Curriculum Resource List

LREI Middle School Curriculum Resource List 2014-2015

Below is a list of resources suggested by the Middle School Faculty.  The list includes books, web sites, and cultural institutions that will enrich your families’ experience in the Middle School.  Some resources directly support the curriculum while others help to explain how and why we do what we do. The books listed below are available through many booksellers and at the public library.  We do not expect families to buy, borrow, or visit all of the references listed.  Read through the list and if a title or web site or cultural institution strikes your fancy it might be worth at look.  The goal is for students and families to enrich the conversations they have at home about what goes on in school.

We have organized the list by subject, combining the suggestions made by teachers at each grade level.  Some of these suggestions were on last year’s list, others are new this fall.  Please feel free to ask the teachers if you have questions about these resources and to pass along others if you have suggestions of your own.  (Some of the descriptions are borrowed from other sources.)

Humanities
(Heather Brandstatter and Wendy Bassin, 5^th grade; Lynne Cattafi and Dave Edson, 6^th grade; Matthew Rosen and Suzanne Cohen, 7^th grade; Sarah Barlow and Sara-Momii Roberts, 8^th grade)

A Writer’s Notebook: Unlocking the Writer Within You by Ralph Fletcher.  This guide for writers of all ages shows how to keep a writer’s notebook and contains entries that could be the basis of a story, poem, or personal essay.

Raising Lifelong Learners: A Parents’ Guide, by Lucy McCormick Calkins, Lydia Bellino. Raising Lifelong Learners: A Parent’s Guide is a vital book for parents. Beginning with talk as the foundation of literacy, and emphasizing the importance of listening to and speaking with children, Lucy Calkins, longtime education specialist, then moves into the stages of reading and writing: how to recognize an emergent reader, how to foster a young author, and how to encourage a love of books and reading through your own interest and modeling. Additional chapters deal with math, science, and social studies.

Material World: A Global Family Portrait by Peter Menzel, Sandra Eisert (Photographer), Charles C. Mann (Contributor), Paul Kennedy (Introduction)  In honor of the United Nations-sponsored International Year of the Family in 1994, award-winning photojournalist Peter Menzel brought together 16 of the world’s leading photographers to create a visual portrait of life in 30 nations. Material World tackles its wide subject by zooming in, allowing one household to represent an entire nation. Photographers spent one week living with a “statistically average” family in each country, learning about their work, their attitudes toward their possessions, and their hopes for the future. Then a “big picture” shot of the family was taken outside the dwelling, surrounded by all their (many or few) material goods.

The Dorling Kindersley History of the World. This is an excellent illustrated overview of the world’s history with a particular emphasis on events that are occurring in multiple places simultaneously.  DK (Dorling Kindersley) books in general offer beautifully illustrated, well-written resources for all sorts of areas of study.

Don’t Know Much About History: Everything You Need to Know About American History but Never Learned, Kenneth C. Davis.  “From Columbus’s voyage to the first Clinton administration, author Kenneth C. Davis carries the reader on a rollicking ride through 600 years of Americana.  With wit, candor and fascinating facts, he explodes long-held myths and misconceptions — revealing the very human side of history that the textbooks neglect.

Lies My Teacher Told Me, James Loewen.  After surveying twelve leading high school American history texts, Professor James Loewen “has concluded that not one does a decent job of making history interesting or memorable.  Marred by an embarrassing combination of blind patriotism, mindless optimism, sheer misinformation, and outright lies, these books omit almost all of the ambiguity passion, conflict, and drama from our past.” Loewen’s book encourages students of all ages to view history textbook with a critical eye.

A People’s History of the United States, Howard Zinn. “Zinn’s work represents more than 500 years of American social and cultural history, going well beyond the wars and presidencies of traditional texts to tell the stories of working men and women.”

