This unit walks students through a variety of activities revolving around George Orwell's book '1984'.

Students developed strategies to add multi-digit numbers within 100 in first grade. While the strategies students likely used are not necessarily generalizable to any numbers within 100, they are sensible and relatively efficient [e.g., 28 + 35 = (28 + 2) + (35 -2) = 30 +33 = 63]. Further, these strategies are likely to be representative of those used when older students and adults solve multi-digit addition problems mentally. In second grade students began exploring multi-digit subtraction. There is focused time throughout second grade spent on helping students make sense of strategies to add and subtract multi-digit numbers. By the end of second grade the CCSS-M states that students should develop fluency using algorithms that are grounded in their understanding of place value for adding and subtracting multi-digit numbers within 100 and they should have strategies for adding and subtracting within 1000. While students are likely to vary in their competency with and understanding of addition and subtraction algorithms upon entering third grade, the focus of this unit is to help students deepen their understanding of place value and use this understanding to support fluency adding and subtracting within 1000.In this unit, students read, write, compare, and order numbers up to one hundred thousand (extending to one million in fourth grade). As part of this work they write equivalent numbers using standard and expanded notation. They use words, symbols, and some combination of the two to write, build, and speak numbers (e.g., 5327 = 5 thousands + 3 hundreds + 2 tens + 7 ones). Incorporating place value understanding is critical in this unit as this structure serves to help students learn to use procedures (i.e., algorithms) with connections to mathematical meaning. These connections support the development of number sense so that students are less likely to make computational errors, realize when their answers do not make sense, and solve problems efficiently and accurately. Place value continues to be important as students use estimation (e.g., rounding numbers to the nearest 10 or 100) in this unit to solve addition and subtraction problems. Students reason about the results they obtain from estimation and consider whether the solution that uses estimation is precise enough for the task at hand. Students also use estimation to judge the reasonableness of their and their peers' answers.This unit provides an important bridge to fourth grade, the year which students are expected to have developed fluency adding and subtracting multi-digit numbers using algorithms. Students in fourth grade are also expected to secure their understanding of place value up to 1,000,000. While this unit establishes connections between place value and addition and subtraction algorithms, it also provides a bridge to the multiplication and division work that students do in later units in third grade. Such connections will be extended in fourth grade as students learn to solve more complex multi-digit multiplication and division problems.As you teach this unit, and others focusing on the development of algorithms, please keep the following quotes in the forefront of your instructional decisions:

