Centennial SD plans Arts and Letters rollout for Grade 8 to address pacing and teacher usability

Missus Neely, a staff member in the Office of Teaching and Learning, told the Education Student Services Committee on May 13 that the district plans to move Grade 8 English language arts from Springboard to an Arts and Letters variant of Wit and Wisdom, published by Great Minds.

"We're really not shredding," Missus Neely said. "We're really just taking and reflecting, being thoughtful, using teacher-informed decisions to align our approach a little bit better and ensure that we have that high-quality standards-aligned instruction." She said a primary driver is lesson pacing: original Wit and Wisdom lessons were designed for 90-minute blocks, while middle schools typically have 60-minute class periods, and the Arts and Letters variant addresses that mismatch.

The district plans teacher preparation with trainings beginning May 28 and a fall rollout. Neely said the materials keep the same core texts, instructional design and standards alignment while offering a more user-friendly teacher manual and clearer pacing and lesson numbering.

District leaders framed the change as incremental rather than a wholesale departure from existing curricular goals. The committee was told the shift could lead the district to adopt Arts and Letters across additional grades if Grade 8 implementation meets expectations. No formal purchase vote was recorded at the committee meeting; the item was presented as information and, if moved forward, would be referred to the full board for approval.

Next steps: teacher training later this month and continued review by the Office of Teaching and Learning; any contract or purchase for materials will be brought to the full board for action.