SIXTH GRADE

OVERVIEW

READING

In sixth grade, students are aware of the author's craft. They are able to adjust their purpose, pace and strategies according to difficulty and/or type of text. Students continue to reflect on their skills and adjust their comprehension and vocabulary strategies to become better readers. Students discuss, reflect, and respond, using evidence from text, to a wide variety of literary genres and informational text. Students read for pleasure and choose books based on personal preference, topic, genre, theme, or author.

WRITING
A purposeful approach to writing is a hallmark of sixth-grade students. They are able to use form, content, technique, and conventions flexibly in order to meet their own purposes or assignment requirements. Competence is evident in the skills of paragraphing, summarizing, and synthesizing in content-area writing, while fiction writing reflects an increasing awareness of its role to entertain, explore human relationships, or persuade.
A Quick Check:

Does each student:
• Remain focused on a topic, audience, purpose, form, and style?
• Maintain personal style but also explore new techniques and emphases?
• Work for precision in the use and spelling of vocabulary in all writing?
• Evaluate honestly both own work and that of others and make a concerted effort to improve weaknesses?
• See writing as an important and effective tool for furthering own learning?

MATH

In sixth grade, students begin developing their understanding of negative numbers with the introduction of integers. Students also begin working with other representations of rational numbers. They examine the concept of volume, as well as collect, analyze, display, and interpret data, using a variety of graphical and statistical methods. They find the probability of events and analyze numerical and geometric patterns. Students also develop an understanding of algebraic terms and solve algebraic equations in one variable.

SOCIAL STUDIES

In sixth grade the main focus is on World Geography and World History and Geography.

The themes are:

A. Cartography – Maps, charts, and geographic tools

B. Spatial patterns and regions

C. Interaction: People, the environment, and culture

D. River Civilizations: Mesopotamia, Egypt, Kush

E. Ancient China

F. Greece and Rome

SCIENCE

In sixth grade students become more like scientists in their thinking and their investigations. They learn how to identify the problems and generate questions that can be answered scientifically. They learn the importance of sound investigative practices. Students begin to apply their understandings to designing solutions to real world problems. The guiding question is "How do scientists use investigation to solve real problems in my community?" Students work on the investigative skills of Designing solutions, Decision making, and Hypothesizing.