Bailey Pounders

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Bringing it all Together

“Both Understanding by Design and Differentiated Instruction are complex and multifaceted to encompass the full range of factors a teacher must address in designing and implementing quality curriculum and instruction.” (Tomlinson, McTighe, 2006)

Like backward planning and differentiated instruction, grading and reporting are serious matters, requiring thoughtful consideration. There are 6 key principles for grading and reporting practices. 

Principle 1. Grades and Reports should be based on clearly specified learning goals and performance standards. 

Principle 2: Evidence used for grading should be valid.

Principle 3: Grading should be based on established criteria, not a arbitrary norms. 

Principle 4: Not Everything should be included in grades. 

Principle 5: Avoid grading based on averages. 

Principle 6: Focus on Achievement, and report other factors separately.

Teachers whose work is guided by the principles of backward design and differentiated instruction do the following: 

1. Identify desired learning results for the subject and topics they teach.

2. Determine acceptable evidence of student learning. 

3. Plan learning experiences and instruction based on the first two principles. 

4. Regard learner differences as inevitable, important, and valuable in teaching and learning. 

5. Address learners’ effective needs as a means of supporting student success. 

6. Periodically review and articulate clear learning goals that specify what students should know, understand, and be able to do as a result of each segment of learning. 

7. Use systematic pre-assessment and ongoing assessment aligned with designated goals to make instructional decisions and adaptations. 

8. Employ flexibility in instructional planning and classroom routines to support success for each learner. 

9. Gather evidence of student learning in a variety of formats. 

“The possibilities are many for moving ahead with classrooms whose hallmarks are high-quality curriculum and instruction that work for each learner. In the end, as is typically the case in education, progress stems from the informed and persistent efforts of those educators who understand that yesterday is never good enough for tomorrow.” (Tomlinson, McTighe, 2006)

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Teaching in an Academically Diverse Classroom

“Virtually all students should consistently experiences curricula rooted in the important ideas of a discipline that requires them to make meaning of information and think at high levels.” (Tomlinson, McTighe, 2006)

“Students need opportunities to learn the “basics” and opportunities to apply them in meaningful ways.” (Tomlinson, McTighe, 2006)

“There is a need to balance between student construction of meaning and teacher guidance” (Tomlinson, McTighe, 2006).

“Students need to know the learning goals of a unit or lesson and criteria for successfully demonstrating proficiency with the goals” (Tomlinson, McTighe,206). 

Planning Proceeds teaching, there is a set of principles designed to provide a blueprint for instructional planning to support our goal, which is teaching students for understanding. 

WHERETO principle:

How will I help learners know what they will be learning? Why this is worth learning? What evidence will show their learning? 

How will I hook and engage the learners? In what ways will I help them connect desired learning to their experiences and interests?

How will I equip students to master identifies standards and succeed with the targeted performances? What learning experiences will help develop and deepen understanding of important ideas?

How will I encourage the learners to rethink previous learning? How will I encourage ongoing revision and refinement? 

How will I promise students’ self-evaluation and reflection?

How will I tailor the learning activities and my teaching to address the different readiness levels, learning profiles, and interest of my students’?

How will the learning experiences be organized to maximize engaging and effective learning? What sequences will work best for my students and this content?

Teaching for understanding in skill; and process-oriented subjects such as the langues arts and math cultivates a metacognitive awareness of ow and why specific skills are beneficial and when they are best applied.  

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What is a struggling reader? Being a struggling reader can mean a range of things, depending on the students strengths and weaknesses. Some students may not be able to decode words while other students may not know how to make inferences, draw conclusions, or make generalizations from texts.  Overall struggling readers do not know how to create meaning from their reading. In a classroom there will always be students who struggle with reading, and many times they will show signs to tell you that they are struggling. Some students may say that reading is “boring” or “dumb”, or avoid reading at all cost. Other signs to look for is students who have a hard time spelling or have a hard time organizing thoughts about a text in writing. Many times if a students cannot tell you the main idea of a text or they have a hard time summarizing the important points in a text they are struggling with reading. There are also some very obvious signs that a student might struggle in reading, if they read aloud with very little to no expression, or that they cannot easily recognize single or some multi-syllable words. These are just a few ways signs that we might see from students who struggle but there are many more signs, each student is unique and we should modify the ways that we help these struggling readers to fit their individual needs. 

http://www.readingrockets.org/article/seeking-help-struggling-reader-seven-steps-teachers This is a great article to read, I think the 7 steps are very good ones for us as teachers to look at. As obvious as it is I think it is very important for us as teachers to keep the child’s interest in mind when we are trying to help them find books to read to improve their reading. No one wants to read something they don’t enjoy and they are not going to try and get better at reading if they never find something that they find interesting and enjoy to read about. I also loved how this article said to get to know the family, meeting students families can really tell you a lot about the student and show you why they are the way they are. By getting to know the students family you build a relationship as well gain a better understanding of what goes on in the house.I also loved how one of the steps was to stay informed, even though you may have a degree in education or may even be a specialist things change and more and more information is always out there. We will never be able to know it all, so if we keep up on our research and are always looking to learn more we will better be able to help our students become life long learners.  

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Teachers must understand how to design responsive teaching that is grounded in sensitive observations of their students learning over time. Instruction is not static, but finally tuned to match the continual shifts that occur in students learning.  In classrooms with a strong theory of teaching and learning the children will become successful readers without supplemental help.  However a small group of students will need more intensive intervention. 

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Organizing for Independence

A well-organized learning environment is necessary for scaffolding students' learning and promoting transfer across multiple settings. The classroom library is a social and intellectual place where students can either work together on literacy projects, or they can independently read. The goal for integrated workshop is to enable students to generalize their knowledge and strategies for different purposes ad across multiple settings. In a well organized classroom children learn self management techniques for regulating their learning across multiple settings.