Homeschool Curriculum Blog Online Learning for PreK-8th

Time4Learning presents a logical and sequential approach to teaching social studies. This approach ensures that children cover the material required by many state standards and that appropriate review is built in from grade to grade.

Seventh and eighth grade social studies are combined, with students rounding out their social studies curriculum with an in-depth study of American history from colonization to the Clinton administration.

The Time4Learning program combines illustration, animation, real pictures, audio, text, video and embedded simulations in multimedia online lessons and activities.  It also combines math and writing skills in cross-curricular activities that are completed both on and offline.  There are 106 lessons in the social studies curriculum, including the following units of study:

• The Age of Exploration
• English Colonization
• American Revolution Causes
• The American Revolution
• Creation of US Government
• Early Years of the Republic
• Age of Jefferson
• Growth and Expansion
• Jacksonian Democracy
• Manifest Destiny
• Reform Movements
• Causes of the Civil War
• The Civil War
• Reconstruction
• Immigration and Industry
• United States as a World Power
• World War I
• Roaring Twenties
• The Great Depression
• World War II
• The Cold War
• Changing Times in America
• Modern America

For a complete list of units and lessons, check out the Seventh and Eighth Grade Social Studies Lesson Plan page.  Or check out a demo lesson from this course.

DEMO LESSON: Liberty or Death Students will analyze the early calls for Independence by colonists and the early battles of the American Revolution.

Posted under Online Learning, grade levels, history, homeschool curriculum, seventh grade curriculum, social studies

A seventh grade language arts program should be taught using a system of seventh grade reading lesson plans including interactive activities, learning games, printable worksheets, assessments, and positive reinforcement. Guided reading is a vital part of a seventh grade language arts program.

And seventh grade language arts lessons should cover all English language arts strands. The major language arts strands for a seventh grade reading program are vocabulary development, reading comprehension, literature, writing strategies, writing applications, English language conventions, listening and speaking. While these language arts strands might surprise you, they are all critical lessons for a seventh grade reading program.

Seventh grade reading lesson plans, reading worksheets, and reading activities teach reading skills covering all the language arts strands. Seventh grade reading activities provide an opportunity for students to describe and connect essential ideas, arguments, and perspectives by using a knowledge of text structure, organization, and purpose. These students learn through guided reading, reading worksheets, language arts games, and many creative methods that make the seventh grade reading program fun for them.

A seventh grade reading program includes vocabulary and concept development. Reading skill develops as students continue to learn with grade level appropriate reading material. Seventh grade reading program students describe and connect essential ideas, arguments, and perspectives found in various texts by using a knowledge of text structure, organization, and purpose. They apply this knowledge to achieve fluent oral and silent, seventh grade guided reading skill.

For example, the seventh grade reading program requires students to apply their knowledge of word origins and word relationships, as well as historical and literary context clues, to determine the meaning of specialized vocabulary and to understand the precise meaning of grade level appropriate words. Language arts lesson plans help seventh grade reading skill students identify idioms, analogies, metaphors, and similes in prose and poetry.

The seventh grade reading level also requires them to use knowledge of Greek, Latin, and Anglo-Saxon roots and affixes to understand content-area vocabulary. In seventh grade students clarify word meanings through the use of definition, example, restatement, or contrast. When reading they should assess the adequacy, accuracy, and appropriateness of an author’s evidence to support claims and assertions, noting instances of bias and stereotyping.

A seventh grade reading program includes language arts lesson plans that help children learn about the structural features of informational materials. For example, they are expected to understand and analyze differences in structure and purpose between various categories of informational materials including textbooks, newspapers, instructional manuals, and signs. They learn to locate information by using a variety of consumer, workplace, and public documents, and analyze text that uses the cause-and-effect organizational pattern.

The seventh grade reading level is tested with reading skill comprehension strategies and analysis of reading skill level appropriate text. Seventh grade students identify and trace the development of an author’s argument, point of view, or perspective in text. After doing this, they will understand and explain the use of simple mechanical devices by following technical directions.

Seventh grade guided reading includes comprehension and analysis of reading level appropriate text. Seventh grade students learn to analyze a range of responses to a literary work and determine the extent to which the literary elements in the work shaped those responses. To strengthen seventh grade reading comprehension, students are asked to read and respond to historically or culturally significant works of literature that reflect and enhance their studies of history and social science. Seventh grade language arts lesson plans guide students to demonstrate reading skill by clarifying ideas and connecting them to other literary works. Seventh grade reading program students are expected to demonstrate the reading skill of literary response and structural feature analysis by articulating expressed purposes and characteristics of different forms of prose including short stories, novelas, and essays).

Another vital component of the seventh grade reading program is narrative analysis of reading skill appropriate text. Students identify events that advance the plot and determine how each event explains past or present action(s) or foreshadows future action(s). After guided reading, students are asked to analyze characterization as delineated through a character’s thoughts, words, speech patterns, and actions; the narrator’s description; and the thoughts, words, and actions of other characters. Also in a seventh grade reading program, students develop reading skill by identifying and analyzing recurring themes across works such as the value of bravery, loyalty, and friendship, or the effects of loneliness. Language arts lesson plans for seventh grade students help them contrast points of view, examining first and third person, limited and omniscient, and subjective and objective in narrative text, explaining how they affect the overall theme of the work.

Time4Learning teaches a comprehensive seventh grade language arts curriculum using fun, seventh grade reading activities to build a solid reading foundation. To find out more about the seventh grade language arts program at Time4Learning, try out one of the demo lessons, ask a question in our parents forum, or even view the entire seventh grade language arts scope and sequence. Sign up today to let your seventh grader experience the fun and learning encompassed in the Time4Learning Seventh Grade Language Arts Program.

