And that is what you’re actually buying. Not the mission statement, but the hundreds and thousands of days your child will spend inside that building. The parts they stop telling you about as they get older, and that almost nobody thinks to share or photograph. So here’s what a day at ŔÖ˛Ątv looks like, start to finish, including the things you don’t usually see in a brochure.

7am: The slow start

The first kids through the gate are the early ones, dropped off on the way to a shift or a commute that isn’t possible without an early start. Our before-care isn’t a holding room, it’s just a quieter version of the school. There are books, drawing, and the ongoing diplomatic crisis over whose turn it is with the good markers. Breakfast is out for kids who want it.

This is the hour that decides whether a school is a real option for a working or busy family. A school that opens at 8:20 sharp is a different logistical proposition than one that opens at 7, and it’s something I know ŔÖ˛Ątv parents really appreciate: an early start that feels like a worthwhile place for our kids to be.

8:30am: The day begins

This is when the shift happens. Kids find their rooms, and the morning starts with the usual business of getting a class oriented. Attendance, announcements, whatever happened at recess yesterday that still needs sorting out before anyone can concentrate.

Then academics. For the older kids, this is where the multi-age structure begins: third and fourth graders are together in one room, fifth and sixth in another, working in groups set by where each kid is in that subject rather than the grade in their file. (Read more on how that works and why we do it.) A strong reader doesn’t sit through a lesson they finished last year, and a kid who needs another pass at fractions gets one with no label attached.

Mid-morning: The parts that aren’t core academics

Spanish, music, drama, visual arts, PE. Not as a reward for finishing another subject, and not billed later as an add-on. Part of the week, the same way reading and math are part of the week.

This is more important than it sounds. Elementary and middle school are when kids find the thing they’re drawn to, and a lot of times it’s not a core subject. The one who discovers they can sing, or build, or make a room laugh during a play needs somewhere for that discovery to happen, and it’s not going to happen during fractions.

Lunch: In the courtyard the school is named after

Hot lunch is made on site, and it’s included in tuition, and so is the afternoon snack. Kids eat, then head out into the courtyard for the part of the day most of them would tell you is the best part.

One thing to notice on any tour: who’s outside with the kids during recess, and whether they seem to know which kid needs a nudge into the game. For a kid who’s an observer, like mine, this can make a big difference.

Afternoon: The long stretch

More academic blocks, project work, and the parts of the curriculum that need room to breathe. A science investigation that can’t be done in twenty minutes, a piece of writing on its third revision, or a California history project taking over reading, writing, science, and a suspicious amount of math time.

This is also where a small school really shines. In a room of twelve or fifteen kids, a teacher notices who’s tired after lunch and does something about it before parent/teacher conferences roll around. (More on what class size really changes.)

3:05pm: And the part most schools don’t talk about

The academic day ends, but only one-quarter of the building goes home.

What happens next is the difference between real after-school care and supervised waiting. There’s a snack, and then homework time for kids who’d rather not carry it home. There are clubs, there’s outside time, art, and the slow unstructured hours where a lot of friendships are made, the ones that don’t come from a classroom or don’t fit into a scheduled block.

6pm: How the day adds up

Eleven hours, if you use all of them. Most families don’t, but the ones who do really need it to exist: they need it to be included in tuition, rather than billed by the hour, and they need it to be worth their kid’s time.

That’s the real case for a full-day school: not that longer is better, or more helpful, or unavoidable, but that the hours your kid will spend there are hours worth having.

But is a full-day school right for your family?

A long day isn’t always a good day, and it isn’t right for every family. Plenty of kids do better with a shorter day and an afternoon at home, and if that’s your situation, a school built around a 7am–6pm schedule is solving a problem you don’t have.

The question isn’t how many hours a school offers, it’s what happens during that time. Which is why the only real way to answer this is to walk in and look, ideally at 5:15, not 10am. (Take a look at our guide for touring schools, if that’s useful.)

Stop by and see us

ŔÖ˛Ątv is a TK-8 independent school in Midtown Sacramento with about 135 students, multi-age classrooms after second grade, and the day described above. TK is full for this year, but there are open seats for kindergarten through eighth grade.

You can schedule a visit on our website or call us at (916) 442-5395. Ask to come at pickup time, or anytime. We’d rather you saw the real thing.

But what is a multi-age classroom, really, and why does it matter?

These are the basics: a multi-age classroom places two grade levels in one room with one teacher, and students stay with that teacher for both years. A third grader and a fourth grader learn side by side, and the following year the third grader becomes the fourth grader. Same room, same teacher, new grade.

That’s the mechanics of it, but what’s more interesting is why a school would choose it, and whether it’s right for your kid.

It’s not the same as a combination class

This part can be confusing, because a lot of parents hear “two grades in one room” and picture something else entirely.

A combination class is usually a math problem, a scheduling fix. Enrollment numbers didn’t divide evenly, so a school combines two grades for a year, and the teacher runs two different curricula in one room at the same time. This was a necessity, not a choice, and it’s typically over by the next year.

A multi-age program is the opposite. It’s deliberate, permanent, and built around the pairing rather than working against it. The curriculum is designed for a two-year cycle, the teacher is trained for it, and the mixed ages are the point rather than the problem.

Why schools do it

• The teacher already knows your child in year two. You’re not starting over in September of the second year. Nobody has to learn that your kid shuts down when he’s rushed, or that she’ll read anything with a dragon in it. Learning a new class from scratch takes a lot of time, and in year two, you get that time back.
• Kids get taught where they are. When two grade levels are in the room, being grouped by ability stops being a big deal, because it’s just how the room works. A strong reader in third grade can work with fourth graders without anyone giving it a second thought.
• Younger students learn from older ones. Not just as a theory, but in reality, every day. They watch how the older ones handle a hard assignment, ask for help, or lose an argument without falling apart. And that’s something that a same-age room can’t replicate.
• Older students learn by teaching. Explaining long division to someone else is one of the fastest ways to find out if you actually understand long division. In year two, kids move into the older role and take on some of that responsibility.
• The social reshuffle is gentler. Half the class is new each year and half isn’t. For a child who finds the first few weeks of school hard, walking into a room where they already know the teacher and half the kids is much easier.

