Grade 8 Competencies
Reading Literature - Students will comprehend and draw conclusions about the author’s intent when reading a variety of increasingly complex print and non-print literary texts, citing several pieces of strong textual evidence to support their analyses, with a focus on how theme relates to characters, setting, and plot; how plot and dialogue interact; word choice, tone, allusions, and analogies; text structure; differing points of view and dramatic irony; analyzing filmed productions; comparing modern and ancient literature.
Reading Informational - Students will comprehend and draw conclusions about a variety of increasingly complex print and non-print informational texts, citing several pieces of textual evidence to support their analyses, with a focus on analyzing the development of two or more central ideas; analyzing connections and distinctions between individuals, events, and ideas; the impact of word choice on meaning and tone; the role of structure in developing and refining key ideas; analyzing author's POV, purpose, and acknowledgement of conflicting viewpoints; evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of different media; delineate and evaluate reasoning; and analyzing conflicting interpretations.
Speaking, Listening, and Language Conventions - Students will initiate and participate effectively in speaking-listening for a variety of formal and informal purposes and audiences with a focus on drawing on preparation for discussions, tracking goal progress, and posing questions that connect ideas. They will justify their views based on new information, analyze the purpose and motives of information presented in diverse media, and evaluate the sufficiency of evidence. Students will emphasize valid points when presenting, clarify information in multimedia presentations and adapting speech to a variety of contexts. When writing, students will demonstrate an understanding of conventions of grammar and usage, including active and passive voice, verb shifts, and verb moods. Students will demonstrate command of conventions including capitalization, punctuation, and spelling when writing.
Narrative Writing - Students will write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences. Engage and orient the reader by establishing context and POV. Use narrative techniques such as dialogue, pacing, and descriptions. With some guidance and support, students will develop and strengthen writing by planning, revising, editing, and rewriting to produce clear, coherent narratives appropriate to task.
Informative/Explanatory Writing - Students will write informative/explanatory texts to examine a topic and convey ideas, concepts, and information through the selection, organization, and analysis of relevant content. Introduce and preview what is to follow. Develop a topic with relevant facts, definitions, concrete details and quotations. With some guidance and support, students will develop and strengthen writing by planning, revising, editing, and rewriting to produce clear, coherent informative writing appropriate to task.
Argument Writing - Students will write arguments to support claims with clear reasons and relevant evidence, introducing, acknowledging opposing claims, using logical reasoning and relevant evidence, and accurate, crebible sources. With some guidance and support, students will develop and strengthen writing by planning, revising, editing, and rewriting to produce clear, coherent arguments appropriate to task.
Inquiry, Investigation, and Research - Students will conduct short research projects to answer a question, including a self-generated question, drawing on several sources, generating additional questions. Gather relevant information from print and digital resources. Assess the credibility and accuracy of sources, and quoting and paraphrasing. Draw evidence from a variety of texts to support analysis.
Critical Inquiry & Analysis - Students will be able to analyze and use a variety of historical sources, documents, maps, and visuals and determine their credibility.
Research & Communication - Students will develop clear claims and counterclaims and use evidence from multiple sources to construct an argument.
Civics - Students will explain and analyze the structure, roles, powers, responsibilities, and limits involved in the origin and evolution of a democratic republic.
Historical Events & Perspectives - Students will make connections between events and identify factors influencing change over time.
Number Systems - Students will expand their understanding of number systems thinking flexibly and attending to precision and reasonableness when solving problems using rational and irrational numbers.
Expressions & Equations - Students will reason abstractly and manipulate symbolic expressions to represent relationships and interpret expressions and equations in terms of a given context for determining an unknown value.
Geometry - Students will solve problems involving reasoning using properties of 2- and 3- dimensional shapes to analyze, represent, and model geometric relationships in pure/theoretical and authentic applied contexts.
Data, Statistics, & Probability - Students will design investigations and conduct probability experiments involving populations.
Functions - Students will make use of structure to describe and compare situations that involve proportionality, change, or patterns and use the information to make conjectures and justify conclusions/solutions.
Patterns, Relations, and Functions - Students will make use of patterns, relations, and functions to interpret, compare, and analyze pure and applied situations, using the information to make conjectures, support conclusions and model real-world phenomena and distinguish the different situations that would utilize each type of function (linear, exponential, absolute value, piecewise, and quadratic)
Operations & Algebraic Thinking - Students will be able to solve linear and quadratic equations, inequalities, and systems of linear equations, and manipulate polynomial expressions using algebraic principles to arrive at accurate solutions and demonstrate conceptual understanding of these mathematical concepts in a real-world context.
Number & Quantity - Students will demonstrate proficiency in manipulating and applying radicals, exponent rules, scientific notation, and other math involving numbers and quantity. This includes simplifying expressions involving radicals, applying exponent rules to solve equations and simplify expressions, and expressing scientific notation for large and small values, as well as using this representation in calculations.
Data, Statistics, and Probability - Students will be able to analyze and interpret statistical data presented in scatter plots, create scatter plots from data, and apply measures of center and variability to describe and compare one and two-variable data sets.
Geometry - Students will solve problems involving reasoning using properties of 2- and 3- dimensional shapes to analyze, represent, and model geometric relationships in pure/theoretical and authentic applied contexts.
Forces - Students will explore how energy transfers during collisions, understanding the relationship between energy in motion (kinetic) and stored energy (potential). They'll build and improve models of forces, including magnetism, to understand and predict how objects interact in collisions and through magnetic attraction or repulsion.
Waves - Students develop ideas related to how energy waves are produced, how they travel through media, and how they affect objects at a distance.
Earth and Space - Students can explain the observed patterns of celestial phenomena, including the Sun's path, lunar phases, and eclipses, and analyze how these events influence Earth.
Genetics and Heredity - Students will be able to analyze the mechanisms of inheritance and genetic variation, including the role of mutations, and explain how these processes, combined with natural selection and common ancestry, drive the evolution of life on Earth.