The books and resources to obtain and how to use them are detailed for the family, grade by grade. Materials recommended are suitable to the home school; both the student and the teaching parent will find them easy to use. Many texts have unit quizzes, and answer keys, too. Where texts do not include their own pace and plan of study, we have added weekly or quarterly course plans. Our parent guides, course outlines and periodic newsletters also suggest a variety of alternative means for gaining and demonstrating mastery of academic skills and subject material.

After evaluating the student's assessment your curriculum advisor will put together a personalized curriculum guide for the student that includes course notes, lesson plans, and book ordering information for each course that is recommended for the student's skill level.

Below you will find sample pages from a handful of our courses.  The Academy has developed hundreds of courses that can be classified into four categories:

• Grammar School - courses designed for students in grades Pre-1st through 8th.

• General Education - courses intended for non-academic, remedial, or concrete learners.  The General Education course type is assigned to courses that qualify as basic high school skills. These are not necessarily college-preparatory courses, but they can draw high school credits while the student is working on developing or remediating key college-prep skill areas. Non-academic courses like Physical Education are GE. All Non-STAA Courses (NSC) are assigned GE course credits.

• College Preparatory - courses designed to equip the student to step into the college classroom.  The College Preparatory course type is assigned to courses that are more textbook- or workbook-based. While strong reading and high school writing skills are required for CP courses, the work often is more focused on comprehension rather than developing reasoning skills as in the coursework in LA courses. While Science, Math, and Languages are an important part to a comprehensive Catholic, Liberal Arts education, they are typically classified as CP courses because they do not contain enough classical works to qualify as LA courses.

• Liberal Arts - courses that introduce the students to the classics and focus on analytical thinking, reading, and writing.  These courses in the Liberal Arts introduce the students to the great writers, thinkers, saints, and Church Doctors that have contributed throughout the ages to making Catholic culture so rich. The students will be reading the source texts and, through oral discussion in the home and assigned writing, will offer their own responses to the authors. LA courses require strong to college ready reading and writing skills.

• Non-STAA Courses (NSC) - course plans are not provided for Non-STAA Courses. However, St. Thomas Aquinas Academy will gladly accept properly reported NSC courses as part of the student’s academic plan. As stated in the High School Diploma Requirements, over 50% of a student’s academic credits in each year of high school must be from St. Thomas Aquinas Academy courses. Dramatic departure from the STAA core plan tends to compromise the cohesiveness of the program and may leave holes in the development of certain college-preparatory skills. Please discuss any planned swapping of STAA courses for NSC courses with your academic planning advisor to verify that your plan will skill keep your student on track for graduation.

Click on the links below to view sample pages from the following course plans.  You will need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed on your computer to view the sample pages.  Adobe Acrobat Reader is available for free download from the Adobe website.