Curriculum Standards

The curriculum of the North Middlesex Regional School District is defined by the Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks available at the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE).  All subject areas have specific standards, or learning outcomes, that students progress toward over the course of the year towards application and mastery.  

The state systematically reviews the curriculum frameworks through a curriculum review cycle with public input and a panel review.  The English Language Arts and  Literacy Framework and Mathematics Frameworks, the Massachusetts State Standards were most recently updated in 2017.   These standards, written by educators and other stakeholders, are the intended outcomes in which we want students to know and control by the end of the grade level.  Standards are not a specific teaching methodology, but expectations for students.  The most recent frameworks for all content areas can be found here.

Some resources to help parents understand mathematics and ELA include:

• The National PTA Parents’ Guide describes, by grade, the expectations for students.
• Council of the Great City Schools, Parent Roadmaps

Curriculum work and instructional strategy conversations are at the heart of our teaching and learning cycle.  Teams of educators are always developing and refining the curriculum maps and outlines within NMRSD to best meet the diverse needs of our students.

The North Middlesex Regional School District prides itself on utilizing curriculum materials, resources and instructional practices that align with DESE's definition of high quality instructional materials (HQIM) and high quality instructional practices (HQIP) and reflect our evolving student demographic, supporting culturally and linguistically sustaining practices to meet the needs of ALL learners.

We have also participated in statewide training to ensure that our instructional offerings promote deeper learning and equitable learning opportunities for all student.  As defined by DESE, "deeper learning is the ability to understand and address the complex elements of a subject or topic and to draw connections within and across contexts - whether that means the same class, another discipline, students' community, or the broader world... deeper learning is cultivated by engaging students with grade-level work that is relevant, real world, and interactive and emerges at the intersection of mastery, identity and creativity as three observed outcomes of learning."  To learn more about DESE's vision of 'deeper learning', click here.

An overview of the district's curriculum for the core content areas can be found here.