Don’t forget that Universal Design can better your planning of lessons and units for your students. How you may ask? Remember that UD seeks to serve a wider range of learners, especially those with exceptionalities and disabilities. It’s about realizing that not all students learn in the same ways. Therefore, it is important to accommodate how you plan to teach, what you plan to teach, the materials you plan to teach with and even how you plan to assess and evaluate student work. It literally benefits EVERY student, so don’t forget! Here is a little rime to help you remember:

“Universal design should be top of mind!”

Good luck!

Nathan

Wish you could be here on the warm beach, but you decided to do an ABQ this summer!

Anyway, here is some things that my help you understand Integrated Curriculum which is unifying 2 or more subject under one theme or topic. 

You may ask why would you do this, it seems like a lot of work.  Well, not only do students perform better and retain knowledge, but teachers also benefit from the process.  And how many times have you complained that there is not enough time to teach all the curriculum.  This is killing two birds with one stone.

Just remember these 6 steps:
 
 1. KDB (Know, Do, Be) – Scan Curriculum documents vertically (one grade above and below) to know the expectations and group reoccurring concepts together. For example Know Big Ideas like systems and structure, Do skill like critical thinking, and Be  the proper attitude like being ethical.

2. Choose a theme for example the life cycle of a butterfly.

3. Brain storm several activities based on expectations – graph the growth, journal the changes, research the stages.

4.  Create a rich assessment task that is challenging and covers the expectations.

5. Create 2 or 3 Big questions to guide the students

6. Create daily instructional activities that matches the Big Questions.

Hey, you should see how this is similar to designing down.  

Good luck with that course; I am off to SCUBA diving lessons,

Bert

Great job reading that article on backwards design! Here are a couple notes you wanted yourself to remember!

Backwards design - starting with the end in mind - is a way to deliver a planned sequence of the Curriculum. 

There are 3 main sections of the Backwards Design.

Be sure to use this design for future planning! 

All the best!

Steve

KBG - Know, Skills, Do Brainstorm possible activities based on expectations. Create a concept web as an organizing graphic or use Assistive Technology with the learners - co-created success criteria & planning to their inquiries!

Remember when you wondered how to assess learning in Play & Inquiry?  These questions keep coming back to me for various subject areas.  I'd like to recall my search for meaningful and rich assessment tasks, which can be difficult to plan ahead for before meeting the community you will be in.  

I appreciated the focus on collaboration toward the end.  Uncover those who are willing to help you early on.  What big ideas did previous teachers focus on?  Should I pick up there or fill in potential gaps?  

Remember that with as much planning as you put in before September, there will be plenty of additional learning as you go with your class.  

Dream big: remember to pull from I Think Camp in solving local issues relevant to students.  How can you incorporate numeracy into this planning?  How can you stretch out long camp days into units?  How can a combined class draw upon their strengths?  

More thoughts & tips that validated my practice:

Scan and cluster to gain better insight into where they're going and where they're coming from. 

Develop concept mapping skills or use Assistive Technology

Identify Desired Results - Determine Acceptable Evidence - Planning Learning experiences and instruction

Decide on culminating task(s)

Decide big questions (sounds like Inquiry) to surround daily lessons. 

I want to connect learners to their world.   

How can I embed math in these authentic ways?  Won't I need practice beforehand?

Global trade sustainability and social justice 

Remember to look back to the Scope and Sequence for ESE and FNMI.  

Keep reflecting and try to keep them in the same spots ( : 

It’s been a while that you learned about Backward Design. You practice it often when you do your unit plans. Here’s a quick refresher for you. There are 3 stages.

2. Determine acceptable evidence

3. Plan learning experiences and instructions

I hope that that’s a good refresher! Keep this and “EML” document in mind for interviews next month. Think back to some strong examples in the classroom. You’ll rock it!

