# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
This collection holds materials from the Education Alliance at Brown University. The Education Alliance was a reform support organization committed to advancing equitable educational opportunities that prepare all student populations to succeed in the 21st century. From 1975-2021, the Alliance partnered with schools, districts and state departments of education to apply research findings in developing solutions to educational challenges. Its mission was to enhance learning for culturally and linguistically diverse students and focused on district and school improvement with special attention to underperformance and issues of equity and diversity. DOI: https://doi.org/10.26300/7eez-dz04

The Education Alliance archived website can be found here

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Brown Digital Repository | Collection | The Education ...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This collection holds materials from the Education Alliance at Brown University. The Education Alliance was a reform support organization committed to advancing equitable educational opportunities that prepare all student populations to succeed in the 21st century. From 1975-2021, the Alliance partnered with schools, districts and state departments of education to apply research findings in developing solutions to educational challenges.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Over the past few decades, students, their experiences, upbringings, and backgrounds have changed. Classrooms now reflect families of varying races, cultures, and socioeconomic statuses. As a result, the way teachers educate these students must change, too, says Cherese Childers-McKee, assistant teaching professor in Northeastern University's College of Professional Studies. One of these shifting approaches to education is known as culturally responsive teaching.

Below, we explore the concept of culturally responsive teaching, compare it against traditional teaching models, and offer a number of strategies that you can use to incorporate the approach into your own methods.

Download Our Free Guide to Earning Your EdD

Learn how an EdD can give you the skills to enact organizational change in any industry.

What is culturally responsive teaching?

Culturally responsive teaching, also called culturally relevant teaching, is a pedagogy that recognizes the importance of including students' cultural references in all aspects of learning. Traditional teaching strategies emphasize the teacher-student dynamic: The teacher is the expert and adheres strictly to the curriculum that supports standardized tests while the student receives the knowledge. This teaching method is outdated, Childers-McKee says.

"Teachers have more diverse classrooms today. We don't have students sitting in front of us with the same background or experience, so instruction has to be different," she says. "It needs to build on individual and cultural experiences and their prior knowledge. It needs to be justice-oriented and reflect the social context we're in now. That's what we mean when we talk about culturally responsive teaching."

Culturally Responsive vs. Traditional Teaching Methods

Culturally responsive teaching can manifest in a number of ways. Using traditional teaching methods, educators may default to teaching literature by widely accepted classic authors: William Shakespeare, J.D. Salinger, and Charles Dickens, for example, adhering to widely accepted interpretations of the text.

Culturally responsive teaching, on the other hand, acknowledges that there's nothing wrong with traditional texts, Childers-McKee says, but strives to include literature from other cultures, parts of the world, and by diverse authors. It also focuses on finding a "hook and anchor" to help draw students into the content using their past experiences.

"This way, students can see themselves in some of what they're reading and not just the white, western world. The learning is more experimental, more hands-on," she says. "Instead, you're showing them a worldwide, multicultural community and looking for different interpretations while relating it to what it means for society today."

Why is culturally responsive teaching important?

Culturally responsive teaching is especially pertinent today because the traditional education path from school to college to a career and life in the suburbs isn't a reality-or desire-for everyone, Childers-McKee says. Educators' approaches to teaching need to reflect these differences.

"That typical, mainstream education is not addressing the realities of today's students. Culturally responsive teaching isn't just for those students who don't come from white, middle-class, English-speaking families-it's an important teaching strategy for everyone. When done the right way, it can be transformative."

When integrated into classroom instruction, culturally responsive strategies can have important benefits such as:

Strengthening students' sense of identity

Promoting equity and inclusivity in the classroom

Engaging students in the course material

Supporting critical thinking

Here's a look at five culturally responsive teaching strategies all educators can employ in their classrooms.

5 Culturally Responsive Teaching Strategies for Educators

1. Activate students' prior knowledge.

Students are not blank slates, Childers-McKee says; they enter the classroom with diverse experiences. Teachers should encourage students to draw on their prior knowledge in order to contribute to group discussions, which provides an anchor to learning. Taking a different approach to the literature that's taught in classrooms is one example of this.

2. Make learning contextual.

Tie lessons from the curriculum to the students' social communities to make it more contextual and relevant, Childers-McKee advises. "If you're reading a chapter in history class, for example, discuss why it matters today, in your school, or in your community," she says. "Take the concept you're learning about and create a project that enables them to draw parallels."

3. Encourage students to leverage their cultural capital.

Because not all students come from the same background, it's important to encourage those who don't to have a voice. Say, for example, you teach an English class that contains ESL students. It's important to find ways to activate the experiences they do have-their cultural capital, Childers-McKee says.

The teacher may choose a book for the class to read in which the ESL students could relate and feel like they could be the expert, for instance. As a teacher, Childers-Mckee's once chose a book that told the story of a child of migrant workers because some of her students came from an agricultural background.

"When you have a mixed classroom, you want those in the minority to feel like they are an expert. You want to draw from their experiences," she says. "I do caution that you don't want to cross a line and make 'Johnny' feel like he needs to speak for all Mexican people by putting them on the spot, for example. That's a line you need to walk."

4. Reconsider your classroom setup.

Take inventory of the books in your classroom library: Do they include authors of diverse races? Is the LGBTQ community represented? Do the books include urban families or only suburban families? Beyond your classroom library, consider the posters you display on your walls and your bulletin boards, too. "These are all small changes you can make to your classroom more culturally responsive," Childers-McKee says.

5. Build relationships.

Not all students want to learn from all teachers because the teachers may not make them feel like they're valued, Childers-McKee says. Teachers need to work to build relationships with their students to ensure they feel respected, valued, and seen for who they are. Building those relationships helps them build community within the classroom and with each other, which is extremely important, she says.

"When we think about culture and diversity, people often automatically think about black students, but people need to think broader than that, now," Childers-McKee says. "Some teachers whose students are all white and middle-class struggle with how culturally responsive teaching strategies apply to them. It's equally important for them to teach students about diversity. These aren't just teaching strategies for minorities, they're good teaching strategies for everyone."

Educating for the Future

Educators have the unique power to impact the lives of their learners. Making use of thoughtful, inclusive instruction can have positive effects on students that last far beyond their time in the classroom.

Employing culturally responsive teaching strategies is a small step toward enacting meaningful change in education. If you're interested in leading your organization toward positive change on a larger scale, earning an advanced degree is one way to gain the necessary knowledge and skills to do so.

Pursuing a degree, such as a Doctor of Education , will empower you to address the challenges currently facing education and improve the learning experience. Students of the program work with industry-aligned faculty on real-world organizational issues, allowing them to have an immediate impact on their professional environments.
To learn more about how an EdD can further your career while improving students' educational experiences, explore Northeastern's Doctor of Education program page, or download our free guide below.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Culturally Responsive Teaching: 5 Strategies for Educators

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Culturally responsive teaching values students' cultural references in all aspects of learning. Here are five strategies to bring to the classroom.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
If you really want to see how innovative a school is, inquire about its thinking and practices regarding assessment. For the students, does the mere thought of assessment trigger stress? Do the teachers rely heavily on high-stakes, multiple-choice, Bell Curve-generating tests? Or do the students seem relaxed and engaged as teachers experiment with new forms of assessment designed to support deep and lasting learning?

Clearly, there continues to be a place for traditional assessments of learning that prepare students for standardized tests such as ERBs, AP exams, SATs, and college midterm exams. However, we believe that independent schools, unrestrained from the chains of public education policies, can take on an important leadership role in transforming K-12 assessments from a mere measure of short-term learning to a crucial component of the teaching and learning process. In this system of assessment, learning becomes personalized, encouraging students to adopt a mindset focused on discovery and engagement rather than grades and test scores. Most important, in such a system, the sharp lines between teaching, learning, and testing diminish.

