Humanities

ENGLISH LANGUAGE & LITERATURE 

Lower School English Curriculum

MLCA introduces students to classic children’s literature often overlooked in modern schools. 

From kindergarten onward, students explore fairy tales, myths, legends, fables, and biographies, including works by Aesop, Grimm, Kipling, and the D’Aulaires. They not only read classic poetry and prose but also memorize and recite them at festive Poetry Nights, sharing works by Blake, Wordsworth, Tennyson, Frost, and more. Along the way they develop skill with literary tools such as meter, rhyme, metaphor, and allegory.

As they advance, students read Shakespeare, Swift, Austen, Dickens, and Hawthorne alongside inspiring historical and Biblical stories. These timeless texts spark imagination, broaden understanding of history and culture, and present courageous characters and adventures that captivate young readers.

Our language arts program complements this literatary training by emphasizing grammar, spelling, composition, penmanship, and oratory. Early study of English deepens understanding of syntax, vocabulary, and literary expression. Older students explore oratory, memorize literary and rhetorical texts, develop analytical skills, and hone their confidence, leadership, and eloquence.

Upper School English Curriculum 

MLCA's Upper School humanities program integrates English, French, Latin, and history through a series of interconnected seminars. Spanning from the 8th century BCE to the present, the curriculum emphasizes literature, poetry, and the exchange of ideas across cultures and time.

Students read extensively and explore works originally composed in Greek, Latin, French, German, and Russian -- encountered here in English translation -- alongside English language texts. They learn to trace a continuous literary inheritance from Greek tragedy through Shakespeare, the Bildungsroman, Romantic literature, and more modern texts. The program draws out the development of the classical tradition. It encourages students to see continuity and evolution in ideas, identity, and human experience.

By examining literature both as a product of its time and as part of a living cultural inheritance, students cultivate critical thinking, historical awareness, and an appreciation for the enduring questions of human nature.

HISTORY 

Journeying and Encountering

MLCA students discover fascinating characters in distant times and places — heroes and villains, kings and saints, warriors and thinkers, artists and inventors. Wherever possible, students encounter history through primary sources, reading the words of those who lived it rather than relying solely on later accounts.

A guiding aim of the program is sympathetic understanding: before a student evaluates a civilization, a conflict, or a decision, she must first grasp how those involved understood themselves and their world. This discipline -- entering a foreign time on its own terms -- sharpens both historical judgment and intellectual honesty.

History at MLCA is also an occasion for what the program calls the human questions. What else could this person have done? How much of this outcome was misfortune, and how much deliberate choice? What does it cost to lead well — and is the price always worth paying? These questions connect the past to the formation of character, which invites students to measure themselves against the figures they study.