Sixth Grade Curriculum Overview
English/Language Arts
Sixth
grade students use oral language, written language, and media and
technology for expressive, informational, argumentative, critical, and
literary purposes. Students also explore the structure of language and
study grammatical rules in order to speak and write effectively. While
emphasis in sixth grade is placed on personal expression, students also:
* Interpret and synthesize information.
* Develop an understanding of the foundations of argument.
* Critically analyze print and non-print communication.
* Use effective sentence construction and edit for improvements in sentence formation, usage, mechanics, and spelling.
* Interpret and evaluate a wide range of literature.
Writing
In
grade 6, students learn the foundations of argument. Students learn
through exploration of a variety of materials how to recognize effective
arguments by summarizing the author?s purpose and stance; by
distinguishing between fact and opinion; and, through developing an
awareness of audience. Students in Grade 6 should be able to respond to
public documents such as editorial and school or community policies.
Math
In
Grade 6, instructional time should focus on four critical areas: (1)
connecting ratio and rate to whole number multiplication and division
and using concepts of ratio and rate to solve problems; (2) completing
understanding of division of fractions and extending the notion of
number to the system of rational numbers, which includes negative
numbers; (3) writing, interpreting, and using expressions and equations;
and (4) developing understanding of statistical thinking.
- 1.
Students use reasoning about multiplication and division to solve ratio
and rate problems about quantities. By viewing equivalent ratios and
rates as deriving from, and extending, pairs of rows (or columns) in the
multiplication table, and by analyzing simple drawings that indicate
the relative size of quantities, students connect their understanding of
multiplication and division with ratios and rates. Thus students expand
the scope of problems for which they can use multiplication and
division to solve problems, and they connect ratios and fractions.
Students solve a wide variety of problems involving ratios and rates.
- 2.
Students use the meaning of fractions, the meanings of multiplication
and division, and the relationship between multiplication and division
to understand and explain why the procedures for dividing fractions make
sense. Students use these operations to solve problems. Students extend
their previous understandings of number and the ordering of numbers to
the full system of rational numbers, which includes negative rational
numbers, and in particular negative integers. They reason about the
order and absolute value of rational numbers and about the location of
points in all four quadrants of the coordinate plane.
- 3.
Students understand the use of variables in mathematical expressions.
They write expressions and equations that correspond to given
situations, evaluate expressions, and use expressions and formulas to
solve problems. Students understand that expressions in different forms
can be equivalent, and they use the properties of operations to rewrite
expressions in equivalent forms. Students know that the solutions of an
equation are the values of the variables that make the equation true.
Students use properties of operations and the idea of maintaining the
equality of both sides of an equation to solve simple one-step
equations. Students construct and analyze tables, such as tables of
quantities that are in equivalent ratios, and they use equations (such
as 3x = y) to describe relationships between quantities.
- 4.
Building on and reinforcing their understanding of number, students
begin to develop their ability to think statistically. Students
recognize that a data distribution may not have a definite center and
that different ways to measure center yield different values. The median
measures center in the sense that it is roughly the middle value. The
mean measures center in the sense that it is the value that each data
point would take on if the total of the data values were redistributed
equally, and also in the sense that it is a balance point. Students
recognize that a measure of variability (interquartile range or mean
absolute deviation) can also be useful for summarizing data because two
very different sets of data can have the same mean and median yet be
distinguished by their variability.
Students learn to describe
and summarize numerical data sets, identifying clusters, peaks, gaps,
and symmetry, considering the context in which the data were collected.
Students in Grade 6 also build on their work with area in elementary
school by reasoning about relationships among shapes to determine area,
surface area, and volume. They find areas of right triangles, other
triangles, and special quadrilaterals by decomposing these shapes,
rearranging or removing pieces, and relating the shapes to rectangles.
Using these methods, students discuss, develop, and justify formulas for
areas of triangles and parallelograms. Students find areas of polygons
and surface areas of prisms and pyramids by decomposing them into pieces
whose area they can determine. They reason about right rectangular
prisms with fractional side lengths to extend formulas for the volume of
a right rectangular prism to fractional side lengths. They prepare for
work on scale drawings and constructions in Grade 7 by drawing polygons
in the coordinate plane.
Sixth Grade Social Studies
North Carolina Essential Standards
Focus: World Geography, History & Culture: Patterns of Continuity and Change
Time
Period: Beginnings of Human Society to the Emergence of the First
Global Age (1450) – Represents the first five Eras of the 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. A conscious effort
should 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.
The
standards are organized around five strands: history, geography and
environmental literacy, economics and financial literacy, civics and
government and culture. The strands should not be taught in isolation,
but woven together in an integrated study that helps understand the
ancient world. Additionally, the course includes two types of essential
standards – one that identifies the skills that students should master
during the course of the year and another that identify the knowledge
and understandings. The skills should be taught within the context of
applying knowledge and understandings to a study of the ancient world.
Science
Learners
will study natural and technological systems. All goals should focus on
the unifying concepts of science defined by the National Science
Education Standards: Systems, Order, and Organization; Evidence, Models,
and Explanation; Constancy, Change, and Measurement; Evolution and
Equilibrium; and Form and Function. The skills of inquiry and
technological design are targeted for mastery.
The concepts for which in-depth studies should be designed at sixth grade level include:
* Scientific Inquiry
* Technological Design
* Lithosphere
* Cycling of Matter
* Solar System
* Energy Transfer/Transformation
* Population Dynamics
Health/Physical Education
Sixth
grade students are instructed on the health-related benefits of health
and physical activity and how these benefits can be acquired and
maintained.
Major focuses in Grade 6 include:
* Recognizes signs of asthma
* Using thinking to predict consequences and to cope appropriately with situations
* Familiar with water safety
* Dealing appropriately with feelings
* Benefits of resistance to harmful substances
* Health-related fitness tests with goals for improvement
* Safe opportunities for participation outside of school hours
* Acknowledging individual differences
* Working independently
* Routines in sequential movement patterns and dance
* Strategies for offense and defense
Computer/Technology Skills
The
strength of technology is that it provides an excellent platform where
students can collect information in multiple formats and then organize,
link, and discover relationships between facts and events. An array of
tools for acquiring information and for thinking and expression allows
more students more ways to enter the learning enterprise successfully
and to live productive lives in the global, digital, and
information-based future they all face.
The focus for 6th grade Computer/Technology Skills includes:
* Responsible and safe use of online resources
* Using Copyright and Fair Use Guidelines
* Refining application skills
* Using formulas in a spreadsheet
* Using search strategy with two or more criteria in a database
* Increasing productivity and accuracy in keyboarding
* Using word processing, spreadsheet, database, and multimedia for assignments in all subject areas
* Locating and retrieving information using telecommunications
* Evaluating resources and information for accuracy and usefulness
* Selecting and using a variety of technology tools