This shift in thinking about assessment is a central issue for all schools. As the research strongly suggests, when students focus on mastery of learning rather than on their performance on tests, they significantly increase their intrinsic motivation for learning.

New forms of assessment can be found in an increasing number of independent schools today. One example is in a 10th-grade United States History class at St. Andrew's Episcopal School (Maryland) taught by coauthor Glenn Whitman. Instead of offering students a typical final exam, Glenn offers them a choice: "What type of final exam would help you to best demonstrate what you have learned in this class?" Based on their reflection, students select the format of their final exam. The more traditional and familiar option allows students to sit for two hours and complete an array of multiple-choice, document-analysis, historical-geography, and free-response questions. The alternative option is to complete what Glenn calls the "Historian's Head" ¹ - a collage of images and scholarly narratives that respond to the essential questions of the course.

In any given year, 60 to 80 percent of the students choose the assessment that asks them to demonstrate their understanding through images and scholarly narratives - even though this alternative is more demanding when it comes to higher-order thinking and executive functioning skills. It is also more time intensive. So why do so many students choose this option?

Here is what a few representative students have said:

I function better on projects than on tests because I do not work well under time constraints. In a two-hour exam, I get too stressed and I take too long on one answer. With the project, I am not timed and therefore I will not be stressed.

My primary reason for creating a "head" over a traditional exam is because it will allow me to be creative and use my knowledge in a different way besides memorizing what I have to know. Also I will be able to dedicate more time to it than I would to studying for an exam.

I chose this option over the regular exam because it has an artistic element to it and we are able to spend more time on it that enables a process of deeper thinking in contrast to the quick memorization that would be necessary for the traditional fi nal.

The journey to designing this assessment has been long. Not surprising, when Glenn first began his independent school teaching career in 1991, his assessments looked a lot like those he experienced as a student. And while instinct and intuition, and student feedback, suggested that there must be a better way to measure student understanding, ultimately the growing body of research in educational neuroscience became the game changer for his 10th-grade history final exam.

The field of educational neuroscience is still quite young - converging developmental psychology, cognitive science, and education. While some of its initial findings merely support what educators have intuitively believed, it is also challenging many assumptions and providing new insight into best educational practices, especially regarding assessment.

What we do know is that a plethora of assessment-related research has shed light not just on the importance of students' mindsets, but also on the importance of continual feedback and how active retrieval of information (memorization recall), in carefully spaced intervals, can produce long-lasting learning. Research also shows that providing students with assessment choice enhances attention and engagement - and confirms that the arts can help deepen long-term memory consolidation. ² These latter points were instrumental in driving the changes to Glenn's 10th-grade history final exam.

Specifically, the following research is helping to change our understanding of the correlation between teaching and learning - and altering our approaches to student assessment.

Mindsets: Performance vs. Mastery Goals

Research on the connection between motivation and learning has focused on two types of mindsets that students develop, based on the kind of experiences (including assessments) we present them with in school. Students tend to develop either performance-related goals or mastery goals. ³

Performance-related goals are those that are linked to more traditional types of assessments. Students become motivated by the grades they achieve, their rankings compared with other students, and extrinsic rewards such as honor rolls or school awards. In contrast, students who develop mastery goals are motivated by the actual learning experiences. Their rewards arise from the challenges of acquiring and applying new knowledge and skills.

While students may possess a combination of both types of goals, those motivated primarily by performance goals tend to lose motivation and confidence when faced with difficult academic challenges or when set back by failures. In contrast, students who are motivated by mastery goals are more likely to persevere in the face of such challenges. Difficult tasks or setbacks do not diminish their motivation or self-esteem. ⁴ Students with a mastery mindset, similar to those students who described their experiences in the history class at St. Andrew's, are more likely to choose more difficult but rewarding ways to demonstrate learning.

Feedback on Performance

Another focal point of research is the timeliness and method of providing feedback to students. Timely feedback has been shown to deepen one's memory for the material assessed. ⁵ Moreover, in a study comparing immediate versus delayed feedback, the mere anticipation of timely feedback produced better performance. Students who knew that they would get immediate feedback performed better on a task than those who were told that feedback would be delayed. ⁶ Finally, studies suggest that marking answers right or wrong (as in multiple-choice tests) has little effect on learning. However, providing the correct response only after a student has spent time "struggling" to find the correct answer significantly increases retention of the material. ⁷

Researchers have also discovered that the spacing of assessments and feedback produces more effective learning. If students revisit content over carefully spaced intervals, they retain information longer than if presented with information once and then only assessed immediately after initial (short-term) mastery. ⁸

These findings, among others, show us the reciprocal relationship between assessment and learning. Providing timely and effective feedback can improve students' mastery of the content and produce more efficient - and satisfying - learning experiences.

Active Retrieval of Information

A growing body of research suggests that actively retrieving information (self-testing) produces significant long-term benefits for learning compared with passive studying (merely reading one's class notes). ⁹ While any assessment requires some type of active retrieval, having students reconstruct what they know through alternative assessments (as in Glenn's U.S. history class) leads to deeper understanding and consolidates learning in more powerful ways than traditional testing. ¹⁰

Active retrieval is also crucial as students prepare for assessments. Too often, when we ask students to reflect on their study strategies, they say they simply reread class notes. Training students to build regular self-testing into their study strategies will help them embed material into their long-term memory. ¹¹

Students with a mastery mindset... are more likely to choose more difficult but rewarding ways to demonstrate learning.

From Theory to Practice

Moving neuroscientific research on assessment into classroom practice faces two barriers. First, despite the fact that the work of educators targets the organ of learning, the brain, most teachers and school leaders have little understanding of the architecture of the brain and how it receives, filters, and applies information. Second, work that falls under the various versions of "brain-based" is too often believed to be of greatest benefit to struggling learners, those who historically might be called "learning-challenged." Such thinking is shortsighted and fails to recognize the importance of research in educational neuroscience for all students.

Also, it seems that too many parents do not want to believe what K-12 teachers intuitively know: that every student needs help and guidance to meet his or her peak potential. A parent of an Advanced Placement History student recently asked Glenn, "What can educational neuroscience do for my son? He is already getting all A's." This question came at a time in the school year when hundreds of thousands of students were gearing up for AP exams and/or final course exams. These cumulative assessments of learning place intense demands and stress on each student - stress that, research tells us, inhibits optimal learning and demonstration of understanding.

Glenn's response to this AP student's parent came in the form of a question: "What if I told you that the lessons from educational neuroscience research could potentially reduce the number of hours your son spends studying?" This question should pique any parent's interest. Research on multitasking challenges the way most students study today - especially the transaction cost of switching between social media and academic responsibilities. Additionally, research also highlights the importance of active versus passive studying and how crucial sleep is for both resting and learning.

What teachers assess should be what they want students to know, not just for an upcoming test, but also for the long term. And how we assess students has important implications for whether students will retain content or procedural knowledge for the short or long term. Far too often, as neuropsychology professor Tracey Tokuhama-Espinosa points out, "While students manage to keep enough dates, facts, and formulas in their head to pass the test, this knowledge never made it to long-term declarative memory, it was never truly learned at all (only memorized in the short term)." ¹² Research in educational neuroscience, therefore, should not only inform the types of assessments teachers give students but also help shape the strategies students use to prepare for assessments, or to work through projects, which Glenn prefers to call "learning opportunities."

