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Carlisle proposes revised seventh- and eighth-grade ELA curriculum emphasizing collections, full-length texts and student choice
Summary
Carlisle Area School District English language arts program supervisor Keeley McGehan presented revised seventh- and eighth-grade curriculum documents that organize instruction around "collections" integrating reading, writing, speaking/listening and grammar; the documents also retain multiple full-length text studies and a literature-circles unit to give students choice.
Carlisle Area School District English language arts program supervisor Keeley McGehan presented revised curriculum documents for seventh- and eighth-grade ELA, saying the materials are intended to finalize the district's 6'to'12 English sequence and to give teachers a clearer, usable guide.
McGehan described the documents as organized around collections that group the four ELA strands'reading, writing, speaking/listening and grammar and usage'so teachers can see reading assignments and aligned writing and speaking tasks together. "No blood, but lots of sweat and sometimes tears," McGehan said of the work that produced the documents.
The revisions follow the structure introduced in the district's sixth-grade guidance and were written to align with Pennsylvania common core standards, presenters said. Each collection is designed to include assessments across strands and to center on at least one published writing piece; the documents also aim to retain three full-length text studies per grade and to embed a literature-circles unit that gives students choices among texts.
Presenters and board members highlighted classroom flexibility in how teachers schedule strands within a collection. McGehan said grammar and usage content from the district's existing scope-and-sequence has been integrated into the collections and applied to students' writing. Teachers, she said, retain autonomy to scaffold and interleave reading, writing and grammar as appropriate for their classes.
Board members and parents asked how student choice works in practice. McGehan described an approval process where teachers submit proposed book lists for review; once approved, teachers introduce all choices to students via book talks and guide students toward books that match their reading needs and goals. She said book sets typically include variety in Lexile levels so classes can support striving readers while challenging others.
Several commenters, including district staff, praised retention of long-form texts as a strategy to build reading stamina and to combat overreliance on short-form materials. Committee members also asked about how the district addresses artificial intelligence in student production. McGehan said English teachers review the district's academic-integrity expectations with students and parents and emphasize the value of the productive struggle of drafting; a district administrator noted the district is developing procedures and policies to balance instructional use of AI with separate expectations for student-authored work.
The committee discussion concluded with the board member announcing that the documents will be brought to the full board for action at the next meeting in two weeks for final approval and adoption.
McGehan said additional curricular items and text approvals are forthcoming for grades 6'12 as the district completes its sequence.