Rationale: Why study history? Why study the distant past? Why does historical thinking matter? To fully realize history's humanizing qualities, to draw on its ability to, ‘expand our conception and understanding of what it means to be human,’ we need to encounter the distant past -- a past even more distant from us in modes of thought and social organization. It is this past, one that initially leaves us befuddled or, worse, just plain bored, that we need most if we are to achieve the understanding that each of us is more than the handful of labels ascribed to us at birth. The sustained encounter with this less-familiar past teaches us the limitations of our brief sojourn on the planet and allows us to take membership in the entire human race. History provides us with the “invaluable mental power we call judgment.”3 Recent research supports the “basic assumption that history teaches us a way to make choices, to balance opinions, to tell stories, and to become uneasy – when necessary – about the stories we tell.”4 Ultimately, democracy and effective citizenship rests significantly on each generation’s ability to think historically. The Oakland Schools’ curriculum moves students beyond mere events, people, and dates. It encourages students to think like historians, geographers, economists, political scientists, anthropologists, and other social scientists. Such sophisticated thinking is, as some have argued, “unnatural” and often challenging for young students.5 Students whose schools have adopted the MC3/Oakland Schools’ curriculum will have encountered this type of thinking beginning in second grade. Building on discipline-focused thinking, this unit extends students’ understanding of historical thinking as they approach the study of world history. By unpacking historical and geographic thinking, students learn how these disciplines are distinct in how they ask questions and frame problems to organize and drive inquiry. They investigate how these social scientists select, analyze, and organize evidence, and then use that evidence to create accounts that answer questions or problems. These skills would be “useful every time they faced a take-home exam or research paper: how to get started when they lack necessary information, how to prepare their minds to deal with new topics, how to develop a hunch. The benefits would extend far beyond the intellectual.”6 Through the development of the historical habits of mind, students build both social and content literacy. As such, the Common Core State Standards for Literacy are a deliberate focal point of the unit. World Geography: The unit begins by building on students’ prior knowledge of world geography studied in sixth grade. Students review how geographers examine, frame, and reframe the world by using topographical features and big “invented” geographic categories. They explore how maps are representations of places and how representations of the same place can differ based on the purposes, knowledge, and points of view of the cartographer.7 They consider how these differences shape how people create accounts of places and that the names geographers, historians or other people use -- “Europe,” the “Rhine River,” “Indonesia”, “Eastern Hemisphere” or “continents” – are interpretative ideas created by people for specific reasons. Throughout the course students will be using others’ historical accounts or maps. Understanding what went into creating an account or map is a key feature in learning to “read” them. Being able to understand and use these ideas in reading are critical, advanced literacy skills and therefore, these ideas are introduced early in the curriculum and are built upon throughout the course. By examining the perspectives and language of historians and geographers, students enrich their understanding of the past. History as “Events” Versus History as “Accounts”: Students also engage in a deeper understanding of history. Scholars of student thinking in history have demonstrated how vital the distinction between “history as an event” and “history as an account” is for students to understand. If students think that “history” really is “all the events in the past,” then learning history must mean memorizing the events in the past. However, if students can see the distinction between these two uses of the word, and can understand that all studies of history are “accounts” of the past, then that opens students to understand the importance of thinking skills other than memorization – such as selecting events or evidence, or perspective taking, all of which are essential in historical thinking. Accordingly, the distinction of history as events versus accounts is foundational for student understanding. Historical Thinking: Students consider how it is possible for historians to create representations or accounts of events in which they were not present or that happened thousands of years before they were even born. They learn that historians must have some evidence to support the claims they make in their accounts. Therefore, this unit introduces students to some of the content area literacy skills central entailed in teaching people “to do” history and geography. Students review the difference between primary and secondary sources (evidence) and begin to employ methods of analysis using strategies called sourcing and corroborating. They are introduced the ideas of internal and external validity, two forms of corroboration involved in reading primary and secondary sources. Students assess the internal validity by examining whether a source contradicts itself. Determining external validity requires students to explore other sources or other pieces of information that supports or challenges the source under investigation. After learning about the importance of framing a historical problem, students explore four thinking tools that historians use to organize and analyze information: significance, social institutions, temporal frames (time), and spatial scales (space). In determining significance, students consider the characteristics that make an event significant and then apply these characteristics to their own lives. To assist students in analyzing and describing past societies, they identify how societies address their needs through the creation of social institutions (e.g., organizing power = government; producing and distributing resources including food, shelter, and clothing = economy; raising and educating children = family; disseminating culture = education; developing common beliefs and values = religion; and communicating = language). In considering time, students explore a variety of calendar systems. They also learn how historians use eras, periodization schemes, and turning points to organize and analyze information. Students then explore how historians use space to organize and analyze past events. In thinking of places as geographic “containers” in which we place historical events, students are introduced to how some containers can be too big for events and make the events difficult to see. They also explore how geographic containers that are too small for an event cut out features of the event. This is important for people who use others’ historical accounts or maps. Understanding what went into creating an account or map is a key feature in learning to “read” historical accounts and/or maps. In considering how geographers frame and reframe the earth, students refine their use and understanding of these big spatial categories throughout the unit. These are critical and challenging lessons for students and teachers because all historical study builds upon these elements. They are the “invisible” tools that historians use to create historical accounts. Sometimes, teachers and students pay no attention to such things as institutions, or the temporal and spatial organization of the historical accounts they are teaching and learning. Too often, teachers and students simply assume that since something is in the curriculum or the textbook it is significant for some reason, and never consider significance at all. Content Literacy: The development of content literacy skills is a critical component in this course and is integrated throughout the unit. Students are introduced to the features and structure of their history textbook. Comparing the disciplines of history and science reinforces the fact that history has its own ways of thinking, knowing, and using evidence. Students begin to examine some potential limitations of history textbooks by exploring to what extent their textbook reflects the evidentiary, problem-based, and interpretative nature of history. The unit culminates with students challenging the official and ‘unbiased’ version of historical events found in their textbooks. By comparing a textbook account of a historical event with two primary sources, students uncover that the textbook offers one narrow version of history that is often void of the ongoing investigative nature of historical inquiry and practice. Students write reflectively on the benefits of using historical habits of mind in and out of the history classroom. The concluding activity of the unit not only reinforces the big ideas explored throughout the unit, but helps establish classroom rules for small group discussions which will be employed throughout the course.