Assessment Tic-Tac-Toe

The following assessment options can be used with middle school and high school students. Assessment Tic-Tac-Toe is designed to offer students options that both play to their strengths and encourage the development of new skills.

During the school year, each student must score tic-tac-toe by choosing a row, column, or diagonal assessment "chain" to be used as a summative assessment for three different units. Students are responsible for creating a grading rubric for each assessment they select as part of their assessment choice.

Podcast

3-D Medium (trifold poster,
diorama)

PowerPoint/Prezi/Keynote
Presentation

Public
Speaking/Oral
Presentation

Free Space (What else is
available that your teacher
has not learned about yet?)

2-D Medium (painting,
drawing, PowerPoint
poster)

How can all this research impact assessment at your school? Think of this as a challenge to teachers to embed richness in assessments - to think about how to foster optimal long-term learning when designing assessments for their classes or for individual students. We recognize that students - all students - have areas of evolving strength and weakness, passion and disinterest. When we get the richness right, we both challenge and support all students. What is important to understand about the human brain is that it changes with experience, a process often referred to as plasticity. When we create rich assessments that require deep thinking and problem solving, teachers are expanding students' cognitive capacities. How exciting to think of teachers as "brain changers."

Every year, we need to assess every student in multiple, developmentally appropriate ways (see sidebar on Assessment Tic-Tac-Toe). This is what differentiated assessment means. Some assessments will play to a student's strengths while others will pose significant challenges; some assessments will, wonderfully, do both.

Another central value of alternative assessments is that they help students learn essential skills for success in today's world - such as critical thinking, problem solving, communication, collaboration, resiliency, and grit. These skills are best developed through a variety of alternative assessments, particularly through project-based learning and design challenges in which "failing forward" - mistakes or failures that lead to breakthroughs, understanding, and student growth - is part of the assessment process. ¹³

Projects enhance student engagement. We also know that when students can own their learning choices, and make an emotional connection to the material, their learning is enhanced. Moreover, when we challenge students to demonstrate their learning in an authentic, purposeful way, they become more engaged in the process and actually learn more. As University of Virginia psychology professor Daniel Willingham points out, "A teacher's goal should always be to get students to think about meaning." ¹⁴ Alternative assessments do just that.

New Thinking at St. Andrew's

Here are some other important, research-informed changes in the ways St. Andrew's teachers think about assessment for their students. Such translation of research to practice further extends the school's highest-achieving students and improves student achievement overall.

Most units begin with a pretest to assess prior knowledge and to be able to measure individual student growth from the beginning to the end of a unit.

Teachers use more formative assessments, such as ungraded (thus low-stress) surprise quizzes, as a self-reflective process for students. Frequent formative assessments, which can be as short as one question, allow students to practice recalling knowledge from their long- and short-term memory. Frequent retrieval of information significantly enhances recall ability. This is called the "testing effect." It is a great way to have students begin or exit a class. And there are technology tools, such as Socrative, designed specifically to help with this process.

Teachers provide students with test-correction opportunities. Delaying or "scaffolding" feedback, and having students struggle with finding the correct answer, leads to better retention than does simply providing correct answers.

In order to help students decide appropriate study strategies, teachers ask them to reflect on what demands - attention, memory, visual thinking, executive functioning, language, neuromotor function, social or higher-order cognition - a particular assessment might be placing on their brains. This process includes providing students an opportunity to reflect - think metacognitively - on their assessment performance, particularly on how well their study strategies worked and how they might study differently in the future.

Teachers share research into the transaction costs associated with multitasking and how limiting the toggling between websites or social media channels while studying can enhance memory consolidation (certainly no easy request of today's students).¹⁵

As designers of their classes, teachers decide the appropriate assessments for a certain body of knowledge or skill. But what research regarding choice and engagement shows is that teachers should also respect the ability of students to make decisions about how they can best demonstrate their understanding (as well as their confusion). That is why it is essential that teachers and educational leaders have ongoing professional development about how the brain learns. The Center for Transformative Teaching & Learning (www.thecttl.org) at St. Andrew's was established to do just this - enhance teacher quality through training in the principles and strategies of neuroeducation.

Recent research on teacher efficacy points to the importance of deepening each teacher's toolkit with a neuroscientific lens into curriculum design and working with every student. ¹⁶ Such research supports the notion that when teachers understand the principles from educational neuroscience, they expand their teaching repertoire, including the ways they measure a student's knowledge, skills, and understanding. Assessments today, therefore, are much broader than what most of us adults experienced in our own academic journeys. And that is a good thing.

Notes

1. The final exam idea was adapted from Jim Percoco's "Historical Head" project in A Passion for the Past: Creative Teaching of U.S. History. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1998.

2. See Mariale Hardiman, The Brain-Targeted Teaching Model for 21st-Century Schools. Thousand Oaks: Corwin Press, 2012.

3. Carole Ames and Jennifer Archer, "Achievement Goals in the Classroom: Students' Learning Strategies and Motivation Process," Journal of Educational Psychology, 80(3) 260-267 (1988).

4. Paul R. Pintrich, "Multiple Goals, Multiple Pathways: The Role of Goal Orientation in Learning and Achievement," Journal of Educational Psychology, 92(3), 544-555 (2000); Heidi Grant and Carol Dweck, "Clarifying Achievement Goals and Their Impact," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85(3), 541-553 (2003).

5. Harold Pashler, Nicholas J. Cepeda, John T. Wixted, and Doug Rohrer, "When Does Feedback Facilitate Learning of Words?" Journal of Experimental Psychology, Learning, Memory and Cognition, 31(1), 3-8 (2005).

6. Keri L. Kettle and Gerald Häubl, "Motivation by Anticipation: Expecting Rapid Feedback Enhances Performance," Psychological Science, 21(4), 545-547 (2010).

7. Lisa K. Fazio, Barbie J. Huelser, Aaron Johnson, and Elizabeth J. Marsh, "Receiving Right/Wrong Feedback: Consequences for Learning," Memory, 18(3), 335-350 (2010).

8. See, for example, Nate Kornell, Alan D. Castel, Teal S. Eich, and Robert A. Bjork, "Spacing as the Friend of Both Memory and Induction in Young and Older Adults," Psychology and Aging, 25(2), 498-503 (2010).

9. See, for example, Jeffrey D. Karpicke and Henry L. Roediger, "The Critical Importance of Retrieval for Learning," Science, 319(5865), 966-968 (2008).

10. Jeffrey D. Karpicke and Janell R. Blunt, "Retrieval Practice Produces More Learning than Elaborative Studying with Concept Mapping," Science, doi:10.1126/science.1199327 (2011).

11. Nate Kornell and Lisa K. Son, "Learners' Choices and Beliefs About Self-Testing," Memory 17(5), 493-501 (2009).

12. Tracey Tokuhama-Espinosa, Mind, Brain, and Education Science: A Comprehensive Guide to the New Brain-Based Teaching. New York: W. W. Norton (2010).

13. See Paul Tough, How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (2013).

14. Daniel Willingham, Why Don't Students Like School? A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions About How the Mind Works and What It Means for the Classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 61 (2009).

15. Eyal Ophir, Clifford Nass, and Anthony D. Wagner, "Cognitive Control in Media Multitaskers," Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (2009).

