Corvian

Community

School

Fifth Grade

Fifth Grade Curriculum

Purpose:

At Corvian, while we certainly teach isolated skills, we strive to continuously give students meaningful and purposeful opportunities to use those newly learned skills. All students at all grade levels are always participating in multi-disciplinary, integrated units of study that give the students an opportunity to participate in meaningful, purposeful and relevant studies. Rather than memorizing isolated facts, students will ponder and reflect upon big ideas that truly matter in the larger picture of life. For every unit, there are one or two of the core commonalities studied as threads that tie our learning together. We adhere to the brain research that supports helping students find connections across all learning.

Theme: American History

Covian students have explored their community and their state before reaching 5th grade. Now they will explore how our country has experienced change from the time of early American explorers to the present. Students investigate how this impacts us as global citizens. They investigate how these changes affect human relationships, government policy, socioeconomic and cultural conditions.

Units of Study

Exploration and settlement of our Nation

The study of Native Americans and settlers in the original thirteen colonies

North American Geography

Colonization of our country, the American Revolution, Civil War's impact, and Westward Expansion and the creation of an entirely new nation.

Author Study

Jean Craighead George, Jerry Spinelli, and a genre study of Historical Fiction

Ecosystems

Estuaries and salt marshes, oceans, lakes and ponds, forests, and grasslands
Producers, consumers, or decomposers (biotic factors)
The interconnected relationship of plants and animals to their ecosystem

Science units of Study

Earth Systems and Structure
Weather
Energy Conservation and Transfer
Genetics
Forces and Motion, Matter: Properties and Change
Structures and Functions of Living Organisms

Field Trips

Civil Rights Museum. Greensboro Science Center, Rocket Ryan science in-house programs, Classic Theater Productions, Barrier Island Experience (trip to Barrier Island Educational Center, Seabrook Island, SC)

*Students in NC are tested at the end of 5th grade in Reading, Math, and Science. These end of grades tests will take place during the last ten days of school.

For detailed NC Standards information, please visit www.ncpublicschools.org/curriculum/