The Triad Academy Curriculum has been designed around the concept of multisensory instruction. Students with Learning Disabilities often do not readily intuit new information and often struggle with traditional teaching methods which emphasize "pencil and paper" learning. For these students to successfully master new material, the auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learning channels must be stimulated simultaneously. Thus, our students "see it, say it, and do it" as they learn. New material is broken into its smallest meaningful units, or sub-steps, and is repeatedly reviewed and taught to a level of mastery. Thus, learning happens incrementally, and on a firm foundation of prior knowledge.

Our students receive intensive, comprehensive, and coordinated remedial instruction in the Language Arts, generally their area of greatest academic weakness. Students are grouped by achievement and receive small group instruction daily in the following:

Language Tutorial
This reading remediation course is based on the Orton-Gillingham principles of instruction. A proven, research-validated approach in which students are taught the sounds, symbols and structure of the English Language in a gradual, logical, and orderly progression. Reading and Spelling skills are mastered simultaneously and cumulatively as students are taught to decode(take words apart for reading) and encode (put words together for spelling) rather than guess. Fluency drills and oral repeated reading facilitate comprehension and automaticity.

Written Expression 
Essential skills for writing are taught in coordination with the Language Tutorial program, and at a student's reading/spelling ability level. Following a logical progression of skills hierarchy, students are taught the grammatical and structural components necessary for building sentences, paragraphs, essays, and report writing. Outlining strategies, graphic organizers, color-coding, are used to help students identify parts of speech and produce organized writing samples. Vocabulary development focuses on direct instruction in understanding the Anglo-Saxon, Latin, and Greek origins of words and word parts and their meanings; the morphological layers of the English language.

Reading Comprehension
Students with significant language processing problems are directly taught visualization, or imaging techniques to facilitate growth in receptive language, reading comprehension, and verbal reasoning skills. Those whose comprehension is impeded by weak decoding skills, and students whose comprehension skills have been remediated to a level commensurate with intellectual ability, read selections at their independent reading level, and are taught to identify and interpret standard components of novels, short stories, essays and expository writing samples using techniques specifically developed for use with LD students.

Math 
LD students often have difficulty with the computation and conceptual components of mathematics. Basic fact mastery is emphasized through daily drills, mnemonics, and other techniques. Concepts are introduced using the MathUSee curriculum, a multi-sensory program designed to teach abstract concepts-from primary levels, through Algebra II in a concrete, manipulatives-based way. Once a concept is mastered, skill retention is reinforced through "pencil and paper" practice.

Content Areas 
Using similar multi-sensory strategies, Triad Academy uses the North Carolina Standard Course of Study as its content guide for teaching Science and Social Studies. Co-curriculars include: Computer, PE, Art, Study Skills, Drama, and Spanish.