6-8 Program

Humanities Program Grades 6-8

The humanities program is designed to challenge our gifted learners with relevant activities to meet their academic needs. The program addresses the New Jersey Student Learning Standards (NJSLS) for Social Studies at an advanced level. It aligns with the National Association of Gifted Children (NAGC) Standards and focuses on creative problem-solving, research, communication skills, and leadership skills within a highly engaging format. 
This gifted and talented program enriches the regular Social Studies curriculum through extended readings, activities that foster critical thinking, and community service projects. Students are expected to participate in Junior Model United Nations, Law Adventure Competition, and other academic programs.

Student selection is based upon multiple measures from within the following categories:

• • Cognitive abilities testing

    • Otis Lennon (OLSAT) -Grade 5

• • Standardized test scores

    • iReady Reading

    • NJSLA ELA

    • Columbia Reading Assessment (Grade 5)

• • Academic performance

    • Report cards

• • Ratings pertaining to characteristics of the gifted student (e.g., inventiveness; creativeness; intuitiveness; curiousness)

    • Renzulli Scale Form completed by teacher

Student progress will be reported after each semester to communicate each student’s growth relative to the program objectives. Students’ overall performance will be evaluated annually; program participants must demonstrate a high level of performance in order to continue in the program.