Howard Zinn’s A Young People’s History of the United States, Vol. 1: Columbus to the Spanish American War and Vol. 2: The Spanish American War to the War on Terror. Volume 1 is a retelling of US history from the viewpoints of slaves, workers, immigrants, women, and Native Americans with color images, a glossary, and primary sources. Volume one begins with a look at Christopher Columbus’ arrival through the eyes of the Arawak Indians and leads the reader through the strikes and rebellions of the industrial age. In volume two, Howard Zinn’s lively, clear prose guides the reader through the wars and revolutions of the twentieth century. Zinn continues his retelling up to the policies and resistances that have characterized the war on terror and that shape the United States of America today. Includes a final chapter updating our country’s history to the present moment.

Math
(Margaret Andrews, 5^th, 6^th and 8^th grades, Michelle Boehm, 7^th and 8^th grades; and
Michelle Healy and Ana Chaney, 5th, 6^th, and 7^th grades)

Enrichment:

• Card Games: Our two favorite math games are 24, which increases speed and flexibility with calculations, and SET, a game of geometric pattern recognition. Both have the benefit of being ever-challenging, depending on your choice of opponent. The web addresses for purchasing your own deck of each are http://www.setgame.com and http://www.24game.com.
• Ken-Ken and Sudoku: Solving these puzzles helps improve logical reasoning and number sense. They can be found in your daily paper or on the following websites: http://sudoku.math.com/, http://www.kenken.com/

Online games, puzzles and practice:

• calculationnation.nctm.org
• mazeworks.com
• www.coolmath.com
• www.mathpuzzle.com
• “Math Blasters” or “Number Munchers” software.

Information for parents:

• National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) This website, www.nctm.org , is a place to learn more about mathematics education and find resources about how to help with homework. 
• Connected Mathematics Project (CMP) Visit www.phschool.com/cmp2/ for information about the curriculum we use in the middle school.

Books:

• Math On Call: Each student now has a Math On Call book which is a mathematics handbook.  He/she should keep this book at home during the school year since we have additional copies in the math room and library.  This book will be returned at the end of the year.
• Letters to a Young Mathematician by Ian Stewart.  From the front cover: “A great book for parents of a budding mathematician or anyone curious about this mysterious world.”  San-Diego Union Tribune.
• The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers by David Wells.  A truly interesting look at all kinds of numbers: imaginary and real, triangular and square, Fibonacci and factorials.  Mr. Wells is also the author of The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Geometry. (Both books appropriate for the mathematically curious in the higher grades)
• Family Math: The Middle School Years, by Virginia Thompson and Ann Humphrey Williams. The University of California published an excellent resource for doing math at home from 5th to 8th grade. Its emphasis is on number sense and algebraic reasoning and it contains fun and instructive activities for families to do together, both during the summer and over the course of the year. It is available from Amazon.

Science
(Dan Bobrowski, 5^th and 6^th grades, and Stephen Volkmann, 7^th and 8^th grades)

The following website is a great resource to use for students and parents interested in learning more about how everything around them works: http://science.howstuffworks.com/.

Additional resources of note include: (1) The New York Times “Science Times” supplement on Tuesdays; (2) Natural History Magazine from the American Museum of Natural History; and (3) Popular Science magazine.

Technology
(Clair Segal, all grades)

To supplement the many exciting projects that students do at LREI, they can strengthen their programming and problem solving skills by using Scratch. Scratch is a programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art — and share your creations on the web. As young people create and share Scratch projects, they learn important mathematical and computational ideas, while also learning to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively. Find out more about Scratch at http://scratch.mit.edu/.

Foreign Language
(Xin, Dai, Sharyn Hahn and Gabrielle Keller)

El Museo del Barrio, 1230 Fifth Av. at 104th Street.  Great seasonal children’s workshops on Saturday morning.

The Hispanic Society of America, 613 W. 155th St. at Broadway Impressive standing collection. www.hispanicsociety.org

New York Times Weekend Section (Fine Arts)- Spare Times for children highlights bilingual productions in the city.

