This chapter was about how to improve teaching and learning through the use of backwards design. It is a process where the teacher begins with the standards before they develop their curriculum. When selecting standards for schools to use, the book recommends the following characteristics: concerned with the essential ideas, useful and clear, rigorous, accurate, sound, brief, feasible, taken together, assessable, developmental, selected and modified or supplemented by consensus, and adaptable and flexible. Another important idea is tailoring mandated standards, when teachers take the vast number of standards and decide what is most important and work on that first before focusing in on the narrower ideas.
When you start with standards, teachers know exactly what students need to learn from their class. Focusing on the big ideas and essential questions is the best way for teachers to accomplish this. They also have to create units that connect with students' lives and maintain their interest. Just because a teacher covers a lot of material during a school year, it doesn't mean that the students will learn any more material. Students will do a lot better if they spend more time working and mastering the big ideas, instead of speeding through smaller concepts.
Assessment is another big part of backwards design. Turning Points 2000 supports varied and authentic assessments along with some formal test and quizzes and informal, such as walking behind students and check their work. Projects are another great assessment strategy. Students need different ways to show that they know the material. They also need to know exactly what is expected of them. Rubrics are a great way for students to know what they are going to be graded on before they even start their project.
Chapter 3 also discusses the "twin towers" of education - excellence and equity. Excellence and equity should be present in both the curriculum and assessment. Excellence requires high standards that makes students acquire and utilize specific skills. Equity means that the standards set expectations that every students can meet.
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13 comments:
One thing we learned in practicum (as students) was that assessment can be great, but only if the feedback provided is helpful and timely. Unfortunately we were on the wrong end of this bargain. Maybe this link could be fowarded to educators who aren't the best at feedback.
I thought both articles were great finds. I really enjoyed the first one, it had so many components that help with the backward design lessons format, and gave great breakdowns of each stage. It gave some good examples of units and was really helpful. I really liked the second article as well. I love authentic assessment, and I like the idea of doing it all the time. This article should be read by all teachers to understand the importance of authentic assessment.
Both your links are awesome resources --I tagged them both. The authentic assessment link speaks to the need for a balance between formative and summative and between tests and more interesting forms of assessments. Great job
I liked the article Farr Side in your first link as well as the other articles. The Farr Side article really addressed how rediculous some things that teachers do, and how detrimental. I really like your second link because it addressed an issue that we were having as a class. The pictures were really cute as well :)
The first link has a lot of useful and valuable links that could be great resources for us. Also, within the site there are a lot more great links to use. The second link is great because, it is true that a lot of students stress out during assessment. If there is a way to make assessments less scary and stressful than that is the better way to go. This link is great because it gives me ideas to due different types of assessments.
I really liked the two links found in this blog. The authentic assessment link in and of itself was very interesting and engaging. I will definitely be sure to go back to the Edutopia site to check out the technology integration and social/emotional learning links.
Both links can be used at great resources for middle grades teachers. I liked all the resources the fist link provided and how helpful they can be. I have not given authentic assessment a whole lot of thought but the link you provided helped me think about it more.
I loved the big ideas articles. The resources were great, and I really liked the unit on Catcher in the Rye. I think integration among subjects is so important, and that was a perfect example of how to cross connect Social Studies with English to create more relevance for students.
Authentic assessment, very important as we all know. This is a good resource link as a teacher to make sure we all use authentic assessment.
Your big ideas link is really good. It had many links to click on inside the link itself. I started looking at an actual unit on volume and area. It seems like a good resource. Great job.
WOW this is good stuff the links that you added are very interesting. I really enjoyed looking through them. The articles were extremely informative and I tagged the first link so I could check it out later on.
Th first link gives ways to get to area that contain information about unit themes and ideas that can be helpful to us as students. The second link has a sidebar that leads to an online community with sage advice which is really interesting to read.
I love resource sites. I like how it connects teachers from around the world. I especially like the phrase that one should be tired after reading from all the work to do. This is so true - you shouldn't just read to read but read to learn and explore. So many students just read to read, but if they explore the reading, they are more apt to learn more.
I love your links. The first one is awesome because it includes links to a whole bunch of other information that has a lot to do with everything we've learned from practicum to stuff we are learning now. There is so much information there about technology and essential questions and a bunch of other stuff. It is really helpful and nice to see what we are learning applied to other places. The second link is awesome too because I don't think people understand well enough the idea that testing is not the answer. That gives you a snapshot of what the student can do, but we want a video instead. That is where authentic assessment comes in.
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