Skip to content

Middle School: 6th through 8th Grade

Middle school students are taught principles of good leadership as they lead the Journey student body. Every middle school student is a member of the student government and participates in the daily leadership class. Additional leadership opportunities are available as students run for student government offices annually. These students are also becoming scholars as they focus on preparing for high school and beyond.

Language Arts

  • Middle school students are assessed and placed in a reading or literature class according to their individual ability.
  • Our students are inspired with reading selections across a variety of genres as they are taught inquiry that helps them learn to question, investigate, and explore.
  • Instruction is bolstered with technology resources as well as an abundance of curriculum links to science, social studies, and periodic assessments that inform.
  • In-depth cross-curriculum thematic units provide an instructional path where students are taught how to do a “first read” and “close read” of each text.
  • A full-text study of literature uses additional resources to broaden the students understanding.

Composition

  • Learning to write well is a crucial life skill that will set your student apart in today’s world. Journey students are provided with a strong writing skillset.
  • Students gain exposure to a wide variety of writing types, with an emphasis on descriptive, narrative, persuasive and expository pieces.
  • Journey students are taught to tap into their individual creativity to develop organization, voice, and confidence in writing.
  • The important components of writing are taught so that students can:
    • Identify and appropriately address the purpose and audience for their writing.
    • Gather knowledge, brainstorm, organize, and express ideas in a logical way.
    • Add detail and more meaningful words to their writing.
    • Create paragraphs with a topic sentence, supporting details, and a conclusion.
    • Form complete and grammatically correct sentences, paragraphs, and essays depending on age and level.

Math

  • Journey’s math program focuses on a five-step problem solving process, which guides students to understand, plan, solve, check and explain.
  • Students are taught a consistent process for evaluating different problem-solving situations and learn how to demonstrate perseverance while working on a problem.
  • The distributed nature of Saxon Math lends itself naturally to developing abstract and quantitative reasoning. Because students are exposed to different concepts at the same time through incremental instruction and mixed practice, review, and assessment, they learn the importance of making sense of quantities and their relationships and of carefully considering the units involved.
  • Math problems do not focus simply on one concept, but rather may involve multiple concepts just as they would in real-world situations. Therefore, it is essential that students can make connections, think about what the quantities mean in a specific context, and solve appropriately.

Social Studies

  • World history is taught chronologically in the middle school beginning with early modern times and finishing with current events.
  • An emphasis on U.S. History is taught each year. Every other year students can participate in a U.S. History trip to Washington D.C.
  • Students discuss and analyze historical information to determine facts and opinions.
  • Student’s recognize patterns in history and gain an understanding of the significance of the past to their own life and to current social issues.
  • Maps are utilized to provide context and relevance to topics covered in class as students more easily visualize complex ideas and situations.
  • A focus is given to the foundation of this great nation throughout the American Revolution and subsequent creation of the Bill of Rights and Declaration of Independence.
  • Students are taught about local, state, and national government.
  • Lessons include the creation of laws and how the voting system works.

Science

  • A variety of science related subjects are studied in a rotation each year including life science, earth science, and physical science.
  • Students are engaged in teacher led demonstrations that promote inquiry, focus on key concepts which leads to heightened curiosity.
  • Students participate in guided inquiry labs that encourage skills such as observing, predicting, classifying, measuring, inferring, controlling variables, manipulating materials, interpreting data and experimenting.
  • Science Interactive Notebooks are used with creative activities to motivate students to process information and demonstrate critical thinking.