Grades 3-5 (Older Elementary) Curriculum Overview

This article provides information about the Grades 3-5 (Older Elementary) curriculum.

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Curriculum Overview

The Lincoln Empowered Grades 3-5 courses help students master content using a variety of interactive, virtual, and hands-on lessons and activities in English Language Arts, mathematics, science, and social studies as well as within elective offerings. Students will continue their educational journeys by developing new skills to express themselves, further their knowledge, and apply what they are learning to their everyday lives.

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Top Facts

  1. While students are working through the content themselves, an adult is still needed at this age to guide and provide adequate support. Adults can utilize the printed Parent and Teacher Guide to instruct and mentor their students. Click here for more information about the Parent and Teacher Guide.
  2. Course content is extended with the incorporation of project-based learning, manipulatives, experiments and labs, lessons written to practice concepts and cross-cutting concepts, and interactive learning objects and games.
  3. Course assessments are built from compelling and supporting questions as well as challenge questions in mathematics, phenomena in science, and fluency in ELA.
  4. Core courses contain Teach It videos, which are implemented to add an auditory component to the Read It within the course, as well as instruction via an avatar. Click here to learn more about Lincoln Learning Teach Its.
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General Details

Lesson Structure

  • Module > Lesson > Learning Object

Learning Object Design

Lessons are driven by behavioral, age-appropriate learning objectives that are based on subject and grade-appropriate national standards. While the content still contains vibrant imagery and colors, it also includes more detail, practice opportunities, examples, and supportive elements. Students can also engage with content both online with videos, games, embedded quizzes, and activities, and offline with labs, hands-on manipulatives, and experiments. Courses begin with a comprehensive Course Resources topic which contains various items that will assist the student through the course including an online version of the Parent and Teacher Guide, a pacing guide, and other course-specific lists.

Click here to learn more about the Lincoln Learning Objects.

Activity Time

  • Per lesson is an average of 60 minutes.

Pacing

  • 1 Lesson = 1 Day of learning (1 hour) per course.
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Credit Information

  • Lincoln Learning Solutions offers various 3-5 core and elective courses. To review available courses along with credit weights, please Browse our Courses via our Lincoln Empowered Course Lists.
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English Language Arts

Content Specifics

  • The English Language Arts 3-5 courses are full-credit courses with 180 days’ worth of lesson content written to unpacked national Common Core standards.
  • The ELA courses in these grades focus on expanding students’ reading, writing, spelling, speaking, and listening skills. Students read a variety of texts, including fiction, nonfiction, and informational texts, and they begin to interpret these texts in more complex ways. 
  • Students are introduced to new forms of writing and begin to use the writing process to plan, draft, revise, edit, and publish their work with the goal of working towards proficiency in writing five-paragraph essays and effective thesis statements.
  • The ELA courses include spelling and reading lists, along with the incorporation of a Reading Log, to give students autonomy in selecting texts to which they relate and enjoy. 

Activity Design

  • All activities are meant to be adult-supported.

Assessment Structure

  • Students take various types of graded and non-graded assessments in the ELA courses including spelling and teacher-graded content assessments, auto-graded Checkpoints, and summative assessments known as Mastery Assess Its. 

What is the percentage of teacher-graded vs. auto-graded?

  • The ELA courses are primarily teacher-graded (80%) with Checkpoints and Mastery Assess Its accounting for the remainder (20%).
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Mathematics

Content Specifics

  • The Mathematics 3-5 courses are full-credit courses with 180 days’ worth of lesson content written to unpacked national Common Core standards.
  • The courses encourage students to explore further the relationship between multiplication and division while using the order of operations to solve real-world problems including one and two-time step word problems.
  • Students continue to work with geometric shapes and operations involving fractions and decimals, use graphs to solve real-world problems involving data, and utilize their measuring skills within the courses.
  • There is a clear progression of difficulty and rigor as concepts are spiraled and built upon each subsequent grade.

Activity Design

  • All activities are meant to be adult-supported.

Assessment Structure

  • There is a mix of both teacher-graded assessments, auto-graded Checkpoints, and summative assessments known as Mastery Assess Its within the mathematics courses.

