What Are Content Standards?

Content Standards, aka Standards define what a student should know and be able to do at the end of each grade level in every subject. They explain the knowledge, concepts, and skills that students should acquire at each grade level. Standards do not define all that can or should be taught; they simply outline end-of-year expectations. For example: In science, a student should be able to develop a simple model that mimics the function of an animal dispersing seeds or pollinating plants by the end of 2nd grade.

What Are Performance Standards?

Performance Standards are the standards all students are expected to learn and be assessed on through the district assessment system. They specify the specific degree of understanding or demonstration of the knowledge and/or skill for a particular content standard. As such, it employs clear action verbs and describes “how good is good enough.” Districts are expected to give students multiple opportunities to demonstrate proficiency on the Performance Standards and provide appropriate supports for student success.

What Are Extended Standards?

The Wyoming Extended Standards (WYES) are extensions of the Wyoming Content Standards and provide an outline of academic content expectations for students with significant cognitive disabilities. They are designed to help teachers provide meaningful access to state academic content standards for instruction, while allowing students to make progress in grade-level content by maintaining rigor and high expectations. The Extended Standards ensure all students with cognitive disabilities are provided with multiple ways to learn and demonstrate knowledge.

Which Subjects Are Tied to State Standards?

In Wyoming, there are currently 10 content areas: science, mathematics, language arts, health, fine & performing arts, physical education, social studies, career & vocational education, foreign language, and computer science. Each content area has its own set of standards. The Wyoming Department of Education has a page dedicated to the Current Wyoming Content and Performance Standards, wherein Standards are available as Microsoft Excel files.

The current Wyoming Content and Performance Standards for each individual grade level in grades K-6 are now available. These grade-level standards documents show the currently adopted standards in all 10 content areas for parents and educators.

• Kindergarten Standards (2022)

• Grade 1 Standards (2022)

• Grade 2 Standards (2022)

• Grade 3 Standards (2022)

• Grade 4 Standards (2022)

• Grade 5 Standards (2022)

• Grade 6 Standards (2022)

• Grade 7 Math Standards (2021)

• Grade 8 Math Standards (2021)

• Middle School ELA Standards (2012)

• High School Math Standards (2021)

• High School ELA Standards (2012)

• High School Science Standards (2021)

• K-12 Social Studies Standards (2018)

Updated Summer of 2024