English Language Arts

Following the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts, sixth graders develop skills in reading, writing, speaking and listening, and language through experience with print and digital resources.  Students read a wide range of texts, varying in levels of sophistication and purpose.  Through print and non‐print text, they develop comprehension strategies, vocabulary, as well as high order thinking skills.  They read a balance of short and long fiction, drama, poetry, and informational text such as memoirs, articles, and essays and apply skills such as citing evidence, determining theme, and analyzing how parts of the text affect the whole.

Students learn about the writing–‐reading connection by drawing upon and writing about evidence from literary and informational texts.  Writing skills, such as the ability to plan, revise, edit, and publish, develop as students practice skills of specific writing types, such as arguments, informative/explanatory texts, and narratives.  Guided by rubrics, students write for a variety of purposes and audiences, and each student’s writing and product samples are compiled in a portfolio.  Sixth graders also conduct short research projects, drawing on and citing various sources appropriately.

They hone skills of flexible communication and collaboration as they learn to work together, express and listen carefully to ideas, integrate information and use media and visual displays to help communicate ideas.  Students learn language conventions and vocabulary to help them understand and analyze words and phrases, relationships among words, and shades of meaning that affect the text they read, write, and hear.  Students are encouraged to engage in daily independent reading to practice their skills and pursue their interests.

Common Core Math 6

• Ratios and Proportional Relationships: Understand ratio concepts and use ratio reasoning to solve problems.
• The Number System: Apply and extend previous understandings of multiplication and division to divide fractions by fractions; multiply and divide multi–‐digit numbers and find common factors and multiples; apply and extend previous understandings of numbers to the system of rational numbers.
• Expressions and Equations: Apply and extend previous understandings of arithmetic to algebraic expressions; reason about and solve one variable equations and inequalities; represent and analyze quantitative relationships between dependent and independent variables.
• Geometry: Solve real‐world and mathematical problems involving area, surface area, and volume. 
• Statistics and Probability: Develop understanding of statistical variability; summarize and describe distributions.

Common Core Math 6 PLUS

Common Core Math 6 PLUS is a compacted course comprised of all the Common Core Math 6 standards and a portion of the Common Core Math 7 standards.

• Ratios and Proportional Relationships: Understand ratio concepts and use ratio reasoning to solve problems; analyze proportional relationships and use them to solve real‐world and mathematical problems.
• The Number System: Apply and extend previous understandings of multiplication and division to divide fractions by fractions; multiply and divide multi–‐digit numbers and find common factors and multiples; apply and extend previous understandings of numbers to the system of rational numbers.
• Expressions and Equations:  Apply and extend previous understandings of arithmetic to algebraic expressions; reason about and solve one variable equations and inequalities; represent and analyze quantitative relationships between dependent and independent variables.
• Geometry: Solve real–‐world and mathematical problems involving area, surface area, and volume; solve real‐life and mathematical problems involving angle and measure.
• Statistics and Probability: Develop understanding of statistical variability; summarize and describe distributions.

Science

Traditional laboratory experiences provide opportunities to demonstrate how science is constant, historical, probabilistic, and replicable.  Although there are no fixed steps that all scientists follow, scientific investigations usually involve collections of relevant evidence, the use of logical reasoning, the application of imagination to devise hypotheses, and explanations to make sense of collected evidence.  Student engagement in scientific investigation provides background for understanding the nature of scientific inquiry.  In addition, the science process skills necessary for inquiry are acquired through active experience.  The process skills support development of reasoning and problem‐solving ability and are the core of scientific methodologies.

Social Studies

Students in sixth grade will continue to expand the knowledge, skills, and understandings acquired in the fourth and fifth grade studies of North Carolina and the United States by connecting those studies to their first formal look at a study of the world.  Sixth graders will focus heavily on the discipline of geography by using the themes of location, place, movement, human–‐environment interaction, and region to understand the emergence, expansion, and decline of civilizations and societies from the beginning of human existence to the Age of Exploration. Students will take a systematic look at the history and culture of various world regions including the development of economic, political and social systems through the lens of change and continuity.  As students examine the various factors that shaped the development of civilizations, societies, and regions in the ancient world, they will examine both similarities and differences among these areas.  Conscious effort will be made to integrate various civilizations, societies, and regions from every continent (Africa, Asia, Europe and the Americas). During this study, students will learn to recognize and interpret the “lessons of history;” those transferable understandings that are supported throughout time by recurring themes and issues.