Curriculum & Instruction

When enrolled in a Marana school, students are provided the highest quality education in safe, nurturing, and award-winning learning environments that facilitate and enhance student achievement and success in college, career, and life. The Marana Unified School District is committed to providing each student with the opportunity to achieve curriculum standards and successfully meet and exceed Arizona's College and Career Ready Standards as established by the Arizona Department of Education.

The District believes that students, parents, and school teachers and staff share the responsibility for academic achievement and regular advancement through the educational process.

Curriculum standards are important because they not only improve what students learn, but how they learn by teaching critical-thinking, problem-solving, and effective communication skills. The standards are more focused on students having conceptual knowledge of something, not mere procedural knowledge. They also better prepare students to compete for the jobs of the future with students from around the world. Promotion from year to year is based upon the mastery of curriculum standards in reading, written communication, mathematics, science, social studies, and other required areas adopted by the State Board of Education.

The District believes that students, parents, and school teachers and staff share the responsibility for academic achievement and regular advancement through the educational process. MUSD encourages parents to be active participants and use ParentVUE to enhance their involvement in their child's education. ParentVUE is the tool/app that provides parents and students with the ability to view student information such as class assignments, grades, course history, and attendance.

Instructional Model

Marana classrooms utilize the Gradual Release of Responsibility Instructional Framework (GRR) which encompasses the theories that students learn best when they know why they are learning what they are learning, as they work together to solve real-world problems in a supportive and engaging environment.

This framework, which has existed for over 30 years, focuses on empowering teachers to gradually release responsibility for learning to students in a purposeful manner. GRR is not a script that teachers follow and instead helps teachers increase precision in their teaching. Additionally, a cornerstone of the framework is that students engage in collaborative and productive work in order to produce evidence of their learning. Students are taught how to work together in order to achieve a successful outcome.

The four instructional components within GRR include:

Focused Instruction: Preparing students for learning by establishing lesson purpose, modeling strategies and skills, thinking aloud, and noticing how students respond.
Guided Instruction: Strategically using prompts, cues, and questions to lead students to new understanding.
Productive Group Work / Collaborative Learning: Allowing students to consolidate their understanding through exploration, problem-solving, discussion, and thinking with their peers.
Independent Learning: Requiring students to use the skills and knowledge they’ve acquired to create authentic products and ask new questions.

John Hattie, Visible Learning (2010)
Fisher and Frey, Structured Teaching for Better Learning (2008)

Professional Learning Communities

At MUSD, Professional Learning Communities are the backbone of teacher collaboration. Teachers work in teams to determine learning expectations and outcomes for students, methods for assessments to monitor student progress, and instructional strategies that support all students in achieving their best. PLCs provide ongoing opportunities for growth for teachers as they support the needs of our learners.

Understanding By Design

At MUSD, we have adopted the Understanding by Design (UbD) curricular framework for our four core content areas in secondary grades 7-12: English Language Arts, Math, Science, and Social Studies. This structure provides a focus on learning knowledge and skills as students develop their unique understandings of content. Our units emphasize identifying desired learning outcomes as the first step in planning. Teachers then design an intentional instructional pathway that includes assessments to check student growth and development.

Writing Philosophy

Writing is the active and cognitive process of constructing text to facilitate our thinking and communicate clearly. Our goal is to develop life-long learners who are independent and proficient writers.

Writing is a process that involves five distinct steps: prewriting, drafting, revising, editing and final draft/publishing. It is a recursive process as writers revisit prewriting steps to develop and expand their ideas. Each step of the process is explicitly taught and then practiced as students compose relevant content.

Learn more about MUSD's Writing Philosophy

Reading Philosophy

Reading is the active and cognitive process of making meaning from print. The goal of reading is to comprehend and apply what is read to real-world experiences. Our goal is to develop life-long learners who are independent and proficient readers.

Effective instruction of these components is systematic and explicit. This is best achieved through an instructional approach that supports the development of students’ communication skills through reading, writing, speaking, and listening.

Learn more about MUSD's Reading Philosophy

K-6 Curriculum

In kindergarten through sixth grade, MUSD uses an integrated unit approach for English Language Arts, Science, and Social Studies. Integrated units bring together academic ideas around a common theme to increase understanding, retention, and application of concepts. Integrating increases student engagement, improves critical thinking skills, and builds connections across the curriculum to improve cognition. An integrated curriculum combines content areas to create meaningful learning experiences for students.

