Curriculum, After School Changes At Mahwah's Elementary Schools This Year

Mahwah’s elementary school students, and their parents, can expect some new additions to the curriculum this year, according to Betsy Ross Principal Christine Zimmermann.

Zimmermann, whose move from Lenape added curriculum coordination to her job description, says improvements are coming to both the English and mathematics courses in elementary schools across the district.

Third graders will be introduced to Word Wisdom, which she called “a new vocabulary development program.”

“A revised and expanded version of Everyday Math that is aligned with the new national Common Core Standards will be implemented,” Zimmermann said.

The new standards are focused on “clarity and specificity,” in an effort to increase mathematics scores in the US, according to the Common Core’s website.

“This summer, our math specialists worked with colleagues from other districts and representatives from the NJ State Department of Education to revise our math curriculum in order to match the new standards.”

For both math and language arts classes, the district will focus more on teaching kids in small, targeted groups, rather than large class settings.

“Small group instruction (SGI) and In-class replacement (ICR) in language arts and math classes will allow for more flexible groupings of students and instruction targeted to address specific student learning needs,” Zimmermann said.

A streamlining may also take place after school at Betsy, Lenape, GW, and Joyce Kilmer.

At the last board of education meeting, the district’s business administrator Ed Deptula mentioned that after-school activities offered at the elementary schools, like cooking, sewing, and others, may not be as regulated as they need to be.

The programs, many of which are operated by “third party vendors,” have not been strictly overseen by the central administration, he said. Some are run by HSOs, but others are not, and Deptula expressed concerns about finance reporting, insurance, and other considerations from those groups.

“There just needs to be a tightening up of how these are run,” he said.

“So, we are going to be looking at that very carefully in weeks to come.”