May/June: What is Grade 6 Studying?

ELA

Module 4: Remarkable Accomplishments in Space Science 

Sixth grade scholars will conclude module #3 with several assessments that evaluate their ability to write an argumentative essay and apply listening and speaking skills that pertain to the topic of American Boarding Schools. Students will peer assess and determine areas of strength and needs of improvement. Following, students will be given an opportunity to gain mastery before final assessments are conducted. Module #4 will continue with students mastering the skills and strategies to write an argumentative essay and to determine point of view in a text. The content will entail the discovery of remarkable accomplishments in space science. Students will pay special attention to accomplishments and people that may have been overlooked until recently. After reading supplemental texts to learn about key events and well-known figures of the Space Race, students will begin their anchor text, Hidden Figures (Young Readers Edition) by Margot Lee Shetterly. This tells the story of the “West Computers,” the first black women hired by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA, later NASA), which had previously enforced discriminatory hiring policies. Students will explore other figures in the field of space science such as; talented mathematicians, like Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, and Katherine Johnson, all who led to major advances in space science and helped land human beings on the moon. Major tasks in the module will provide opportunities for students to uncover and uplift the stories of these and other hidden figures who have typically not been centered in popular accounts of space science. Module #4 will end with  a final presentation displaying the skills and content studied over the course of module 4.

Math: Illustrative Math:

Unit 6 Percent Increase and Decrease

Students use ratios, scale factors, unit rates (also called constants of proportionality), and proportional relationships to solve multi-step, real-world problems that involve fractions and percentages. They use long division to write fractions presented in the form a/b as decimals, like 11/30. They learn to understand and use the terms “repeating decimal,” “terminating decimal,” “percent increase,” “percent decrease,” “percent error,” and “measurement error.” They represent amounts and corresponding percent rates with double number line diagrams and tables. They use these terms and representations in reasoning about situations involving sales taxes, tips, markdowns, markups, sales commissions, interest, depreciation, and scaling a picture. Students use equations to represent proportional relationships in which the constant of proportionality arises from a percentage, for example, the relationship between price paid and amount of sales tax paid.

Unit 8:

This unit introduces the students to key statistical concepts. Students are introduced to dot plots and histograms as ways of visualizing data and distributions. They informally describe the distributions using center and spread before more formally computing mean, median, mean absolute deviation, and interquartile range as ways of quantifying the center and variability. Then, students consider what they can do when they do not have access to all of the necessary data. Ways to get samples, why using random processes is important, and how information from samples can be variable are all introduced. An optional section examining probability is provided at the end of the unit.

Science:

Ocean, Atmosphere and Climate

In the Ocean, Atmosphere, and Climate unit, students investigate how ocean currents behave and what effect they have on the climate of different locations around the world, specifically the air temperature of various locations. Energy flow from the sun is what drives this story. The sun transfers energy unevenly across Earth, with the most energy transferred at the equator and the least transferred at the poles. This energy from the sun is the main factor in what determines the air temperature of a place. Winds push the ocean surface, which contributes to the behavior of ocean currents. As surface ocean currents move around Earth—warm water is carried away from the equator and cold water is carried away from the poles—they gradually exchange energy with the atmosphere of the regions they pass. This results in the warming or cooling of the air affecting the overall temperature and climate of a region. When changes in the atmosphere or oceans occur that affect the patterns of these ocean currents, the effects can be felt around the world. 

In the role of climatologists, students investigate changes in air temperature in Christchurch, New Zealand during El Niño years. This serves as the anchor phenomenon that students will investigate throughout the unit. Students are called upon by the New Zealand Farm Council, who have noticed a climate change that has affected their crops. During El Niño years, the air temperature is cooler than usual. Students are tasked with explaining what causes the change in air temperature. By analyzing temperature fluctuations caused by changes in wind and surface ocean currents that occur during El Niño years, students learn about the relationship between atmosphere and ocean and its effects on regional climate/temperature patterns.

Social Studies: 

United States and NYS History

NATIVE AMERICANS: The physical environment and natural resources of North America influenced the development of the first human settlements and the culture of Native Americans. Native American societies varied across North America.