| The staff at the St. Thomas Aquinas
Academy proved to be more helpful than I'd hoped for as I began
homeschooling two years ago. My 7-year-old son has learning
disabilities (part of my reason for homeschooling) and every
recommendation from STAA has been exceptionally on target. My son is
now at grade level (or above) in all subjects but one due in no
small way to the experience, knowledge, intuitiveness and faith of
those at STAA. Whether it was during my early, nervous, tenuous days
of homeschooling or, later, just curious about the "latest" math
approach, St. Thomas' has been ready, able and willing to supply me
with needed answers and, sometimes just as importantly, has been
able to ask me the right questions. I cannot recommend the STAA
enough. -- Karla from Kentucky (July 2003) |
| When we first decided to homeschool,
we'd been told our son (who has auditory processing issues) should
repeat preschool since he had a difficult time absorbing material
and because he couldn't print his name "small enough for
kindergarten". What we saw was a bright boy who would need
one-on-one instruction. We knew we wanted a homeschool program that
would reinforce and nurture our Catholic faith, yet also be flexible
enough to work well for a child who didn't fit the cookie-cutter
mold traditional schools prefer. After prayer and much internet
searching, we discovered the website of the St. Thomas Aquinas
Academy. It looked good. Very, very good. I called and spoke with
the director, Mrs. Deborah Yonan. By the time our conversation
ended, I not only felt as if I knew her, but also that she knew our
son quite well and would be a wise and experienced guiding hand. We
signed up. Curriculum suggestions included books and programs I'd
never heard of, yet they suited our son perfectly. Math-U-See made
mathematics his favorite subject; the activity book that accompanied
his Faith & Life religion book helped create a fascination with the
Old Testament stories. Handwriting Without Tears---could the title
be any more appropriate? Yet, few of these ideal matches would have
materialized if it hadn't been for the St. Thomas Aquinas Academy's
experience and patient understanding of what was needed to help our
son, not just reach grade level, but thrive. By 2nd grade, our son
had scored in the 93rd percentile for overall math scores in the CAT
test. Language Arts, always his roughest area, was slightly above
average. In 4th grade, his composition abilities suddenly soared and
writing became an activity that brought pleasure to him. As we look
forward to beginning 5th grade with the St. Thomas Aquinas Academy,
we look back on our intriguing studies of Egypt, ancient Greece,
ancient Rome and the classical education that neither my husband nor
I had been exposed to in elementary school. Ahead are Norse myths,
medieval heroes and a new level of mathematics with Horizons Math
among other programs this year. I firmly believe that the St. Thomas
Aquinas Academy has contributed greatly to our homeschooling success
and would not hesitate to recommend them to other homeschooling
families, both newcomers as well as those exhausted by programs
weighted down with busywork. They truly are a unique and thoughtful
resource. -- Karla in Kentucky (July 2006) |