GRADES K-2

Overview

Content standards for kindergarten, first grade, and second grade extend the prior knowledge of students and increase their understanding of the world in which they live. Students in Grades K-2 are naturally creative, imaginative, and inquisitive. They learn most effectively by being actively engaged and challenged by a variety of multisensory instructional activities. The incorporation of play-based literacy development, art, theatre, movement, music, literature, and other hands- and minds-on activities characterizes classrooms that reflect the most effective learning communities.

The K-2 social studies curriculum introduces young students to basic social studies concepts, skills, and generalizations that enable them to make connections to their environments. Instruction focuses on five areas of essential development: physical, emotional, social, moral, and cognitive. The importance of providing an interactive learning environment that lends itself to exploration as well as the establishment of positive relationships with adults and peers is crucial at this developmental level.

The four strands (economics, geography, history, and political science) provide a framework through which students construct knowledge in the following ways:

· Economic experience includes understanding and using basic economic vocabulary, distinguishing between wants and needs, and realizing consequences of economic decisions.

· Geographic learning uses students’ personal experiences as a basis for developing geographic skills and concepts, exploring distant and unfamiliar cultures, and identifying positive and negative uses of the environment.

· Historic understanding is experienced through sequencing, participating in activities that create a sense of order and time, and recognizing that individuals hold different views about the past.

· Knowledge of political science leads to students’ developing a sense of fairness and order through their relationships with others, recognizing the rights and responsibilities of citizens, and understanding fundamental civic ideals and practices.

The overall goals of the K-2 curriculum are developing awareness of self and family, understanding the role of the individual within the community and state, and making connections with people and places around the world. Achievement of these goals increases students’ understanding of the communities in which they live and provides them with a foundation for becoming responsible citizens.