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GT 7 CURRICULUM GUIDE
GT 7 is a course that focuses on creative and higher-order thinking, while also addressing the affective (social/emotional) needs of gifted learners
and meeting the reading informational and literary text standards of the 7 th grade ELA (English Language Arts) curriculum. By the nature of this
curriculum, speaking, listening, language, and writing standards are also addressed. Each grade level (6, 7, and 8) will include these primary
concept components: AFFECTIVE DEVELOPMENT, RESEARCH, SYSTEMS AND ORDER, and CHANGE
Each of these four units is aligned to a unit in the ELA curriculum.
ELA Unit 1: River of Change, to be aligned with Affective Development
AFFECTIVE DEVELOPMENT: Students will develop an understanding of themselves as gifted individuals in their communities. This understanding
includes how to perceive and manage feelings, values, motivations, and attitudes.
ELA Unit 2: Struggles and Injustice, to be aligned with Change (in Others/Community)
CHANGE in Others/Community: Students will continue to explore the concept of change, with a focus on change in their communities, and develop
their abilities to analyze, recognize, and apply both argumentative and persuasive techniques.
ELA Unit 3: Triumph Over Trial, to be aligned with Research
RESEARCH: Students will gather, analyze, and evaluate primary and secondary sources, synthesize information and ideas from complex texts,
generate and support claim(s), and develop a product appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.
ELA Unit 4: Beyond Boundaries, to be aligned with Systems and Order
SYSTEMS AND ORDER (Community): Students will explore the order and structure of systems to make predictions and problem-solve.
Updated June 2015
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UNIT 1
Unit 1: River of Change (including Affective Development): Through reading, analyzing, and evaluating narrative and
informational texts, students will examine how change causes personal growth. Additionally, they will explore stress, time
management, peer relationships, social skills, and response styles. Students will develop an understanding of themselves as
gifted individuals in their communities.
Essential Question: How does change cause personal growth?
Enduring Understandings (Affective)
Stress can be a result of both positive and negative change.
Social skills can be learned and applied.
Motivation and attitude impact an individual’s ability to use gifts and
talents to effectively meet life’s challenges.
Concept
Using literature to explore personal
change
The role of stress in personal change
(including social skills, motivation, and
attitude)
Guiding Questions
What is stress? What causes stress?
How can stress be both positive and negative?
What are different positive and negative ways that people use to
manage stress?
How do response styles affect social interactions?
How can you use strategies (like the ASSERT formula) to self-advocate?
How can you take control of the decisions in my life?
What are the advantages of trying difficult or unknown things?
What are some things you would really like to try? What is stopping
you?
GT
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N/A
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Fighting Invisible Tigers: Stress Management
for Teens by Earl Hipp
Michael Chabon’s “Manhood for Amateurs:
Childhood’s Lost Wilderness”
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2009/jul/16/man
hood-for-amateurs-the-wilderness-of-childhood/
Updated June 2015
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ELA
Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse
No Promises in the Wind by Irene Hunt
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark
Twain
“After Twenty Years” PH p. 453
“Oranges” PH p. 82
“The Chase” PH p. 576
“No Gumption” PH p. 566
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See shared digital content for updated
materials
Possible Classroom Applications
*See shared digital content for suggested implementations and resources
Compare and contrast character growth (in novels Out of the Dust and No Promises in the Wind)
Fighting Invisible Tigers teachers’ manual suggestions
Exploration of non-fiction related to themes and time periods in literary works
Re-write “Dreams” (excerpt from Out of the Dust) to communicate what students have a ‘hunger’ for
Use metaphorical thinking to portray a character’s or students’ childhoods visually (ex, as maps)
Comparison/discussion/reading on childhood experiences past and present
Updated June 2015
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UNIT 2
Unit 2: Struggles and Injustice (Change): The nature of communities generates struggle and injustice. Students will learn
about societal struggles and injustice by interacting with a variety of texts. Students will continue to explore the concept of
change in communities and develop their abilities to analyze, recognize, and apply argumentative and persuasive
techniques.
