GLADE PARK COMMUNITY SCHOOL

Curriculum Overview

The K-2 program at the Glade Park Community School will be focused on developing early literacy and numeracy skills while giving students a solid understanding of the Glade Park community and surrounding areas.  Collaborative decision making and teamwork will be of utmost importance to create a safe and productive learning environment.  Multi-age classes will offer opportunities for students to take on leadership roles within the classroom.  Trimesters will be based on themes with several excursions occurring outside of the classroom each trimester. Science and social studies will be taught in an integrated and hands-on manner.  Students will frequently be out in the natural world and in the community working on real-world projects.  

The curriculum at the Glade Park Community School will be thematic in nature and guided by student and teacher-generated questions (see project-based learning below).  A curriculum map may be used to facilitate integration between disciplines.

 At least one project that draws on resources from different disciplines will be completed each year.  Whenever possible, integration will occur between different disciplines to model the real world.  The scope and sequence of each discipline will be based on the Colorado Content Standards. 

Project-based Learning

The Glade Park Community School will foster and encourage project-based learning.  With the belief that children learn best (and remember most) when they are engaged in what they are learning, therefore, the emphasis will be on the process of learning.  Project-based learning allows children to make choices and take ownership in their work. It involves in-depth study and is student-directed so that it can be tailored to the learning needs and interests of individual children. The project choices will be designed by the teacher and the learners and guided by the state standards.

Integrated Curriculum

As appropriate the Glade Park Community School will use an integrated curriculum.  An integrated curriculum looks at a variety of ways subjects can interlink and work together to blend across the subject areas.  Working with a curriculum in this way can create a more holistic experience for the child, rather than learning skills in isolation.

Environmental Education

At the core of the Glade Park Community School approach to learning is the idea of students learning outside the classroom.  We intend to give children direct experiences in the ecological and cultural environment that serves as an essential part of learning.  Through understanding the natural environment and the local community better, children will grow to understand their sense of place and a strong sense of stewardship for the natural world.

Language Arts

Our balanced literacy framework will have five distinct components.  Our teaching will be geared to the individual learner and each literacy component will be individualized for each student.

Independent Reading Workshop is the first of these components.  Our goal is to foster the development of readers who not only know how to decode and answer comprehension questions, but also readers who can discuss the story, and connect it to their own lives.  Each day students will have an opportunity to read independently at their “just right” reading level.  Students will be taught how to choose “just right” books and the strategies needed to improve their reading.  During each workshop time, teachers will listen to students read independently and give feedback and suggestions.

Shared Reading is the second component.  Shared reading takes on many forms throughout the day.  For example, each morning we may begin with a morning message which the students read together and discuss everything from conventions to homophones.  Later in the day, students may explore a poem together in their literacy groups.

 The third component is an Interactive Read Aloud.  Read aloud would take place during our literacy time in small groups.  Many times our read aloud is theme based, allowing us a natural space to tie literature into our theme.  This will also foster more discussion and provide a common story to review comprehension strategies.  Finally, it is a time to model what strong readers do to foster comprehension and connections.

The fourth component of our literacy program is Writing Workshop.  Within our small literacy groups we devote time each day to specifically work on writing.  Each writing workshop will begin with a mini-lesson and students work on one of the 6 traits of writing.  While the end product of a writing assignment will come in many forms, each student will have focused on the same skill.  Writing during this time is frequently theme related, but may also be free in focus, allowing imaginative minds to explore the world of writing.

Word Study is the fifth component of our literacy program.  Students will participate in both interactive and independent activities to build their phonemic awareness as well as word sense. Students will also manipulate and explore word structure and patterns in  “word play” activities.  Word sorts, word wall activities, making words, guess the mystery word and rhyme play activities will also fall under this block.

Math

The goal of our K-2 math program is to help students develop a strong math base as well as instill a sense of excitement and confidence in students.  To help us achieve this goal, we intend to use a constructivist math program such as Investigations. The focus of this curriculum is to enable children to learn more mathematical content and become life-long mathematical thinkers.  

Skills and concepts introduced during K-2 grades will fall into 6 categories as designated by the Colorado State Standards. The spiraling nature of the curriculum will allow students to build upon a strong foundation and extend concept understanding.  The Investigations curriculum places special emphasis on establishment of links to past experiences—both in the classroom and in everyday life, discussion of ideas and comparison of equivalent expressions. When possible, problems and projects presented in the texts will be adapted to be relevant to Glade Park area and the current focus of our classroom themes.

Social Studies and Science

The sciences will be taught through experiential activities with a reverence for the wonder and beauty of nature.  Projects and experiments will be approached through inquiry-based approaches that ignite curiosity, sustain interest, and allow children to make their own discoveries as a bridge to understanding scientific concepts.

The Glade Park Community School will be committed to building a school culture of respect for diversity and an understanding of people and their values. We will teach a model of mediation for problem solving.

Geography will be integrated into the curriculum supporting major themes.

