Math in Focus/ Greg Tang
Welcome to the experience of helping your child make connections in math with the Math in Focus® program. Math in Focus®: Singapore Math by Marshall Cavendish is the world-class math curriculum from Singapore adapted for U.S. classrooms.The Math in Focus® Kindergarten program consists of classroom learning experiences structured around the Investigate–Discover– Explore–Apply format:
- Investigate invites children to sing, clap, rhyme, and discuss colorful, playful scenes presented in the Big Book while the teacher systematically elicits related math talk.
- Discover provides hands-on work in small groups or pairs to allow children to act out or engage actively with the new math idea.
- Explore reinforces and enhances concepts as children go one step further with the concept.
- Apply provides children the opportunity to work independently with paper and pencil to practice the new concept or skill.
Fundations
Fundations® is a multisensory and systematic phonics, spelling, and handwriting program that benefits all K-3 students. Fundations is designed as a whole-class, general education program.
Informed by an extensive research base and following principles of instruction demonstrating success for a wide variety of learners, key features include:
Informed by an extensive research base and following principles of instruction demonstrating success for a wide variety of learners, key features include:
- Thoroughly teaches the foundational skills, and significantly supports the reading, writing, and language standards, found in states’ rigorous college- and career-ready standards.
- Presents the following concepts and skills in a cumulative manner from Unit to Unit and year to year:
- Letter formation
- Phonological and phonemic awareness
- Sound mastery
- Phonics, word study, and advanced word study
- Irregular (trick) word instruction
- Vocabulary
- Fluency
- Comprehension strategies
- Written composition (spelling and handwriting)
Schoolwide Reading and Writing
Reading
Reading Fundamentals has a central mission to develop, expand, and enhance the skills, strategies, and tools students can use to make meaning of, and interact with, text. Reading Fundamentals Units of Study exist inside a balanced literacy framework. Within this framework, there are opportunities to read to students (mentor texts), to read with students (shared texts), and to have students read independently (books and other texts at their independent reading levels).
Writing
Because writing matters for success in school, the community, and the workplace, Schoolwide’s Writing Fundamentals Units of Study have a central mission to improve students’ writing by providing explicit instruction that focuses on demonstrating why writers write and how writers communicate their ideas effectively. In order for students to write with power and purpose, the Writing Fundamentals units use quality literature and informational texts to provide authentic examples of various genres and text types.
Reading Fundamentals has a central mission to develop, expand, and enhance the skills, strategies, and tools students can use to make meaning of, and interact with, text. Reading Fundamentals Units of Study exist inside a balanced literacy framework. Within this framework, there are opportunities to read to students (mentor texts), to read with students (shared texts), and to have students read independently (books and other texts at their independent reading levels).
Writing
Because writing matters for success in school, the community, and the workplace, Schoolwide’s Writing Fundamentals Units of Study have a central mission to improve students’ writing by providing explicit instruction that focuses on demonstrating why writers write and how writers communicate their ideas effectively. In order for students to write with power and purpose, the Writing Fundamentals units use quality literature and informational texts to provide authentic examples of various genres and text types.