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Respond to the prompt and add your name.

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Respond to the prompt and add your name.

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PROMPT:

As you think about the elementary lessons and units in your classroom, grade level, or building, what ideas does this redesign example give you?

Example Response:

Shannon Quandahl

The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me view some of my lessons through a different lens. I appreciate that I don't have to scrap my lessons but instead look for a shift that can make the lesson different for students (deeper cognitive load, higher levels of engagement, greater joy in learning).

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This is the book I'm reading this year. Comes with a study guide.

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Depth and Complexity has transformed the way educators challenge students to think, and now you can master it with confidence.

After years of using the framework in their own classrooms, writing extensively about it, and leading hundreds of hours of professional development, Ian Byrd and Lisa Van Gemert have created the ultimate teacher's guide to Depth and Complexity.

Inside, you'll find 27 practical, easy-to-digest chapters that show you exactly how to:

Use the framework in real classrooms across grade levels and subjects

Navigate common challenges, from early elementary to lesson planning

Adapt Depth and Complexity to fit your unique teaching style

Take your practice further than you thought possible without the overwhelm

More than a how-to manual, this book is a mentor on your shelf , equipping you with both the "why" and the "how" of Depth and Complexity. Whether you're brand new or already using it, you'll discover fresh insights, clarity, and the confidence to make it your own.

By the end, you won't just know Depth and Complexity. You'll know how to make it work for you, your students, and your classroom.

The Gifted Guild's Guide to Depth and Complexity is the tool you need to take your teaching and your students' thinking to the next level.

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Gifted Guild's Guide to Depth and Complexity: Finding Your Way Through the Framework

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Amazon.com: Gifted Guild's Guide to Depth and Complexity: Finding Your Way Through the Framework: 9781700076519: Byrd, Ian, Van Gemert, Lisa: Books

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Kelly Johnson

The Deeper Thinking & Learning shift helped me realize I can take something I'm already doing and help students engage more fully and deeply with the content. This writing lesson is already one students enjoy, but they really liked the added storytelling as a whole group as well as with a partner. They asked to do it again next week! It was a really great way to get them on board right away, engaging with the subject matter in a meaningful way, and set the stage for the rest of the lesson content.

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Annika Krieg

I think this shift has specifically reminded me to look at all my lessons through a lense of reflection and what I can build on/change for the next time I may teach on similar skills. The lesson I chose focuses on the skills of finding the main idea and giving supportive details to support reasoning. I am excited for my students to do the first lesson and then build off of those same concepts on a deeper level for the redesign lesson after getting feedback from my PLC.

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Sarah Schacherer

This shift was a good reminder that my students are capable of so much. It has reminded me that I can use my current lessons, but to push my students to do more. Despite my students being young, they can think at high levels and make big decisions in how they learn.

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This Deeper Thinking and Learning Reflection helped me truly see how excited kids were to participate when I used their language in saying they would become "influencers" and allowed them to bring technology and their own creativity into the lesson. I feel there are several concepts that I teach that could become much more meaningful to students with this added approach. I am also excited to continue brainstorming other ways I can bring technology and student voice into into my lessons as it was so fun to see so much enthusiasm from two very "hard to reach" students. :)

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This Deeper Thinking and Learning shift reminded me how important it is to give my students time to think more deeply about a topic or lesson. It also reinforced the value of productive struggle. I liked that I didn’t have to come up with something completely new—I could take something I was already doing and help the kids dig deeper. The students really enjoyed creating their books in Book Creator, and I found their comments to be thoughtful. They were even able to come up with strategies for their classmates to flip their thinking, which was fantastic to see.

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It had me looking at ways to allow my students to think deeper about their learning and how I can use our technology to support that deeper thinking.

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It has allowed me to push students to think deeper about their learning, make connections, and practice utilizing different aspects of technology.

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This course has made me think about how I can use technology to assist my students with deeper thinking. I used SeeSaw to enhance the student's learning about Holidays around the World.

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This course had me take a different approach to ways in which I could add more technology and deeper thinking into my day.

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This course has helped me think deeper about how I teach units in kindergarten. Using technology helps students take their learning one step further compared to day to day paper pencil activities.

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This shift made me think about how I could use deeper thinking and reflection with students in art to write artist statements. I don't want to focus too much on technology usage in my classroom, because I want students to be using physical materials. However, we could use it to expand on things we are already doing (reflecting on our work) or using, like Artsonia (where I upload their artwork).

