Should we revisit testing as a means of assessment? No doubt, students will need to be prepared for college (or, if you teach middle school high school; if you teach elementary school, middle school), and most colleges still using testing as a primary means of assessing students. After all, when you have a lecture class…
I am once again teaching The Odyssey. I have posted my UbD plan for this unit over at the UbD Educators wiki. The unit plan is not different from what I’ve done with The Odyssey in the past, but I don’t think I’ve ever framed it with essential questions. Incidentally, inspired by Tom from Bionic…
Some months down the road after its creation, the UbD Educators wiki has fallen silent. I logged in today to find that neither changes nor discussions had taken place in the last 30 days. Yikes! I take part of the blame upon myself. Having five preps leaves me, ironically, with not much time to plan,…
As I have been working to create UbD plans over the last couple of days, a couple of things have become glaringly obvious to me. The first is that the quality of available study guides and teachers’ guides varies widely. Most of them only have a handful of “good” lesson plans. What I mean by…
You sure can tell when school is back in session again around this blog, can’t you? We started back on August 20, and I am busily evaluating summer reading, grading, and planning. I am advising National Honor Society again after a hiatus, and I am looking forward to making that a really good, solid organization…
You have probably heard elderly family members or friends refer to having an 8th grade education. Going through grammar school, or 8th grade, without continuing on to high school was fairly common in the past. But what exactly was an 8th grade education? Genealogy blogger Randy Seaver posted an 1895 Salina, KS. 8th grade final…
I created a UbD unit for One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, which my seniors read for summer reading. Please check it and tell me what you think. The webquest for the unit can be accessed here. Also, I created the webquest for my UbD unit on Brave New World. [tags]ubd, brave new world, one…
Our students at each grade and level read three books over the summer. You can check out our summer reading brochure here (pdf) to see our requirements and recommendations. We have latitude regarding assessment of summer reading, but we are encouraged to evaluate students’ understanding of one book through an objective test and to evaluate…
After finishing Understanding by Design, I created two units: Apostrophes (9th grade Grammar, Comp., and Lit.) Beowulf (11th grade British Lit. and Comp.) If you are familiar with UbD (or even if you aren’t), I’d appreciate feedback. You can contribute to discussions at UbD Educators wiki without joining the wiki. I can’t remember if I…
The final chapter of Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe’s Understanding by Design is a summary of the research presented in refutation of three common reasons educators give for why they do not implement UbD: 1) “We have to teach to the test”; 2) “We have too much content to cover”; and 3) “This work [backward…
