We are currently accepting learners for our Sparks (lower elementary), Discovery (upper elementary), and Exploration (middle school) studios. We will grow to meet the learners’ needs, launching a High School studio as learners need them. Learn more about our studios here.

Learn more about tuition and fees here.

We are not a Montessori school but we do incorporate Montessori manipulatives and principles into our studios, especially for our youngest learners.

As an Acton parent, each academic year, you will be required to attend approximately four parents’ nights and two Journey Meetings with your child; you will also be invited to attend each session’s last-day exhibition.

Most children can thrive at Acton Academy if parents are committed to respecting the methods, which may mean stepping back to let your children make mistakes as part of the learning process or stepping back and refusing to rescue them as they struggle through the discomfort of conquering their own challenges.

Our school year begins in mid August and ends in early June. The school calendar is based on a series of 4 to 6-week long sessions. Each session revolves around themed project sprints called “Quests.” Every session is followed by a weeklong break to process what they have learned and refuel for the next session. We do our best to align these session breaks with holidays where appropriate.

We can provide a copy of this year’s school calendar upon request or during the enrollment process.

Each day begins at 8:00 am and ends at 3:15 pm.

• Mornings are reserved for Core Skills
• Afternoons are for hands-on Quest projects in the shoes of a real-life hero
• 15-minute Socratic discussions bookend the work periods and provide a time to reflect, think deeply, and bond as a group
• Plenty of time is built into the day for free play and exercise.

Although we don’t have grade levels, each learner’s core curriculum work is tracked, managed, and saved.  All of this work translates into a transcript, which we are able to provide you.

We measure learner progress in several different ways:

1. Learners set Daily, Weekly, and Session goals for which they are accountable.
2. Robust real-time data from our online learning tools is available for both parents and guides to find out exactly what students are learning and where they may be struggling and need guidance. Learners do not advance in a topic until they have shown mastery.
3. Learners each have a paper portfolio to showcase their best work.
4. Although we never “teach to the test,” standardized tests are given each Spring to provide benchmark data.

We believe in the power of balance. While we do use incredible, self-paced eLearning tools, we also incorporate plenty of good books, traditional paper and pencil work, and even Montessori manipulatives into the curriculum so children are not glued to a screen all day. Using this hybrid curriculum, we can provide the rigor needed for learning math, vocabulary, spelling, and grammar in about two hours each day in the Discovery Studio. This frees up the rest of the day for engaging, project-based learning. There is even less use of individual technology in the Spark Studio.