Multi-age at ŔÖ˛Ątv

We wanted to be specific about the structure here, because “multi-age school” doesn’t mean every classroom is paired.

TK, kindergarten, first grade, and second grade each have their own classroom. The pairing starts after second grade, so third and fourth are together, and fifth and sixth are together. Students hit the two-year cycle once they’re past the early years when the foundational skills are in place, which is when the multi-age model has the most to offer.

Within those classrooms, students are grouped by where they are in a given subject, rather than by grade. ŔÖ˛Ątv calls these “L+1” groups, the idea being that each child works just past their current level, which is where learning really happens. A fifth grader who’s strong in math might work with sixth graders for that hour, and then go back to their own grade for writing.

This works partly because the school is small. We have about 135 students total, which is what makes that kind of flexible grouping possible at all. (More on what small class sizes mean for the day-to-day.)

The real deal: it isn’t for every kid

Multi-age is a real differentiator, which means it’s also a real preference, and preferences cut both ways.

Some children do better in a single grade with a fresh start each fall; a kid who had a hard year and wants to start over in September doesn’t get that chance in a two-year pairing. A child who is intensely competitive may find the mixed-age comparisons more frustrating than motivating. And if a teacher-student match isn’t working, two years is a long time, which is why you should ask any school how they would handle that.

The model also really depends on the teacher. Multi-age done well is amazing, but multi-age done as an afterthought is just a crowded room with a teacher who is suddenly expected to teach two classes at once. That’s a fair thing to ask about on a tour, and a good school will welcome your questions.

Questions parents should ask about multi-age classrooms

Will my older child be held back by the younger students?
This is the most common worry, and the answer is in the grouping. Students work at their own level in each subject, so an advanced fifth grader isn’t waiting for anyone. If anything, the older kid gets the leadership role, which tends to raise expectations rather than lower them.

Will my younger child be lost or overwhelmed?
Younger students are working at their level too, with an experienced teacher and a room full of older kids modeling how things are done. Most parents report the opposite of overwhelm, since kids usually rise to meet what they see around them.

Does my child repeat the same curriculum in year two?
No. Multi-age curricula run on a two-year cycle, so the content rotates. A student sees the full scope across both years without repetition.

Is a multi-age classroom the same as a combination class?
No. A combination class is typically a response to uneven enrollment. A multi-age program is an intentional design with the curriculum, teacher training, and structure built around the pairing.

What if my child needs more challenge, or more support?
That’s why this model exists. Because two grade levels are already in the room, moving a student up or giving them another pass at something feels normal, rather than an intervention with a label attached.

What to ask on a tour

Save these, take a screenshot, or write them down before your tours!

1. Which grades are paired, and which are stand-alone?
2. How are students grouped within the classroom: by grade, or by level in each subject?
3. How does the curriculum rotate across the two years?
4. What happens if a student and teacher aren’t a good match?
5. How are your teachers trained for multi-age instruction, specifically?

If you want to see a multi-age classroom

Multi-age is much easier to understand when you’re standing in the room than when you’re reading about it.

ŔÖ˛Ątv is a TK-8 independent school in Midtown Sacramento with about 135 students, a day that runs 7am to 6pm, and with before- and after-care, meals, and enrichment included. TK is full for this year, but there are open seats for kindergarten through eighth grade.

You can schedule a visit or call (916) 442-5395. And if you’re earlier in the process, you might find our guide comparing Sacramento private schools, what to look for in the elementary years, or how to tour a private school useful.

Nobody is lying to you, but you are seeing the version of the school that gets shown to visitors, which is not quite the same as the version your kid would live in from morning drop-off to evening pickup, five days a week, for the next nine years.

That’s not a reason to skip the tour, but it is a reason to show up with a plan. Here’s what I would do, having done this myself (and having made most of the mistakes that are possible).

Before you go

• Write down what your kid really needs. Not what a good school looks like in the abstract, what you need, in your own unglamorous words. “She disappears in big groups.” “He is bored and hiding it.” “Somebody has to have him until 5:30 or none of this works.” Three or four lines in your phone. This is the list that’s easy to forget the instant you set foot on a campus.
• Ask to see the grade your child would enter. Not the highlight reel, but the specific classroom, ideally with children in it, being children. If the school can only offer you an empty room with the chairs stacked, that is fine, but ask when you could come back on a real school day. And then pay attention to how they answer.
• Drive the route at the time you’d actually drive it. Not Sunday afternoon, when everyone is either at home or brunch. Try it on a weekday at 7:40 a.m., with the coffee and the missing shoe and the person who cuts across three lanes to make their exit. That’s your real commute, and it can be a big factor in deciding whether or not a school will work for your family, long-term.

What to watch, not what to listen to

The talking points will be good, because they’re all good. The real story is in what nobody’s presenting:

• Do the adults know the kids’ names? Walk the halls and listen. “Hey Marcus, how’d the science fair go?” is worth more than any speech about community. Generic warmth is easy, but specific warmth is earned.
• What are the kids’ faces doing? Not just “well-behaved,” but are they engaged, relaxed, occasionally a little goofy? A room of perfectly silent children is not automatically a good sign, and neither is chaos. What you want is absorbed, and you’ll recognize it instantly.
• Who is doing all the talking? If you get to see a lesson, notice the ratio. Is the teacher delivering to a room, or are kids asking, arguing, working through something? Both have their place, but you want to know which one is the default.
• What’s on the walls? Student work that’s messy, various, and clearly theirs, or twenty-four identical projects in a perfect row? One tells you kids get to make choices, too.
• How do the staff talk to each other? Teachers who like their colleagues tend to like their jobs, and teachers who like their jobs stay. You can usually tell in about ninety seconds in the front office.