The focus of this unit is to develop students' fluency with addition and subtraction facts within 10. To do this, students continue to work with number patterns and relationships, including skip counting by 5s and 10s and identifying the relationship between written and spoken number words and written numerals. They order and compare numbers to develop an understanding of their relative sizes. They become more skilled at instantly recognizing the amounts in a patterned set of objects without counting them (subitizing), e.g., dots on dice, dominos, or a ten-frame. These activities engage students in thinking about part-part-total number relationships and aid in learning the number combinations foundational to learning other basic addition and subtraction facts in first grade.Students compose and decompose numbers to ten, which provides experiences with the big mathematical ideas of equivalence and the commutative property for addition. They also learn to use strategies such as adjusting the numbers in a problem to make it easier to solve (e.g., 6 + 4 = 5 + 5; 2 + 4 = 3 + 3). They develop fluency with complements of ten to establish ten as an anchor or benchmark number for future work with addition and subtraction. They solve different types of word problems within sums of 10 that include concretely, pictorially and numerically modeling and explaining their solutions.When reading the standards below, keep in mind that the focus of this unit is developing strategies and fluency for adding and subtracting within 10. Students will work with larger numbers later in the year.

The focus of this unit is on deepening students’ use of mental strategies for facts as fluency with basic addition and subtraction facts is foundational for multi-digit computation. In first grade students explored a variety of reasoning strategies for finding the sum of two one-digit numbers. In second grade students need to become fluent with basic faction order to free up more complex problems including two- and three-digit addition and subtraction problems. As students work to deepen and extend their strategies for facts above ten, they work with place value concepts. The work students do with place value in this unit reviews decomposing numbers into tens and ones. As students explain their thinking and listen to the thinking of others, they expand their understanding of number relationships and properties of operations. For example, one fact strategy for adding 7 + 9 is to think, “7 + 9 = (6 + 1) + 9 = 6 + (1 + 9) = 6 + 10 = 16.” Another strategy for 7 + 9 is to think, “7 + 9 = 7 + 10 - 1 = 17 – 1 = 16.” These are useful strategies that students may also apply when using mental arithmetic to add 8 or 9 ones to a multi-digit number (e.g., 46 + 8 = 8 + 2 + 44 = 10 + 44 = 54 or 46 +10 – 2 = 56 – 2 = 54).

To develop “spatial sense”, students use positional words to describe the location of physical objects in the classroom or school (above, below, beside, in front of, behind, next to).

This introductory unit extends students’ understanding of geographic thinking as they approach the study of world geography and global issues. After exploring several definitions of geography, students review and apply geographic concepts to different spatial scales. They use the expanding environments model of elementary school (self-school-community-state-country) to consider the questions: What is where? and Why is it there?. Students are then introduced to the method for geographic inquiry, using the drying up of the Aral Sea is used as a case study to model the process. They then apply the geographic inquiry process to new geographic issues. Next, students explore the tools and technologies of geographers such as globes, aerial photographs, and satellite images, and learn how new technology such as Global Position System (GPS) and Global Information Systems (GIS) provide geographers with new and detailed information about the Earth. They also review the five themes of geography as an organizing framework for geographic inquiry. Students deepen their knowledge of the five themes through a categorization exercise of global questions related to each theme. Focusing on a global perspective, they then use the five themes to describe the Earth itself.

In this unit, students build the foundational understandings that functions model relationships between quantities. In addition, students build an arsenal of tools to study functions throughout the course including the routine of examining functions with multiple representations. “Students should develop ways of thinking that are general and allow them to approach any type of function, work with it, and understand how it behaves, rather than see each function as a completely different animal in the bestiary” (Grade 8, High School Functionsprogression document, page 7). Specific features of linear, exponential, quadratic, and polynomial functions are each studied extensively in their own units in Algebra 1. Many standards that are introduced in Unit 1 will be further developed and/or utilized across these future units; look for these standards under the Unit Level Standards heading.Contexts are important for developing conceptual understanding. Drawing from contexts, students justify that one quantity depends on another and that each element of the domain corresponds to exactly one element of the range. They can qualitatively describe aspects of functions (e.g., increasing, decreasing) and reason about a function’s domain and range leading to conjectures about additional representations. In addition, students use contexts to make sense of function notation. For example, if the functionhrepresents the height in centimeters of a bean sprout at specified days,t, then students should be able to talk about and/or identify each of the following:h(3), 5=h(t), h(6.5)=13.2,andh(t)=n.When functions are expressed symbolically, students input values into the equations to generate a table of output values and use these corresponding values to graph the function. After manually generating numeric and then graphic representations, students will use technologies such as a graphing calculator to generate both tables of values and graphs of functions. In doing so, they should pause to reflect upon the functional relationship between variables exhibited in these representations and why the representations make sense. By generating and comparing multiple cases, students recognize that functions can be organized by similar and different features like patterns of change, restrictions in the domain/range, and general shape. This organization of functions both serves as as an introduction to the families of functions that they will study throughout the course and equips students with strategies to study and represent functions.Students should not be expected to generate symbolic representations until later units. Likewise, symbolic manipulation of equations to reveal key features of functions (e.g., intercepts, maximum, horizontal asymptote) is included later in specific function units.