16. Mariale Hardiman, Luke Rinne, R. John Bull, Emma Gregory, Julia Yarmolinskaya (in review), "How Knowledge of Neuro- and Cognitive Sciences Influences Teaching Practices, Attitudes, and Efficacy Beliefs." Manuscript submitted for publication. R. John Bull, Mariale Hardiman, Luke Rinne, "Professional Development Effects on Teacher Efficacy: Exploring How Knowledge of Neuro- and Cognitive Sciences Changes Beliefs and Practice." Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association conference, San Francisco (2013).
Independent Ideas Blog
Overcoming Negativity Bias with Students, Parents, and Colleagues

Why do we focus on the unpleasant thoughts rather than the positive ones? Here's how our brain works and tips for training it to focus on the good stuff.
Read the Post

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
If you really want to see how innovative a school is, inquire about its thinking and practices regarding assessment. For the students, does the mere thought of assessment trigger stress? Do the teachers rely heavily on high-stakes, multiple-choice, Bell Curve-generating tests?

# data[].attributes.headline
California Virtual College - Online Education Initiative 

# data[].attributes.subject
California Virtual College - Online Education Initiative 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
"The California Community Colleges are at the forefront of online education in California, more so than any other segment of higher education in the state." -Hans Johnson, a Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) Senior Fellow

The California Virtual Campus - Online Education Initiative (CVC-OEI) is a collaborative effort among California Community Colleges (CCCs) to ensure that significantly more students are able to complete their educational goals by increasing both access to and success in high-quality online courses.

The CVC-OEI is sponsored by the Foothill-De Anza Community College District as the recipient of a grant disbursed by the California Community College Chancellor's Office (CCCCO). Composed of high-quality online courses, resources for students, and technology, the CVC-OEI represents a comprehensive and collaborative program that leverages effective practices and technology to significantly increase the opportunity for higher education degree attainment in California.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
"The California Community Colleges are at the forefront of online education in California, more so than any other segment of higher education in the state."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Study Skills & Evidence-Based Learning Strategies

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Sponsored by PowerSchool and ISTE U

This post contains Amazon Affiliate links. When you make a purchase through these links, Cult of Pedagogy gets a small percentage of the sale at no extra cost to you.

When I taught seventh grade language arts, one of my favorite things to teach was S.E. Hinton's book The Outsiders. Every year, we began the unit with a discussion about the cliques that formed in students' lives, how these groups interacted, the unwritten rules that governed their behavior, and what happened when groups clashed or people formed relationships across group lines. After we did some reflecting, writing, and talking, we were ready to start the book.

The reading went fine, more or less. Some chapters we did in class (I would read to them, then they would read silently), and others at home. Some students became as absorbed in the novel as I'd hoped they would; others, not so much. Predictably, some fell behind in the book like they did with all assigned reading.

I checked students' progress with occasional quizzes, we did some work on plot and characters, setting and theme, and then, after a unit test over the whole book-containing mostly questions that asked students to identify characters, setting, and key plot points-we spent nearly three class periods watching Francis Ford Coppola's movie version of the book. And I got to drool over Matt Dillon in the movie's opening scene again and again and again. From start to finish, the whole unit took about three weeks.

In retrospect, I'm not sure why it was my favorite. Seriously. I mean, even though I loved the book, my students' response to it was mostly lukewarm. Maybe it was just the idea of teaching it that I loved. Maybe it was the connections I was able to make to the stuff students dealt with on a day-to-day basis. I don't know. I taught that book a few times, and even though I looked forward to it every time, I always finished the unit a little unsatisfied.

And it's only now, years later, that I'm starting to understand that dissatisfaction: I can't say with any confidence that my students actually learned something from that unit. Upon deeper reflection, I'm not confident that any of my students learned anything of lasting value from at least half the lessons I taught.

This is a hard pill to swallow, because I wasn't half bad as a teacher. I had decent relationships with my students and I believe most of them had good experiences in my classroom, but real, durable learning? I can't say how much of that actually happened.

I don't love admitting that.

But at least now I understand why my teaching didn't produce a lot of actual learning: I never set clear, measurable learning targets.

Things would have been so different if I'd known about backward design.

When teachers talk to each other about the stuff they're teaching, they often say things like this:
"What novels do you do in 8th grade?""Oh that'll be perfect. I can use this when I teach the American Revolution!"
"I don't think I can fit that in; we're doing moon phases next month."

We tend to talk about our teaching plans in terms of the broad topics we cover. This shorthand is practical; we're not going to drill down into specific skill and knowledge objectives while waiting our turn at the bagel table. But when I think about the lessons I gave my students, the ones I observed in my colleagues' classrooms, and the work I've seen my own children do, I think this shorthand might be a pretty fair representation of what many of us are still doing: churning out lessons that keep students busy with our content without ever getting clear about what we want them to learn.

Instead of starting with a topic, we'd do better if we start with an end goal, and that's where backward design comes in.

Traditional vs. Backward Planning

Traditional Lesson Design

For many years, teachers have been planning lessons and units of instruction like this:

Step 1: Identify a topic or chunk of content that needs to be covered.

Step 2: Plan a sequence of lessons to teach that content.

Step 3: Create an assessment to measure the learning that should have taken place in those lessons.

Notice that in this approach, the assessment is created after the lessons are planned. Sometimes it isn't created until most of those lessons have already taken place. The assessment is kind of an afterthought, a check to see if students were paying attention to the stuff we taught them.

For most of my teaching career, this is how I planned. It's presumably how most of my colleagues planned. I believe it's still how many teachers plan.

So what's wrong with it? Well, when we plan this way, we're more likely to include content and activities that have questionable value. When teaching the American Revolution, for example, if our goal is just to "teach about the American Revolution," we can throw in anything that has any relation to that topic: a coloring page of the Boston Tea Party, a colonial flag craft project, or a worksheet where students unscramble words like minuteman, independence, and Hancock.

This random approach creates two problems.

The first and most important problem is a lack of durable, transferable learning. One reason so many of us don't remember much of what we learned in school is that we learned it through this haphazard, topic-driven approach. These random activities are taking up precious time that could be spent on much more valuable stuff.

The other is poor student engagement. Our students know when they're being asked to do something pointless. If they don't see the relevance of what they're learning or a direct line between the content of your course and a desirable outcome, they'll tune it out. Sure, many students will do what you ask anyway, because they want good grades and the benefits that come from them. But they're not learning. If you don't believe me, ask them.

Backward Design

In their book Understanding by Design, which was originally published in 1998, Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe introduced us to backward design, an approach to instructional planning that starts with the end goal, then works backward from there. The "full" version of Wiggins and McTighe's original approach is pretty complex and can be time-consuming to implement. If you're ready for that, I recommend digging into their book. For now, though, I'm just going to share the most basic version of backward design.

Here are the steps:

Step 1: Identify what students should know and be able to do by the end of the learning cycle.

Step 2: Create an assessment to measure that learning.

Step 3: Plan a sequence of lessons that will prepare students to successfully complete the assessment.

The difference in order is significant: Plan the assessment first, then plan only lessons that will contribute to student success on that assessment.

I was first introduced to this concept in my sixth year of teaching, and the genius of it completely blew me away. I used it when planning my next unit and experienced the biggest spike in student success I'd ever seen. On top of that, I was actually excited about teaching the lessons I had planned. For the first time, it felt like none of my class was wasted; everything actually mattered. There was something a lot more satisfying about doing things this way.

Let's take a look at an example to illustrate the difference between a unit planned the traditional, topic-driven way, and the same unit planned with backward design.

Before and After: The Lunar Cycle

The Before, Where the Final Product is a Test

At some point in their school careers, students study the phases of the moon. One pretty typical way to teach this is as follows:

A lecture or video about the phases of the moon, followed by a worksheet to label the phases.

An interactive activity like scraping the filling out of Oreos to represent the lunar phases.

Following a teacher's sample, creating a physical model of the moon phases using something like styrofoam balls.

