Hello, and thank you for joining me today to discuss evaluating lesson plans using Understanding by Design planning-- part 2. The essential questions that we'll be able to answer by the end of today's tutorial are, what is the criteria for evaluating stage 3 of lessons that utilize the Understanding by Design framework. And what does this evaluation look like?
A quick recap of Understanding by Design stage 3-- remember, we used the WHERETO acronym. So Where stands for, how do I make sure my students see the big picture of the assignment. Hook-- how do I pique interest and keep my students engaged throughout. Equipment experience means, how do I provide the knowledge, resources, and tools that the students need to be successful. Rethink-- how can we shift perspectives, challenge assumptions, and investigate new evidence and ideas. Evaluate-- how can I provide timely and formative feedback. Tailor-- how can I differentiate this lesson for the various students that I have and their different needs, et cetera, not just the assignments, but also the instruction. And Organize-- what is the sequence for the desired outcome.
Stage 3, even though it's the third step of Understanding by Design, actually acts as a bridge from stage 1 to stage 2. Stage 1 is, what are the major goals that we want our students to take from this lesson. What are the essential questions and big understandings.
And stage 2 is the major performance event. Stage 3 is our bridge from stage 1 to stage 2. It's how do we get from what I want my students to learn to them proving their knowledge.
So some guiding questions we need to ask ourselves when we're evaluating in stage 3 of Understanding by Design is, did I use the WHERETO elements from creating my learning activities. And is there a variety of assessments that appeal to the different learning styles and skills for my students.
Just as a review, this is a second-grade classroom and they're learning about the different zones of the ocean. So where, which again is just ensuring that they see the big picture. I'm going to post the essential questions in the room and I'm going to have a conversation with my students about essential questions. And I'm also going to help them maybe generate more questions or even help generate a rubric and a timeline for the assignment.
The hook. How do I pique their interests and how do I keep them engaged? I'm piquing their interest by showing scenes from Nemo. And I'm keeping them engaged by having a variety of engaging resources, which also leads us to equip and experience.
We're going to have field research at the local aquarium. We're going to have experts come in. We're going to have manipulatives in the classroom that mimic what they would see in the ocean. We're going to create on the wall a giant mural of the different zones of the ocean. And we're going to create the animals that go in it.
We're going to have picture books. We're going to have all sorts of resources. We're going to have some of the resources that have the same information the students are going to have to mash them up or make decisions about which one is the more reputable resource.
We're also going to have rethink? And this is going to come in the form of the group work. In the groups we're going to have students with various perspectives. We're going to have students who stand very firm in their beliefs.
And the kids are going to have to have discourse. They're going to have to talk to one another. They're going to have to have empathy to come to a conclusion to create that puppet show at the end.
For the evaluation, this goes to our second guiding question of, is it varied. It definitely is. We have check-ins. We have journals. We have a variety of different ways to deliver the information. We have a variety of different ways to assess students on whether or not they're getting the information.
These are also tailored lesson plans. I've collected data on my students. I know what they need to know and what they already know.
It's skills-based. What student has a strength in what area? What student has a deficiency? Partnering those students together so that there's pure scaffolding and modeling.
Interest-based. I'm actually going to try to assess what students are interested in what zones, and mix them up so that for the puppet show we don't have all the sunlight zone students together focusing solely on that.
For organization, we have a posted timeline where we've chunked the assignment into small, manageable pieces. And I've had student input on that as well as on the rubric. So if I say, hey guys, we're doing a puppet show in a month, what should we do first, create sets or research information, we're going to discuss that as a group. And they'll also have a mini-lesson on managing time and figuring out logically what steps should have come first in the project.
Let's reflect really quickly. Why is it important to have a variety of assessments? What are some challenges you can foresee when using WHERETO?
All right, to review. Today, we talked about what the criteria is for evaluating stage 3 of lessons that utilize the Understanding by Design framework. And we also talked about what this evaluation looks like.
For more information on how to apply what you learned in this video, please view the Additional Resources section that accompanies this video presentation. The Additional Resources section includes hyperlinks useful for applications of the course material, including a brief description of each resource.
Thank you for joining me, and happy teaching.
Overview
(00:00-00:17) Introduction
(00:18-01:25) UbD Stage 3 Recap
(01:26-03:57) Process and Evaluation of Lesson Plan
(03:58-04:14) Reflection
(04:15-04:44) Conclusion
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