Curriculum and Instruction
The South San Francisco Unified School District (SSFUSD) curriculum is intended to cultivate intellectually curious and independent learners. The district provides strong teaching and professional staff, who work hard to provide SSFUSD students with a comprehensive, rigorous, and relevant PreK-12 curriculum.
As students progress through this curriculum, the district strives to provide them with appropriate support to help them achieve their fullest potential. SSFUSD believes this is particularly important during students’ elementary years, when foundations for learning are established in preparation for the rigors and challenges offered at the secondary level. Accordingly, two major hallmarks of SSFUSD’s educational program, beginning in the elementary years, are smaller class sizes and strong support services and enrichment programs. Later years’ efforts build on this base.
Central to curriculum development at SSFUSD is the belief that children learn at different rates, and that individual mastery can occur at different points in a continuum of skill development. Understanding and mastery are preceded by introduction, guided practice, and reinforcement followed by review, further reinforcement, and opportunities for independent, consistent application. This model of learning ensures that every student has many opportunities to learn and develop each skill.
Another important component of SSFUSD's curriculum is the emphasis on critical thinking: learning when and how to apply the aforementioned skills. SSFUSD teachers and professional staff help students develop a solid foundation of skills by exposing them to a variety of information, material, and concepts and then introduce them to a variety of strategies to apply and synthesize what they learn in school to the world around them.
State Curriculum and Content Standards
The California Department of Education (CDE), which is governed by the State Board of Education, defines subject-matter content areas and sets content standards for each area. These standards provide the blueprints for curriculum frameworks, which CDE reviews and revises every eight years.
South San Francisco Unified School District (SSFUSD) has based its core instruction on California's Common Core English/Language Arts, Common Core Mathematics, History-Social Science, and Next Generation Science standards. These standards provide clear expectations for what students need to know and be able to demonstrate in each subject area and at each grade level.
The district has also continued to refine and develop standards in other subjects including Physical Education, Visual and Performing Arts, World Languages, and Career Technical Education.