ELA Approach

At MUSD, we believe in the science of reading research that supports the development of students’ communication skills through reading, writing, speaking, and listening. This is accomplished through the Elementary Literacy Block, which includes Phonological Awareness, Phonics/Word Work, Read Aloud, Shared Reading, Guided Reading/Small Groups, and Independent Reading.

MUSD's READING & Writing Philosophy

Science Approach

A fundamental goal of science education is to help students determine how the world works and make sense of phenomena in the natural world. To develop a scientific understanding of the natural world, students must be able to ask questions, gather information, reason about that information, and connect it to scientific principles, theories, or models, and then effectively communicate their understanding and reasoning.

Sense-making in science occurs with the integration of three essential dimensions: Science and Engineering Practices (what we do), Cross-Cutting Concepts (how we think), and Core Ideas (what we learn). These are known as the Three Dimensions of Science Instruction. The AZ Science Standards support these concepts.

Social Studies Approach

The AZ Social Studies Standards are no longer a “checklist” approach but rather based upon an inquiry approach. Using the Inquiry Design Model, the focus of these units is to look through the lens of the Disciplinary Skills and Processes, where students uncover their learning and are able to apply it to any historical era, context, or content area. Using these tools, students think like historians, geographers, political scientists, and economists. These skills and processes are especially critical in a time when students are exposed to massive amounts of information in numerous forms and must develop the skills to make sense of it.

Math Approach

The AZ Math Standards are supported by the implementation of Eureka Math. This curriculum, designed like a story, focuses on the key concepts of Focus, Coherence, and Rigor developed over multiple grade levels. Coherent models and problem-solving help students gain a complete body of math knowledge, not just a discrete set of skills. Rigor, defined as the blend of conceptual understanding, procedural skills and fluency, and application are also prevalent throughout this resource. The eight Standards for Mathematical Practice highlight the applied nature of math and clarify the expectations held for the use of mathematics in and outside of the classroom.

7-12th Curriculum

Math

The AZ math standards are supported by the implementation of our MUSD Understanding by Design Units. This curriculum focuses on the knowledge, skills, and understanding students need to support transferable mathematical skills. This focus is in direct alignment with the eight Standards for Mathematical Practice. The Mathematical Practices highlight the applied nature of math and clarify the expectations held for the use of mathematics in and outside of the classroom.

ELA

Our ELA curriculum is guided by state standards, which are grouped into Reading Standards for Literature, Reading Standards for Informational text, Writing Standards, Speaking and Listening, and Language Standards. MUSD emphasizes strong foundations in critical reading, writing, thinking practice, and skill development. We have organized standards in a progression that honors student learning, focuses on relevant understandings, and provides rigorous assessment.

Social Studies

The Arizona Department of Education states that “The Arizona History and Social Science Standards are premised upon a rigorous and relevant K-12 social studies program within each district and school in the state. Engaging students in the pursuit of active, informed citizenship will require a broad range of understandings and skills including:

Think analytically
Read widely and critically
Communicate cogently and in a compelling manner”

MUSD has mapped the Arizona state standards in order to create the framework of each high school social studies course in order to teach to the learning goals established by the state.

Science

MUSD has created aligned course offerings in middle and high school. These courses are founded on the statement from The Arizona Department of Education that explains: “The Arizona Science Standards focus on thirteen core ideas in science and engineering, adapted from Working with Big Ideas of Science Education. The ten core ideas for Knowing Science center on understanding the causes of phenomena in physical, earth and space, and life science. The three core ideas for Using Science connect scientific principles, theories, and models; engineering and technological applications; and societal implications to the content knowledge to support that understanding. The complexity of each core idea develops as students’ progress through each grade band.”

MUSD Core Curriculum Overviews

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ADE Standards By Grade Level

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More Info

Please contact:

Educational Services

Elementary Curriculum:

For additional information about Elementary curriculum:

Kimberly Parker

Curriculum Coordinator

Educational Services

Secondary Curriculum:

For additional information about Secondary Learning & Literacy contact:

Christine Hrutkay

Secretary IV

Asst. Superintendent