Week+Three

Storyboarding

Tuesday: Semester --What is it?

Scope and sequence is simply the WHAT and WHEN of student knowledge, understanding, and skills to be attained. It IS a big deal--it guides our instruction. Determined primarily by the national legislature, it is revised and adopted by state legislature who then receive input from school districts and grant some flexibility in adoption. As a result, each school district makes available to their stakeholders (students, teachers, administrators, parents, and community members) what content subjects will be taught and at what grade level and in what sequence.  Scope and sequence is usually prescribed in a matrix / chart with embedded or attached documents providing more detail. Scope and sequence documents are intended to serve as general guides to help teachers and curriculum developers align their curricula and instruction to support the National, State and District Standards of Learning. The samples you will see are organized around specific standards to help teachers present information in an organized, articulated manner. Scope and sequence guides are not intended to prescribe exactly how curriculum should be developed or how instruction should be delivered. Instead, it provides examples showing how teachers and school divisions might present information to students in a logical and effective manner information that has been aligned with the Standards of Learning. Teachers should correlate the scope and sequence content identified in the guides with available instructional resources and develop lesson plans to support instruction.

 --Why do it? Watch this video (first 3 minutes): http://minutebio.com/blog/2009/06/25/it-came-from-hollywood-storyboarding/

--Format

--Considerations: time, inclusions

--Class work: in pairs, storyboard (with stickies on the table), a semester at chef school

Homework:

Below is a link you can open that will give you a GENERAL idea on scope and sequence by grade level. Here you can quickly access and thoughtfully evaluate the WHAT that is taught for your grade level / content area and the WHEN it is taught. This is the first step to understanding how to design your curriculum. Once you are familiar with scope and sequence, as a teacher, you can begin to write units of instruction that contain lesson plans and assessments in a meaningful way that reflects 21st century teaching and learning.

[|National Scope and Sequence]

 Design a semester storyboard for one course in your content area at one grade level. (Use stickies)




 Thursday: Unit Storyboarding --3 concepts and a guru: scaffolding, differentiation, objectives Sternberg --Objectives to activities vs general free-braining --See samples --Look at process --Homework

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There are MANY ways to design curriculum. Designing instruction has been at the heart of teaching since Socrates' days (or is that daze?). This creates controversy -- what is the best way to design instruction to maximize student learning and engagement? =====

 And, there are SOO many different theories on how to design curriculum. Let's take a look at a few: [|Curriculum Practices] 

 To implement curriculum, teachers give instruction in thematic segments call units. These are designed in two-to three week time periods. Consider a book in which you have chapters with subheadings and information, activities, and a logical sequence of information.

Let's take a look at what units LOOK like. As you are perusing through these site, ask yourself "Is this “good” curriculum? What feels right about it--content? activities? Would you implement the curriculum? Are there other disciplines included in this unit? Does it have an authentic (real world) component?

 Would you teach this unit? If not, what would you change in order to adopt it?

High School: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> (high school units designed by teams of teachers)

So, what concepts, knowledge and skills would be taught? How would we organize that information in a logical manner? What teaching strategies would we use to get students to understand and be able to use the concepts, knowledge and skills? Is there an inclusion of other disciplines? How would we know if the students have mastered understanding?

Things to think about in planning a unit:

--what concepts need to be taught --what knowledge needs to be mastered --what skills need to be attained --what is the authentic connection to the students' life --what is the logical sequence of activities that will led students through to a larger understanding and application of the concepts --what activities can I design that will offer the students a variety of ways to attain understanding --how will technology be used to enhance 21st century learning principles --how will I know if the students have mastered the content

The first thing to do is to consider the time you have to teach the subject. Unfortunately, time is a task master. For secondary schools, a course is taught in 18 weeks. Of course, many of these days are lost to other activities (field trips, assemblies, no contact days, fire alarms, etc.).

The next thing is to consider the units that will be taught and the length of time you will devote to each unit.

Next, each unit must be fleshed out: key concepts to cover, knowledge to gain, skills to master.

With that understanding, the teacher now looks at the teaching strategies and organization for implementing the unit.

Let's take a look at the topics that will need to be covered (and uncovered): <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">[|Civics in Action Syllabus.doc] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">

Now, let's take a look at how a teacher writes ONE unit of instruction. Read this carefully--this is what you will be doing in this course!

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">[|genoCurric2.pdf] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">

When I think about writing a unit, this is the process I walk through: <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">[|How to write a unit.doc] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;"> I've written hundreds of units (some good, some great, some awful), but I've written many. And, as a result of working on many of these collabertively, this is a process that is sound and will work. Obviously, as you get more experienced, you will adapt it to your personal style or maybe design your OWN process, but PLEASE READ THIS and try it.

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">HOMEWORK: Your task is to storyboard ONE unit of instruction. Repeat what you did for storyboarding your semester, but this time, it is focused on a unit.

The unit should be two-three weeks, should be in your content area.