The questions that will reveal something

Skip the ones with an obvious answer, because nobody is going to tell you their teachers are miserable. These are the questions where the answer has nowhere to hide.

1. “How many kids are in the class my child would join next year?” School-wide averages can hide a lot. You want the number for that room, that grade, next fall.
2. “Tell me about a student who struggled here and what you did.” This is the best question on the list. A school with real systems will have a specific story, with details. A school without one will reassure you warmly and say nothing, and you’ll hear the difference.
3. “How long have the teachers in this grade been here?” Teacher tenure is the closest thing to a vital sign that a school has, and it can tell you a lot.
4. “What happens between the last bell and 6pm?” Ask what the kids are doing at 5:15. “We have aftercare” and “there’s homework club, art, and outdoor time until pickup” are very different programs going by the same name.
5. “Where did last year’s eighth graders go, and how did they do?” For a K-8 school, this is the outcome question. Listen for a process and detail, not a list of impressive high school names. And yes, ask it even if your child is five.
6. “What kind of kid is this school not the right fit for?” A school that answers honestly is telling you it knows itself, which is rarer and more useful than it sounds. A school that says “oh, we’re a fit for everyone” is telling you something, too.

The things nobody tells you to do

• Come back unannounced. Walk into the front office on a random morning with a question about applications. How you’re treated when you’re not expected is the truest thing you’ll learn all week.
• Ask to see pickup. 5 p.m. at a school tells you more than 10 a.m. Are kids doing something, or just waiting? Do the after-care staff know them, or just keep count?
• Find a parent who isn’t on the tour. Schools introduce you to their happiest families, which is normal, but if you can find a parent in the pickup line, ask what they’d change. Everyone has an answer.
• Notice how they handle your hard question. You’ll have one, about cost, about a learning difference, about something you read somewhere. A school that gets a little defensive in August is showing you how it’ll respond when you have a concern in March.

After the tour

Write down your gut read in the parking lot, before you talk yourself into or out of anything. Just one or two sentences: how did it feel, and could you picture your kid in that hallway?

Then tour at least one more school, even if you loved the first one. I know, nobody has spare time. But fit reveals itself by contrast; you often don’t know exactly what you loved until you until you see a place that doesn’t have it.

And if you want a head start before you book anything, we put together a guide comparing Sacramento private schools, including ours.

If ŔÖ˛Ątv is on your list

We do one-on-one tours year-round, and fall is when most families come and look. ŔÖ˛Ątv is a TK-8 independent school in Midtown with about 135 students, multi-age classrooms where kids pair with the same teacher for two years after 2nd grade, and a day that runs 7am to 6pm with before- and after-care, meals, and enrichment included. TK is full for this year, but there are open seats in kindergarten through eighth grade.

Depending on where you are in the process, some of our other articles may be helpful, including choosing a private kindergarten, what to look for in the elementary years, or choosing a private middle school. And if you’re still deciding whether a smaller school is right at all, start with the signs your child might thrive in one.

Come see us! You can schedule a visit on our website or call (916) 442-5395, and don’t forget to bring your hard questions. We like those.

The years in between get a lot less attention, which is funny because that’s exactly when a lot of things happen. First through sixth grade is when a kid stops decoding and starts really reading, they learn whether they think of themselves as a “math person,” they find their people, and they decide whether school is a place they like being. And that’s only a few of the questions they’re (unknowingly) answering about themselves and their education during those years.

So if you’re looking at private elementary schools in Sacramento, here’s what I’d be thinking about.

What to look for in a private elementary school

• How kids are grouped, and how flexible it is. A third grader can read at a fifth-grade level and still be learning simple multiplication. Ask what the school does when a kid who’s ahead in one subject is average in another. That answer will tell you whether they teach to each kid or to the middle of the room.
• Class size for your specific grade. School-wide averages are a magic trick. Ask for the number in the room your child would walk into. (Here’s why that number changes so much about a kid’s day.)
• What’s included outside of the core subjects. Elementary is when kids find the thing they love, and it’s almost never long division. Ask what music, art, Spanish, PE, drama, and field trips look like during the week, and which ones are added on as paid extras.
• How teachers get to know students. A teacher who has your child for one year meets them in September and starts to really understand them around March. And then it starts all over again the next year. Ask how long teachers stay with a class, and how the school shares what it knows about a kid from year to year. “Oh, we talk” is not a system.
• The full day, including the parts before and after. If you work a 9-to-5 (or just have a lot to do each day), an elementary school that ends at 3:00 with vague aftercare isn’t a school that will work for you, in reality. Ask what 5:15pm looks like. Is it homework help and a soccer club, or a room where kids wait?
• Where students go next. At a K-8 or TK-8 school, ask where 8th graders go to high school and what the school does to help them get there. Even if your kid is still in second grade, it tells you what the school is building toward.

What the elementary years look like at a small school

This is the part I didn’t understand until I was inside one.

At ŔÖ˛Ątv, the elementary years run with multi-age classrooms after the kids finish second grade. Third and fourth together, fifth and sixth together, same teacher for two years. (TK, kindergarten, first, and second each have their own classroom.) So September of year two isn’t a reset. The teacher already knows your child: how they learn, what they avoid, who they sit next to, when to push and when to leave it alone.

Inside those classrooms, kids are grouped by where they actually are in a subject rather than by grade level. ŔÖ˛Ątv calls them “L+1” groups, with each student working just past their current level. In practice, that means a strong reader isn’t idling through a lesson they mastered last spring, and a kid who needs another pass at fractions gets it without a label attached.

What surprised me most was how much of the week isn’t core academics. Spanish, music, drama, visual arts, PE, and regular field trips are built into the schedule rather than sold separately, which matters enormously in the years when kids are still auditioning for their own interests.