 

When educators plan their units and lessons, they should always follow the backwards design model.  Backwards design allows educators to specify desired results or learning for their students, determining which content to deliver, methods to employ, and activities to create in order to meet the desired outcome.  In simpler terms, backwards design provides teachers with a map of where they would like to take their students, giving their units/lessons purpose and direction.

 

When planning, the “twin sins” of traditional design should be avoided.  They include activity-oriented design and coverage.  Both of these methods fail to promote deeper thinking as they lack focus on important ideas fail to engage students. 

 

There are 3 stages to backwards design:

 

1) Identify desired results-here we consider our goals for students, examine content standards and consult curriculum expectations.  We must clarify our priorities.

2) Determine Acceptable Evidence- we must think in terms of collected assessment that serves as evidence that students have reached desired learning goals. Encourages teachers to think like an assessor. 

3) Plan Learning Experiences and Instruction-Here we determine what instructional strategies to use.  We must decide what knowledge students need to develop to succeed, what activities will best help students in developing that knowledge and what will be taught/coached.  We use these decisions to help us put together a sequence of lessons to get students to the desired end point of our unit successfully. 

 

Make sure to use the backwards design model throughout future planning.

 

Good luck with your teaching career! 

Alex

How to: Begin by checking out he curriculum and prioritising learning goals. Next, ask what evidence there will be that these goals have been achieved/ lessons learned? What questions will have to be answered, what will the students be able to do at the end? Then, you can plan based on deciding which skills and processes will students need to demonstrate or possess and how you will teach those concepts. 

Sometimes it can be overwhelming, thinking of all of the curriculum areas that need to be covered in the year and figuring out how to differentiate for so many students with such different needs! Today, I was reading about the idea of Integrated Curriculum, in which you integrate multiple subjects across the curriculum into one large inquiry-based project. 

Planning would look something like this: 

Not only does this planning method increase your ability to simultaneously cover multiple areas of the curriculum, but it will increase student engagement and allow for differentiation. Real world application is as exciting for them as it is for you! 

Can’t wait to see how you apply this concept in your planning! 

    - Important to know and do
    - Worth being familiar with

2) Determine Acceptable Evidence. This is a continuum throughout the unit that works to answer the question, how will we know if the students achieved success?

3) Plan Learning experiences and instructions based on the first two stages, and individual students needs.

To maximize student learning, avoid the “twin sins” while planning.  The first sin is when teaching is activity-oriented without it being intellectually stimulating (hands-on without being minds-on).  The other sin is coverage, which is when you teach through the text book, page by page.  This method does not place any relevance as to why it is important to learn the topic.

I want you to keep in mind, there are three stages of backward design:

1)           Identify desired results: What you hope to accomplish by the end of your lesson.

2)         Determine acceptable evidence: This is based on collected assessments to see if the desired learning has been achieved.  We should “think like an assessor.”

3)         Plan learning experiences and instruction: Determine what knowledge and skills the students will need in order for them to reach your desired result of learning.  What kind of instructional strategies will you employ? 

Remember: Backward design is about having a clear goal, which will help you narrow your planning to reach a desired end result.

Love,
Ritu

If you are ever feeling like your lessons or your planning are getting too confusing and scattered, a tip to remember would be to plan backwards. Plan the assessment piece first based on the learners and their needs, and then teach the unit. This will help you stay accountable and on track, and it will also help the students to learn better because there is a clear goal in mind that they are working towards. If you do not plan backwards, it could still be a great unit with wonderful lessons, but you might get distracted half-way through, or you might feel like you are falling behind your unit plan schedule. It might just be easier to plan backwards from the beginning. Backwards planning will also make your end of unit assessment more meaningful for the students, because you will have worked up to it through your lessons because you knew it was coming from the very beginning. This will also give you time to practice it with your students if it is something new, since their assessments should be something that they have seen before. Never lose sight of your goal!

