Chapters International

DESCRIPTION:

Established Standards provide a clear set of worthy educational outcomes. However, the Standards are not curriculum. Educators must use the standards as a basis for designing high-quality curricula and assessments to support impactful teaching for effective learning. In addition to academic standards, a growing number of voices within and outside the educational establishment are calling for an enhanced emphasis on the “21st-century skills” of critical and creative thinking, collaboration, and wise use of technology.

In this virtual workshop series, we’ll examine the ideas in Jay McTighe’s recent book, Leading Modern Learning: A Blueprint for Vision Driven Schools (Solution Tree), for transforming the Standards and 21st-century skills into a coherent curriculum that emphasizes understanding and long-term transfer. Key principles and practical tools from Understanding by Design (ASCD) and Schooling by Design (ASCD) will be offered to guide curriculum design and implementation.

INTENDED AUDIENCE:

This workshop is designed for curriculum leaders and specialists; school-based administrators; teacher leaders (e.g., department chairs, grade-level leaders, members of curriculum committees), state/provincial/regional service agency staff involved with Standards, Curriculum and Assessment; and higher ed. staff who teach curriculum and assessment courses.

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

Participation in this workshop will enable participants to:

Use “backward design” to create a curriculum blueprint to guide the design of a coherent and vertically aligned curriculum;
Unpack standards to identify conceptually big ideas and transfer goals;
Generate overarching essential questions that spiral across the grades;
Create recurring cornerstone performance tasks and companion rubrics that integrate 21st Century Skills with academic content;
Develop a “third generation” curriculum map around desired performances rather than simply a scope and sequence of content for “coverage;”
Engage PLCs to look systematically at student work generated from authentic tasks; and
Consider a modern approach to grading and reporting, including Guskey’s 3P’s and Learning Board,® a 24/7 digital communications system; and
Utilize an excellent collection of web-based resources for “working smarter” in district- and school-based curriculum design.

LEARNING ACTIVITIES:

This 3-session virtual workshop will feature a balance of lecture presentation with small group discussions (in designated Meeting Rooms), active review of multiple examples, design activities* in role-alike groups, review of web-based resources, and on-going opportunities for Q and A.

*Participants will have opportunities to work with colleagues from their district or school – or – join a role-alike group (e.g., subject matter specialists, curriculum coordinators, assessment staff, school-based leaders, instructional coaches) to apply the ideas in this workshop to develop one or more of the following products:

a set of disciplinary and transdisciplinary Transfer Goals
a set of overarching Essential Questions to spiral across the grades
a “third generation” Curriculum Map (1 year or multi-year)
a set of authentic Performance Tasks linked to Transfer Goals and power standards
common rubrics for unifying assessment across grade bands

Participants will receive a 100+ page electronic handout containing numerous examples and design tools. A large collection of excellent, supportive websites will be shared and previewed as well.

Jay McTighe

Jay McTighe brings a wealth of experience developed during a rich and varied career in education. He served as director of the Maryland Assessment Consortium, a state collaboration of school districts working together to develop and share formative performance assessments. Prior to this position, Jay was involved with school improvement projects at the Maryland State Department of Education where he helped lead Maryland’s standards-based reforms, including the development of performance-based statewide assessments.

DATES & TIMES:

8th, 15th & 22nd May 2021
Each Session will be for 2 hours
Hong Kong 7:00 am | Melbourne 9:00 am
which corresponds with 7th, 14th, 21st May 2021 Times San Francisco 4:00 pm | New York 7:00 pm