The need to reason logically occurs daily. Principles of reasoning are useful whether developing a strategy to win a game or the sequence of steps needed to repair a lamp. Students use coordinates, diagrams including constructions, and language (i.e. precise terms and conditional statements) to solve problems in this unit and establish them as tools to use in reasoning throughout the course., students will move from explaining their reasoning informally to more formal explanations. Using valid arguments and reasoning patterns with correct assumptions and careful explanation of the reasoning is important. Students build flexibility with the forms used to prove theorems. Paragraph proofs, flow chart proof, two-column proofs, transformational proofs, coordinate proofs, arguments affirming the hypothesis, chains of if-then statements, and use of counterexamples are some possible methods students could use to prove a conjecture.

Third graders are welcomed into their reading workshop with an invitation to show off their knowledge, talent and energy for reading. These readers are reading L/M reading levels or higher and will have to think about the kind of reader they are and want to be as they establish themselves inside their new reading community.Concept 1 asks third graders to think of the habits they bring to reading and the habits they want to create to strengthen their reading and make their reading community and their own personal reading growth the best it can be. Creating long term and short term personal reading goals, choosing just right text, and assisting the reading community meet and exceed classroom stamina goals shows readers the habits necessary for success. This concept also demonstrates for readers the need to read at a pace which allows for the greatest number of pages to be read, while still seeing the text in mind and understanding all that has been read.Concept 2 asks readers to understand that every bit of text they read is important to their understanding. Readers enhance their strategies to clear confusion by stopping, rereading, and taking the time to figure out unfamiliar words while still envisioning the text and keeping their appropriate pace. Readers think about their attitudes towards reading and the teaching hopes to influence a growth mindset where readers come to the work seeing it’s importance and the need to read many books across their days and weeks.Concept 3 organizes readers into like-level partnerships. Readers reading the same or about the same levels are paired for thinking and conversation. Readers learn to care for their partner by coming prepared to partnerships, listening well, and keeping an open mind. They come to see that a reading partner is an important person in life, as partners help each other gain reading stamina and focus. Partnersdo except to prove a point or take their partner back to a page to clear confusion. Choral, echo, and reading page by page together aloud are abandoned to allow readers more time for thinking and talking. At these levels, it is more important that readers learn to read silently to themselves during independent reading and read aloud only when needed in partnership, given their conversation or plans. Partners push each other to think about strong habits needed to be strong readers. Looking at reading logs, sharing books read and noticing changes in each other over time helps partnerships bond; building a strong working relationship that moves into the next unit of study.The unit, like all units, ends with a celebration in session 16. Empowering readers to reflect on ways they have changed as readers in a short time is suggested. There certainly could be other ways to celebrate based on the culture built within the reading community and teachers should feel free to celebrate in different ways based on their insights of readers.Differentiating by reviewing the K-2 units may be helpful depending on the levels of readers.

