The Harbour School - The Garden Campus

THS is a model for providing a 21st-century education for typical, advanced and gifted children while also providing support to students with areas of weakness. We have created an environment that provides a comprehensive, integrated education building on a strong foundation of core skills to develop a global cultural literacy in science, history, technology, and the arts in an atmosphere of kindness, flexibility, respect, and individualism. Our first twelve years have shown that a community of learning can be exciting, fun, rigorous, compelling and creative.

In addition to a structured approach to math, reading, and writing, we use an experiential approach in areas such as science, history and the arts. Students at THS are active, learning many things through experimentation, project work, discussion or action. They have built and monitored coral reefs, started companies, imported coffee, designed and built a school in Africa, created computer games and much more. Our students learn through authentic production and solving real problems.

THS is a leader in experiential education and a Leadership Circle school in the Independent Schools Experiential Education Network (ISEEN).

Experience is defined as “an event or occurrence which leaves an impression on someone” and we view it as paramount to the learning journey.

• Remember that learning happens best when material is developmentally appropriate and compelling.
• Know that emotionally healthy people learn more and produce better.
• Invest into each interaction with each other and the world.
• Classroom experiences include historical role-play, hands-on experimental science, debates or seminars, and the production of real events or products.
• Develop self-direction.

The skills that are needed in the 21st Century include such things as creativity, flexibility, collaboration, presentation, self-direction, social responsibility, critical thinking, and problem solving. Employers are telling us that they want mentally healthy workers who can innovate, collaborate and communicate, but many students today are still being told to sit down, face front, be quiet and be stressed. That wasn’t working yesterday, and it definitely won’t work for tomorrow. In addition, the antiquated notion that there is one specific body of knowledge in the ocean of the knowable is no longer tenable, as young people today are not training for one definable career. More than ever, they need to have a yearning for learning and an ability to seek out necessary knowledge and skills.

At THS, learning is multi-directional, authentic, and tied to an individual's greater understanding. We value thinking and deep understanding related to a subject in addition to simply knowing content, and outside of school walls we encourage home learning instead of just home work. We encourage rigorous thinking, which involves intellectual honesty and the questioning of assumptions, processes, advice, rules and solutions. Whether people are creating a performance, starting a company, writing a rebuttal or monitoring a coral reef, we encourage the highest possible level of production and strive to push beyond limiting expectations.

Students in the applied science and social studies classes take their knowledge to the sea on the school’s outdoor classroom, the Black Dolphin, to learn first-hand what life lives in Hong Kong’s waters and bring history to life.

They learn things from how to do a beach survey for marine life and collect data on water parameters, to migration, navigation and exploration. They often also collect samples that can be studied back in their classrooms or at our Marine Science Center.

The learning goals vary for different aged students and expeditions but are always tied to teacher's core curriculums.