A unit test that requires labelling the phases of the moon from memory and answering multiple-choice questions about the lunar cycle, eclipses, and seasons.

In many classrooms, teachers also have students track the appearance of the moon over the course of a month, so that might be added as well.

Following this plan, a teacher would feel pretty satisfied that they "covered" the topic of moon phases. But if we look at the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), the standard relating to moon phases says that grade 6-8 students will:

" Develop and use a model of the Earth-sun-moon system to describe the cyclic patterns of lunar phases, eclipses of the sun and moon, and seasons" ( MS-ESS1-1).

Note the language here: Students are meant to develop a model, then use it to describe these patterns. But in the plan above, students merely copied a model, and they didn't use it to describe anything; even if the model required some written captioning to explain what was going on, because the model was a copy, it can't be safely said that students were really the ones describing the system.

Then there's the test. If we assume that a large portion of a student's grade is based on the test, then students are not being measured on their achievement of that standard. The standard does not require students to memorize the phases of the moon. Nor does it ask them to "demonstrate knowledge" of how the whole system works. The standard wants students to develop a model and use it to describe the system.

It would be easy to blow off this distinction, to say Bah, same difference. The test asks students a lot of questions that would show an understanding of these concepts, so we're covered.

But not really. Asking a person to develop a model is a much higher-order task than asking them to copy a model. Describing systems and patterns is way more challenging than selecting the correct description.

Developing models and explaining things is the work of real scientists: They notice phenomena, study it, then figure out how to represent those phenomena in order to make it clear to other people. To say, "Look at this! It's interesting and it explains why things are the way they are!"

And that's exactly what the NGSS authors had in mind: "Any education that focuses predominantly on the detailed products of scientific labor-the facts of science-without developing an understanding of how those facts were established or that ignores the many important applications of science in the world misrepresents science and marginalizes the importance of engineering." (National Research Council, 2012, p. 43).

In other words, a superior education will teach students to think and practice like scientists. If we don't plan learning experiences that make that possible, we're giving them a sub-par education.

The After, Where the Final Product is a Model and a Presentation

So if we re-do this unit plan with backward design, we'll need to start by developing an assessment that would measure success with that standard. That means the assessment would not be a test where students merely label the moon phases, but a student-developed model of the moon phases along with some kind of presentation where students use that model to explain lunar phases, eclipses, and seasons.

When designing this final assessment, it's essential that the teacher crafts a rubric that clearly outlines specific, high standards for both the model and presentation. The rubric should list criteria for the accuracy and functionality of the model, plus the quality of the presentation itself. Here's an example of what that might look like:

With a good rubric in place, we then work backwards to determine what lessons students need to do excellent work on the final assessment.

Direct Instruction: Students still need to know the basics of the lunar system. Memorization is not the goal, so we're not grading for that, but students do need to know the information well enough to explain it and use the right vocabulary, so we can keep the lecture or video from the original plan. And having them work with the information a bit on some kind of worksheet or with some kind of online practice is fine, but I wouldn't give points for this work. If you need to motivate students to do it, require them to demonstrate proficiency (like scoring at least 80% on the match game with a set of Quizlet flashcards) before they can move on to the next step.

Active processing with models: Next, give students a chance to work with a model so that they experience the cycle in action. This will deepen their understanding of the earth-sun-moon system, which will better prepare them to give their own presentations. Something like this interactive model from CK-12 allows students to manipulate the time of day and the position of the moon to see how these variables change what we see in the sky. Working in groups, students could use the simulator to answer questions about the moon's appearance depending on what phase it's in and the time of day, then transition into making and checking predictions based on those variables.

Presentation practice: If students are going to do well on the final presentation, they'll need practice in explaining the lunar cycle in their own words. Using an existing model (such as the interactive mentioned in the previous step), have students explain the lunar phases, including information about the seasons and eclipses, to a partner or small group. Ask the listening partners to "coach" the presenter if their description has any holes or inaccuracies. Hearing their peers explain the system, along with attempting the explanation themselves, will help them use the language of the lunar cycle more fluently.

Model development: Now students begin developing their own models. The standard does not specify that this has to be a physical model, so you could offer students choice: The model could very well be made with styrofoam balls, but it could also be a hand-drawn diagram, a slideshow presentation, an animated video, a children's book, or even a short skit they present to the class or record on video. Many of these options, like the children's book, include the "presentation" piece right along with the model. Give students time in class to work on these models; this will ensure that they do their own work and will allow you to give feedback if a student is heading in the wrong direction. Remind them regularly that the explanation of the model is nearly half their grade, so they should consider scripting that out if their presentation is going to be "live."

Model presentations: Finally, students present their models. If you have a lot of students opt to give a "live" presentation this could take several class periods, which could be pretty mind-numbing since the subject matter is exactly the same for everyone. To cut down on that overall time, only have students present to the whole class if the class is actually participating in the model (like in some sort of skit or simulation). Otherwise, students can record their presentations on video or present to you one-on-one while their classmates work on something else independently.

With this "after" version, every lesson is designed to prepare students to give excellent presentations at the end. The whole time, they are using the lunar cycle vocabulary, correcting each other's misconceptions, and just like scientists, thinking about how to explain concepts to other people.

Some Questions About Your Lessons

Okay, so we've looked very closely at one small unit for a middle school science class. Now, take this same process and apply it to the things you teach.

1. What exactly do your standards require? Do they ask students to memorize and identify facts, or do they ask them to describe, explain, analyze, or create? (It's probably the latter.)

2. If it's the latter, how closely do your assessments measure those standards? Do they actually require students to do the describing, explaining, analyzing, or creating (which would likely require them to write, present, or create some product), or do they merely ask them to recognize when someone else does it in the form of an answer on a multiple-choice test?

3. Do you need to adjust your assessments so they more closely align with the standards?

4. If you do, the next step is to rework the lessons that lead up to that assessment. Does every lesson contribute to student success on that assessment? Could some of your lessons be omitted because they don't connect directly to the assessment? Are you missing anything? For example, if your assessment requires students to write in academic language and support their ideas with evidence, you should include some lessons that give students practice with that kind of writing.

5. Finally, will the assessment be weighted heavily in your gradebook? (It should be.)The lessons and activities leading up to the final assessment are there to give students exposure to the knowledge and practice with the skills necessary to perform on that final assessment; ideally, they should receive no grades at all on those activities. If you absolutely must assign some points, be sure the final assessment is worth a heck of a lot more than those smaller tasks.

Like I did, you probably also have some favorite lessons and activities. Some of these might turn out to be not just fun to teach, but also solid in terms of equipping students with knowledge and skills that will last.

If it turns out that those favorite lessons don't really align with any standards, you might be able to revise them so they do. Or you might keep them for other reasons-not every minute of class time has to be spent on standards-based instruction. Some activities have value because they help us get to know each other better, they help students develop social-emotional skills, or they simply offer a bit of fun. But if a lesson doesn't do any of these things, if it's disguised as learning but is doing little more than keeping students busy, it's time for it to go.

Using a process like backward design helps us get better at making these decisions. By making this approach part of our regular practice, we'll be able to look back on a day, a week, or a year of teaching and say with a lot more certainty that when they were under our care, our students learned.
Reference:
National Research Council (2012). A framework for K-12 science education: Practices, crosscutting concepts, and core ideas. The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/13165.