Fourth graders are welcomed into their reading workshop with an invitation to show off their knowledge, talent and energy for reading. These readers are reading P/Q reading levels or higher and will have to think about the kind of reader they are and want to be as they establish themselves inside their new reading community.Concept 1 will ask Fourth graders to think of the habits they bring to reading and the habits they want to create to strengthen their reading and make their reading community and their own personal reading growth the best it can be. Creating long term and short term personal reading goals, choosing just right text, and assisting the reading community meet and exceed classroom stamina goals will show readers the habits necessary for success. This concept also demonstrates for readers the need to read at a pace which allows for the greatest number of pages to be read, while still seeing the text in mind and understanding all that has been read.Concept 2 asks readers to understand that every bit of text they read is important to their understanding. Readers will enhance their strategies to clear confusion by stopping, rereading, and taking the time to figure out unfamiliar words while still envisioning the text and keeping their appropriate pace. Readers will think about their attitudes towards reading and the teaching hopes to influence a growth mindset where readers come to the work seeing its importance and the need to read many books across their days and weeks.Concept 3 organizes readers into like-level partnerships. Readers reading the same or about the same levels, will be paired for thinking and conversation. Part of this thinking uses readers’ previous work with retelling to lift comprehension and conversation by teaching readers to summarize with the author’s message in mind. Readers learn to care for their partner by coming prepared to partnerships, listening well, and keeping an open mind. They will come to see that a reading partner is an important person in life, as partners help each other gain reading stamina and focus. Partnerswill not read aloud to each other except to prove a point or take their partner back to a page to clear confusion. Choral, echo and reading page by page together aloud are abandoned to allow readers more time for thinking and talking. At these levels, it is more important that readers learn to read silently to themselves during independent reading and read aloud only when needed in partnership, given their conversation or plans. Partners will push each other to think about strong habits needed to be strong readers. Looking at reading logs, sharing books read and noticing changes in each other over time will help partnerships bond; building a strong working relationship that will move into the next unit of study.The unit, like all units, ends with a celebration in session 16. Empowering readers to reflect on ways they have changed as readers in short time is suggested. There certainly could be other ways to celebrate based on the culture built within the reading community and teachers should feel free to celebrate in different ways based on their insights of readers.Differentiating by reviewing the K-3 units, may be helpful dependent on levels of readers.

Second graders are welcomed into the world of BIG TIME READERS. These readers are reading I/J/K (Fountas and Pinnell) reading levels or higher and will have to make decisions for sophisticated strategy use with speeded action. They will learn that some of the strategies they once used in kindergarten and first grade aren’t as well suited for their reading growth at current text levels.Concept 1 will ask second grade readers to think of themselves as BIG TIME READERS who make their own decisions. It may feel odd to invite readers, the first day of school to show what they already know about workshop and reading, but the rewards of this invitation will be plentiful. Plan to watch and listen for the kinds of readers in the group. Take notes as readers; settle in, read and flag and jot based on previous experience. They will begin logging reading and setting goals for reading more pages across days and weeks.Concept 2 asks readers to step into thinking about text from the minute the text is picked up and into conversations long after the book is put down. Readers learn to use what is already known about books and text and make BIG predictions about the way text will go. Readers learn that revisiting text by rereading entire books can aide in making more meaningful connections to how all the pieces of the text fit together, which will offer ease with thinking about author's intent or message.Concept 3 organizes readers into like-level partnerships. Readers reading the same or about the same levels, will be paired for thinking and conversation. Readers learn to care for their partner by coming prepared to partnerships, listening well, and helping problem solve. They will come to see that a reading partner is an important person in life, as partners help each other gain reading stamina and focus. Partners will not read aloud to each other, except to reread for fluency, to prove a point or to act out character voices. They certainly can read a favorite part or a part that was important, but choral, echo and reading page by page aloud are pushed aside to allow readers more time for thinking and talking. At these levels, it is more important that readers learn to read silently to themselves and read aloud when needed in partnership, given their conversation or plans.Concept 4 shows readers that they can take speeded action to solve problems. Teachers may want to review first grade strategy charts for alignment but also cross out and revise those strategies that are no longer useful (always pointing to words, reading out loud). Readers will delight in the idea that they are more grown up readers and are using the strategies of BIG TIME READERS. The problem solving lessons emphasize stopping in the midst of text when stuck, being your own problem solver, rereading word parts, and thinking about the meaning of text. Jotting and flagging notes, in the midst of independent reading, where problems aren't solved gives an authentic strategy and elevates the need for partners to help, at times.The unit, like all units, ends with a celebration. Empowering readers to see how far they have come is the theme. Suggestions are listed in session 19.