And the schedule was clearly built for working and busy families: the day runs 7am to 6pm with before- and after-care, and breakfast, hot lunch, most field trips, and break camps are included in tuition rather than billed separately.

So is a small school actually better?

Not automatically, no. Some kids do really well with a big peer group, a ton of activities, and the energy of a larger campus. And a big elementary school with a great teacher beats a small one with a mediocre teacher every time. Size isn’t exactly the question. The question is whether the school knows how to teach your particular kid.

Which is pretty much the same question underneath every school decision anyone has ever made. If you’re still working out whether a smaller setting is the right direction for your family, we wrote about the signs a child might thrive in a smaller school. If you want the wider landscape with specific school details, here’s our guide comparing Sacramento private schools.

Five questions you should ask on every tour

If you’re like me, you’ll forget every one of these the moment you start a tour, so print these out or write them down, if it helps!

1. How many students are in the specific class my child would join next year?
2. How do you teach a child who’s ahead in one subject and steady in another?
3. How long do students stay with the same teacher, and how do you pass along what you know about a child?
4. What do music, art, Spanish, PE, and field trips look like in a typical week, and what costs extra?
5. What happens between the end of the school day and 6pm?

If you’re touring elementary schools now

First grade or fifth, staying put or making a change, the only real way to know is to walk into a few schools and watch how the adults talk to kids when they don’t think a parent is listening. Pay attention to how the rooms feel, and trust your intuition.

And if your child is younger or older than the elementary window, we’ve written about choosing a private kindergarten and choosing a private middle school too.

If you’d like to see a small, full-day TK-8 school in Midtown Sacramento, you can schedule a visit or call us at (916) 442-5395. We’re at 24th and C, about ten minutes from East Sacramento, Land Park, and Curtis Park, and we do one-on-one tours year-round. We’d love to show you our school, and there are open seats in K through 8 for this school year.

I went through this search myself, in these same core Sacramento neighborhoods, so consider this the local-parent version of what I learned: what “independent school” actually means, what to pay attention to, and how to think about the options near East Sacramento.

First, what makes a school “independent”?

An independent school is self-governed and nonprofit. It isn’t part of a public district, and it isn’t a branch of a national for-profit chain with a headquarters three states away. That means the curriculum, the culture, and the everyday decisions get made locally, by the people who actually work there, not handed down from a corporate office or a district administration.

That’s the real appeal: an independent school can build its program around a real philosophy and community instead of a mandate. (If you want to see how the Sacramento-area options stack up side by side, we put together a parent’s guide comparing the local private and independent schools.)

What to look for near East Sacramento

When you’re ready to start touring schools, here are a few things to focus on:

• The real commute. East Sac families tend to look within a tight radius: East Sacramento itself, plus neighboring Midtown, Land Park, Curtis Park, and Tahoe Park. A school ten minutes away in Midtown can be a much easier daily reality than one twenty-five minutes out, even if both look equally “close” on a map. Drive the route at 7:40 a.m. before you commit to anything, because Google Maps will lie to you at 11:30pm on a Sunday.
• Class size and being known. A smaller school means your child is really known. By their teachers, of course, but also by the people in the office, other teachers, building staff, everyone, and that’s more important than almost any single program. (Here’s what small class sizes actually change, day to day.)
• The full-day schedule, including the bookends. If you work a standard day, the question isn’t just when school starts, it’s whether there’s before- and after-care with real programming, or just a room where kids wait for someone to come and pick them up.
• Educational philosophy. Independent schools vary more than people expect. They can be traditional, accelerated, multiage, project-based… and these aren’t just brochure words, these philosophies can change what your child’s day looks like. Ask which one the school is built around, and get specific.
• Where students go next. For a K-8 or TK-8 school, the best outcome question is a simple one: where do the graduating 8th graders go to high school, and how does the school help them get there?

The neighborhoods East Sac families choose

Here’s a bit of local truth: some of the independent schools East Sacramento families choose are just over the line in Midtown, a short hop away. In daily life, the neighborhoods blur together, and families from East Sac, Midtown, Land Park, Curtis Park, and Tahoe Park often end up at the same schools, drawn by fit rather than the exact zip code on the map.

ŔÖ˛Ątv is one of those schools: a TK-8 independent school at 24th and C in Midtown, minutes from East Sacramento, with a lot of East Sac families already in the mix, mine included. It’s small (about 135 students) with multi-age classrooms where kids stay with the same teacher for two years in a row starting after 2nd grade. By year two, the teacher really knows your kid: how they think, what trips them up, what gets them excited. The day runs 7am to 6pm with before- and after-care built in, and meals, field trips, and enrichment are included in tuition rather than billed as extras.

For me, the commute from East Sac runs 10 minutes with no traffic and some good luck with the stoplights, and usually maxes out around 15 minutes, which is great to be able to count on for those mornings when everything takes twice as long.

Questions you should ask on every tour

1. What’s the class size in the specific grade my child would enter next year?
2. What do the before- and after-care hours look like day to day?
3. How long do your teachers typically stay?
4. What’s the educational philosophy the school is built around?
5. Where do your graduates go to high school?

If you’re just starting the search

The best thing you can do is tour a few schools and pay attention to how each one feels. Trust your instincts. And if you’re still weighing whether a smaller setting is right for your kid in the first place, we also wrote about the signs a child might thrive in a smaller school, and about choosing between TK and kindergarten.

If you’d like to see a small, full-day independent school a short drive from East Sacramento, you can schedule a visit or call us at (916) 442-5395. We give one-on-one tours all year, and we’d love to show you around.

So here’s the guide I wish someone had given me. But I should tell you first, my kid attends ŔÖ˛Ątv School, and I help ŔÖ˛Ątv with its marketing, so I’m not exactly a neutral bystander here. I’m a parent who did this exact search, made my choice, and now works with the school I chose. But I’ve tried to write about every school below the way I’d talk about it with a friend, including mine. Read my ŔÖ˛Ątv section with that in mind, and then go and verify everything on your own tours. You were going to tour them all anyway, right? Because no blog post (including this one, obviously) beats standing in a hallway watching how the adults talk to the kids.

