Grades 6-8
Once students have become accustomed to the vocabulary and structure of the “language” learned in their early years, they are ready to speak that language and apply it to new circumstances.
This marks the transition into the next stage of learning, which can be understood by analogy as the “logic stage” or the “pert stage.”
Students in this stage are able to combine multiple foundational principles or skills and apply them to a multi-step problem or multi-part question.
They are now more capable of seeing “the big picture,” and this allows them to find and correct their own errors and work problems backwards as well as forwards. The students continue to expand their body of knowledge by reviewing or encountering new material at a deeper level. They are able to articulate fact as in previous years but now can be introduced to using those facts to construct and support a thesis in a persuasive argument. Students can independently organize their materials and time in the completion of work assigned with little to no teacher supervision.