Unit one in kindergarten is our chance to invite children into the world of reading so that by the end of September, they see themselves as part of a larger reading community and also see themselves as readers in that community. The hope is that readers acquire confidence around selecting books, develop a sense of story and meaning through reading pictures across books and gain information as well as find numerous ways to talk and read with other readers in reading partnerships. These are all habits readers share regardless of age.This unit inspires a love for reading while balancing the teaching of reading process work. In this unit and all that follow, teachers demonstrate that reading is always about thinking about the text while their eyes are busy looking at the text. Over time readers use pictures and words to read their text page by page to build their reading stamina. In narrative text, readers can become the characters through pictures, which adds engagement and liveliness, and also sets kindergarteners in the shoes of their characters ultimately helping them to think about the "meaning making" that runs along narrative print. In informational text, readers learn to acquire as much information as possible about their topics of interest through pictures, photographs and diagrams and in turn teach others all they have learned.Partnerships meet the very first day of reading workshop, however these meetings initially are randomly selected by readers or the teacher (possibly, just partnered by who is sitting nearest). Partnerships may feel short lived and casual within the first weeks of unit one. However, near the third to fourth week, once the teacher has had the time to get to know readers a little deeper, partnerships lift in rigor and importance by having a partnership that lasts across numerous days or weeks. Emphasis is placed on partnerships by having partners meet after the mini-lesson with independent reading following. Readers learn strategies for planning, sustaining and utilizing their partnerships. Readers see that it is essential to share their reading and thinking with others.The conclusion of unit one is marked by a celebration when students reflect and/or share their work and growth as readers. The purpose is to pull this community of readers together and take stock of all the learning before turning a corner toward unit two. Although most of your kindergarteners will not be conventional readers at this time of year, the intent of this unit is that they recognize themselves as people who read, share reading and share their thinking through talk!:As you move through this unit teachers should include instruction about procedures, management and expectations for reading workshop as needed. This instruction could take place during the mid-workshop teach or during the share. This unit does not teach students how to sit on the carpet day one and then on subsequent days teach students how to hold a book and turn the pages. Rather, this unit immerses students into the act of reading and ask teachers observe their students behaviors and make teaching decisions based on these observations.

Launching the reading workshop in first grade is all about the excitement and pressing the importance to do all that readers know to do already as readers. Our roles as teachers will be to gather our class around an inspiring spirit, guided by support and encouragement to become powerful readers. We will want our readers to see that they are already part of a larger reading community. They come to us with literary knowledge and know-how and we’ll want to help them see that they can build on and extend their foundation by reading, thinking and talking.The first concept in this unit isReaders stretch themselves to read with stamina and focus. This line of work will lead teachers and readers to see that each and every day we stretch ourselves to become even better than the previous day. The work at hand will have teachers timing minutes read, and demonstrating ways that readers can stay focused on print and meaning making. You may even decide to challenge another first grade to see which class can increase their minutes read with focus. You will teach readers that daily, we keep records of number of books read and number of minutes spent reading. We will not set demands without thoughtful demonstrations based on readers’ previous experiences with reading workshop classrooms and structures. It will be important to begin quickly by assessing informally. This will help to determine who is already reading above grade level expectations, who needs support with staying focused, and who does or does not understands the routines and procedures. This will allow teachers to keep layering instructional moves, while also differentiating based on reader’s needs.The second concept in this unit isReaders envision the way their books go in their minds, and revise them as they read on. Here we will implore “eyes on the print and minds on making meaning”. The teaching points within this concept will ask readers to consider the pictures the words help make in their minds and push them to see beyond the pictures on the page. Readers will spend time flagging pages with post-its where words created vivid pictures and movies so that they can share their findings with reading partners. This work will help readers see that the words on the page and the readers’ thinking stay closely connected.The last concept in this unit, Readers build stamina and focus by sharing reading and thinking with others,shifts much of the work into beginning partnerships based on quick observations and assessments. It is not necessary to do a formal DRA or Benchmark assessment to assert that “these two readers are reading at similar levels and using similar strategies”. Initially, partnerships may last day by day, a few days, or a week at a time. However, as you near the last concept, consider forming lasting partnerships until the unit concludes based on your informal or formal assessments. This will allow readers to read and think with partners at similar reading levels, adding to the minutes of appropriate reading time across the day and week. We will encourage partnership stamina and focus in ways similar to independent reading time. Teaching readers ways to read with partners, ways to talk with partners and ways to think with partners.