What’s important when you’re comparing

Rankings and test scores can be comforting because they feel like real data, but most of that is noise. The things that actually predict whether your kid will thrive are less Googleable and a lot more human, and you can spot almost all of them on a single tour:

• Grade levels served. °Ő°­â€“8, ±Ę°­â€“8, ±Ę°­â€“12; each shape implies different things about culture and transitions.
• Enrollment and class size. A school of 135 is an entirely different animal than a school of 580, and neither is automatically better. (Here’s what small class sizes actually change day to day, if you want the deep dive.)
• The schedule, including the bookends. If you work until 5:30, a school that ends at 3:00 with a token hour of aftercare is not a school you can actually use, no matter how lovely the tour was.
• Educational philosophy. Traditional, accelerated, multiage, project-based. These are real differences that shape your child’s day.
• Religious affiliation, if any. All four schools below are independent and nonsectarian.
• Neighborhood. A 25-minute drive looks perfectly reasonable on a map and feels like a personality test at 7:40 on a rainy Monday.
• Tuition range. Sacramento private schools cost roughly $15,000 to $40,000 a year, depending on school and grade. Every school below offers tuition assistance. Ask early, and get the specifics.

At a glance

Figures are from publicly available 2025-26 information, so treat them as a starting point and then verify with each school directly.

The four schools

Sacramento Country Day School

Country Day is the largest school here and the only one running through 12th grade, with roughly 580 students on an 11-acre Sierra Oaks campus, and the resources that scale brings: college counseling, varsity athletics, AP courses in the upper school. The lower school gets its own building and a low student-teacher ratio, so the little kids aren’t sharing a hallway with seniors.

Best fit for: Families who want one school for the whole K-12 haul and like the idea of a college-prep trajectory that starts early. The trade-off of any K-12 school is exactly that, your child’s elementary years unfold inside an institution that is also, at the same moment, managing teenagers.
Ask on a tour: What’s the class size in the specific grade your child would enter, not the school-wide average? How do the lower and upper schools share the campus day-to-day? What does the typical tuition-assistance award look like?
Tuition runs from roughly $26,000 in the early grades to about $37,000 in high school. Need-based assistance is available.

Merryhill Elementary & Middle School (Midtown)

Merryhill’s V Street campus in Newton Booth serves ±Ę°­â€“8 as part of a national school network (Spring Education Group). That brings system-wide curriculum and infrastructure, and trades away some of the locally grown character you find at independents. Classes are reported to be around 18 students.

Best fit for: Families who want a structured, standardized program, the reassurance of a national network behind it, and hours that work for working parents.
Ask on a tour: How much of the curriculum is decided locally versus handed down from the national office? How long do teachers tend to stay? Where do 8th graders go for high school?
Tuition isn’t published openly. Public reporting suggests high teens annually for elementary grades, but confirm those numbers directly when you inquire.

Brookfield School

Brookfield is a K–8 independent in the Pocket with an accelerated identity it wears proudly. The school describes its program as built for “bright and gifted children,” complete with pre-first and accelerated kindergarten tracks. About 200 students, French and Spanish starting in kindergarten, and extended care that runs from 7:30am to 6pm.

Best fit for: A kid who thrives on pace and high expectations.
Ask on a tour: What does “accelerated” mean for a child strong in math but average in reading? How much homework at each grade? When a student is struggling to keep up, what happens next, and what does social-emotional support look like alongside all of the academics?
Tuition runs around $19,000 annually per public reporting.

ŔÖ˛Ątv School

Mine. Same format as the others, and you’ve got the disclosure from up top, so let’s go.
ŔÖ˛Ątv is a °Ő°­â€“8 nonprofit independent at 24th and C in Midtown, around 135 students, and it’s been a part of the community since 1982. Most families come from Midtown, East Sacramento, Land Park, Curtis Park, and Tahoe Park. The day is built for busy and working parents, with before- and after-care until 6pm, and breakfast, hot lunch, field trips, and break camps included in tuition rather than billed as add-ons.

Two things make it structurally different from the other schools on this list. First, there are multi-age classrooms. After second grade, kids stay with the same teacher for two years, so by year two the teacher truly knows your child and teaches exactly to where they are. ŔÖ˛Ątv calls these “L+1” groups, each kid working right at the edge of what they can do, one notch past comfortable. Second, the size. At 135 students, every adult in the building knows every kid by name. The office, after-care staff, all of them.

One thing to note: it’s a school where demand shows up in the calendar. TK typically fills by the spring before the school year starts.

Best fit for: Families who want their kid to be really known, not just enrolled; two-income parents who need the full-day schedule so they can work; kids who’d get lost or go quiet in a bigger building. (If that last one is the worry that brought you here, we also wrote about the signs a child might thrive in a smaller school.)
Ask on a tour: How does multi-age work, from hour to hour and day to day? At 5:30, is after-care real programming or a holding pen? Where do 8th graders go when it’s time for high school?
Tuition is shared on a tour and varies by grade. Assistance is available.

Which one is right for your family?

After a few tours, you’ll have a head full of impressions. The energy of the front office, whether kids in the hallway looked happy, how the principal answered the hard question you asked. Most of that is real, so trust your instincts.

Then sit with three harder questions:

• Who is each school built for? Every school has an ideal student it’s designed around. The accelerated school assumes a kid who loves to move quickly, the K-12 prep school assumes a future AP student. The small multiage school assumes a kid who needs to be known. So which one is yours?
• What’s the real schedule math? Count the hours between drop-off and the last possible pickup, and think about what happens in the extended-care hours. There’s a real difference between “open until 6” and “worth being there until 6.”
• Walk into the office unannounced. The scheduled tour is a performance, and that’s fine, everyone performs for company. But a random weekday at 11 a.m. is the truth.