Students will study different areas of the world learning (following Colorado Content Standards) about how people lived in the past as well as how they live now.  A goal of the social studies program is to help students understand the larger world around them as well as their local communities.

Glade Park Community School also believes strongly in the role of service learning and throughout the grades students will be given the opportunity to make a difference in the larger world.

Thematic-based learning

Each year at the Glade Park Community School teachers and students will explore a theme in depth.  This annual theme will allow for a more interdisciplinary approach to teaching all subjects.  The theme also promotes the acquisition of a sense of place through education. 

 Communities may be one of these yearlong themes.  Each trimester will have a different community focus, and science and social studies lessons, in particular, will be developed around this theme. Some possibilities of how this could look are listed below.

In the Fall, students may explore the Glade Park human community to better understand many of the entities that make up a healthy community. Students could visit the volunteer fire station and speak with the fire fighters to learn about both the social and ecological implications of domestic and forest fires within a community. They could also visit the National Monument Visitor’s Center to learn about local geological history and conservation. Students could learn about concepts of history, dates, and change by studying the history of Glade Park by talking with the descendants of homesteaders who continued to reside on their ancestral land and by visiting the many sites of petroglyphs and pictographs left behind on the canyon walls by civilizations as ancient as the Freemont

In the Winter, the focus would shift to animal communities.  Student would learn about migration, adaptation, communication, habitat and the interaction between our human community and the animal communities around us.  Students will gain experience in winter animal tracking, create their own animals with special adaptations, simulate deer and elk migration through an obstacle course or meet with local ranchers, scientists, naturalists, conservationists and policy makers to learn about their professions and world views. . Students may learn about the chemistry and different states of water by examining snow and ice in their schoolyard.

In the Spring the focus will shift to plant communities.  Students could explore various plant communities and determine their different needs, as well as the interconnections between plant, animal and human communities.  For example, students could learn about the successes and failures of the early human settlements in their initial attempts at establishing agriculture and make comparisons to the issues ranchers and farmers have on Glade Park today.  On day trips to nearby Pinon Mesa, Colorado National Monument and the Colorado River students could explore and compare aspen, pinon/ juniper, and riparian communities.  Based on their observations, students may then predict the different uses animals have for the various plant communities and discuss whether a bald eagle, for example, is more likely to be found soaring above a riparian community or a pinon/juniper community.

Service Learning

Learners will participate in age-appropriate service projects. These projects will give students the opportunity to apply their knowledge and academic skills to a real community need.  They will develop partnerships and a sense of shared responsibility with community members, as well as feel learners to take responsibility and to make decisions. They have opportunities to become engaged with the larger contexts of self, family, school, community and the world.

Music

Music will be an integral part of the child's day in our school. Although there will be a designated time for music with a trained music teacher, the threads of rhythm and song weave throughout the curriculum. Transitions may be signaled through musical cues, stories could be enhanced with music, and music is used to calm, focus, and inspire the child. Exposure to many styles of music, as well as the music of many cultures, guarantees that children can gain an appreciation for and understanding of the world's music. Wherever possible, music will be tied into curricular activities.

The music experiences of learners will be presented where possible in a playful atmosphere. Elements of play provide children with flexibility in the environment coupled with cooperation as they develop musicianship.

Poems, rhymes, games, songs and dances provide the basic teaching materials. These may be traditional or original. Singing and recorder playing will form a thread throughout the grades. In addition, children will be involved with the following musical elements:

Speech-choral reading, using the speaking voice in a variety of ways

Singing - single line, rounds and canons, part-singing

Listening experiences - of many styles and cultures

Movement - creative movement, folk dancing

Instrumental music - rhythm instruments, recorders, Orff instruments, percussion

Art

All students will participate in weekly visual arts classes.  Students will be encouraged to create artwork using the principles and elements of art and design, and demonstrate an understanding of how subject matter, symbols and ideas are used to communicate meaning in art.  Lessons will be integrated into thematic units reflecting the broader goals of the elementary curriculum.  Students will have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with periods of art and cultures throughout history.  Students will learn about important artists and make connections to these artists’ styles in their own work.  Glade Park Community School artists have the opportunity to work with various media, learn new techniques and processes, and develop and honor their own unique artistic talent.

Movement

The intention of movement instruction at the Glade park Community School will be aimed at giving children the skills and attitudes they will need to remain fit and to enjoy a variety of recreational activities. A balance between traditional games and outdoor fitness activities will be sought. Children will be challenged to find their own level of ability and work towards personal growth.

Where possible, the movement activities will form a natural extension to the child’s day in the classroom. Extensions include:

World games of cultures investigated in the classroom, musical games, math games, and games related to craftwork

Nature hikes, rock climbing, bird-watching, or tracking related to a class study

Activities related to school festivals or events

Non-competitive games

Activities based on the use of equipment such as: balls, rings, Frisbees, hoops, paddles, parachutes, and ropes

Musical and rhythmical activities; folk dancing, creative movement

*Integrated Day:

 The theory that education is a process of living and not a preparation for future living; the total environment is educational.