What is Humanities

GATE Humanities is a special program which challenges students to extend themselves and strengthens their skills in writing, researching, study habits and reasoning skills, just to name a few. The GATE Humanities Core strives to incorporate elements of differentiation in curriculum. Students will delve into various subject matters in depth, looking for further meaning beneath the surface. Complexity provides opportunities to extend a student’s thinking by looking at an event from different perspectives, across time periods and among disciplines. Novelty provides inquiry and exploration of nontraditional modes within the class setting and teacher guided situations. Acceleration enables a student who has demonstrated mastery of the core curriculum to move ahead at a faster pace without sacrificing comprehension.

Enhance the learning experience through a variety of activities and challenging projects.

Expand students’ knowledge and critical thinking skills in the areas of English, literature and social studies as well as make the crucial connections to other key areas of study in other fields such as science, art and math. Critical thinking includes ability to reason, identifying assumptions, analyzing arguments, understanding inferences, and formulating conclusions.

Enrich students’ awareness of other cultures, historical connections to current events, and expand students’ knowledge of world geography and the changing political face of the world.

Enable students to improve their own skills of self-expression through writing, speeches/ dramatic readings, and media presentations.

Reinforce and expand students’ vocabulary through Word Masters and Vocabulary Enrichment, as well as students’ grasp of and use of grammar in all areas of written and oral expression.

Promote independence in their work and study habits, timeliness and thoroughness of assignments completed, and improve the quality of their peer relationships in class through team projects or study buddies

“Qualitatively Differentiated” means that your student will be participating in a program that has all of the components of a regular Humanities Core program and so much more

1.) Vocabulary Enrichment Program: This is an advanced two-year program featuring advanced vocabulary with multiple definitions, etymologies, variant forms of the root word, opportunities for usage, with testing on spelling as well as definitions.

2.) Competitive Opportunities: Students will have many varied opportunities to compete in contests outside the school environment. The school regularly receives information, which is passed onto students concerning contests that would allow them to demonstrate their abilities in areas of personal interest.

3.) Reading Counts: This is a reading opportunity in addition to the assigned literary works (usually four novels through Humanities for the year.

4.) Simulations: Students will have an opportunity to “live out” historic events or situations

5.) National History Day: Students participate in this program, which encourages students to expand their research skills, problem solving, and analytical thinking in history. The national organization announces a topic for the year and students begin research. The end result is a research project to be shared with other students on campus in the form of exhibits like a science fair, power points, or websites.

6.) Word Masters Challenge: The Word Masters Challenge is an exercise in critical thinking that first encourages students to become familiar with a set of interesting new words (considerably harder than grade level) and then challenges them to use those words to complete analogies expressing various kinds of relationships.

7^th grade GATE classes at Rancho have the rare opportunity to travel back in time to the 500’s and move forward towards the 1700’s. Reading historical novels such, as Anna of Byzantium, and Jackaroo just to name two, complement this year of study, and help to engage students with the literature and history through a variety of art activities and simulations: Great Civilizations of Africa; dioramas of Japanese culture; the Black Death or Plague; the always stimulating Warlords of Japan; forming of Guilds of the Middle Ages and creation of goods for sale at the Renaissance Faire; Medieval journalists practicing interviewing, editorializing and producing a newspaper; and the “Meeting of the (Great Medieval/ Renaissance) Minds.” The round table medieval banquet allows students to dress in costume for the famous personage about whom they researched and share the information over a feast of foods from around the world Everything is geared towards exciting the students about the curriculum, re-enforcing good work habits, outlining, study strategies, time management, and organization, while expanding essay writing and research skills.

What is GATE Humanities, besides a combination of History and English?

GATE Humanities is a special program which challenges students to extend themselves and strengthens their skills in writing, researching, study habits and reasoning skills, just to name a few. Students will delve into various subject matters in depth, looking for further meaning beneath the surface. Complexity provides opportunities to extend a student’s thinking by looking at an event from different perspectives, across time periods and among disciplines. Novelty provides inquiry and exploration of non- traditional modes within the class setting and teacher guided situations. Acceleration enables a student who has demonstrated mastery of the core curriculum to move ahead at a faster pace without sacrificing comprehension.

q be able to accomplished assigned work in language arts and history with little assistance. This extra help should not be excessive, requiring hours of help from parents, older siblings or tutors.

q be skilled in accommodating diverse social and academic situations. Student should be articulate, and a good communicator. They should work well with others of different cultures, religious denominations and ability levels.

q desire to be an advanced class which would require more work and more in depth research.

q be at least 1-2 grade levels above in their reading ability and be able to handle 10 to 15 pages of fiction or nonfiction reading per night.

q show continued growth in the standardized tests, not digression in scores, even if they were tested for GATE at an earlier age.

After submitting by mail a letter with two previous years grades (5^th and 6^th), student will be considered for Gate:

q even if they were not in APPAS or GATE the year before but have shown through grades that they are highly motivated, achievers.

q if they have been tested recently by the district to be admitted into GATE, and/ or if their standardized tests for both 5^th and 6^th grade show increased improvement and are at least 90% in the Reading, Spelling, and Language.

q If they as well meet 5 or more of the above criteria for the characteristics of a GATE student in the middle school.

q Being in GATE in the Middle School is no guarantee the student will qualify for honors in high school (based on 7^th grade standardized scores in Language Arts, 8^th grade grades, and 8^th grade teacher recommendation.)