Upper School Curriculum | 4-6
Creatively and
Intellectually
Challenging:
The Perfect Mix for
this Pivotal Season
Upper School is an important milestone in a student’s life. Grade 6 is a time when they are transitioning from elementary school toward young adulthood, and are maturing intellectually, spiritually, social-emotionally, and physically.
These years often shape a student’s beliefs and perspectives about themselves, their communities, and the world around them.
Using the city as an extension of our classroom, our program nurtures, inspires, and guides students in Grade 6 through this important time in their lives.
Additionally, students and faculty work in partnership with community members to provide meaningful application of course skills and content.
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Grade 4 is focused on responsibility, independence and choices.
Students are encouraged to take responsibility for their own learning which fosters independence, and there are many opportunities for making choices. Through student-led projects, students research topics of interest, gain deeper knowledge and share their knowledge with peers through presentations and projects.
Throughout the curriculum students are engaged in a variety of ways to satisfy their natural curiosity: through novel studies in English, solving real world word problems in Math, hands-on experimentation in Science, research projects in Social Studies, and a year-long cursive handwriting program.
Technology is used to deepen student knowledge through research, to record science data, practice math skills, learn coding skills and more.
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Reads for a variety of purposes while exploring a variety of genres
Explores literature as an expression and record of human experience and thought
Applies the skills of a good reader including clarifying, questioning, connecting, summarizing, predicting, and inferring
Uses nonfiction sources to understand text features and make meaning from text, understands opinions and facts, draws conclusions, and questions
Studies character, setting, and plot
Writes effectively for a variety of purposes and audiences
Uses the writing process to create meaningful text in a variety of modes: expository, narrative, persuasive, and poetry
Develops content, organization, style, and conventions to proofread, edit, and refine writing
Accesses, selects, evaluates, and effectively uses information from a variety of sources
Communicates effectively, listens critically, and responds appropriately in a variety of situations
Engages effectively in a wide range of collaborative discussions with diverse partners building on others’ ideas while clearly expressing their own
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Uses the four operations with whole numbers to solve problems
Generalizes place value understanding for multi-digit whole numbers less than or equal to 1,000,000
Gains familiarity with factors and multiples
Uses place value understanding and properties of operations to perform multi-digit arithmetic
Solves problems involving measurement and conversion of measurements from a larger unit to a smaller unit
Geometric measurement: understand concepts of angle and measure angles
Generates and analyzes patterns
Extends understanding of fraction equivalence and ordering
Generates and analyzes patterns
Builds fractions from unit fractions by applying and extending previous understandings of operations on whole numbers
Understands decimal notation for fractions, and compare decimal fractions
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Includes research, reading, writing, discussing and student-led projects and presentations.
Regions of the United States
Growth and the Civil War
Reading maps and globes
How our government works
The nation’s economy
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In Grade 4 students begin building and revising knowledge about the natural world based on evidence in a collaborative and equitable culture.
We work together in the same ways that scientists do to figure out interesting phenomena and solve design problems we encounter in our everyday lives. We seek out innovative curriculum to field test with local and national research partners and citizen science projects to participate in. Topics of study have included:
Energy transformation
Waves and ocean structures
Stormwater engineering
Earth’s changing surface
Grade 4
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Grade 5 marks a significant turning point in a child's academic journey. In Grade 5, students show an increased sense of self and responsibility for their learning as they transition into more in-depth exploration of subject-area concepts.
Students in Grade 5 learn how to manage time and academic expectations, identify their own learning styles, and dive deeper into their own academic interests through project based learning on topics of their choosing. For example, if a student is learning a certain topic, they may choose to share what they have learned by writing a song, creating a diorama, or presenting a research paper. If the student gets to create something in which they are interested, they will have a deeper understanding and gain more knowledge on that particular subject.
Students in Grade 5, as lifelong learners and problem solvers, are expected to be active and critical thinkers, work cooperatively with their peers, and continue to develop their academic stamina in preparation for Middle School. As the leaders of the Lower School, students in Grade 5 will have access to different enrichment/elective options and they will have opportunities to lead Lower School assemblies, take charge of projects, and more.
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Explores a variety of genres through different book studies during the year, as well as a Poetry Cafe
Reads with sufficient accuracy and fluency to support grade level comprehension, as well as reading with purpose
Determines a theme and compares and contrasts stories in the same genre.
Uses knowledge of language and its conventions, as well as determines the meaning of unfamiliar words from a range of strategies
Produces clear writing to inform, support an opinion, and to share a narrative
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Understands the place value system
Performs operations with multi-digit whole numbers and with decimals to hundredths
Converts like measurement units within a given measurement system
Writes and interpret numerical expressions
Applies and extend previous understandings of multiplication and division to multiply and divide fractions
Represents and interprets data
Applies and extends previous understandings of multiplication and division to multiply and divide fractions
Geometric measurement: understand concepts of volume and relate volume to multiplication and to addition
Classifies two-dimensional figures into categories based on their properties.