Change is a conceptual unit in GT grades 6 – 8.
6th: Change in Self
7th: Change in Others (Community)
8th: Change in the World
Essential Question for Change: How does the study of societal struggles and persuasive texts from history inform our ability
to bring about change?
Enduring Understandings
Guiding Questions
Change (GT)
How does change apply to all areas of our community?
What are some changes that are universal?
Change is linked to time.
How is change in communities linked to time?
How does the passage of time affect how we perceive change?
Change can be perceived as random or orderly.
How can change be predicted?
How is change unpredictable?
Change may represent growth and development or regression and
What is progress?
decay.
How is progress culturally defined?
How is change cyclical?
How does decay fuel growth?
Change may happen naturally or be caused by individuals or groups.
What influence do people have over changes in communities/nature?
What influence does nature have over changes in communities?
Struggles and Injustice (ELA)
Struggle and injustice are inherent in society.
How does society allow injustices to occur?
Change is pervasive (everywhere).
Groups or individuals can perpetuate or eliminate an injustice in
society through the use of persuasion.
Updated June 2015
How does society strive to overcome struggles and injustice?
How might struggles be both beneficial and/or detrimental?
What is the difference between argument and persuasion?
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Concept
Struggles and injustice as a catalyst for
change
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GT
Teacher manual for College of William and
Mary Persuasion unit
Selected texts from the College of William
and Mary Persuasion student booklet (such
as, “The Declaration of Independence,”
“March on Washington Address,” “The
Valiant,” and “The Velvet Hangover”
Suggested novels from the College of William
and Mary Persuasion curriculum (such as, The
Secret of Gumbo Grove, Taking Sides, and
Dragonwings [This is approved for 6th grade
ELA but can be offered as a choice in 7th.])
Self-Evident Truth Series: Statements of
Equality (Royal Fireworks Press)
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ELA
Farewell to Manzanar by Jeanne
Houston
Endless Steppe by Esther Hautzig
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred
Taylor
“All Together Now” PH p. 618
“Abraham, Martin, and John” PH p. 773
Written by Michael Clay Thompson: Jefferson’s
Truths, Free At Last, Lincoln’s Ten Sentences
Written by Thomas Milton Kemnitz: An Issue The
Nation Cannot Ignore: Barack Obama’s Speech on
Race
Possible Classroom Applications
*See shared digital content for suggested implementations and resources
Selected activities from College of William and Mary Persuasion unit
Debate
Write a persuasive text modeled on a well-known text (ex, Declaration of Independence)
Use primary source documents to better understand the historical setting of curricular texts
Begin independent research (particularly if competing in National History Day)
Updated June 2015
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UNIT 3
Unit 3: Triumph Over Trial (including Research): Students will examine how individuals triumph over their trials through
reading a variety of texts. Students will gather, analyze, and evaluate primary and secondary sources, synthesize
information and ideas from complex texts, generate and support claim(s), and develop a product appropriate to task,
purpose, and audience.
Essential Question for Research: Why is a deep understanding of texts, their origins, and their credibility important?
Enduring Understandings
Guiding Questions
Research (GT)
Diverse, high-quality sources are crucial to meaningful research and a
What makes a primary source relevant?
multi-faceted understanding of a topic.
How do researchers evaluate and use primary and secondary sources
differently?
What is the value of considering wide and balanced sources?
Research is a complex, ever-changing process that requires monitoring
and adjusting.
What makes a question worthy of investigation?
How do researchers trouble-shoot to overcome obstacles in their
process?
How can you reconcile conflicting information and diverse
interpretations?
A high-quality product shows the significance of findings within
What is historical context?
historical context.
How can you use your product to demonstrate historical context?
How does your product meet the expectations of the task, purpose,
and audience?
