - that we might help them discover the best version of themselves.
At Hillbrook, students and faculty are a team, working together to co-create an educational experience that encourages our entire community to be the best that they can be. Academic rigor extends beyond the classroom - the challenges of social impact play a key role in students' intellectual and emotional development.
Across our Lower School, the SEL Competencies we teach remain the same, though their complexity and nuance progress with children’s age and stage. The Hillbrook Social-Emotional Core Competencies are:
Perspective-Taking
Self-Awareness
Self-Regulation
Social Awareness
Conflict Management
Effective Communication with peers and adults
Stress Management
Responsible Decision-Making
Relationship Building
Respect for Self & Others
If you can dream it, you can make it in the Hub! The Hub is where engineering and the arts come together, allowing creativity and curiosity to flourish. The Hub invites students - through electives and in their own free time - to design, imagine, and create incredible projects and works of art, with access to tools and teachers they need solve any problem and imagine any future.
With an endless collection of craft supplies (paint, fabric, scrap wood, string), the Hub is the ultimate makerspace, with everything students need to make their ideas come to life.
Reach Beyond Block, or RBB, occurs once weekly across Hillbrook's campus. Reach Beyond block is co-designed and taught by JK-4 homeroom teachers, along with some specialists, staff, and school leaders, with lessons and experiences that inspire new interests and perspectives, engage local partners, and enrich learning. Students are empowered to identify their interests and dreams and transform them into reality with the skills and content learned from the other areas of their school experience. The ultimate goal: learning how to reach beyond ourselves and make a difference in our world.
RBB works cross-collaboratively, involves a mix of independent and group work, and promotes both leadership and listening. Students learn how to identify and solve problems through advocacy and leadership.
JK/K: Our Selves, Our Community & Making Change
- We learn about others, near and far, who have made a difference in order to consider what difference we might make.
1st & 2nd Grade: Movers and Shakers
- Students explore ways they each uniquely influence their communities to create ripples of impact and change—in their classrooms, on-campus, and beyond.
3rd & 4th Grade: Teamwork, Leadership & What Matters to Me
- Field trips and service learning opportunities offer us new perspectives on people and environments beyond campus, connecting to in-school themes like kindness, ability awareness, waste & recycling, environmental health, local history, and social emotional skill-building.
Lower School is an adventure of laughter and learning - here are just a very few of the activities we look forward to each year:
Field Trips
- throughout the year, students visit local interactive learning hubs, including The Children's Discovery Museum, Sanborn Park, and Magical Bridges, as well as family farms, museums, and music performances.
After-School Enrichment
- The fun continues after school - three times a year, students can sign up for Enrichment Classes after school. Past classes have included LEGO engineering, skateboarding, theater arts, chess, filmmaking, and world languages.
Author’s Walkabout (1st/2nd grade)
- Throughout the school year, students build collections of original artwork and stories, which they share with parents and peers at the end of the year!
JK/K Family Celebration
- At the end of their first year at Hillbrook, our youngest students celebrate a year of incredible growth, learning, and skill-building with a family picnic and singalong.
View our curriculum guide
View our curriculum Connections
A Day in the Life
The Lower School Schedule
JK-4th Grade Students:
8:00 AM - 3:00PM
Teachers collaborate intentionally to design school days that engage and inspire young learners. Students start each day in homeroom with Morning Meeting, emphasizing social emotional learning (SEL) and community-building. Students remain in homeroom for the core subjects (mathematics, social studies, and literacy) and visit specialist teachers for science, Spanish, art, music, physical education, and research skills.
We never forget that our students are kids–first and foremost–so they have ample time and freedom to use our beautiful, outdoor learning spaces to run hard, move freely, and just play. Finally, in keeping with our vision, we dedicate time in the weekly schedule to empower students to
“reach beyond themselves to make a difference in the world”
through authentic and meaningful service, community building, leadership, and civic engagement opportunities.
Helpful Links
Sample Schedule of a Kindergarten Student
Sample Schedule of a 3rd Grade Student
Social Emotional Learning: Common Developmental Milestones
Bi-weekly Lower School assemblies cultivate a "through" line for our Lower School students - continuing to create community while also encouraging growth within each grade level.
By the Numbers
18
Average Class Size
1:7
Teacher to Student Ratio
1:1
iPad to Student Program
14
Acres on campus
READY TO APPLY?
Powered by Finalsite
Skip To Main Content
Hands-On and Hearts Open:
Hillbrook Lower School
The Lower school experience
Hillbrook Lower School provides a rich and rigorous experience for students in both academics and personal development. Students are known and respected as learners and information-seekers, and are encouraged to actively engage in their own unique journeys. Our experienced educators guide student explorations and build on their natural curiosity and playfulness - at Hillbrook, learning is a process focused on inspiring new and exciting questions, not just finding answers. Students discover their passions and grow into confident, creative learners.
Each day is an adventure in hands-on activities and project-based learning, with intentional opportunities to connect each lesson to the world beyond the classroom. Foundational academic skills are taught alongside collaborative skills: problem-solving, communication, a positive sense of identity, and empathy. Both our curriculum and our beautiful campus - 14 acres of sunshine, hills, and trees - create an expansive space for our students to take risks, build confidence, and discover who they are, both as individuals and as a cherished part of a kind, inclusive community.
Journey
Hillbrook's Lower School program helps children develop a strong sense of self as an individual and as a member of a diverse and thriving community. Our daily learning is joyful, active, and collaborative; research and best practices in education guide us toward a whole-child approach with student curiosity and interest at the heart of our days.