The French Institute has a variety of programs throughout the year, which encourage the understanding of the French-speaking world and support the process of learning French. There are films, speakers, book discussions and festivals (such as the Bastille Day event on July 14.) The Institute can direct you to additional resources, such as bookstores, that would be helpful to a young student. There are also classes offered. French Institute: 212-355-6100 22 E. 60th Street (between Park and Madison).  www.fiaf.org

Franceworld.com is a good research site, which includes culture and geography. It can lead a student to other sites as well. It is particularly useful when the class is doing a report on a city or a region in France. it can be read in both English and French.

Chinese museums and workshops:
China Institute.  125 East 65 street, New York, NY, 10065
The Museum of Chinese in America (Moca).  215 Centre street, New York, NY, 10013
Asia Society. 725 Park Avenue, New York, NY

Chinese theatre works. http://www.chinesetheatreworks.org/w/

Online dictionary: http://www.nciku.com/

Online Pinyin Practice: http://blog.lrei.org/awang/category/pinyin/

Software: 6th to 8th grade Mandarin students can use Rosetta Stone to practice Mandarin at home or use it as enrichment. https://lrei.rosettastoneclassroom.com/en-US/

Art
(Jeremiah Demster, 5^th and 6^th grades, and Rohan Cassells, 7^th and 8^th grades)

For all grades we are lucky to live in a city with so many fine museums.  The students will, during their four years in the middle school spend a fair amount of time in the Metropolitan Museum of Art:  website: www.metmuseum.org. With their classes, the Fifth Grade will visit galleries focusing on the Ancient Near East, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece and Rome.  The Sixth Grade–Arms and Armor; also the Cloisters Museum and the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine.  The Seventh and Eighth Grades will visit a range of galleries and studios and will have visits with a variety of artists. A great book for learning art terms is Key Art Terms for Beginners by Philip Yenawine. Other resources include:

• The Whitney Museum- www.whitney.org
• The Jewish Museum- www.thejewishmuseum.org/
• The National Museum of the American Indian- www.nmai.si.edu
• The Brooklyn Museum- www.brooklynmuseum.org

Music
(Matt McLean, all grades)

NPR.org has a list of all their music programs on line. Basic Jazz Record Library has an archive of shows that talk about and listen to jazz. Performance Today has some great history and listening shows too. Baroque Sunday is a 4 hour program of early music and their playlists are on line along with some interesting outside links. Jazz at Lincoln center has some things just for kids. There is much more at NPR.org and wnyc.org

The web site of the New York Philharmonic–nyphilharmonic.org —has activities and concerts tailored for kids for those who are willing to pay.

Manhattan School of Music offers many free jazz and classical concerts. They are located at 122^nd Street and Broadway. A calendar of events is available at their web site homepage:
http://www.msmnyc.edu/calendar/index.asp.

Julliard offers many free jazz and classical concerts as well. They are located at 65^th Street and Broadway (check the web sight for detailed directions, because it’s not right there on the corner.  It’s in side the Lincoln Center complex.) A calendar of events is available at their web site–www.Julliard.edu.

Drama
(Joanne Magee, all grades)

TO GO TO THE THEATRE

• New Victory Theater, For Children’s Theatre : www.newvictory.org: 229 West 42nd St., NY, NY 10036.
• Brooklyn Academy of Music  www.bam.org
  
• Howard Gilman Opera House, 30 Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11217
• BAM Harvey Theater, 651 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217 
• High 5 Tix–“Dedicated to creating a young, motivated audience for the arts, High 5 offers teens ages 13 to 18 tickets to dance, theater, music, film, museums and more. Through High 5 you can get $5 tickets — or two for $5 — to more than 1,000 events at hundreds of New York City arts venues year-round. Need to know more? http://www.high5tix.org

FOR RESEARCH:

• New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, www.nypl.org, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-7498 (917) 275-6975
• Museum of TV and Radio, 25 West 52 Street, New York, NY 10019. (212) 621-6800. www.mtr.org – The Museum of Television and Radio is dedicated to audio-visual artifacts with a collection of over 50,000 TV and radio shows. Pick your selection from the library and watch it at one of the many video consoles.

