Our Signature Programs

Our eighth grade students rehearse and present a 25-minute interpretation of a Shakespearean play for other area students at the Folger’s Theater in Washington, DC.  In preparation for this performance, the students also attend a professional Shakespeare play to better acquaint themselves with the material and style of Shakespeare performances. Observed and critiqued by professional actors from the Folger’s Theater, students receive feedback and praise on their performances. In the past, Christ Episcopal School has won many individual awards for performance highlights at the festival.

Every quarter a selected group of lower school students will have the opportunity to win a chance to present their best writing piece to a small audience. Lower school teachers assemble as a collective grading panel to review the top writing pieces selected by each classroom teacher. The lower school teachers use a cumulative grading rubric to score each assignment based on the 6 +1 Writing Traits. The two students that score the highest in each grade will be invited to present their writing at the Young Author’s Tea. Family of the winner will be invited to the event as well. This event is held during the school day and allows the winners for each quarter to present their writing to a small audience, accompanied by light refreshments. 

Through Project BioEYES, CES students travel under the sea to study the lifecycle of the zebrafish. Project BioEYES is a K-12 science education program which provides classroom-based learning opportunities through the use of live zebrafish.

The mission of Project BioEYES is to foster enthusiasm for science by offering students opportunities to explore life science through real world applications using a hands-on approach to learning.

Classroom units are designed to teach conceptual understanding of life science content and processing skills while exciting children to the thrill of scientific discovery. When children are appointed junior scientists, they participate in a fun exercise that breaks down stereotypes about both science and scientists. The goal is to educate young citizens to think critically and scientifically, thereby impacting future scientists and doctors.

BioEYES is located at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA; the Carnegie Institution for Science in Baltimore, MD; Notre Dame University in South Bend, IN; and Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.

Upon entering our middle school in fifth grade, students need additional support with the increased responsibilities and academic demands. Students face multiple teachers, larger unit tests and projects, in addition to more extra curricular activities. At CES, we dedicate a class to teaching our students how to manage their time and responsibilities so that they can achieve success. They are taught how to:

• organize their binders and paperwork
• manage their time
• study for tests and quizzes
• take notes
• research the internet
• self-advocate to teachers
• practice mindfulness
• stay safe on the internet

Seventh graders continue to find the power of their voice and develop confidence in public speaking and persuasive oratory as they participate in Ford’s Theatre’s Oratory Program. As well as working under the direction of the classroom teacher who is a National Oratory Fellow in Ford’s program, a teaching artist visits the class to help students utilize Podium Points, warm and cool feedback, and text analysis, including the rhetorical triangle, to become effective orators themselves.

As part of the civics curriculum, eighth graders participate in the Project Citizen Research Program. Students learn how to effectively use their voice to influence public policy as they cooperatively work as a class in this project based program. The class produces a portfolio outlining the steps they have taken as they identify a problem in their community, consider policy based solutions, develop a class policy proposal as well as an action plan to convince officials to implement their policy. Project Citizen is funded by a research grant from the U.S. Department of Education to the Center for Civic Education and Georgetown University’s Civic Education Research Lab.

One of the traditions in 8th grade is our six-week Ethics Seminar, unique to Christ Episcopal School. Taught by Mr. Collin Vredenburg, it is a class that encourages deep thinking and discussion about the philosophy of ethics and how we approach it in our own lives.  The description of the course is as follows:

Ethics: The study of "Good, Right, and Ought," and a special class at CES. Mr. Vredenburg, a Catholic University School of Philosophy alumnus, comes to visit once a week during the spring semester to ask our 8th graders the big ethical questions: "Why should we be Good?" and "What makes us truly happy?" This introduction to the works of great thinkers including Saint Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theologiae, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, and various writings of C.S. Lewis challenges the students to translate those big questions into a practical guide to being ethical in High School and beyond.