PCS Curriculum Review Week

Day 1

June 18-22, 2013Eastern Elementary School

Welcome & Introductions

Norms for the Week

• Start & end punctually• Dress appropriately• Listen actively• Disagree respectfully• Participate enthusiastically• Focus completely (monitor your

technology)• Have Fun

Remember…

What is learned here leaves here

Schedule for the Week

Tuesday Wednesday Thursday

• Establish Focus

• Big Ideas, Essential Questions, and Learning

Targets

• Vertical Alignment

•Criteria for Success

• Continue work from yesterday

• Cross-Curricular Units

• ESL & Literacy Integration

•Finalize Guides

Schedule: Day 1

• 8:00-10:30 – Opening Session• 10:30-11:45 – Work Session

• Group Introductions• Establish Team Norms• Establish the Goals

• 11:45-1:00 – Lunch (on your own)• 1:00-4:30 – Working on the Work• 4:30-4:45 – Listening/Debrief Session

CRW: The Big Idea

CRW is about identifying and designing…

The right kind and quality of instruction delivered with…The right level of intensity and duration to…The right children at…The right time

- Joseph K. TorgeseonCatch Them Before They

Fall (1988)

Direction for Today

1. Understand the purpose and format of the new guides

2. Examine Big Ideas, Essential Questions, and Learning Targets

3. Identify the big ideas for the year4. Examine Vertical Alignment

Deliverables for Today

1. Create group norms for your group2. Create draft big-idea framework for the

year3. Review vertical alignment with other

grades

The Goal

Learning Target: I will create a district curriculum

guide.

Criteria for Success:The district guide

Which do you choose?

New Guides: The Vision

PCS’ District Curriculum Guides are a dynamic tool to guide and assist education professionals

as they:

• Develop student sequencing•Plan, design, and implement daily instruction

•Integrate instruction across disciplines•Assess student learning

CRW Week Desired Outcomes

• Create DRAFT District Curriculum Pacing Guides

• Begin the process for Continuous Improvement of Teaching and Learning

Desired Outcomes

Begining with the End in Mind

Objectives/Learning Targets go here;Addresses what students NEED to learn

Criteria for success goes here – focus is on students and not

teachers

Media Coordinators

will assist with this

Sample unit/lesson

ideas

Standards taught go here; this section willchange based on the subject/grade-level

(Stage 1)

Some subjects will have multiple content areas on the same guide(see next example)

(Stage 1)

Identifying Big Ideas & Essential Questions

Big Ideas: Defining Them

•Broad and abstract•Conceptual lens•Represented by one or two words•Universal in application•Timeless—carries through the ages•Represented by different examples that share common attributes

Big Ideas: Finding Them

•Organization of Common Core/Essential Standards lends itself to these “Big Ideas”

•Strands or Clusters HELP to determine focus

•Within Strands or Clusters there are “Big Ideas” and “Themes” that can be unified for the unit framework

Big Ideas: Examples of Them

ScienceNatural Phenomena Causal Explanations

Systems, Order, OrganizationChange, Constancy, Measurement

Form and FunctionEquilibrium/Balance

Systems and InteractionsModels

Big Ideas: Ways to Find Them

Review the standards’ text and…•Circle recurring nouns to identify ideas •Underline verbs to identify tasks•Compare with list of transferable concepts•Ask questions about a topic/standard (Why study..?

What’s transferrable about…? How would…be applied in the real world?)

•Generate ideas related to suggestive pairs (light & shadow; matter & energy; sum & difference)

Big Ideas: Group Activity1. Read Essential Standards for the

grade/course at your table2. Use sticky notes to record “concepts”

or “skills” reflected in the standards.3. Use one sticky note per concept/idea4. Work as a team to organize the

concepts into similar groupings (use sticky notes and brainstorming paper)

5. Name the groupings with a Title

Essential Questions: Defining Them

As a table, discuss the purpose of the “Essential Questions” based on the reading you did to prepare for the

week.