Posted under grade levels, homeschool curriculum, language arts, middle school curriculum, online reading, reading curriculum, seventh grade curriculum

A seventh grade math curriculum should be taught using seventh grade lessons including interactive activities, learning games, printable worksheets, assessments, and reinforcement. Manipulatives are very important for seventh grade math lessons.

And a seventh grade math curriculum should cover all the math strands, not just arithmetic. The major math strands for seventh grade curriculum are number sense and operations, algebra, geometry and spatial sense, measurement, and data analysis and probability. While these math strands might surprise you, they are all critical lessons for a seventh grade math curriculum.

Seventh grade math students build on what they learned in sixth grade math. In sixth grade math they worked with numbers through the hundred-thousands or more. During seventh grade math children learn about decimals, percents, exponents, scientific notation, ratios, and square roots. Seventh grade math opens them up to a greater understanding of measurement techniques, geometry and algebraic thinking. It will be a challenging year as they are presented with many new and complex concepts.

Seventh grade math students are expected to learn word names and standard numerals for integers, fractions, decimals, ratios, numbers expressed as percents, numbers with exponents, numbers expressed in scientific notation, and numbers expressed using the square root radical. They read and write whole numbers and decimals in expanded form, including exponential notation. Using seventh grade math curriculum, students compare and order integers, fractions, decimals, numbers with exponents, and numbers expressed as percents or in scientific notation.

Also seventh grade math students learn examples of rational and irrational numbers found in real-life situations including the irrational numbers Pi and the square root of 2. They describe the meanings of rational and irrational numbers using physical or graphical displays. Learning about relationships between fractions, decimals, and percents is another vital aspect of seventh grade math curriculum.

Seventh grade math students learn to express a given quantity in a variety of ways including integers, fractions, decimals, numbers expressed as a percent, numbers in scientific notation, and ratios. They express whole numbers in exponential notation and evaluate numerical expressions that contain exponential notation. They express numbers greater than one in scientific notation.

Seventh grade math lessons teach the effects of the four basic arithmetic operations on whole numbers, fractions, mixed numbers, and decimals. Students are taught to apply knowledge of the decimal number system and non-place-value systems. Seventh grade math students apply properties of rational numbers to solve problems, including commutative, associative, distributive, identity, equality, and inverse properties. They learn about the inverse relationship of positive and negative numbers.

Seventh grade math lessons give students real-world two and three-step problems to solve using decimals and fractions. Using percents, students solve real-world problems including discounts, simple interest, taxes, and tips. Seventh grade math students will be expected to apply the order of operations to solve problems using parenthesis, exponents, multiplication, division, addition and subtraction. They learn about proportional relationships using tables, graphs, and “constant ratio” relationships to solve and explain problems.

Seventh grade math students use whole numbers, fractions, or decimals to solve one or two-step real-world problems. They learn appropriate estimation techniques for solving problems using whole numbers or fractions. Estimates will be used to predict results and check the reasonableness of results. Students are asked to determine whether an exact answer is needed or if an estimate will do. Seventh grade math lessons teach students to know if numbers are prime or composite and to determine the prime factorization of composite numbers. Students find the greatest common factor and least common multiple of two or more numbers, apply number theory concepts to determine terms in a sequence, and use divisibility rules to solve real-world or mathematical problems.

Seventh grade math curriculum uses concrete and graphical models to show students how to create formulas for finding volumes and surface areas of solids including prisms and cylinders. The students solve and explain problems involving perimeter, area, circumference, and the surface area and volume of prisms and cylinders. Using a protractor, seventh grade math students find the measure of angles. They apply angle relationships including corresponding, complementary, supplementary, interior and exterior.

New concepts are taught during seventh grade math, including the development and use of the distance formula (d=rt). Given a two or three dimensional figure seventh grade math students create a new figure by increasing or decreasing original dimensions. The students are expected to know relationships between perimeters, areas, surface areas, and volumes of an original figure and those of a newly created figure. Using appropriate scales, seventh grade math students produce proportional drawings or models. They learn about proportional relationships used in scale drawings, and produce scale drawings.

Using customary or metric measuring units, seventh grade math students measure length, weight, mass, capacity and volume. Seventh grade math curriculum teaches them to know relationships between metric units of mass and capacity. Students find measures of length, weight, mass, capacity and volume using proportional relationships and properties of similar geometric figures. Units of measurement within a system (metric or customary) are compared. Students perform operations on measurements within each system.

Solving real-world problems, seventh grade math students select an appropriate unit of measurement and do conversions within the metric or customary measurement systems. They are expected to understand that measurements are always approximate and that the degree of accuracy depends on the precision of a measuring device. Seventh grade math lessons encourage students to select appropriate measuring tools such as scales, rulers, thermometers, measuring cups, protractors, or gauges.

Time4Learning is an online learning system for homeschool education, enrichment, e-tutoring, or for sharpening summer skills. We provide seventh grade math worksheets and seventh grade math games in a total curriculum. Each unit has multimedia lessons, interactive exercises, printable worksheets for reinforcement, and assessments. Click to see the details on Time4Learning’s online seventh grade math lesson plan.

There are 339 math activities in the seventh grade curriculum, and children can either move through them sequentially, or pick and choose from the lessons, using the Activity Finder. Parents can easily follow their child’s progress by logging into the child’s portfolio and viewing day by day lessons or a customizable and printable report than can be sorted by subject, lesson type, or date range.

To find out more about the seventh grade math program at Time4Learning, try out one of the demo lessons, ask a question in our parents forum, or even view the entire seventh grade math scope and sequence. Sign up today to let your seventh grader experience the fun and learning encompassed in the Time4Learning Seventh Grade Math Program.

Posted under Homeschool, Online Learning, grade levels, homeschool curriculum, math curriculum, online math curriculum, seventh grade curriculum