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The redesign reminds me to keep focusing on deeper learning in the classroom; giving students time and encouragment to engage more deeply with the material. And how easy it is to take something I'm already doing and switch it up. My new and improved "Critical Thinking when Using Digital Sources" lesson must have sunk in -- I had a parent mention to me how they appreciated the lesson for their student.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me take lessons I am already teaching and make them more engaging while encouraging students to think at a deeper level. Through this shift, I realized that I don’t need to completely create new lessons or start from scratch. Instead, I can enhance existing lessons by including technology. The Balloons Over Broadway activity was a fun and meaningful way to boost our learning, allowing students to apply creativity, problem-solving and deeper thinking while staying connected to the original lesson goals.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me to strengthen my lessons by using what I am already doing instead of thinking to replace my ideas completely. I see that I can make my ideas more engaging without starting over. This learning helped me to think about ways to deepen student thinking while sticking to my original goals. The Balloons Over Broadway activity was super engaging for students! We were able to think about creation in connection to what thousands of people experience in NYC!

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me to think about lessons in a different way. I was relieved to learn that I don't have to completely start from scratch, but rather I can instead improve an "old" lesson by making it more engaging, and encourage the students to think more deeply about the work they are doing. Our lesson for "Balloons Over Broadway" was a pretty doable shift to implement. I liked that it was something we were able to do in 1-2 lessons; it wasn't a week long project that we had to take on in order to make this shift. I'm already thinking about future lessons that I can shift too!

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me make learning more engaging. The redesign shows how moving away from passive tasks toward meaningful, student-centered work increases ownership and motivation. Students are not just completing assignments but actively thinking, questioning, and creating.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has rereminded about other lesson design strategies such as backwards design. Too often, I'm just trying to get through content instead of having students engaging deeply with the content. I appreciated how I was able to zoom in on a specific lesson and tweak it just a bit to not only use more technology in the lesson, but to also use higher order thinking skills such as synthesizing and analyzing. It felt very doable and led to higher student engagement and collaboration.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has reminded me that I can take a general lesson that I've taught for years and redesign it making it more engaging for students through adding technology. The students were excited to learn about and use Book Creator as a technological tool and enjoyed watching themselves in the class book where they each shared their favorite sport. They were also able to reflect and make connections to others based on their favorite sports. It provided a meaningful and deeper-level thinking extension to an otherwise basic lesson.

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I was able to quickly realize that students are much more engaged with technology when they have more flexibility in the final product. When it is a typical cut and glue craft where the teacher gives the example and everyone's final product looks similar, they do take much ownership in the topic. I believe due to that, they are less likely to have a deeper understanding of the intended topic. With my lesson, we learned the topic and had a chance to get broad guidelines and they had the freedom to create what they felt would show their deeper understanding of the intended lesson. Moving forward, I would like to try to included this with as many lessons as possible because the students can truly show what they know instead of making a 'cute craft/activity'.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has reminded me of how much students are capable of doing and learning. They can be incredibly creative when they are engaged in their learning. Students thrive when given ownership and choice.

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Sarah Carlson

The shift made me think about how I can use technology to make my lessons more engaging and meaningful. Most students were able to show show their learning at a deeper level, while practicing different technology skills. Students that don't normally enjoy responding to a story with paper and pencil were motivated to responding using the app.

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Sarah Brynsaas

This lesson encouraged me to find ways to incorporate technology into my lessons and see how that technology can support deeper thinking.  I used Book Creator to enhance a literacy lesson. Students were able to show their learning and understanding at a deeper level.

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Carrie Nimrod

The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift allowed students to use technology rather than paper and pencil to complete their lesson in a new way. We use Seesaw for mostly math exit tickets, so students needed lots of reminders of how to accomplish the aspects and may need more practice recording themselves.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me to think about lessons in a different way. It has made me think about how to use technology to assist my students with showing what they learned through Book Creator instead of writing on paper with a pencil. I used Book Creator to enhance our animal research.

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Using Book Creator to create animal research books increased student engagement and ownership of learning. Students enjoyed combining text, images, and recordings, which supported different learning styles and helped them better organize and present their research. The ability to easily revise their work encouraged deeper thinking and improvement. In the future, I would like to expand this project by adding peer feedback, collaborative books, and opportunities for students to present their books to an authentic audience, such as families or other classes, to further strengthen communication and digital literacy skills.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has allowed me to see how much the students already know. It has allowed me to look at my current lessons and reflect on how I can incorporate technology. Using Book Creator as a way to finish their research project was so exciting for the students.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me to think about lessons in a different way. It has made me think about how to use technology to assist my students with showing what they learned through Book Creator instead of writing on paper with a pencil. I used Book Creator to enhance our animal research. This strengthens communication and digital literacy skills.