Come back for more.
Join our mailing list and get weekly tips, tools, and inspiration that will make your teaching more effective and fun. You'll get access to our members-only library of free downloads, including 20 Ways to Cut Your Grading Time in Half, the e-booklet that has helped thousands of teachers save time on grading. Over 50,000 teachers have already joined-come on in.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Are we planning with clear, measurable, meaningful learning goals in to guide us, or are we just keeping students busy?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Learning Outcomes

Learning outcomes are what you want your students to learn, either as a result of a specific lesson or on the grander, more general scale of the entire course. Learning outcomes target knowledge, skills, or attitudes for change. Bloom's taxonomy specifically targets these by seeking to increase knowledge (cognitive domain), develop skills (psychomotor domain), or develop emotional aptitude or balance (affective domain). Learning outcomes might be identified by someone outside the teacher, such as state-wide or departmental standards. The taxonomy provides a basis for developing sub-goals and assessment methodology to meet these goals. It is important to note that learning outcomes are goals, and are not the activities performed to achieve those goals. Outcomes can be categorized into broad, global outcomes that may take many years to achieve and provide direction for education, educational goals that guide curriculum development over the weeks or months it takes to complete a specific course, and instructional goals that narrowly focus on the daily activities, experiences, and exercises used in a specific lesson plan.

Objective Builder Tool

For applications specific to a course, the Center for Distributed Learning has developed an objective builder tool to help craft the language for measurable learning outcomes.

Applications of the Taxonomy

Taxonomies are developed to provide a framework for organizing a continuum along an underlying structure. For example, languages may be classified as Romantic, Germanic, etc. based on their underlying grammatical structure and origin. Bloom's taxonomy primarily provides instructors with a focus for developing their course learning outcomes. There are a number of reasons why a teacher would want to use Bloom's taxonomy. Initially, it can be used to increase one's understanding of the educational process. Teachers can see and understand complex cognitive development and how lower-level skills build into higher-order thinking (e.g., recalling facts and comprehending previous problems allows a student to apply their experience to similar problems). Using this understanding facilitates the prioritizing of material and can steer the organization of lessons to maximize class time. For example, lower-level skills (e.g., memorizing factual knowledge) can be developed before higher-level skills are introduced (e.g., analysis of relationships). Current educators frequently face a confusing array of standards and curriculum requirements. Bloom's taxonomy offers a guiding framework for breaking these criteria down into accessible chunks which can be used to direct day-to-day lesson plans and can be easily compared to their own goals for the class. Just as different levels require different instructional delivery methods, they also require different assessment methods. Bloom's taxonomy can be used as a checklist to ensure that all levels of a domain have been assessed and align assessment methods with the appropriate lessons and methodologies. In this way, the taxonomy also makes it easier for you to maintain consistency between assessment methods, content, and instructional materials and identify weak areas.

Update to Bloom's Taxonomy (2001)

Originally, Bloom's taxonomy was one-dimensional with an exclusive focus on the knowledge domain. The current updated version developed by Anderson and Krathwohl (2001) reorganizes, and highlights the interactions between, two dimensions: cognitive processes and knowledge content. Anderson and Krathwohl identify two reasons for updating the original handbook. They emphasize a refocusing of educational outcomes back to the original handbook, which was ahead of its time and can still offer assistance to modern educators and to incorporate new findings in psychology and education into the framework. In their revision, cognitive processes are presented as verbs and the knowledge content are presented as nouns. Along with exchanging the levels of Evaluation and Synthesis (which they rename to Creation), Anderson and Krathwohl redefine the knowledge dimension to include four types:

Factual Knowledge: Basic elements of a discipline that a student must know and be able to work with to solve problems including basic terminology and specific details and elements.

Conceptual Knowledge: Interrelationships between basic factual knowledge that demonstrate how elements work together, for example, classifications and categories, principles and generalizations, and theories, models, and structures.

Procedural Knowledge: How something is done including the methods of inquiry, skills, algorithms, techniques, and methods needed to investigate, apply, or analyze information.

Metacognitive Knowledge: Awareness and knowledge of one's own cognition including strategies for learning, contextual and conditional knowledge about cognitive tasks, and self-knowledge.

References:
Bloom, B. S. (1969). Taxonomy of educational objectives: The classification of educational goals : Handbook I, Cognitive domain. New York: McKay.
Anderson, L. W., Krathwohl, D. R., & Bloom, B. S. (2001). A taxonomy for learning, teaching, and assessing: A revision of Bloom's taxonomy of educational objectives. New York: Longman.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
IntroductionBloom's taxonomy was developed to provide a common language for teachers to discuss and exchange learning and assessment methods. Specific learning outcomes can be derived from the taxonomy, though it is most commonly used to assess learning on a variety of cognitive levels. The table below defines each cognitive level...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Teaching Strategies: Cognitive Load Theory

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Metacognition: The Skill That Promotes Advanced Learning

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The UDL Guidelines are a tool used in the implementation of Universal Design for Learning, a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights into how humans learn. Learn more about the Universal Design for Learning framework from CAST. The UDL Guidelines can be used by educators, curriculum developers, researchers, parents, and anyone else who wants to implement the UDL framework in a learning environment. These guidelines offer a set of concrete suggestions that can be applied to any discipline or domain to ensure that all learners can access and participate in meaningful, challenging learning opportunities.

Reenvisioning the UDL Guidelines

Because the UDL Guidelines are meant to be informed by feedback from the field as well as new research, they have been updated several times in the past. We are in the process of updating the Guidelines once again in our UDL Rising to Equity initiative.

This update will focus specifically on addressing systemic barriers that result in inequitable learning opportunities and outcomes. CAST aims to develop a transparent, inclusive, and community-driven process. If you are interested in collaborating and staying updated on our progress, we invite you to complete a brief survey.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The UDL Guidelines are a tool used in the implementation of Universal Design for Learning, a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights into how humans learn. Learn more about the Universal Design for Learning framework from CAST. The UDL Guidelines can be used by educators, curriculum developers, researchers, parents, and anyone else who wants to implement the UDL framework in a learning environment. These guidelines offer a set of concrete suggestions that can be applied to any discipline or domain to ensure that all learners can access and participate in meaningful, challenging learning opportunities.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Would you want to be a learner in your classroom? That's not a trick question-think about it. Perhaps some of the activities and lessons wouldn't resonate if you were sitting behind a desk listening to them yourself. This may be especially true in classrooms where material is presented in a one-size-fits-all format. After all, the more options students are given to complete assignments, the more likely it is they'll find one that interests them.

Such an approach is nothing new. Many educators know it as the building blocks behind Universal Design for Learning, or UDL. Developed by CAST, UDL is comprised of three guiding principles that seek to increase engagement and accessibility: Providing learners with multiple means of engagement; representation; and action and expression.

What does that mean: engagement, representation and action and expression? First, engagement looks at ways the learner regulates their learning while sustaining interest, effort and motivation. Representation is focused on how the information is presented to the learner, in order to to promote understanding. Finally, action and expression focuses on the ways the learner can demonstrate their mastery of the subject and respond to the activity.

UDL is not a special ed thing or even a general ed thing. It's just an ed thing. It is a way to connect every student to the learning experience, and a way at looking at learning that is fully inclusive and promotes success for all learners, regardless of ability.

According to educator and author Todd Rose (watch his TEDtalk The Myth of Average), everyone has a "jagged learning profile." That is, we have both strengths and weaknesses. Educators who employ UDL principles in their classroom are taking a proactive approach to learning and working to ensure that every learner has the opportunity to demonstrate their expertise and use their strengths to be successful. Every student can be an expert in something, and the UDL principles can help them show it.

That's because the ultimate goal of UDL is to develop expert learners, which CAST defines as "purposeful and motivated; resourceful and knowledgeable; and, strategic and goal directed."