This focus for this unit of study is twofold: writing an effective Small Moment story and readability. First, students will focus on the writing of personal narratives by stretching out a Small Moment. Small Moment stories are when an author takes a true story from his/her life and instead of telling the whole story, s/he tells a small part of the story and stretches it across pages. It is important to teach writers to hold these moments in their heads as they stretch them across a sequence of several pages. Revisiting the strategies for story generation students learned in kindergarten, in addition to learning new strategies, will develop students’ repertoire for gathering story ideas. The unit will emphasize and elaborate upon the qualities of good writing including detail, dialogue, setting, sequence, and answering reader’s questions. Students will be taught the importance of focusing their writing.The expectation is that first graders will write approximately three to four booklets a week during the course of the unit. These three to five page booklets will have two to four sentences on each page. These are rough estimates and will vary based on student need and writing background. Writers will be taught how to make thoughtful decisions about what goes on each page. The idea of quantity versus quality is often brought up in units such as this. In first grade, we are providing students with many opportunities to try out new skills and techniques through writing multiple pieces. When asking students to go back to the same piece, we often find that we are teaching the writing, not the writer. Our focus needs to be on the writer and his/her growth over time.Partnerships play a critical role in the development of young writers. Students will be taught to rehearse and share their pieces with each other like storytellers. Partners will provide compliments and suggestions in a kind way. Along with developing a critical eye, partners need to be taught how to notice and celebrate detailed topics, actions in pictures, dialogue and other qualities of good writing.The second focus of the unit is readability. Young writers will be taught to reread their pieces to see if they are readable and then make adjustments if needed. Partnerships continue to play an important role as we move through this second focus. Partners will review each other’s pieces and suggest ways to make them more readable. During share time, friendly tips, compliments and asking questions will be highlighted so partners learn that feedback includes attention to parts well done.

The Common Core State Standards require Fifth grade students to write narratives in which they orient their reader by establishing a situation and introducing a narrator or characters with the event sequence unfolding naturally. Additionally, students are expected to use details including dialogue, descriptions of actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words and phrases to signal event order, and provide a sense of closure. The goal of this unit is for students to write personal narrative stories that elaborate the tension or problem and focus upon an important message or heart of the story. Students will immerse themselves in age-appropriate personal narrative mentors to discern how these texts tend to go and to gather possible story ideas from turning points within their life experiences. They will draw on everything they've learned from writing small moment stories from Kindergarten- second grade, as well as personal narrative writing in third grade and fourth grades. Additionally, students revisit qualities of good writing and craft to write personal narratives. They will select their best work to revise, edit, and publish.Lessons are designed to teach writers how to navigate through the process: generating story ideas, rehearsing for writing, drafting, rereading, revising and publishing. Mid- unit, children will choose their best work and revise this more deeply and extensively to share with an audience. Students will begin a second personal narrative piece as an independent writing project guided by previous sessions, anchor charts, conferences and small groups. Students will learn ways to raise the level of their writing within their independent writing project working at their own pace within the writing process. The unit culminates with students surveying their growth, recognizing their growing knowledge of good writing, their increasing repertoires of writing strategies and their success with cycling through the writing process in order to name their strengths but also determine future goals.

The Common Core State Standards require Fourth Grade students to write narratives in which they orient their reader by establishing a situation and introducing a narrator or characters with the event sequence unfolding naturally. Additionally, students are expected to use details including dialogue, descriptions of actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words and phrases to signal event order, and provide a sense of closure. The goal of this unit is for students to write well-elaborated realistic fiction stories that focus upon an important message or heart of the story. Students will immerse themselves in age-appropriate realistic fiction stories to discern how these texts tend to go and to gather possible story ideas from their lives’ experiences. They will draw on everything they've learned from writing small moment stories from Kindergarten- Second Grade, as well as personal narrative writing in third grade. Additionally, students revisit qualities of good writing and craft to write realistic fiction. They will select their best work to revise, edit, and publish.Lessons are designed to teach writers how to navigate through the process: generating story ideas, rehearsing for writing, drafting, rereading, revising and publishing. Mid-unit, children will choose their best work and revise this more deeply and extensively to share with an audience. Students will begin a second realistic fiction piece as an independent writing project guided by previous sessions, anchor charts and conferences and small groups. Students will learn ways to raise the level of their writing within their independent writing project working at their own pace within the writing process. The unit culminates with students surveying their growth, recognizing their growing knowledge of good writing, their increasing repertoire of writing strategies and their success with cycling through the writing process to name their strengths but also determine future goals.

Students enter Second Grade having spent two years writing about important moments from their lives.  Now, it is time for them to revisit and re-energize these small moment stories.  The overall goal of this unit is for these students to lift the level of their personal narratives to more fully engage and inform an audience.  They’ll learn to incorporate a repertoire of strategies to write more focused and compelling pieces.  These “seasoned” young writers will utilize a storyteller’s voice to show, not tell; to paint pictures in readers’ minds through the use of details.  They’ll learn to bring the heart of a story alive!Special attention will be given to reviewing routines and rituals in order to develop a community of independent writers. Studentswill learn to build effective partnerships so they can support one another in cycling through the writing process at their own pace, developing increased independence and self-reliance.Lessons are designed to teach writers how to navigate through the process:  generating story ideas, rehearsing for writing, drafting, rereading, revising and then starting on another piece.  At the end of the unit, children will choose their best work and revise this more deeply and extensively to share with an audience.  The unit culminates with a celebration of writing growth, recognizing students’ growing knowledge of good writing, their increasing repertoires of writing strategies and their success with cycling through the writing process.