Vision
Students of all ages need to be equipped with skills in communications, critical thinking, collaboration, and creativity to adapt to any challenges that they face. With a curriculum that balances academic rigor with social-emotional learning, Hillbrook students build the skills they'll need for a future we cannot yet imagine.
Community
Hillbrook’s mission and vision serve as the foundation of our Lower School program. From JK through 4th grade, from the classroom to the playground, all students learn and live out our Core Values -
be kind, be curious, take risks, be your best -
as we strive to help each student reach their highest potential in school and in life.
Signature Programs
PASSION-DRIVEN ACADEMICS
Social-Emotional Learning in Lower School
THE HUB
REACH BEYOND BLOCK
Beyond the Classroom
Hillbrook's Lower School program p
rovides a rich and rigorous experience for students in academics and personal development.
Lower School learning is an adventure every day - joyful, active, collaborative, and driven by student questions and curiosity along with research and best practices in the field of education.
Hillbrook's best-in-class educators are dedicated to developing each child’s highest individual potential with a whole-child approach - an intentional practice of academics alongside a skills-based approach to community and self. Our teachers and specialists strive to truly know each child as a learner, community member, and individual, in order to provide right-fit challenges and meet each child where they are - that we might help them discover the best version of themselves.
At Hillbrook, students and faculty are a team, working together to co-create an educational experience that encourages our entire community to be the best that they can be. Academic rigor extends beyond the classroom - the challenges of social impact play a key role in students' intellectual and emotional development.
Across our Lower School, the SEL Competencies we teach remain the same, though their complexity and nuance progress with children’s age and stage. The Hillbrook Social-Emotional Core Competencies are:
Perspective-Taking
Self-Awareness
Self-Regulation
Social Awareness
Conflict Management
Effective Communication with peers and adults
Stress Management
Responsible Decision-Making
Relationship Building
Respect for Self & Others
If you can dream it, you can make it in the Hub! The Hub is where engineering and the arts come together, allowing creativity and curiosity to flourish. The Hub invites students - through electives and in their own free time - to design, imagine, and create incredible projects and works of art, with access to tools and teachers they need solve any problem and imagine any future.
With an endless collection of craft supplies (paint, fabric, scrap wood, string), the Hub is the ultimate makerspace, with everything students need to make their ideas come to life.
Reach Beyond Block, or RBB, occurs once weekly across Hillbrook's campus. Reach Beyond block is co-designed and taught by JK-4 homeroom teachers, along with some specialists, staff, and school leaders, with lessons and experiences that inspire new interests and perspectives, engage local partners, and enrich learning. Students are empowered to identify their interests and dreams and transform them into reality with the skills and content learned from the other areas of their school experience. The ultimate goal: learning how to reach beyond ourselves and make a difference in our world.
RBB works cross-collaboratively, involves a mix of independent and group work, and promotes both leadership and listening. Students learn how to identify and solve problems through advocacy and leadership.
JK/K: Our Selves, Our Community & Making Change
- We learn about others, near and far, who have made a difference in order to consider what difference we might make.
1st & 2nd Grade: Movers and Shakers
- Students explore ways they each uniquely influence their communities to create ripples of impact and change—in their classrooms, on-campus, and beyond.
3rd & 4th Grade: Teamwork, Leadership & What Matters to Me
- Field trips and service learning opportunities offer us new perspectives on people and environments beyond campus, connecting to in-school themes like kindness, ability awareness, waste & recycling, environmental health, local history, and social emotional skill-building.
Lower School is an adventure of laughter and learning - here are just a very few of the activities we look forward to each year:
Field Trips
- throughout the year, students visit local interactive learning hubs, including The Children's Discovery Museum, Sanborn Park, and Magical Bridges, as well as family farms, museums, and music performances.
After-School Enrichment
- The fun continues after school - three times a year, students can sign up for Enrichment Classes after school. Past classes have included LEGO engineering, skateboarding, theater arts, chess, filmmaking, and world languages.
Author’s Walkabout (1st/2nd grade)
- Throughout the school year, students build collections of original artwork and stories, which they share with parents and peers at the end of the year!
JK/K Family Celebration
- At the end of their first year at Hillbrook, our youngest students celebrate a year of incredible growth, learning, and skill-building with a family picnic and singalong.
View our curriculum guide
View our curriculum Connections
A Day in the Life
The Lower School Schedule
JK-4th Grade Students:
8:00 AM - 3:00PM
Teachers collaborate intentionally to design school days that engage and inspire young learners. Students start each day in homeroom with Morning Meeting, emphasizing social emotional learning (SEL) and community-building. Students remain in homeroom for the core subjects (mathematics, social studies, and literacy) and visit specialist teachers for science, Spanish, art, music, physical education, and research skills.
We never forget that our students are kids–first and foremost–so they have ample time and freedom to use our beautiful, outdoor learning spaces to run hard, move freely, and just play. Finally, in keeping with our vision, we dedicate time in the weekly schedule to empower students to
“reach beyond themselves to make a difference in the world”
through authentic and meaningful service, community building, leadership, and civic engagement opportunities.
Helpful Links
Sample Schedule of a Kindergarten Student
Sample Schedule of a 3rd Grade Student
Social Emotional Learning: Common Developmental Milestones
Bi-weekly Lower School assemblies cultivate a "through" line for our Lower School students - continuing to create community while also encouraging growth within each grade level.
By the Numbers
18
Average Class Size
1:7
Teacher to Student Ratio
1:1
iPad to Student Program
14
Acres on campus
READY TO APPLY?
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