Intrigued? Let's dig deeper into the three principles and discuss some real world classroom applications to lead to a more inclusive learning experience for all students.

Engagement

Let's start with engagement, or finding ways to motivate learners and promote persistence as they move through the learning activities. Getting students to help design the learning experience can also increase engagement-as can strategies that help them become more invested in what's being taught.

One tool that demonstrates this idea of engagement is Flipgrid. This free video response tool, recently acquired by Microsoft, allows students to respond to questions through video. Students who may not be comfortable participating in whole-group activities may be more inclined to participate via pre-recorded video. Students can also leave video comments for classmates and engage in deeper discussions.

It's not all high-tech tools, though. Some no-tech examples of engagement could include using sticky notes as an exit ticket to check for understanding, a daily reflection journal and classroom expectation checklists.

One important thing to remember about engagement is that it's OK for a learner to disengage during an activity. Think about it: you do that throughout your day, right? You stop an activity to check email or perform another task. The critical component here is fostering an environment that promotes re-engagement. How can I bring a learner back to the activity and provide support to facilitate success?

Representation

For many students who learn differently, their days are filed with worksheets and other print materials that they are unable to read. Why not provide some options beyond text to promote understanding?

Providing text in a digital format will increase opportunities for accessibility and flexibility for all learners. Apps like Seeing AI, Claro Scan Pen and Prizmo Go use the camera on your mobile device to take a picture of text and then read it aloud. (Check out this YouTube playlist to see how these tools look in action.)

How about providing an audio recording of the materials? Any audio recording app will work. Look around your school and find an old tape recorder. Make this a classroom job for students to read materials into the recorder and produce audio clips. I have worked in schools where volunteers have created audio materials for students to use. (Would you prefer to listen to this article read by the author? Follow this link to listen to the audio version of the article, which was recorded using Anchor. This free app/web tool can provide a platform for audio recording and podcasting.)

Low-to-no tech examples of representation include teachers posting infographics around the classroom that share important information and using a graphic novel instead of a text-heavy work of fiction. The pictures below show Moby Dick in two very different formats. Both share the same information but each format offers an opportunity to connect with different learners.

Want to create your own digital versions of print materials? One of the most powerful digital creation tools is Book Creator. Available as an iOS app or web-based tool (which works well on Chromebooks), educators or students can create engaging digital books that can feature text, pictures and embedded multimedia through the use of audio and video clips.

Other great tools include KWL charts (a form of graphic organizer), as well as visuals posted in the classroom for vocabulary and writing strategies and manipulatives for math equations.

Action & Expression

As we move into this last focus area of UDL, note that many of the tools and strategies mentioned above can also be used by students to provide options for action and expression. Students can use video as a response to an assignment instead of writing, create a comic strip using a tool like StoryboardThat to complete a writing task or produce an audio podcast. Presentations can be a powerful way for students to share their voice. From Pages to Google Slides to Microsoft Sway, there are plenty of edtech tools available in our classrooms to amplify student voice.

As with the other areas of UDL, technology is not necessary to provide options. Students can draw their own comic strip for a writing task or use a word wall (with words/pictures) to compile work.

These are just some examples of learning options the can be integrated into our learning environments to support all students. There are so many other options we can use to promote inclusive learning environments. Do you have an idea you used in your classroom? Share it via this Flipgrid. Like our students, we all get better when we share.

What are some immediate steps you can take to promote an inclusive UDL learning environment? Be intentional as you design learning experiences. Ask yourself: Am I providing options during this learning experience? You won't be able to infuse all areas of UDL into every lesson. That's OK. Start small. Find ways to infuse UDL into learning activities. Build on your successes. And keep moving in a positive direction and watch your students succeed.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Tips, Tricks and Tools to Build Your Inclusive Classroom Through UDL - EdSurge News

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Would you want to be a learner in your classroom? That's not a trick question-think about it. Perhaps some of the activities and lessons wouldn't ...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
What is MBE?

Mind, Brain, and Education Science is a newly emerging discipline that incorporates developmental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and educational psychology to answer the question: "How do we learn best?" The answers to this question are found through an intersecting study of the above-mentioned disciplines and their broader fields. The answers will, eventually, come to inform pedagogy, in the hope of creating a learning environment for students that works with the natural functioning of their brains and minds.

Five Well-Established Concepts of MBE Science

As quoted from Mind, Brain, and Education Science by Tracey Tokuhama-Espinosa:

1. Human brains are as unique as faces.

2. All brains are not equal because context and ability influence learning.

3. The brain is changed by experience.

4. The brain is highly plastic.

5. The brain connects new information to old.

A Few Major MBE Players (Alphabetical Order)

1. Antonio Damasio: Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Southern California and Director of the Brain and Creativity Institute; he studies decision-making and emotions.

2. Kurt Fischer: Founder of the Mind, Brain, and Education Program at Harvard; first President of the International MBE Society; Editor of the MBE Journal; he studies cognitive and emotional development.

3. Mary Helen Immordino-Yang: Current (2016-2018) President of the International MBE Society; Associate Professor of Education and Psychology at University of Southern California; she studies the psychology and neurobiology of social emotional, self-awareness, and its impact on learning.

4. Mark R. Rosenzweig: Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley; he is best known for discovering neuroplasticity-the brain's ability to change and grow.

5. David Sousa: Member of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society and world-renowned educational consultant on the brain and learning.

6. Tracey Tokuhama-Espinosa: Educational researcher and professor who seeks to advance the field of MBE. She has two main books on MBE: one acts as a "comprehensive guide" to MBE, while the other focuses on "50 practical applications" of MBE.

MBE Papers & Guides

Mind, Brain, and Education: Building a Scientific Groundwork for Learning and Teaching, by Kurt W. Fischer
Excerpt from the abstract: The primary goal of the emerging field of Mind, Brain, and Education is to join biology, cognitive science, development, and education in order to create a sound grounding of education in research. The growing, worldwide movement needs to avoid the myths and distortions of popular conceptions of brain and genetics and build on the best integration of research with practice, creating a strong infrastructure that joins scientists with educators to study effective learning and teaching in educational settings. Science and practice together provide many potentially powerful tools to improve education.

Mind, Brain, and Education: The Birth of A New Science, by Michel Ferrari and Hazel McBride
Abstract: In this paper, we examine the history of the emerging discipline of Mind, Brain, and Education (MBE) and explore the benefits as well as the difficulties involved in integrating neuroscience into educational policy and practice. We examine the power of neuroscience to impact practice and document the rise of neuromyths. History is on the side of the new discipline of MBE, but there is still much important work to be done to make neuroscientific findings accessible, comprehensible, and relevant to educators.

The Science of Learning, by Deans for Impact
About: The Science of Learning summarizes existing cognitive-science research on how students learn, and connects it to practical implications for teaching. The report is a resource for teacher-educators, new teachers, and anyone in the education profession who is interested in how learning takes place.

Mind, Brain, and Education: Implications for Educators, Edited by Lynn Butler-Kisber
Statement of Purpose: LEARNing Landscapes (TM) is an open access, peer-reviewed, online education journal supported by LEARN (Leading English Education and Resource Network). Published in the autumn and spring of each year, it attempts to make links between theory and practice and is built upon the principles of partnership, collaboration, inclusion, and attention to multiple perspectives and voices. The material in each publication attempts to share and showcase leading educational ideas, research and practices in Quebec, and beyond, by welcoming articles, interviews, visual representations, arts-informed work, and multimedia texts to inspire teachers, administrators, and other educators to reflect upon and develop innovative possibilities within their own practices.