What is the percentage of teacher-graded vs. auto-graded?

  • The mathematics courses are primarily teacher-graded (70%) with Mastery Assess Its accounting for the remainder (30%).
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Science

Content Specifics

  • The Science 3-5 courses are full-credit courses with 180 days’ worth of lesson content written to unpacked national Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) standards.
  • These courses review topics that include ecology, weather and climate, space science, energy, force and motion, properties of matter, light, magnetism, electricity, and technology and engineering. 
  • The science courses highlight physics, chemistry, genetics, earth science, biology, agriculture, and natural resources with their engineering standards encouraging students to ask questions and define problems, develop and use models, plan and carry out investigations, analyze and interpret data, use mathematics and computational thinking, construct explanations and design solutions, and obtain, evaluate, and communicate information. 
  • Engaging in these practices allows students to understand how scientific knowledge develops as well as the links between engineering and science in the real world.

Activity Design

  • All activities are meant to be adult-supported.

Assessment Structure

  • There is a mix of both teacher-graded assessments, auto-graded Checkpoints, and summative assessments known as Mastery Assess Its within the science courses.

What is the percentage of teacher-graded vs. auto-graded?

  • The science courses are primarily teacher-graded (75%) with Checkpoints and Mastery Assess Its accounting for the remainder (25%).
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Social Studies

Content Specifics

  • The Social Studies 3-5 courses are full-credit courses with 180 days’ worth of lesson content written to unpacked C3 framework.
  • The social studies courses largely focus on the United States including its history, culture, geography, and government. Students are encouraged to think about what it means to be productive, responsible citizens of both the nation and their own local communities. 
  • To support learning, students develop and research compelling questions on historical topics, distinguish between fact and opinion, and evaluate the validity of sources. Students also explore how regional differences in physical environment and culture affect how people live and work.
  • The social studies courses foster a command of the concepts and tools of geography and provide an explanation of core aspects of economics with elements of civic responsibility woven throughout the content.

Activity Design

  • All activities are meant to be adult-supported.

Assessment Structure

  • There is a mix of both teacher-graded assessments, auto-graded Checkpoints, and summative assessments known as Mastery Assess Its within the social studies courses.

What is the percentage of teacher-graded vs. auto-graded?

  • The social studies courses are primarily teacher-graded (70%) with Checkpoints and Mastery Assess Its accounting for the remainder (30%). 
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Auto-Graded Details

Auto-Graded courses provide students with a fully asynchronous experience with automatically graded assessments and educationally-sound feedback. To determine which courses are available, please review our Auto-Graded Course list on the Browse our Courses section of our website. Click to learn more about our Auto-Graded Course Experience.

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Sample Schedule

When setting up your student’s schedule for the year, please consider these examples below:

Enrolling in Core Courses

Semester 1

Suggested Start Date: First Day of School

Suggested End Date: End of 1st Semester

Semester 2

Suggested Start Date: End of 1st Semester

Suggested End Date: Last Day of School

A Week at a Glance

Each X indicates a lesson should be completed. This can be used per semester.

Elective Enrollments

For Elementary electives, you can determine your enrollment scenario per course. The charts below identify the number of lessons a student would need to complete each day based on the enrollment timeframe and the number of lessons within the course.

Full Year

Semester

9-Weeks

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FAQ

Q: What is the projected screen time for a student in a 3-5 course?

A: The amount of screen time for the student is dependent upon what the adult would prefer for the child. The material was created so the student could sit with an adult and do everything on the screen (minus the worksheets and the completion of the hands-on activities). However, screen time limits were taken into consideration throughout the process of creation, and all of the lessons could be completed with only a limited amount of time in front of a screen. 

Q: What electives are available for students in the 3-5 courses?

A: Students in the 3-5 courses are encouraged to take elective offerings to broaden their interests and expand upon their knowledge sets. Lincoln Learning Solutions provides various options for students within the subjects of Art and Music, Wellness and Nutrition, and Introduction to Foreign Language.

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Resources

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