Big Ideas
Children are constantly striving to make meaning of their world and invited to think big by engaging with Big Ideas.
SEE supports children to construct knowledge through active exploration, investigation, inquiry, and social interaction with peers, adults, and materials.
Connecting to and Extending Children’s Thinking
Each unit of study is framed by a Big Idea – familiar enough to connect to what children already know and novel enough to spark their interest to know more.
- Every child can find an entry point and a pathway that follows their interests.
- Learning activities are designed with intention.
- Daily classroom activities are integrated (not isolated) and provide opportunities for real-world applications of the Big Ideas.
- Children play an active role in the world around them.
- Through thematic projects and experiences, children build academic knowledge and vocabulary.
- High-quality children’s books serve as an anchor for learning experiences.
- Connective threads of recurring themes, authors/illustrators, and characters weave between and throughout the units of study.
- Big Ideas are an interconnected web of concepts that help children develop a deeper understanding and make meaningful connections between learning and their lives.
Unit 1: Me and My Friends
Everyone – educators, families, children – begins school with hopes and dreams of a year of joyful learning. Everyone wants a classroom that works together cooperatively, purposefully, and peacefully. Getting there requires an investment of time, effort, and intentional teaching. While children will have varying experiences of being in a group, this will be everyone’s first experience of being in their classroom. The first three weeks of school lays the foundation for a successful year and establishes a positive, supportive classroom climate.
Unit 2: Our Community
In Our Community, children explore the people, places, and things that make up the community around their school and their home neighborhoods. The anchor texts introduce children to the roles and responsibilities community members have and how they work together to support each other. Children will continue to enhance the classroom community by developing the collaboration and communication skills that strengthen their relationships.
Unit 3: Transportation–On The Road
In Transportation–On the Road children explore the different vehicles that keep their communities on the go! The anchor texts will introduce children to the variety of transportation in a community and how it brings a community together. Children will continue to build their classroom community by developing problem-solving and perspective taking skills that enhance their relationships.
Unit 4: Seasonal Changes
In Seasonal Changes, children explore how communities are affected by changes in the weather. They compare and contrast how animals and people respond to and prepare for those changes. The anchor texts depict a variety of neighborhoods, children, and families navigating through snow and rain. They learn content specific vocabulary to discuss weather and the motivations/feelings of the characters in the anchor texts for this unit.
Unit 5: Light, Shadows, and Reflections
In Light, Shadows, and Reflections, children explore the properties and functions of light. They will consider how light is beneficial to people and animals. Children will have multiple opportunities to ask questions, set up simple experiments, and develop ideas about how phenomena work. They demonstrate their understanding of the Big Ideas through discussion and collaborative projects as they develop their language and quantitative skills.
Unit 6: Life in Trees
In Life In Trees, children discover the interconnectedness of nature’s systems. They compare and contrast life in trees to their lives in neighborhoods and communities. Life in Trees will provoke many interests, pique children’s curiosity, and offer rich opportunities to develop language, critical thinking, and social-emotional skills.
Unit 7: Growing and Changing
In Growing & Changing, children build on and extend understandings they gained in Life in Trees to explore the life cycle of all living things, from insects to plants to people. As this is the last unit of the school-year, it is an opportune time to reflect on how much your children have grown and changed, individually, and as a classroom community.
Unit 8: Water All Around Us
In Water All Around Us, children build on and extend understandings they gained in Growing & Changing to explore how all living things depend on and need water and survival.