We believe the world needs you to find your passion. The Riviera Ridge STEAM2 electives program allows our middle school students to develop their talents, passions, and a growth mindset all within a school day!
STEAM2 Certificate Program
The Riviera Ridge STEAM2 (science, technology, engineering, arts, mathematics, and movement) electives program allows our middle school students to develop their talents, passions, and a growth mindset. We offer 25-30 course selections each year led by highly-trained faculty. Students will choose three courses a year, for a total of 9 courses in their middle school experience.
All Riviera Ridge Middle School students have the opportunity to earn STEAM2certificates. Students enrolled from 6th-8th grade need a total of 4 credits from each certificate area and students who join us in 7th grade need a total of 3 credits from each certificate area. The liberal arts certificate, which is an interdisciplinary certificate, requires students to take one STEM, one art, and one free choice course per year.
Certificate Programs
Liberal Arts
Mathematics
Performing Arts
Science
Service and Leadership
Technology & Engineering
Visual Arts
Fall 2023 Trimester (Sample Course Descriptions)
Fall Musical
The Fall Musical Elective invites students to be introduced to the world of Theater Production! Students learn the importance of being a part of a creative collaborative environment. Students will be exposed to all elements of a theater production; on stage and behind the scenes and how these sections work together to bring a musical from the page to the stage. Our students will be guided by a team of professional stage directors, vocal coaches, set designers, choreographers and makeup artists. Our students will learn a wide range of skills including the audition & rehearsal process; acting, vocal and dance techniques; stage management, makeup & costuming basics; scenic painting and set design. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntreRlCJMiI
Surfing
The surfing elective is so rad. Students study the history, music, cinema, board and fin design, and ocean dynamics that make surfing such a soulful endeavor. At Campus Point on surf trips, students receive expert surf instruction and experience the thrill of surfing for themselves. Students also design and implement plans to help keep our ocean and beaches healthy. Bring your stoke, your aloha, and let's go surfing!
Rock and Roll Robotics
Students will learn the fundamentals of coding with our sphero robots. Each student will have their own robot and depending on skill level, students will use block coding or javascript to guide their robot through a series of tasks. Some tasks of interest include: building a maze, sphero olympics, and bridge building.
Service Brigade
Do you LOVE helping others? Connecting with your community? Organizing service initiatives? This is the elective for you! Come nurture your soul and build service planning skills in the Service Brigade! For the Fall Term, Service Brigade will be organizing a school wide service initiative culminating in a presentation at our annual GrandFriends’ celebration. Additionally, we’ll be planning service trips around Santa Barbara, organizing the Fall Special Lunch and managing Walter the Vending Machine!
The Training Camp
Training Camp provides the physical training that will help you adapt to any sport you might choose. This athletic training course is designed to help increase coordination, agility, quickness, reaction time, jumping strength and endurance.
Pop Art
We will explore the masters of Pop art, where we will learn how to use popular culture, the signature bold and bright colors, along with the techniques to create comic style portraits. This art style is a fun and funky way to express the mainstream images and popular figures using all different mediums. We will explore mediums such as print making, collage, and textiles.
Speech and Debate
Original oratory (persuasive speech writing and delivering)
Oral interpretation (reading a published work in dramatic speech)
Impromptu speaking (speaking eloquently about a topic given to you in the moment)
Duet acting (performing a short part of a published play)
Debate (partner activity with a rigid set of rules for competition)
Yoga and Mindfulness
Want to relax, improve balance, gain flexibility, and build strength? Join this class and stretch your way into calmness and clarity by connecting your movements to your breath. In addition, Nurse Bower will be joining us to share journaling, aromatherapy, meditation, vision-boarding, and other self-care/mindfulness practices, so you can reduce stress and have fun! Yogis will also enjoy field trips to practice in the park and at a local yoga studio followed by a Backyard Bowls treat!
Kaleidoscope routemap
Choose age group
IntroductionAll ages
Early EducationJK - Grade 1
Lower SchoolGrades 2 - 5
Middle SchoolGrades 6 - 8
Kaleidoscope | Introduction
At The Riviera Ridge School, we want our students to examine the world around them, to find the beauty in differences, and to value multiple perspectives. Through the lens of our signature program, Kaleidoscope, our students are given the unique opportunity to experience and study the traditions and values of world religions and diverse cultures through a global and unifying perspective. Just as a Kaleidoscope reflects light in different ways, our students shine in a variety of ways as well. The Kaleidoscope Program presents students to share what lights them up while illuminating the perspective of others as well. In the same way a kaleidoscope’s rotation presents an ever-changing view, we encourage our students to be tolerant, open, and flexible in theirs. Our students broaden their minds through the study of historical, cultural, ethical, and moral perspectives in a reflective view of world religions.
Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.
- Aristotle
Take a singular part out of a kaleidoscope, and it won’t look like much. It relies on the interconnectedness of each little light. As the sum of its parts, growing and changing with every turn, a stunning tapestry is created. Our students learn that they are part of this tapestry, with each year of study, the knowledge becomes more vivid: they’re connected to something bigger. Religious Traditions Explored include: Buddhism, Catholicism & Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Judaism, Native American Traditions, Indigenous cultures, Shinto, Sikhism, and Taoism.
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Kaleidoscope | Early Education
The idea that one possesses a purpose beyond self is part of our school’s vision. Our core values are introduced to our students the moment they step on campus. In Junior Kindergarten through First Grade, students delve into literature-based units of study that illustrate our shared values of Joy, Kindness, Diversity, and Ethical Responsibility.
In Junior Kindergarten, students and their families share their heritage and traditions through storytelling and by bringing in food and favorite recipes to share with the class. In Kindergarten students learn ways to solve conflicts by being peacemakers as exemplified by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In First Grade, children learn about being a friend to self and others through powerful stories such as The Rabbit Listened.
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Kaleidoscope | Lower School
An exploration of world religions begins in 2nd grade and continues through 5th grade. The Kaleidoscope Program introduces students to religious traditions through stories of real people, especially children. Students encounter religious traditions authentically, as integral to everyday life, as well as personal and communal identity.
In Second Grade students study geometric patterns of mosaic tiles in mosques and make their own mandalas. In Third Grade, students can be found listening to music from various world religions, studying the importance of the arts through cultural traditions. In 4th and 5th grade, students learn about traditions through guest visits from locals, such as a Chumash elder.
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Kaleidoscope | Middle School
As students enter the Middle School years, our vision of cultivating social responsibility and empowering individual potential grows even stronger. In 6th grade Service Learning, students learn about what it means to be a social entrepreneur and create their own Service in Action Project. In 7th Grade Ethics, students reflect on how they make decisions and examine their own beliefs and moral frameworks, as well as the ethics of others. The Kaleidoscope Program culminates with a comparative and comprehensive study of Comparative Religions in the 8th grade. Our 8th grade leaders graduate from The Riviera Ridge School empowered with a profound awareness for empathy, love of diversity, and immeasurable purpose beyond self.
The Riviera Ridge STEAM2 (science, technology, engineering, arts, mathematics, and movement) electives program allows our middle school students to develop their talents, passions, and a growth mindset. We offer 25-30 course selections each year led by highly-trained faculty. Students will choose three courses a year, for a total of 9 courses in their middle school experience. 