Analyzes patterns and relationships
Graphs points on the coordinate plane to solve real-world and mathematical problems
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Understands a variety of primary and secondary resources to communicate arguments, organize data, and develop historical awareness
Develops geographical awareness
Gains an understanding of Industrialization, the Gilded Age, and the Progressive Era
Examines and summarizes the events from World War One and World War Two and America post war and the Civil Rights Movement
Explores early Tennessee and into Statehood.
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Students focus on the understanding that science builds coherently
Investigates what happens to our garbage with the key concepts gained relating to the particle nature of matter and gas, observations of the weight of the garbage materials, conservation of weight of matter, on chemical reactions, and decomposers in the environment
Explores, using models, that the organisms in an ecosystem are interrelated with each other and physical components of the ecosystem. Key concepts gained relate to interdependent relationships in ecosystems, plants and energy, ecosystems and the cycle of matter and energy in ecosystems, and human impacts on ecosystems
Examines Earth systems: geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere. A blind taste test comparing tap water and bottled water leads to identifying the properties of the tap water and bottled water with students’ questioning the sources of the tap water and bottled water. Models are developed to use as a thinking tool to describe the interaction of the hydrosphere with the geosystem. Key concepts gained relate to Earth materials and systems, the roles of water in Earth’s surface processes, human impacts on Earth systems, defining and delimiting engineering problems, developing possible solutions, and optimizing the design solution
Analyzes and creates models to explain falling stars. Key concepts gained relate to the structure and properties of matter, the universe and its stars, Earth and the solar system, and types of interactions
Grade 5
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The transition into an Upper School ELA classroom is marked by a shift in focus beyond simply identifying the main elements of a story, moving instead towards nurturing the ability to discuss the significance of a text and how an author’s use of language enhances a text’s meaning.
The Grade 6 students learn to make inferences, look for character change and development, and identify tone and figurative language. These new skills are supported by guided annotations, group reading, and class discussions.
Accordingly, the study of literature serves as the foundation of all of our skill building in Grade 6. Through an examination of texts such as Island of the Blue Dolphins and Brown Girl Dreaming, the students learn how to read critically, identify and evaluate important language from the text, find their academic voice in class discussions, and begin to generate more formal written reflections.
This exploration of literature is complemented by a text-based study of vocabulary. Students define and practice using words in context and then build towards incorporating these words into their own speech and writing.
Finally, the Grade 6 student also engages in the study of basic sentence structures, parts of speech, and the fundamental rules of punctuation, all in the service of helping them to become better readers, writers, and thinkers.
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Mathematics in Grade 6 is built to strengthen the skills learned in the lower school (place value, multiplication and division, fraction, decimals, percents) while introducing more complex problem solving and pre-algebra concepts.
The curriculum covers a wide variety of topics including ratios, proportions, integers, percents, fractions, decimals, and an introduction to algebraic thinking.
The content is designed to lay the foundation for future math studies beyond Upper School. Students work both in cooperative groups and individually while using problem sets and hands-on activities to engage the material.
Students are encouraged to take risks and boldly attempt to solve problems with strategies that are being developed.
Algebraic thinking is introduced using real life activities and data.
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Using the OpenSciEd curriculum, students study the following topics:
Light & Matter: Why do we sometimes see different things when looking at the same object?
Thermal Energy: How can containers keep stuff from warming up or cooling down?
Weather, Climate & Water Cycling: Why does a lot of rain, hail, or snow fall at some times and not others?
Plate Tectonics & Rock Cycling: What causes Earth’s surface to change?
Natural Hazards: Where do natural hazards happen and how do we prepare for them?
Cells & Systems: How do living things heal?
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Grade 6 Social Studies focuses on the geographical, political and technological contributions of Ancient Civilizations and World Geography, ranging from Ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, Islamic World Africa, China, and Japan.
Critical thinking is a focus, as students learn about other cultures as a way of understanding themes that connect all human cultures and civilizations.
Students practice primary source analysis, developing opinions, and supporting our ideas with evidence, and becoming well-informed global citizens who care about the world we live in.
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Students experience exposure and practice of basic conversational elements structures of the language in different scenarios.
Units of study include: Greetings; Introductions; Weather; Simple present tense; Verb conjugation; Responding to classroom instructions; Descriptions of themselves and others; Activities/likes and dislikes; Reflexive; Speaking and Writing 3-5 sentence segments.
Core skills include:
Speaking and Comprehension: Priority is given to speaking as much as possible, showing students the value of being able to communicate in another language. As the year progresses, increased expectations around speaking more Spanish and less English occur. Students are not expected to understand everything, nor is this the goal; the purpose is to accustom the students’ ear to the language, so they practice listening comprehension.
Daily routines include using the reflexive, practicing using dialogue in different scenarios and using basic conversational commands in Spanish. Differentiated instruction helps to meet a variety of learning styles and needs.
Reading and Writing: In keeping with maintaining high academic standards and preparing students for higher education, attention is also given to reading and writing the language. Students have daily opportunities for practicing writing, responding to prompts, developing dialogue, or writing about themselves. Spanish has one of the most consistent phonetic systems of any language. Once the students learn the basic rules of Spanish phonetics, reading and spelling become more fluid and easy to master.
Grammar: Grammar weaves its way through every core skill in this holistic approach to learning, at times in the form of specific grammar lessons and exercises, other times in reading and writing assignments.
