Catholic Classical Liberal Arts Education

Classical Liberal Arts Education

Our Catholic classical liberal arts curriculum operates on the premise that our good and loving God has created all that is for a purpose and with a plan. Moreover, God has given humanity special gifts that enable us to learn and grow, to apply ourselves in seeking what is true, good, and beautiful. The gifts of intellect and free will, which God gave to the human person, who is the pinnacle of God’s creative work, enable humans to order their thinking with reason and to exercise virtue in their choosing. The Catholic classical liberal method of education seeks to present learning as an adventure that encourages the student’s sense of wonder at how God’s order and plan can somehow be discovered in all academic subjects.

Learning at St. Ann Classical Academy involves more than just absorbing facts and information for the sake of a test. We provide a high-quality classical education and encourage the development of students' gifts and potential. At our New Jersey Catholic school, our aim is for our students to learn how to think and reason well. These skills carry students through future academics and life. Students at St. Ann Classical Academy become smart and wise to come to understand that both reason and faith are necessary, rather than opposed to each other.

At St. Ann Classical Academy, our desire is to awaken wonder and awe as our students learn about order, patterns, and natural laws found within math and the sciences. Students' hearts and minds are opened to the beauty and truth found in great literature and in the lives and events of historical heroes and saints. A strong language arts foundation enables students to express themselves clearly and effectively.

The Trivium and Quadrivium (Seven Liberal Arts)

At St. Ann Classical Academy, we prioritize critical thinking and a pursuit of truth, beauty, and goodness in our classical education.

The Quadrivium (arithmetic, music, geometry, astronomy) and the Trivium (grammar, logic, rhetoric) make up the seven classical liberal arts of antiquity. This is the education that great minds of the past such as Plato, Aristotle, and Saint Thomas Aquinas would have received.  

Rooted in the Trivium - Latin for "the three ways" of learning - our approach encompasses three developmental stages:  Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric. In the Grammar stage, we tap into children's natural curiosity, training them to absorb diverse knowledge. Progressing to Logic, students in Grades 5-8 engage in analytical thinking, questioning, and logical reasoning. By the time our students graduate 8^th grade, they are ready to enter into the Rhetoric stage (9-12), where they mature into expressive individuals, equipped to articulate informed judgments through writing and public speaking.

The Quadrivium is the study of arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy. These four disciplines observed the laws of the natural world.  Mathematics, more than any other subject, builds upon the previous layers of knowledge.  The Quadrivium naturally recognizes that and establishes a systematic approach to learning that forms the student's mind gradually over time by building on the progress made previously.  

Ancient philosophers sought wisdom as the highest virtue.  Wisdom to the ancient Romans and Greeks was more than simply a body of knowledge to be learned or sound decision making, it was the ability to understand deeply the order and harmony of the natural world around them.  The unchanging truth of mathematics allowed ancient philosophers to understand the universe through the natural laws thaat govern the physical world.  

However, the ancient Greeks and Roman philosophers could only understand truth to a certain point through natural reason.  Christianity eventually perfected wisdom through grace and divine revelation, bridging the final gap between man and the divine.  The Quadrivium, centered in a Christian worldview, allows us to know and love God more deeply through the study of His created world.  Every law of nature and observation of the natural world gives us a tiny glimpse into the divine.  In a sense, the seven classical liberal arts form the mind to better understand God through revelation written in Sacred Scripture as well as the Natural Law that is written on our hearts. 

Join us in a vibrant and distinct classical Catholic education at St. Ann Classical Academy in Raritan, where children develop personal and academic confidence, know they are uniquely loved, and learn to respect the dignity of the human person, themselves, and that of others.