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This shift changed my thinking by helping me see how technology could support and enhance what I do in intervention. Implementing the Digital Learner app with an intervention group gave students opportunities for extra practice with the phonics skill through interactive activities and served as an extended resource from our decodable book collection, providing additional texts that reinforced the same skills. It also reminded me to think about ways for my students to use deeper thinking and make their learning more meaningful, building both confidence and independence as readers.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me think about how I can enhance writing time with students. Using Book Creator for animal research has been a fun way for students to share their research with others.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me to think about technology integration in a more productive way to help students think at higher levels, make deeper connections, and be more engaged. I used book creator instead of students using paper and pencil to share their animal research project. It strengthened their communication skills and allows them to share their work more widely.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has made me think about lessons with a different lens. It has provided a way to use technology, like Book Creator, to enhance lessons and students writing projects. Students are able to showcase their understanding and learning through the digital platform.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning shift has made me view technology as a tool for thinking, not just for practice. In my first grade classroom, students can use technology to explain their thinking, create, and reflect on their learning. Technology also allows students to collaborate, revisit their work, and receive feedback, which encourages reflection and growth. I can embed technology into daily routines in purposeful ways to encourage deeper thinking and learning during my ELA lessons.

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The Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has helped me to think about how to go about designing lessons in more engaging ways. In focusing on the student agency shift, it made me reflect on ways that I can give more ownership to my students as they are learning new concepts and ideas in Coding class. Seeing my students engage in a deeper level of learning through authentic opportunities to both practice and demonstrate their knowledge is invaluable.

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The “Treasure Transport Challenge” shows how to make lessons more fun and student-centered. Students work together, make choices, and solve problems as a team instead of just doing relays. It builds teamwork, creativity, and communication while keeping students active and engaged.

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Deeper Thinking & Learning Reflection - Michaela Seeman

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Deeper Thinking & Learning Reflection - Michaela Seeman

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The Deeper Thinking & Learning shift has helped me to think of ways that I can use lessons that I've used in the past and extend them to help students think more deeply and have a higher level of engagement with the material. I also have enjoyed being able to have time to talk through ideas, brainstorm with my PLC, and try out some of those ideas.

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Deeper Thinking &                        Learning Reflection                                               John Hines 

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Deeper Thinking &                        Learning Reflection                                               John Hines 

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The Deeper Thinking & Learning Reflection shift allowed the opportunity to watch my students use their voices and creativity during the activity. Although it got a bit off task and silly at times it was still more engaging for the students. It reminded a lot of my old Team Building unit that I used to do when I had the time and space to do so. Overall it was good reminder and experience.

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Deeper Thinking & Learning Reflection Sara Blake 

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Deeper Thinking & Learning Reflection Sara Blake 

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The deeper thinking & learning shift has made me rethink how I am asking questions to my students. I have been able to change from just asking the question and expecting a verbal response to asking the question and providing photos/choices to help with the response from the students.

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This section : Deeper Thinking and Learning Shift has brought to my attention how much our students are truly capable of.

When given opportunities they are very creative, which often helps with their engagement in assignments or tasks.

This autonomy allows the student to find their own value in the work they are doing and get more from the given tasks.

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Deeper Thinking and the performance task

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Deeper Thinking and the performance task

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Instead of presenting their report to the class or the grade in a museum-type event, students will demonstrate their understanding of their subject by sharing a few fun facts.  The technology that will be used is through Canva. The students will be recording themselves and creating a QR code to present with their reports. In order to do this, they must analyze the information about their subject to choose facts that are core to who that person was.  They must be able to evaluate the contributions that their subject has made to history and prioritize the many facts that they come across. They will reframe the subject's essence in 3 short but essential facts.

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The redesign example made me reflect on my lesson to dive into best teaching practices. Asking further questions such as what do students need? How can I help students who are not getting it? How can I get more creativity into class

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We could extend the use of taking pictures to other objectives such as numbers of items or beginning sounds. We could turn our photos into a book and students could help write or type using invented spelling or dictate words for the pages.

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I used this shift to rethink how I can foster more independence in how students provide information for IEP meetings. I'm hoping this redesign will help students to think more about the way they engage with their learning and reflect on the areas that are strengths and their own preferences about how they learn in class.

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Erika Bruess

The redesign process gave me valuable insight into how I can take a lesson I've taught before and transform it into something more meaningful and engaging for students. Our team focused on a "Balloons Over Broadway" lesson we have taught in the past. By shifting from paper-and-pencil float designs to Google Slides, students had the opportunity to problem-solve and explore technology in fresh ways.

What excited me most was seeing how this change opened new possibilities for peer interaction. Students could now engage with each other's projects in ways that simply weren't possible with static paper creations.