Upper Elementary mathematics builds a foundation of skills and concepts that students use in their future studies of algebra, geometry, trigonometry, statistics, and calculus. Throughout the three-­‐year cycle in Upper Elementary students extensively work with the following list of concepts, skills, and applications, adding layers of complexity as they master each level. The Upper Elementary Geometry curriculum is woven into the weekly schedules throughout the year. The geometry curriculum continues to expand students’ working knowledge of geometry in nature and design using calculations, formulas, and theorems. The four operations are also fundamental in the progression of the Upper Elementary math curriculum. As students explore a three‐year, spiraling curriculum, they are expected to master all four operations as they are applied to fraction and multi-digit decimal work. Students will also gain a greater understanding of the value of numbers and the four operations as they explore various estimation strategies, the order of operations, and the properties of equality. Students also continue to work with various forms of measurement conversions as they are applied to science and real-life situations. Finally, students will build on previous work with number lines and number value as they work with the four operations as they are applied to negative and positive integers.

 

Upper Elementary students work with ratio, proportion, and percent as they apply to real life events and situations. By understanding rate concepts and using the appropriate language to express the relationship between two events, students will practice, experiment, and analyze many types of situational events. Students will also use their understanding of decimals and fractions to make connections with and calculate percent and proportional relationships.

 

Students spend all three years spiraling through a pre-­algebra curriculum, learning first to use a variable in place of a numeric quantity before moving through the steps required to write, simplify, and solve multi­‐step algebraic equations as well as graphing linear and non­‐linear functions. This curriculum is integrated throughout the Upper Elementary math curriculum and is used in conjunction with the work within geometry, number systems, ratio, and proportion. Collecting, organizing and interpreting data is also consistently related to real-life situations. As a means to interpret data, Upper Elementary students find the mean, mode, and median as well as the range and deviation. Students will use this information to draw conclusions about a data set and use the information to create and interpret various types of graphs.