Triumph Over Trial (ELA)
External conflicts help build qualities a character or individual
How can external circumstances cause internal change?
possesses.
Can all conflicts be resolved? Why/why not?
How do individuals demonstrate perseverance?
Concept
Research (content, process, and
product)
Updated June 2015
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GT
National History Day materials
(National Site www.nhd.org)
ELA
Primary focus is on GT research component.
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Triumph and Trial in Literature
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(State Site http://history.idaho.gov/nationalhistory-day-idaho)
Library of Congress sources
National Archives Docs Teach sources
(docsteach.org)
The Big 6 Research Process (see The Big 6: The
Definitive Big6 Workshop Handbook by
Michael B. Eisenberg and Robert E. Berkowitz)
“To Build a Fire” by Jack London
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The Call of the Wild by Jack London
“Lather and Nothing Else” PH p. 491
“The Cremation of Sam McGee” PH p.
736
Possible Classroom Applications
*See shared digital content for suggested implementations and resources
National History Day Competition
In NHD, students select a historical topic related to the annual theme, conduct extensive primary and secondary research, and present their findings and analysis in the form
of an exhibit, documentary, performance, website, or essay. Regional competition is held late February or early March.
Creative Problem–Solving
Independent Research
Flow Theory (The Call of the Wild)
Survival - themed texts and resources
Comparison/discussion/reading on historical time period of literature
Use “To Build a Fire” to introduce themes and review literary terms and concepts before reading The Call of the Wild
Literary analysis in the form of graphic organizer
Socratic seminar
Updated June 2015
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UNIT 4
Unit 4: Beyond Boundaries: Students will use texts to understand the nature of systems and order. This exploration allows
students to use innovation and creativity to go beyond boundaries.
Essential Question Beyond Boundaries: How do systems balance stability and innovation?
Enduring Understandings
Guiding Questions
Systems and Order (GT)
Order can determine the stability and/or predict the success of a
What defines order within a system?
system.
What defines stability?
How can literature be defined as a system?
Beyond Boundaries (ELA)
Reading and writing expands imagination and encourages innovation.
How does literature expand imagination and encourage innovation?
Writers create worlds where the unknown can be explored.
In what ways can writers create worlds where the unknown can be
explored?
Literature is a reflection of the society in which we live.
In what ways is literature (fiction and nonfiction) a reflection of our
society?
How does science fiction provide social commentary?
Concept
Systems and Order
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Beyond Boundaries
Updated June 2015
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GT
College of William and Mary unit Threads of
Change in the 19th Century American
Literature
College of William and Mary unit The 1940’s:
A Decade of Change
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night
Shakespeare’s As You Like It
See LCMS Futuristics Unit in shared digital
content
 Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night
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ELA
“Rip Van Winkle” PH p. 144
“The Blind Men and the Elephant” PH p.
422
“The Creativity Crisis” (online article by
Newsweek)
“The Night the Bed Fell” PH p. 279
“Sonnet 130” (find online)
“The Charge of the Light Brigade” p. 230
“The Monsters are Due on Maple Street”
PH p. 696
“All Summer in a Day” PH p. 288
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Shakespeare’s As You Like It
College of William and Mary unit Utopia
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“Zoo” PH p. 418
“The Third Level” PH p. 50
Possible Classroom Applications
*See shared digital content for suggested implementations and resources
Analyze science fiction for social commentary (particularly “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street”)
Compare and contrast text and film versions (Twilight Zone versions of “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street, readings of Sonnet 130 by
different readers on YouTube, and video versions of “The Charge of the Light Brigade”)
Word studies (Shakespeare’s word innovations)
Dramatic performance(s)
Shakespeare’s ability to balance stability with innovation (ex, style, theme, structure)
Read widely on futuristic predictions of societal elements/infrastructure and evaluate which will be the most successful
Reading and analysis of well-known, influential authors and stories, including Socratic Seminar opportunities
Updated June 2015