The Common Core State Standards require third grade students to write narratives in which they establish a situation and introduce a narrator or characters with naturally unfolding sequence of events. Additionally, students are expected to use details including dialogue, descriptions of actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words and phrases to signal event order, and provide a sense of closure. The goal of this unit is for students to write well-elaborated true stories based on students’ experiences. Students will immerse themselves in age-appropriate narrative stories to discern how these texts tend to go and to gather possible true story ideas. They will draw on everything they've learned from writing small moment stories from Kindergarten - Second Grade and their study of craft. Additionally, students revisit qualities of good writing to create their personal narratives or true story pieces. They will select their best work to revise, edit, and publish.Special attention will be given to reviewing routines and rituals in order to develop a community of independent writers.Studentswill learn to work in effective partnerships so they can support one another in cycling through the writing process at their own pace, developing increased independence and self-reliance.Lessons are designed to teach writers how to navigate through the process: generating story ideas, rehearsing for writing, drafting, rereading, revising and then starting on another piece. At the end of the unit, children will choose their best work and revise this more deeply and extensively to share with an audience. The unit culminates with a celebration of writing growth, recognizing students’ growing knowledge of good writing, their increasing repertoire of writing strategies and their success with cycling through the writing process.

This unit extends what students learned in third grade regarding multiplication and division by developing more precise use of mathematical vocabulary and more sophisticated ways of analyzing number patterns (see 4.OA.C.5.). As part of their analysis of number patterns students deepen their understanding of the structure of the base ten system paying particular attention to how the value of a digit changes given its position in a number (e.g., in the number 7,700 the value of the 7 in the thousands place is ten times that of the 7 in the hundreds place). They also notice that numbers have unique characteristics such as prime, composite, and square and they begin to understand why these characteristics can be important when solving problems. Students develop mathematical vocabulary as a tool to describe and reason about the multiplication and division equations they write and solve (e.g., factor, divisor, multiple, quotient). They are an understanding of prime, composite, and square numbers and begin to understand why these are helpful ways to describe numbers . They also describe equations by referencing the numbers the Precise mathematical language includes such terms as equations, factors, product, quotient, multiples, prime, composite and square as they apply to numerical attributes. While the ideas developed in this unit In earlier grades, students use multiplication facts to compose and decompose number into their respective parts (e.g., 7 x 6 can be decomposed into (5 x 6) + (2 x 6)). In fourth grade, students use decomposition to identify all factors for any given number between 1 – 100. As students progress from additive to multiplicative comparisons (i.e. interpret 42 = 6 x 7 as a statement that 42 is 6 times as many as 7 as opposed to 42 is 35 more than 7), they learn to interpret a multiplication equation as a comparison statement. They also represent verbal statements of multiplicative comparisons as equations.As students continue to work with various representations and mathematical models of both multiplication and division problems (including real world and mathematical contexts, multi-step word problems, and equations including those with variables) they build upon their understanding of the inverse relationship between multiplication and division from third grade. Important mathematical generalizations can be made explicit when students build visual representations. For example, the Commutative and Associative Properties of multiplication allow students to rewrite equivalent equations.Throughout fourth grade students will build upon their knowledge of place value and of multiplication/division facts. They begin to use extended multiplication facts (e.g. 4 x 90 = 360, 270 = 3 x 90, 250 ÷ 50 = 5, and 60 = 240 ÷ 4) to solve problems. Working with extended multiplication facts supports students future work with angles and angle measurement as, in Unit Two, students will partition a 360 degree rotation into equal parts. In Unit Three, students will extend their understanding of place value to include tenths and hundredths as they work with decimal fractions. Then in Unit Four, they will use strategies based on place value to multiply two-digit numbers (e.g., partial products).Students will examine the patterns generated from either repeatedly multiplying by ten (e.g., 10 x 10=100, 10 x 10 x 10 = 1000, 10 x 10 x 10 x 10= 10,000) or decomposing powers of ten (1000= 100 x 10 = 10 x 100 = 100 x 1). This exploration allows students to make connections between factors, multiples, and place value.