The goal of HAFTR Middle School is to guide students in grades six through eight from the fundamental discovery years of the primary grades to the exciting challenges of high school in both limudei kodesh and general studies. HAFTR Middle School celebrates the uniqueness of this age by providing innovative, stimulating, and diverse learning opportunities that address the specific developmental needs of each student in a warm and nurturing atmosphere.
Growth Mindset
Part of our Instructional Focus includes the cultivation of a “Growth Mindset” and the teaching of this concept to our students. Mindset is a simple idea developed by world-renowned Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck in decades of research on achievement and success—a simple idea that makes all the difference. In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talents instead of developing them. They also believe that talent alone creates success—without effort. They’re wrong. In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Virtually all great people have had these qualities.
Instructional Focus
We are committed to developing each student’s capacity for academic and intellectual achievement.
We are committed to developing each student’s capacity to learn both individually and collaboratively.
We are committed to developing each student’s “Growth Mindset.”
We are committed to developing each student’s metacognitive and social-emotional learning capacities: self-awareness, social awareness, decision-making and relationship skills within and beyond the classroom.
We view every HAFTR student as our student.
Social-Emotional Learning
Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) is critical to the development of Middle School students. SEL, which teaches students how to regulate their emotions, connect effectively with others, and use and develop their strengths, has been linked with significant, positive outcomes for students, including greater resilience, well-being, and happiness, improved academic grades, and decreased emotional reactivity and stress. HAFTR Middle School’s SEL initiative, spearheaded by HAFTR Middle School’s Guidance Team, focuses on four pillars. Students are provided with programming, workshops, and activities on the school-wide, classroom and individual level to ensure that they internalize and use the information they are taught to maximize their happiness and success.
