Jun 11, 2024 | By: Miles Walker
Brainerd School Board Approves Science & Math Curricula for Different Grades
With kids now out of the classroom for the summer, the Brainerd School Board has turned its attention towards future plans for the 2024-25 school year and beyond.
A collection of the topics discussed during Monday’s meeting centered primarily around grades K-12 and each respective age group’s curriculum.
Brainerd Area Schools Director of Instructional Technology Christina Lundgren and Digital Learning & Curriculum Specialist Robin Knutson presented three different curriculum proposals, the first of which was for kindergarten through fourth grade for media and technology, as they wish to best prep the students for middle school.
“We developed the scope and sequence and then we looked at kind of along the same lines as the portrait of a graduate, developing a portrait of an elementary technology graduate,” explained Lundgren to the board during the meeting. “So what were those key skills that all of those elementary students would have moving into their Forestview [Middle School] years?”
Following that was the mathematics curriculum for grades five through eight, which Knutson stated is centered mainly around providing an ideal and updated method to meet the state’s standards for the subject.
“The first pathway is activity-based, and the second pathway is a guided exploration,” said Knutson. “And in our strategic plan, our Warrior way, it talks about kids having opportunities, grit, and accountability.”
And for the high schoolers, the proposed science curriculum concerned OpenSciEd, which would require students to complete a combination of OpenSciEd, earth, and space science courses, all while providing a environment conducive to the kids best processing the info. It’s also based around meeting the state’s framework for high school science.
“Those questions and putting together the pieces with the teacher, and then at the end, they look at all of their questions and did they get their questions answered or not,” Knutson explained. “And then, if not, they need to go back to the drawing board to see what they need to do to get their questions answered.
The curriculum is also based around meeting the state’s framework for high school science.
“A friend of mine, his name is Dan, and he works for OpenSciEd – he has built Minnesota alignment, and so we’ve been using his model to help make sure that the standards align within each of our classes,” added Knutson. “And so that is what’s been helping us with our work.”
The Brainerd School Board unanimously approved each proposed curriculum.