Designing Quality Curriculum to Prepare Quality Teachers

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Designing Quality Curriculum to Prepare Quality
Teachers

• National Center for Alternative Certification
  Annual Conference
• February 8-11, 2006

Becky Washington, Program Director Catherine
Haynes, Curriculum Specialist
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Sessions Objective

• To share our curriculum development process which
  lead to

Clear alignment to state educator standards
Successful performance on the state
accountability exam
Increased use of effective teaching practices
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The Curriculum Alignment Process

• Can we live with it?
• Can we live without it?

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What WERE we doing?

• Go to a good conference?
• plug it into the curriculum
• Have something youre really passionate about?
• Plug it into the curriculum
• Had another trainer share a good lesson plan?
• Plug it into the curriculum

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Why should we change?

• New state standards
• Note state exam results were okay
• Field Support reports
• Note our teachers were struggling in the
  classroom

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Why Change???
"Some people change their ways when they see the
light, others when they feel the heat." Carolyn
Schroeder
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• Insanity is doing what youve always done and
  expecting different results.

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How did we get there?

• Two processes
• The process of CHANGE
• The process of ALIGNMENT

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Guiding Principle

• How can we design instruction that is aligned to
  state standards while also increasing the
  likelihood that our teachers are successful?

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Taking Stock

• A Curriculum Audit

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Alpha Teacher Prep Program
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Omega Teacher Prep Program
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Needed a framework--

• Chose Understanding by Design
• Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe
• Backward by Design model

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To begin with the end in mind means to start
with a clear understanding of your destination.
It means to know where youre going so that you
better understand where you are now - so that the
steps you take are always in the right
direction. -Stephen Covey
The Big Idea of UbD
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Stages in the Backwards Design Process
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Identify Desired Results

• What do we want our teachers to know and be able
  to do?

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Determine Acceptable Evidence

• Performance tasks or projects
• Quizzes, tests, academic prompts
• Student self-assessment

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Plan learning experiences

• Knowledge and skills needed
• Teaching and learning experiences
• Demonstration of targeted understandings

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Strengths of UbD

• Guided our thought process

What are the enduring understandings we want our
interns to remember 40 years from now?
How will we know they have these understandings?
(evidence)
What activities will get us there?
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Our Process?

• Designated one person to develop the curriculum
• Formed a review team
• Put a Trainer of Trainers model in place

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Standards

• Texas Educator Standards are derived from the
  INTASC standards.

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Ponderings

• How can we
• take a lot standards a lot of contentand shape
  it into engaging, thought-provoking and
  meaningful learning
• avoid an activity based approach
• avoid a covering the standards based approach
• deliberately impact learning

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Aligning Our Units to the Standards
Domain 1 Planning and Preparation
Domain 2 The Classroom Environment
Domain 3 Instruction
Domain 4 Professional Responsibilities
INTASC and Texas Framework
Our Instructional Units/Courses
Unit 1 Instructional Design
Unit 2 Classroom Environment
Unit 3 Instructional Delivery
Unit 4 Professionalism
Additional Unit Mentor/Intern
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Stages in the Backwards Design Process
Develop Enduring Understandings Essential
Questions from the standards big ideas
Developed by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe
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Enduring UnderstandingsDistinguishing
Characteristics

• refer to transferable, big ideas having enduring
  value
• involve abstract, easily misunderstood ideas
• are best acquired by uncovering and doing the
  content

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Enduring Understandings

• Professionalism Unit
• - Teaching is a responsibility, not just a job

• Classroom Environment Unit
• The teacher is the decisive element
• Behavior management is a content area
• Behavior is communication

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Whats essential in essential questions?
Questions that

• stimulate thought/discussion and spark more
  questions
• are not answerable with finality
• uncover deep understanding about big idea(s)
  questions that push to the heart or essence of
  the content

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• gtThe beginning teacher
• knows the wide range of
• individual developmental
• differences that
• characterize students in
• early childhood through
• grade 12 and the
• implications of this
• developmental variation .
• gtThe beginning teacher
• recognizes how
• characteristics of students
• at different developmental
• levels impact teaching
• and learning.

Objectives
Questions
gtHow does who we teach influence how we teach?
gt Is it ever OK to NOT teach in a
developmentally appropriate manner? gtAt what
point do we know a student is not developing in
a typical manner?
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gtThe teacher will plan learning experiences
that provide students with opportunities to
explore content. gtThe teacher will
understand the significance of the
standards. gtThe teacher will use appropriate
criteria to evaluate the appropriateness of
learning objectives.
Objectives
Questions
gtWhy plan? gtWhats a good lesson plan? gtWhat
does a student need to be taught? gtWhy use
standards to plan? gtHow will I know with
certainty my students got what I planned?
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Stages in the Backwards Design Process
Enduring Understandings Essential Questions
Blended Mode of Delivery face to face online
Developed by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe
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From our experience

• This process
• Provides meaningful, deep and provocative inquiry
  into the content
• Leads to learning how to use the content
• Conversely,
• lack of true understanding leads to amnesia,
  misunderstanding and rigid knowledge

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Embracing Problems
Failing forward is the way people learn from
their errors
Often, we learn more from a failed attempt than a
successful one
Acceptance of failure is inevitable and valuable
Without the problem, we would not have the
learning
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Successes---

• Moved from a model of coverage
• To deep understanding

standards
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Successes---

• Moved from using what feels important to teach
• To using standards to determine what to teach

standards
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Successes---

• Moved from using activities to guide instruction
• To using assessment objectives to target
  instruction

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Key Learnings

• Perseverance

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What can we do for you?

• Give you more information about our curriculum
  including prices
• Provide technical assistance

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Contact---

• Catherine Haynes
• Curriculum Specialist
• catherine.haynes_at_esc13.txed.net
• 512.919.5348
• Becky Washington
• Associate Director
• becky.washington_at_esc13.txed.net
• 512.919.5343