Essential Questions: Defining Them

•Great thought-provoking openers

•Guide unit delivery

Essential Questions: Their Roles

• Asked to be argued• Designed to “uncover” new ideas, views, lines of

argument• Set up inquiry, heading to new understandings• Deepens understanding• Leads to more questions• Helps to organize material

Essential Questions: Examples• What makes wounds heal in different ways?• Why is asthma so prevalent in poor urban comminutes?• What keeps things from rusting, and why?• How do chemicals benefit society? • Are animals essential for man’s survival?• How do scientists find out about objects, living things, events and phenomena?• What does it mean to be living?• How do living things adapt to the environment?• What makes a great story?• Why is communication/reading important?• How do authors use words to create images?• Does a good read differ from a ‘great book’? Why are some books fads, and others

classics? • What does an independent reader look like?• What do good readers do?• How can the way a story is structured help me to read with understanding?

Essential Questions: Group Activity1. Refer back to the affinity chart you

created for your big ideas2. Craft one or two “Essential Questions”

that could be used to guide the development of a unit for your grade level/content area

Targets defined…

• Are specific generalizations about the “big ideas.” They summarize the key meanings, inferences, and importance of the ‘content’

• Can be framed as a full sentence – “I can…”

Unpacking/Deconstructing the Standard

• Determine standard/target type(s)• Knowledge• Reasoning• Performance skill• Product

• Identify its underpinning learning targets• Create student-friendly “I Can” statements

Learning Targets

Measurable achievement expectations of what

students should know and be able to do

I will create a district

curriculum guide

Learning Targets: Developing Them

Questions to Ask•What will students do during the learning process? •What are the standards/ criteria for success (content, 21st Century Skills) for desired quality of work?•Will the learning targets be met after achieving the criteria for success? If not, what is the next step?

Learning Targets: Knowledge

• What students need to know, be able to do and/or be able to locate (know outright vs. know via reference)

• Often stated in verbs: knows, lists, names, identifies, and recalls

Learning Targets: Reasoning

• Thinking proficiencies – using knowledge to solve a problem, make a decision, plan, etc.

• Application of knowledge• Make up the majority of learning targets• Represent mental processes such as predicts,

infers, classifies, hypothesizes, compares, concludes, summarizes, analyzes, evaluates, and generalizes.

Learning Targets: Performance Skill

• Must be demonstrated, observed, heard, and/or seen to be assessed

• Examples include oral fluency in reading, playing a musical instrument, demonstrating movement skill in dance, serving a volleyball

Learning Targets: Product

• Call for students to create a product• The product isn't a medium to show the learning;

the product IS the learning.• Found more often in the arts than in core subject

areas• Examples include notating music, using desktop

publishing software to create a variety of publications, creating a scatterplot to display data, creating a personal wellness plan.

Reminder…

Standard (target) Type

Underpinning Learning Targets

Knowledge

Reasoning

Performance Skill

Product Product + S + R + K

Reasoning + K

Skill + R + K

Knowledge

Group ActivityLook at the clarifying objectives related to one cluster from your chart

1.Record the Title for the “cluster”2.Develop a question or two that illustrates the “Big Idea” and could get to the heart of what we want students to discover or uncover during their learning.3.Record on chart paper 4.From the “Big Idea” and Essential Question in one cluster from your diagram Determine the UNDERSTANDINGS students should uncover throughout and by the end of the unit. (Learning Targets)

Resource Review

• Find them all at http://successforeverychild.com

• Wikispace(http://pittcountycommoncore.pbworks.com)

• Content/Grade Level Standards• Unpacking Guides

Group WorkFor each content area/grade your group is responsible for:

1.Develop norms for your group (online)2.Develop big ideas for the entire year3.Discuss vertical alignment (may need to meet with other grade levels)4.List the Curriculum Standards/Clarifying Goals associated with the Theme/Big Idea

3-2-1 Reflection Activity

• List 3 things you were expecting when you arrived today

• List 2 pleasant surprises• Write 1 question you need

clarification on for tomorrow