High School Courses
The design of the High School virtual curriculum allows students to have great flexibility as they work toward their post-secondary goals and pursue life-long interests. While all students must meet the graduation requirements outlined for them, the path to meet the requirements can vary significantly. Students are also able to take PASD hybrid courses and dual enrollment courses in partnership with local colleges. Each year, the PASD Virtual Academy will continue to grow and add more variety to our course selection guide, allowing students to continue their studies in more advanced courses.
In all of our high school courses, teachers facilitate live, synchronous instruction for a minimum of 90 minutes per six-day cycle for each one-credit course (approximately 15 minutes per period per day). Teachers provide learning activities that are both synchronous and asynchronous using Canvas. Teachers may assign work for students to complete while they work individually with students, a practice that already occurs daily during in-person instruction. Synchronous sessions may be recorded for future viewing by students at teacher’s discretion.
Middle School
The Middle School virtual curriculum is designed for students to develop greater knowledge of the areas they began to study in elementary school, including English Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, and Social Studies. In addition to core subjects, students will also have mixed media classes, including Health & Physical Education, World Language, Art, Band/Orchestra, Music, Family and Consumer Sciences, STEM, and others.
In all of our Middle School courses, teachers facilitate live, synchronous instruction for a minimum of 90 minutes per six-day cycle for each one-credit course (approximately 15 minutes per period per day). Teachers provide learning activities that are both synchronous and asynchronous using Canvas. Students will naturally progress more quickly in some classes than in others, depending on their own interests and comfort level with the materials. Teachers may assign work for students to complete while they work individually with students, a practice that already occurs daily during in-person instruction. Synchronous sessions may be recorded for future viewing by students at teacher’s discretion.
Elementary School Classes
Elementary teachers will provide daily instruction both synchronously and asynchronously for Reading, Writing, Math, and Social Studies/Science classes. Synchronous instructional blocks will mirror the building and grade level master schedule. The school day is a blend of synchronous (live) instruction and asynchronous learning activities along with time for independent practice and teacher check-in. Over the course of the week, the student will have opportunities to work in small groups with peers and conference with teachers. The teacher will provide students and their families a suggested pacing guide to ensure that all students stay on track to meet learning expectations.
In addition to core subjects, students participate in Art, Health & Physical Education, Library, and Music. In order to minimize the number of classes in which students are instructed at one time, all students will have their specials in 6-week blocks. Thus, for six weeks a student might have daily art lessons, and then switch to music or library lessons for the next six weeks. Virtual band and orchestra lessons will be scheduled on a specific cycle day based upon building and grade level schedules.