Mind, Brain, and Education: The Students at the Center Series, by Christina Hinton, Kurt Fischer, and Catherine Glennon
From the Introduction: This paper considers student-centered learning approaches in light of mind, brain, and education research. Student-centered approaches to learning comprise a research-based framework for education that aims to help students from a wide range of backgrounds master the skills necessary for college and the 21st-century knowledge economy (JFF 2011). In particular, it is intended to support underserved youth who are often excluded from higher education. The approaches begin with a common set of rigorous standards. Students can reach these standards through learning experiences tailored to their needs and interests, which may include informal learning outside of school. Students are empowered to take responsibility for their own learning, with teachers
and other professionals as facilitators.

Learning About Learning: What Every New Teacher Needs to Know, by The National Council on Teacher Quality
Letter of Support: We have spent much of our professional lives researching learning and cognition. In the course of that work, we have
used and reviewed many textbooks of educational psychology and instructional methods - textbooks that are required reading in teacher preparation programs. We have been consistently frustrated by the lack of discussion in many of these textbooks of teaching strategies that are backed up by strong evidence, and by a frequent overemphasis on strategies for which evidence is anecdotal at best.
Teaching aspiring teachers how to maximize student learning and retention is the paramount task of their training. It is therefore of real consequence that the guidance given by textbooks on these topics makes only passing reference
to essential knowledge about learning.

MBE Links for Further Study & Networking

Bella Abdurachmanov is an educational writer and writing instructor. As editor of The Learning Mind, a project of Kars4Kids, she studies the science behind how people learn best. Bella teaches college writing and creative writing at Touro College, hoping to impart a love of learning to her students. She enjoys writing, in all of its forms, as a spiritual endeavor and means to self-growth.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Mind, Brain, and Education Science is a newly emerging discipline that incorporates developmental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and educational psychology to answer the question: "How do we learn best?" The answers to this question are found through an intersecting study of the above-mentioned disciplines and their broader fields.

# data[].attributes.headline
MBE and the Pandemic: Advice for Teachers

# data[].attributes.subject
MBE and the Pandemic: Advice for Teachers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.provider_name
The Center for Transformative Teaching and Learning

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
This is my 25th back-to-school after winter break and I still find it a weird time. It is challenging too, even in a normal year, to get that classroom buzz going again, connect new material with old threads, and re-establish the routines that help my students be successful. At the beginning of 2021, with hybrid and online school, plus the mental space it takes to process the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, the challenge feels magnified. So what insights from Mind, Brain, and Education Science can I use to help make this critical point of a unique school year go well?

1. Begin with Belonging

Students always return from an extended break in a wide range of emotional states, which impacts their capacity to learn. We can imagine that this is the case even more so this year. Pause and create opportunities for emotional check-ins with your students, and, when concerns arise, communicate internally using your school's system of support so that you do not feel like you are the only person dealing with the issue. Include short, simple activities that help each student feel like they belong to this class collective. Keep hitting this through January and February, not just the first week of school. Elementary classes tend to do this very well, but it is important at every grade level. Just because a student seemed to be connected in December doesn't mean they will pick up where they left off.

2. Design for Motivation

Many students, sitting at home facing online school after winter break, are going to have a hard time getting motivated. Here are some things we can do to help build motivation:

Work on the three learning mindsets that underpin motivation.

Make real-world connections to things that are genuinely relevant to your students.

Include carefully constrained elements of choice in topic of study or the medium students can use to produce a piece of work.

Clearly explain the purpose of topics and assignments.

Build in opportunities for social connection and let students talk about things not related to your class, but also make sure you have a way to quickly bring students back on task.

Remove unnecessary barriers by breaking longer projects into discrete steps and including rubrics and scaffolds that help students plan their work and know when they have met the objectives.

3. Deepen Learning and Build Connection with a Project

Our goal every year is to build knowledge that is durable, usable and flexible. The first step of this is building and consolidating fundamental knowledge and skills, and we have done a lot of this since August and September. The next step is getting students to transfer this to a new context - and our students are perfectly poised for this step. Projects are a great way to do this. This is also a great time for a project as it allows us to build in many of our "Design for Motivation" elements, such as socialization, relevance, and choice, and helps us schedule one-on-one or small group chats with students to check in on how they are doing. But not all projects help learning. For details on a Mind, Brain, and Education Science approach to designing great projects, see our post in Edutopia.

4. Mind the Gap

One focus of the time between now and spring break needs to be finding and addressing gaps in what your students know and can do. Begin with this six minute reflection activity:

(i) Look left. What are the big ideas from last year that your students should know but might not? Set a timer for two minutes and make a list.

(ii) Look right. What are the essential skills, ideas, and factual knowledge that students need from your class in order to be successful next year? Again, set a timer for two minutes and make a list.

(iii) Look up and down. Think back on all that you covered so far this year. What do you really hope your students know? What do you really hope they can do? Once more, set a timer and make a list.

Research suggests that even in normal school years teachers have a very hard time accurately judging what their students know and can do. This year it has to be harder still. Plan a series of short formative assessments spread over the next two to four weeks to find out (either no-stakes or by giving a few points that can be earned by putting in good effort). Use what you listed in (i) to (iii) above to write these formative assessments. Include key ideas and skills more than once. Reteach where you find systematic gaps, and create practice and review assignments where students are rusty. Instead of writing the same thing on many students' work, include three-to-five minute bursts of direct instruction to address areas where numerous students seem weak.

5. Reduce Cognitive Load

- yours, as well as your students'. The stress and added mental burden of school this year is very real. Students report feeling that work is harder and more intense than in other years, that stress levels are higher and motivation levels lower. When we compare the volume of material we have taught to other years, it is significantly less, but to students, the work burden seems greater.

Reduce cognitive load by setting reasonable expectations, and providing scaffolded support where necessary.

Focus on (3) deepening knowledge and (4) finding and filling gaps rather than an endless drive to present students with new content. Cover less but teach it well.

Record simple two-to-five minute videos of yourself explaining something (using Loom or Screencastify). This can be time and energy saver. Your first video will feel horrible - that is normal - but this will fade over time.

Be on a mission to eliminate extraneous cognitive load wherever you find it.

Be mindful of the Yerkes Dodson curve - too little stress or too much stress hurts learning, but there is a Goldilocks Zone in the middle. This is what you are aiming for, and it is going to take day-to-day, often spur-of-the-moment decisions to help keep your class in it.

From Neuroteach by Glenn Whitman and Ian Kelleher, used with permission from the authors.

Here at The CTTL, we love to see how our community integrates Mind, Brain, and Education Science research into their classrooms and schools. If you try any of the strategies above, let us know. Send an email to info@thecttl.org or tag us on Twitter @TheCTTL.
Dr. Ian Kelleher is a science teacher at St. Andrew's Episcopal School, and Head of Research for its Center for Transformative Teaching & Learning. His work focuses on helping teachers translate the science of learning into everyday practices in their own classrooms, and measuring the impact. Ian is the co-author of "Neuroteach: Brain Science and the Future of Education," and co-designer of Neuroteach Global. Ian is the the inaugural Joseph and Kathleen Dreyfuss Faculty Chair for Research, an endowed position at St. Andrew's Episcopal School for the lead CTTL researcher.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Five MBE Insights for Teaching in a Complex New Year - The Center for Transformative Teaching and Learning

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This is my 25th back-to-school after winter break and I still find it a weird time. It is challenging too, even in a normal year, to get that classroom buzz going again, connect new material with old threads, and re-establish the routines that help my students be successful.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
TrillEDU:  Culturally Responsive Pedagogy...  | Jeffrey Dessources | TEDxNewJerseyCityUniversity