Five questions to ask on every tour

1. What’s the actual class size in the grade my child is entering next year?
2. How long do your teachers stay, on average?
3. How do you handle a child who’s struggling, academically or socially? (Listen for specifics, not reassurance.)
4. What does extended care look like at 5:30 p.m.?
5. Where do your graduates go to high school, and how do you help them with that transition?

Go deeper

We’ve written specific guides for most of the smaller decisions hiding inside this big one:

• TK vs. Kindergarten: which is right for your child?
• Choosing a private kindergarten in Sacramento
• Choosing a private middle school in Sacramento
• What is a multi-age classroom?
• What small class sizes actually mean, IRL
• Signs your child might thrive in a smaller school
• A Day at ŔÖ˛Ątv
• Our summer camp guide (an easy, low-pressure way to experience a campus)

If ŔÖ˛Ątv made your shortlist

Tour more than one school. I mean it. The right fit tends to reveal itself by contrast, the way you don’t realize the music was playing a little too loud until it stops. And if you’d like to see a small, full-day °Ő°­â€“8 up close, schedule a visit or call (916) 442-5395. One-on-one tours, year-round, no hard sell, just a walk through a school where everyone will know your kid’s name by the second visit.

It’s a fair worry, because the middle years are exactly when someone noticing you and knowing you feels really important. Elementary kids are resilient and adored by default, high schoolers are starting to steer their own ship, but middle schoolers are stuck between the two. And the school environment they spend those years in shapes more than we like to admit. So if you’re looking for a private middle school in Sacramento, here’s what’s important, and why size belongs near the top of your list.

Why the middle school years are different

Middle school is when everything changes at once: bodies, friendships, moods, music taste, the whole sense of who they are. The kid who used to narrate every minute of their day now answers “how was school?” with “fine” and considers that a complete sentence. That part is normal. Annoying, but normal.

Here’s what it means for you, though: the stakes of really being known at school go up, not down. A middle schooler who feels invisible almost never announces it. They don’t slam doors or complain, they just quietly recede, and by the time it shows up in grades or friendships, it’s usually been going on for a while.

That’s what I would think about on every tour. (If you’re earlier in this process and still wondering whether your child needs a smaller setting at all, we also wrote about the signs your child might thrive in a smaller school.)

What to look for in a private middle school

When you tour Sacramento private middle schools, here’s what you should look at:

• Class size and how well kids are known. This matters more in middle school, not less. Ask how many students are in the grade, and whether there’s an adult who knows each kid well enough to notice a bad week, not just a bad report card. (Read more about why small class sizes change a kid’s day so much.)
• How the school handles the social-emotional rollercoaster. Friendship blowups, exclusion, the group chat drama that somehow started at recess. Listen for specifics. If you get a warm, vague “we really foster community,” that’s a yellow flag. You want to hear exactly how they handle the hard stuff.
• The right academic stretch. Middle school should build real independence: taking notes, managing deadlines, owning their own work. What it shouldn’t do is crush kids in the name of rigor. Ask what an ordinary day is like.
• Room to find their thing. Electives, arts, athletics, clubs. The middle years are when a lot of kids stumble onto the subject or activity that becomes their anchor, and often their people too. A school with space and options gives them more chances to land on it.
• Real relationships with teachers. The single best protective factor for a middle schooler is one adult at school who clearly knows them and really likes them. Ask how the school builds that on purpose instead of hoping it happens by accident.
• High school transition support. This is the big question for any K-8 program. Where do graduating 8th graders end up, and how does the school help families through the application and placement process?

Why small is important in the middle

Here’s the deal: in a small middle school, there’s nowhere to disappear. Twelve or fifteen kids in a room instead of thirty-plus means a teacher actually clocks the quiet day, the dropped friendship, the kid who’s suddenly not turning in work. That structure does some of the noticing for you, which is a gift in the exact years your kid stops volunteering information at home.

That’s a lot of why families choose ŔÖ˛Ątv for the middle years. Besides the multi-age classrooms where teachers have two years with the same students, each grade is small enough that every student is known by name and by personality, and the program is broad enough that kids have room to find their thing, whether that’s hands-on science, coding, theater and music, Spanish, or PE. There are even life skills classes covering things like cooking and taxes. (Yes, taxes. Your thirteen-year-old may soon be the most financially organized person in the house.) And when it’s time for the transition to high school, students are ready. ŔÖ˛Ątv middle school alums attend the leading high schools in the area, such as Christian Brothers, Jesuit, St. Francis, McClatchy, JFK PACE, Rio Americano, and Mira Loma. Our intimate middle school class size coaches them up and gives them confidence at an age that is, let’s be honest, awkward. (Don’t you wish you attended a private, helpful middle school like ŔÖ˛Ątv?)

Whatever schools you’re considering, whether ŔÖ˛Ątv or elsewhere, push on this point everywhere you tour. In the middle years, being known isn’t just a nicety, it can really make a difference.

Questions you should ask on every tour

1. How many students are in the middle school grades, and is there an adult who knows each one well?
2. How does the school handle social conflict and the emotional ups and downs of these years?
3. How do you challenge kids academically while building real independence?
4. What electives, arts, and athletics can my child try?
5. Where do your 8th graders go to high school, and how do you support that transition?

But honestly…

There’s no award for getting into the most prestigious middle school, there’s only figuring out what’s right for your particular kid, for a stretch of years that can feel a little stormy. So trust what you see in the hallways. Do the kids look comfortable? Do the adults seem to know them, and like them? A parent’s instinct can be worth more than any ranking.

If you’d like to see a small middle school where every student is known, you can schedule a visit or call us at (916) 442-5395. We’d be glad to show you around and help you find the right fit, wherever your family lands.

I’m in it right now myself with a kindergartner starting this fall, so I’ve done the tours, asked the awkward questions, and learned to spot when a school is trying to sell me something. Here’s what really matters once you get past the brochures and the websites that all start to blur together, including the one thing working parents need to know but nobody puts on the front page.

