Sixth Grade WIN: The Fifth Academic Class
For those of you with children in sixth grade, you may be wondering about a class on your child's schedule called Academic Foundations. Despite its name on your child's schedule, for us this Period 5 sixth grade class is called WIN. WIN stands for "What I Need" and is designed to meet students 'where they are' primarily in English Language Arts and Math. Like most middle schools, all students at Hamilton have five academic classes. Students at all grades have English Language Arts, Math, Social Studies, and Science on their schedules. Students in grades seven and eight have a World Language class (Spanish or French) to round out their academic schedules with a fifth class. World Language classes are not offered in sixth grade, yet a fifth academic class is required. In the past, this fifth class at sixth grade focused on an extra period of Reading for all students.
This year, the fifth class of Reading has been replaced with our WIN class. For this class, our team considered available assessment data to assign students to WIN focus areas. Many of our students will still be in classrooms with a focus on reading and writing, but our differentiated approach allows us to provide an additional scoop for students in need, while providing exploration opportunities for students who are more proficient and advanced in their ELA skills. The same is true for math where students can be provided an additional boost, or an opportunity to explore concepts not necessarily covered in any typical math class.
We are starting the year with a short course in WIN, running from now through October 8. In October we will reshuffle our WIN groups based on assessments that the students are currently taking. These new groups will start in mid-October and run until the end of the semester, when new assessment results will be used to reset groups for the second semester of the school year.
WIN classes currently meet every day, Monday through Friday. Beginning in October, WIN groups will meet Monday-Thursday, and on Fridays all students will self-select into reading groups that focus on various genres such as historical fiction/adventure, fantasy/Sci-Fi, racial justice, coming of age, etc. Quarter and Semester grades for students in WIN will be based on a Pass/Fail system.