Sincerely,

Rita

I am sure that life is treating you well in the primary grade classroom that you are teaching. I hope you have remembered to use the valuable unit planning method that you learned about when you took the online course through the University of Toronto in the summer of 2018. If not, here are the basics of backward design. It’s as easy as 3-2-1 or 1-2-3:

1.       Identifying desired results: What I want the students to understand, know and be able to do?

2.       Determining assessment evidence: How do I check that they have learned?

3.       Planning learning experiences and instruction: Which learning activities will lead students to the desired result?

Don’t forget, it is important to have clearly defined goals prior to planning the instruction as that makes it easier to ensure a complete and directed learning experience. Also, remember that it is highly beneficial to collaborate with colleagues when designing concrete, evidence-based assessments prior to the learning experience as that will maximize curricular coherence and support reliable evaluation across all students. 

Miss you. XO 

 Love, Sharrie

The Backward Design should be considered when making applications with curriculum planning. There are three stages of Backward Design. Stage one is when you identify desired results by reviewing goals, content standards and curriculum expectations, and confirm intentions.  The second stage involves determining acceptable evidence by indicating how students will acquire knowledge of concepts and to outline expectations to determine success. Lastly, the third stage is in regard to planning learning experiences and instruction. This can be done by choosing a method of instruction, identifying appropriate instructional activities, and outlining skills required. Moreover, it involves identifying required materials and providing resources. By following these stages, you will know what your plan and assessments are before you even start the lesson.

Keep me posted!

You did wonderful job for learning the article about backwards design. I cannot say that I’m totally understand backwards design, but I just would like to try to remember some differences between traditional and backward design planning. Probably, it helps to understand backwards design.

Backwards design: 

-Focusing on the end result is key to backwards design. The idea is to ‘focus first on the desired learnings from which appropriate teaching will logically follow.’ (Wiggins & McTigh,2005, p14). Knowing the destination makes clear the methods and activities to arrive there.

-If lessons are focused on engaging ‘mind on’ activities and materials, students will be able to understand the point, the big idea, why they should learn the material, and how to apply it in other areas.

-Each activity in backwards design will point the student toward the end goal and allow them to use multiple skills from previous lessons. This may require time spent on content to explore the many questions and applications for purposeful tasks. 

-Backwards design begins with the ability to think about a unit or course in term of the collected assessment evidence needed to document and validate that the desired learning has been achieved.’ (Wiggins& McTighe, 2005, p.18). Determine the measurement before the activities. 

-UbD requires planning to revolve around essential questions. These question keep the lessons focused on the big ideas driving the end result and what the students should understand. They are not concrete, but stimulate thought to provoke inquiry and spark more questions(Wiggins& McTighe, 2005, p.106).

-Because backwards design is driven by essential questions and big ideas, student goals for lessons will be to understand rather than perform. Students can apply knowledge, such as, in addition to knowing what engine parts do, understanding how they function together and can be altered or improved.

Traditional Design:

-Traditional Design wasted on planning activities to do and materials to use while there is no clear destination or results. This leaves the educator hoping the content they used will ‘stick’ with the students. 

-When activities and materials are chosen because they seem fun or interesting without essential end-result goals, then their job is to merely engage and the activity has lost meaning and relevancy toward learning. 

-Traditional methods attempt to cover as much as possible in content areas. This often leads to skimming and the student’s inability to understand skills and apply them in multiple areas. It also leads to the inability to successfully assess for understanding. 

-Traditional design begins with planning what content needs to be covered rather than knowing how the students will display their understanding of that content. Once again, it leads to the ‘hope’ that something from the material has stuck. 

-Questions in traditional design are limited to immediate material or content and do not reach across big ideas or understanding. Generally, they are lessons pulled from well-intentional textbooks that supply knowledge, but not fail to inspire critical thinking.

-In staggered lessons, students find their goals begin with what they will be able to do at the completion. While performing is necessary, learning is not apparent unless they can use that knowledge to connect an understanding in multiple areas. This is merely understanding what each part of an engine does.

Good Luck!

Junmin