What private kindergarten really offers

The true selling point for private kindergarten isn’t that it’s “better.” But it is usually smaller and more individualized. Fewer kids in the room means that the teacher can really get to know yours: how they learn, what gets them excited, and what’s worrying them that week. Which makes a real difference at this age, and it’s worth more than any single program or buzzword. (If you want the deep dive on why class size matters so much in the early years, read more from us about what small class sizes actually mean day to day.)

This is nothing against public kindergarten, which is great for plenty of kids. It’s just that some children do their best when they feel a more personal connection with their teachers and other adults at the school, and that’s easier to do in a small class than in a big one.

What you should be looking for

So when you’re on a tour, standing in a kindergarten classroom, and your mind has suddenly gone blank, here’s a quick list of things to look for:

• Class size, the real one. Ask for the number of kids in next year’s kindergarten, not the school-wide average, because a small class is where “being known” stops being a tagline and starts being true.
• The daily schedule and the bookends. What time does the school day start and end? And just as importantly, what happens before and after it? (More on this below, because for working families, it can be a big part of the decision.)
• The balance of play and academics. Good kindergarten is developmentally appropriate, which just means that real learning, like letters, numbers, and early reading, is delivered through play, movement, and hands-on work, not more time at a desk with worksheets and pressure.
• Social-emotional support. At five, learning to manage big feelings, share, and be part of a group matters every bit as much as academics. Ask how the school handles a hard day, a squabble over a marker, or a kid who’s taking a while to settle in.
• Who’s in the room, and how long they stay. Teacher tenure is one of the best signs of a healthy school. If teachers stick around for years, that really tells you something, so ask how long the kindergarten team has been there.
• The transition plan. How does the school help a brand-new kindergartner (and their slightly nervous parents) ease in during those first few weeks?

Important: for working (or busy) parents

Here’s the information that can be hard to find: an amazing kindergarten program that runs 8:30 to 3:00 with no real aftercare is not actually a school a working parent can use. The campus can be gorgeous. The mission statement can make you tear up a little. None of that helps you at 4:45 on a Tuesday when you are still at your desk.

So look hard at the full-day schedule. Is there real before- and after-school care, or a vague “we have something”? Is the extended-care time organized and engaging, or is it a holding pen until pickup? Are meals and enrichment included, or billed as endless add-ons? For a lot of families, this is the single most important and overlooked factor in the entire decision.

This is one of the things about ŔÖ˛Ątv that I constantly hear other parents say they love: the day runs 7am to 6pm with before- and after-care built right in, meals and enrichment included, so “extended care” feels like part of the program instead of an afterthought. Whatever school you choose, push on this point. It’s the difference between a schedule that really works and one that only looks good on paper.

Questions you should ask on every tour

1. What’s the actual class size in the kindergarten my child will be in next year?
2. What are the real hours — and what does before- and after-care actually look like at 8am and 5:30pm?
3. How much of the day is play-based versus seated academic work?
4. How long have your kindergarten teachers been here?
5. How do you help a new kindergartner settle in during the first few weeks?

But for real

You don’t get a prize for picking the “best” kindergarten; there’s only what’s right for your family and your particular five-year-old. So trust what you feel on the tour. Watch how the grown-ups talk to the kids, and notice whether the children look comfortable and if there’s a real connection there. You know what your kid needs, so trust your instincts.

And if you’re still deciding between transitional kindergarten and kindergarten in the first place, that’s its own rabbit hole, and we broke the whole thing down in another blog, TK vs. Kindergarten.

If you’d like to see a small, full-day kindergarten in person, you can schedule a visit or call us at (916) 442-5395. We’d love to show you around and help you find the right fit, wherever you and your kid land.

If that sounds familiar, you’re not alone. Transitional kindergarten is one of the more confusing parts of the early school landscape in California, partly because the rules have changed a lot in the last few years. So here’s what I wish someone had told me: what TK is, how it’s different from kindergarten, and how to figure out what is right for my kid.

So what is TK, really?

Transitional kindergarten is the first year of a two-year kindergarten program. Think of it as a bridge between preschool and kindergarten, built for kids who are right on the edge: old enough to be ready for a school setting, but young enough that jumping straight into kindergarten might be asking a lot of them.

The day leans play-based and developmentally appropriate, which is a fancy way to say that the learning is real, but it does not feel like work. Kids learn letters, numbers, and fine-motor skills, but through hands-on activities, toys, and games rather than worksheets and pressure. Honestly, the best way to picture it is as the year a child learns how to do school. Routines, sharing, raising a hand, sitting in a circle without rolling away or melting into the floor (most of the time).

The age rules everyone Googles

This is the part most parents actually come looking for, so I’ll get right to it. For the 2026-27 school year, California’s age cutoffs work like this:

• Transitional kindergarten: your child turns 4 by September 1
• Kindergarten: your child turns 5 by September 1
• First grade: your child turns 6 by September 1

TK is now “universal,” which just means that all four-year-olds are age-eligible. One thing to keep in mind is that both TK and kindergarten are optional in California, since school isn’t legally required until age 6. ŔÖ˛Ątv follows these same state guidelines, so the dates above are the ones that apply here, too.

What’s actually different, day to day

Let’s set age aside for a second, because TK and kindergarten do feel different once you are in the classroom.

TK is a gentler and more foundational year. A big part of that is social and emotional: learning to be part of a group, name and manage big feelings, follow a rhythm, and build the kind of independence that makes everything down the road easier. The academics are real but disguised as play. Counting during a game, sounding out their own name, and building the hand strength that writing will depend on.

Kindergarten picks up from there. There’s more structured academic time, the first real building blocks of reading, and an expectation that kids can focus for longer stretches and work a little more on their own.