BOOKS TO PURCHASE:

• For scripts, plays, monologue books etc : Dramatic Publishing, www.dramaticpublishing.com
• Minute Monologues for Kids by Ruth Mae Roddy is a great resource for budding actors and actresses.
• The Drama Bookshop on West 40th Street between 7th & 8th avenue is an excellent bookstore with everything from plays, musicals, costumes, tech, scenery/set design, theatre history, criticism, etc.  The staff is very helpful.

MUSICALS TO CHECK OUT:

• Music Theatre International, www.mtishows.com

Learning Styles
(Robin Shepard, 5^th and  6^th grade, and Susannah Flicker, 5^th through 8^th grades)

A Mind at a Time by Mel Levine.  Recognizing each child’s intellectual, emotional, and physical strengths–and teaching directly to these strengths–is key to sculpting “a mind at a time,” according to Dr. Mel Levine.  But to teachers and parents whose children face daily humiliation at school, the author bellows, “Try harder!” A professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina Medical School, Levine eloquently substantiates his claim that developmental growth deserves the same monitoring as a child’s physical growth. Levine’ latest book is The Myth of Laziness.  In this book he, ” offers theories on why it’s so hard for some teenagers-even bright ones-to succeed in school.”  www.allkindsofminds.com

Smart but Scattered: The Revolutionary “Executive Skills” Approach to Helping Kids Reach Their Potential by Peg Dawson and Richard Guare. There’s nothing more frustrating than watching your bright, talented son or daughter struggle with everyday tasks like finishing homework, putting away toys, or following instructions at school. Your “smart but scattered” child might also have trouble coping with disappointment or managing anger. Drs. Peg Dawson and Richard Guare have great news: there’s a lot you can do to help. The latest research in child development shows that many kids who have the brain and heart to succeed lack or lag behind in crucial “executive skills”–the fundamental habits of mind required for getting organized, staying focused, and controlling impulses and emotions. Learn easy-to-follow steps to identify your child’s strengths and weaknesses, use activities and techniques proven to boost specific skills, and problem-solve daily routines. Small changes can add up to big improvements–this empowering book shows how.

The Organized Student: Teaching Children the Skills for Success in School and Beyond by Donna Goldberg and Jennifer Zwiebel. The overstuffed backpack, the missing homework, the unused planner, the test he didn’t know about. Sound familiar? When the disorganized child meets the departmentalized structure of middle school, everything can fall apart. Even the academically successful child will start to falter if she misses deadlines, loses textbooks, or can’t get to class on time. This practical book is full of hands-on strategies for helping parents identify and teach organizational skills.

Library
(Jennifer Hubert Swan, all grades)

From Hinton to Hamlet: Building Bridges between Young Adult Literature and the Classics by Sarah K. Herz with Don Gallo  “The literary classics that are traditionally required in grades 7-12 are often too complex and removed from the adolescent experience. This highly readable guide, from a classroom teacher and one of the nation’s leading authorities on Young Adult Literature, shows teachers and librarians how to use Young Adult Literature as a bridge to the classics to help students become more critical and enthusiastic readers. Innovative thematic connectors link quality Young Adult novels, many of them multicultural, to the twelve most frequently taught works of literature. Extensive annotated lists of additional works of Young Adult literature complement each of these 12 classics.”–from Hinton to Hamlet

Reading Rants: A Guide to Books That Rock by Jennifer Hubert, LREI Middle School Librarian. Lively summaries and literary criticism of 100 recent young adult novels, complete with age and grade recommendations and read alike titles. This book is most useful to 7th and 8th grade families.

Both of these titles are available in the Sixth Avenue library to be checked out.

Homework

Homework Without Tears: A Parent’s Guide for Motivating Children to Do Homework and to Succeed in School by Lee Canter. Parents with school-aged children will find in this volume the help they need to create a less stressful learning environment in the home and motivate their youngsters to succeed in school.