About Us
Our Mission
Our Mission is to provide children in the Lower Rio Grande Valley with a traditional Christian education, to see them grow in knowledge of God, of man and the world around them in order that they may be followers of Christ, people of Christian virtue and character, and helpful citizens as they serve in their community.
How it Works
We operate and educate from a historically Christian stance with Anglican roots. We are influenced by the philosophy of Charlotte Mason who “designed, developed, and promoted a relational education in a living environment filled with books, experiences, nature, and ideas, where the child is viewed as a person and the educator as one who cooperates with God.”
We believe that this style of education can produce leaders in the modern world and challenge the status quo of the traditional education method. We combine the Charlotte Mason philosophy with the Nurtured Heart Approach to classroom structure and discipline which teaches educators and parents to recognize and amplify positive behavior and create connected relationships.
Check out the resources below for more on the Charlotte Mason philosophy, the Nurtured Heart Approach, and the Trinity School’s beliefs.
For the Children’s Sake: Foundations of Education for Home and School by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay
Transforming the Intense Child: An Experiential Guide for Learning and Implenting the Nutured Heart Approach by Howard Glasser
“Parents as Primary Educators” a faculty essay written by Michael Moynihan of The Heights School
Fundamental Convictions
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In an atmosphere of sincerity and truth, students are free to learn for the pleasure of learning. Students do not compete with their peers for rank, grades or prizes. Learning is the focus, not besting a classmate. Real life is placed before the students to study and discuss. Students are stimulated to observe, explore, and understand.
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At The Trinity School, we consider the process of student work to be as important as the end product. Rather than developing persons who are able to study well for the next exam, we are interested in helping students develop a life of study. We ask the questions: Did she attend? Did he put forth effort? And was she thorough? We believe school is not just an institution to get through, but rather a place to develop habits that will serve children the rest of their lives.
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Real learning occurs when the learner wonders, asks why and how. And it needs to happen in an atmosphere that stimulates thought, in an atmosphere rich with ideas. Our objective is to place the very best books before our students, books rich in content and ideas, putting them into relationship with the finest authors. Through the use of “living books” students interact with scientists, mathematicians, philosophers, historians, artists, poets, and explorers.
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Because children are born in God’s image, they are therefore born with great potential for a fruitful and full life of interests and relationships. At The Trinity School, children are not identified or limited by their strengths or weaknesses. All children participate in a broad, rigorous curriculum — all children calculate, solve, attend, explore, ponder, recite, paint, and sing. The expectation that prevails within the school is that all students will learn and grow to their full potential as persons and attain their vast inheritance.
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Children live in relationship with God, self, others, creation, and the world of ideas. These relationships are cultivated in the educational process through a broad, challenging curriculum and a faculty that seeks to relate to students, parents, and one another in accordance with the principles of Jesus Christ.
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Children will naturally delight in the feast of great ideas set before them. They will savor them and grow in the ability to enjoy and celebrate their relations with persons, ideas, and creation. But they will also at times struggle. We consider the struggle to be as essential to the learning process as the delight. Children must learn to labor with problems not yet grasped, to remain on task when uncertain of the outcome, to struggle to completion when mind and hand are tired, to experience the rewards and negative consequences of their actions. There is no growth in character without struggle.
Foremost among the enemies of the delight and the struggle necessary for the cultivation of a learner are entertainment and indulgence. In the classroom, entertainment and indulgence both encourage passivity. To grow, a student must be strenuously engaged in the work of learning. Thus, teachers at The Trinity School, while often creative in their presentations, make no effort to entertain their students.