The biggest gift TK offers is time. For a kid with a summer birthday, one who’s smart but young, or one who just needs a bit longer to grow into a school setting, that extra year can change everything. Not because they’re behind, but because readiness is about where they are developmentally, not how many candles were on the last cake. And since TK is the first year of a two-year arc, kids get a whole extra year to find their footing and build confidence before first grade begins.

So which one is right for your child?

There is no one-size-fits-all answer here, and anyone who tells you otherwise has not met enough five-year-olds. It really does come down to your kid. But here are a few things to consider:

• If your child is technically old enough for kindergarten but still seems young, whether it’s emotionally, socially, or in their ability to stick with a task, TK can be a real gift. And so can starting kindergarten the following year as one of the older kids in the room.
• If your child seems ready, meaning focused, independent, comfortable saying goodbye at drop off, and comfortable in the mix with other kids, kindergarten may be the better fit.

Mostly, just trust what you see at home. You’re watching for focus, independence, how they handle a goodbye, and how they hold up in a group. You are not watching for whether they can already read, so cross that off your worry list. And here is the reassuring part: thoughtful, loving parents land on different answers for different kids, sometimes even within the same family. There is no wrong choice here, just the right one for your particular child.

Quick common questions parents ask

Is TK the same as preschool? No. TK is part of the school system and uses a modified kindergarten curriculum. Preschool is childcare-based and not a part of K-12.

Is TK required? No. In California, school isn’t mandatory until age 6, so TK and kindergarten are both optional.

Can my child skip TK and go straight to kindergarten? Yes, if they meet the kindergarten age cutoff, which means turning 5 by September 1. TK is an option, not a requirement.

How it works at ŔÖ˛Ątv

At ŔÖ˛Ątv, the youngest students move from TK to Kinder after a year. Each classroom is a warm, dedicated space made for teaching and learning at exactly that age. A familiar room with familiar faces.

My kid just finished TK, and for us, it was a great choice. His birthday is one day before the age cutoff, so he’s always going to be the youngest. And while he is incredibly smart and funny and sweet (obviously), spending a full day in a school setting was a big transition for him. TK gave him the space to work on his social-emotional skills and start building more independence (big shout-out to ŔÖ˛Ątv for going WAY above and beyond to make him feel welcome and comfortable).

If you’d like to see for yourself, schedule a visit or call us at (916) 442-5395. We’d love to show you around and help you talk it through.

The trouble is that “small class sizes” tells you almost nothing about what your child’s actual day looks like. A school can advertise “small classes” and still seat your kid in a room of 24. So instead of talking numbers, let’s talk about what a truly small class changes in real life. Like the stuff that shows up in your kid’s day, not just the bullet points and buzz words.

So… what does “small” even mean?

It varies wildly. Public elementary classes around here often run 24 to 30-plus kids, especially past the early grades. On the private side, “small” is all over the map. Some schools call 18 small, others mean 12, and a few count the school-wide ratio rather than the size of the actual room your child sits in.

And that last part is important. The number to ask about is the size of the specific grade your child is entering next year, not the school-wide average. Averages can hide a lot. A school with tiny kindergarten classes and packed middle school grades still gets to put a flattering number on the brochure.

For reference, ŔÖ˛Ątv runs about 135 students total with roughly a 12-to-1 ratio, in multi-age classrooms where kids stay with the same teacher for two years.

What actually changes day to day

This is the part the brochures skip, so let’s get specific :

• Your kid talks more. In a room of 12, a child gets several times as many turns to answer, ask, and think out loud as they would in a class of 28. Participation isn’t a personality trait, a lot of it is just math: how many hands are up, and how many minutes there are to go around.
• The off day gets caught early. A teacher with twelve kids notices when one of them walks in quiet, or off, or clearly exhausted. In a big room, that same kid can have a whole rough week before anyone sees it.
• Less crowd control, more teaching. A meaningful chunk of every large class goes to managing the room. Settle down, eyes up front, please stop doing that to the pencil sharpener. Shrink the room, and all of that energy goes back into actual teaching.
• Feedback that’s actually read. When a teacher has twelve essays instead of thirty, your kid’s writing gets read closely and commented on specifically, not skimmed, stamped “Good work!” and sent home.
• A smaller social world to navigate. Fewer kids means fewer cliques to get shut out of and fewer places to feel invisible. For a lot of children, that makes a big difference.
• Nowhere to coast unnoticed. In a small class, a bright kid can’t quietly check out for a semester, and a struggling kid can’t slip through the cracks. Everyone is seen, which is exactly the point.

To be fair, the research on class size is mixed. But where it shows clear benefits is in the early grades, and for kids who need more individual attention. Which makes sense considering everything above.

What small class sizes are not

Here’s the real deal: small isn’t automatically better. A small class with a checked-out teacher is worse than a big class with a great one. Class size is an enabler, not a guarantee. It creates the conditions for a kid to be known and taught well, but it doesn’t do the work by itself.

So “how small?” is only part of the question. A low number only matters if the teaching takes advantage of it.

How to actually evaluate it

When you tour a school, here’s what you do:

1. Ask for the specific number in the exact grade your child is entering next year, not the school-wide average.
2. Watch a class in session if you can, and notice whether the teacher seems to know each kid as an individual.
3. Ask about the philosophy behind the number. A school that’s thought hard about why small matters will have a real answer, and one that hasn’t will give you a statistic and a smile.

For more on this, take a look at our guide on How to Tour a Private School.

If small classes are what you’re after

The best way to understand what a small class feels like is to visit one. If you’d like to see what about twelve kids and a teacher who knows all of them really looks like, come visit us or call (916) 442-5395. We do one-on-one tours year-round, and we are always excited to meet new kids, answer questions, and show people what we’re all about.

And if you’re still in the earlier stage of wondering whether a smaller setting is even right for your child, we wrote a companion piece on exactly that: Signs Your Child Might Thrive in a Smaller School. You can also read more about how our multi-age classrooms make the small-class advantage go even further.