Offers a practical guide for improving schools dramatically that will enable all students from all backgrounds to achieve at high levels. Includes assessment forms, an index, and a DVD.
What is understanding and how does it differ from knowledge? How can we determine the big ideas worth understanding? Why is understanding an important teaching goal, and how do we know when students have attained it? How can we create a rigorous and engaging curriculum that focuses on understanding and leads to improved student performance in today's high-stakes, standards-based environment? Authors Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe answer these and many other questions in this second edition of Understanding by Design. Drawing on feedback from thousands of educators around the world who have used the UbD framework since its introduction in 1998, the authors have greatly revised and expanded their original work to guide educators across the K-16 spectrum in the design of curriculum, assessment, and instruction. With an improved UbD Template at its core, the book explains the rationale of backward design and explores in greater depth the meaning of such key ideas as essential questions and transfer tasks. Readers will learn why the familiar coverage- and activity-based approaches to curriculum design fall short, and how a focus on the six facets of understanding can enrich student learning. With an expanded array of practical strategies, tools, and examples from all subject areas, the book demonstrates how the research-based principles of Understanding by Design apply to district frameworks as well as to individual units of curriculum. Combining provocative ideas, thoughtful analysis, and tested approaches, this new edition of Understanding by Design offers teacher-designers a clear path to the creation of curriculum that ensures better learning and a more stimulating experience for students and teachers alike.
The bestselling guide for school leaders—updated in a new edition Data-driven instruction is the philosophy that schools should focus on two simple questions: how do you know if are students learning? And when they are not, what do you do about it? Driven by Data 2.0 is a practical guide that answers these questions to empower schools to achieve significant gains in student achievement. Rooted in a proven framework that has been implemented in thousands of schools, the book presents what makes schools successful along with tools to put the framework into place to make data work for your schools: Assess—set the roadmap for learning Analyze—identify why students struggle Act—teach more effectively what students need Build the culture—train and develop your staff so that data-driven instruction can thrive If you’re a K – 12 leader, coach, or teacher looking to implement data-driven instruction in your school district, Driven by Data 2.0 has the tools to train your staff: PD materials, videos of exemplar practice and all the resources you need to achieve remarkable results.
"Gathering data and using it to inform instruction is a requirement for many schools, yet educators are not necessarily formally trained in how to do it. This book helps bridge the gap between classroom practice and the principles of educational psychology. Teachers will find cutting-edge advances in research and theory on human learning and teaching in an easily understood and transferable format. The text's integrated model shows teachers, school leaders, and district administrators how to establish a data culture and transform quantitative and qualitative data into actionable knowledge based on: assessment; statistics; instructional and differentiated psychology; classroom management."--Publisher's description.
Tools and techniques from the trailblazers in data-based education reform Over a period of several years, Amanda Datnow and Vicki Park visited public schools with a reputation for being ahead of the pack in data-driven decision making. The results of this pioneering study reveal how education leaders can make data work for students and teachers, rather than against them. This book is an essential guide to meeting the challenges of high-stakes accountability, building performance-based schools, and improving student outcomes. By following the advice in this book, you’ll be able to transform data overload into a data-positive school culture. You’ll learn the difference between “data-driven leadership” and “data-informed leadership,” and how to use distributed leadership to inspire collaboration and guided analysis. Incorporating narrative reflections drawn from real educators and administrators, the authors refine their observations and interviews into practical conclusions that leaders can put to use immediately. This book empowers leaders to support inquiry, build trust in data-based initiatives, establish goals for evidence use, and provide educators with the skills they need to mobilize data for the good of all stakeholders. “Datnow and Park’s ideas are easily accessible and grounded in clear examples, and their seven ‘calls’ about what needs to be done nail the problem and the solutions. Use this book as your action guide and you’ll be rewarded with better results in student learning.” —Michael Fullan, professor emeritus, University of Toronto “Datnow and Park uncover, at last, what it means to use data to inform leadership. Documenting the four P’s (people, policies, practices, and patterns) in schools, we learn about the organization and dynamics of reform informed by data. A must read!” —Ann Lieberman, senior scholar, Stanford University
“When students know how to learn, they are able to become their own teachers.” —Nancy Frey, Douglas Fisher, and John Hattie Imagine students who describe their learning in these terms: “I know where I’m going, I have the tools I need for the journey, and I monitor my own progress.” Now imagine the extraordinary difference this type of ownership makes in their progress over the course of a school year. This illuminating book shows how to make this scenario an everyday reality. With its foundation in principles introduced in the authors’ bestselling Visible Learning for Literacy, this resource delves more deeply into the critical component of self-assessment, revealing the most effective types of assessment and how each can motivate students to higher levels of achievement.
Cuban takes a richly detailed history of the Austin, Texas, school district, under Superintendent Pat Forgione, to ask the question that few politicians and school reformers want to touch: given effective use of widely welcomed reforms, can school policies and practices put all children at the same academic level?
Connect data and instruction to improve practice Gathering data and using it to inform instruction is a requirement for many schools, yet educators are not necessarily formally trained in how to do it. This book helps bridge the gap between classroom practice and the principles of educational psychology. Teachers will find cutting-edge advances in research and theory on human learning and teaching in an easily understood and transferable format. The text′s integrated model shows teachers, school leaders, and district administrators how to establish a data culture and transform quantitative and qualitative data into actionable knowledge based on: Assessment Statistics Instructional and differentiated psychology Classroom management
"Every student deserves a great teacher, not by chance, but by design" — Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey, & John Hattie What if someone slipped you a piece of paper listing the literacy practices that ensure students demonstrate more than a year’s worth of learning for a year spent in school? Would you keep the paper or throw it away? We think you’d keep it. And that’s precisely why acclaimed educators Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey, and John Hattie wrote Visible Learning for Literacy. They know teachers will want to apply Hattie’s head-turning synthesis of more than 15 years of research involving millions of students, which he used to identify the instructional routines that have the biggest impact on student learning. These practices are "visible" for teachers and students to see, because their purpose has been made clear, they are implemented at the right moment in a student’s learning, and their effect is tangible. Yes, the "aha" moments made visible by design. With their trademark clarity and command of the research, and dozens of classroom scenarios to make it all replicable, these authors apply Hattie’s research, and show you: How to use the right approach at the right time, so that you can more intentionally design classroom experiences that hit the surface, deep, and transfer phases of learning, and more expertly see when a student is ready to dive from surface to deep. Which routines are most effective at specific phases of learning, including word sorts, concept mapping, close reading, annotating, discussion, formative assessment, feedback, collaborative learning, reciprocal teaching, and many more. Why the 8 mind frames for teachers apply so well to curriculum planning and can inspire you to be a change agent in students’ lives—and part of a faculty that embraces the idea that visible teaching is a continual evaluation of one’s impact on student’s learning. "Teachers, it’s time we embrace the evidence, update our classrooms, and impact student learning in wildly positive ways," say Doug, Nancy, and John. So let’s see Visible Learning for Literacy for what it is: the book that renews our teaching and reminds us of our influence, just in time.