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Hello, ladies and gentlemen. I hope you are having a wonderful day today. Today, we're going to be looking at that intersection of standards and competencies. But we're going to be looking at it in practice taking a look at some real subject standards and seeing how we can align those with the technology standards to develop some good student objectives and outcomes.
For today's lesson, I've chosen a quote by Benjamin Franklin which states, "The discovery of what is true and the practice of that which is good are the two most important objects of philosophy." That's exactly what we're going to do today. We are going to put into practice what we have learned about the intersection and the combination of those standards and competencies.
By the end of today's lesson, you will be able to analyze the alignment between the subject area standards and the technology standards in practice with real content standards. So let's go ahead and get started.
For our first content standard that we're going to look at, I've chosen a standard from the foreign language standards, standards 2.1, which states, students should demonstrate an understanding of the relationship between the practices and the perspectives of the culture studied. So after I've chosen this content standard, I am going to look and see if I can find one of those ISTE standards which fits well with this content standard.
And the one I've chosen is number three for the student standards, which is research and information fluency, stating that students will apply digital tools to gather evaluate and use information. In my mind, I think that these two fit nicely together because it's focusing on students gathering that digital research and information and then presenting what they found on that relationship between the practices and perspectives of the culture studied and their own.
Knowing that I'm going to bridge these two together, I can use them to develop my student outcomes. And I've created two here. In the I can statements, that is, a student is saying it and taking ownership, I can use digital tools to research my culture's practices and perspectives and the practices and perspectives of another culture.
And then I can use digital tools to create a presentation of the comparisons in contrast between those two cultures. So I'm not only combining both the ISTE standards and the content standard, but I'm breaking it down into two different ones, both the research element and that presentation element.
Let's take a look at another example of this. This time, we're going to focus in on math, particularly math in the elementary levels. For the content standard I've chosen from the common core math standards, a third grade standard which states, overarching that students will represent and interpret data.
I've aligned this content standard with the ISTE standard for creativity and innovation stating that students will demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technologies.
I think that these align really nicely together because I'm looking one on the math side at representing and interpreting data and, on the technology side, on using technology to develop and demonstrate and construct that knowledge.
So let's look at how we've taken these two elements together to create our student outcomes. We have four very simple-- because again, we're working with elementary students here-- simply-stated student outcomes. I can interpret a bar graph on paper and digitally.
And then I can create a bar graph using paper and digital programs. Why I've used paper and digital here is that a lot of times, especially when we're dealing with these younger grades, teachers will want to take students step by step in creating these elements.
And then I can interpret pictographs on paper and digitally, as well as I can create pictographs using paper and digital programs. We focused in on two different types of data, both having students focus on interpreting that data as well as representing it and creating it.
Now let's look at one final example of this, this time using English language arts. And we're going to use a high school standard for English language arts to see kind of what the differences are between those two different grade levels.
So for this content standard, I used the common core English language arts standard for 9th through 10th grade, which states that students will be able to cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support the analysis of what the text says explicitly, as well as inferences drawn from the text.
So you can see already in the content standard, we have something that's much more complex. However, I-- and this might come from being a language arts teacher-- really feel like language arts aligns really nicely with the technology standards. So let's take a look at which technology standard I've chosen.
I've looked at number two, which is communication and collaboration, broken down and edited for space which basically states students will use digital media to communicate and work collaboratively to help support their individual learning and contribute to the learning of others.
So already, my mind is moving and thinking I can have students looking at that text and then presenting it in a digital format while working with other people perhaps in a group to help come together and make arguments and then find support for those arguments in whatever text it is that we're reading. There are a lot of different technologies that can be used to do this.
So from those two elements, I've created the student outcomes which say I can analyze what the text says explicitly and draw inferences from what is not said explicitly. That draws directly from the content standard.
And I can cite specific sources to back up my analysis of the text, again, drawing directly from the content standard, as well as a student outcome that draws from the technology standard. I can use digital media to communicate this analysis. So we're pulling from both of those standards to help create our student outcomes for the lesson.
Now that we have an idea of really how to put that process into practice, I want to take a look at focusing in on those standards and competencies and using those standards to develop year-end objectives.
So we're going to focus in on that content standard that we just looked at for 9th through 10th grade, really honing in on students citing strong textual evidence both from what is said explicitly, as well as what is inferred. That's the content standard we are going to use to create our end-of-the-year objective.
So what I've done is I've taken it almost directly from that standard. And I've stated, by the end of the year, students will be able to cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly, as well as inferences drawn from the text. From that, it is really important that we break down that year-end objective into measurable competencies that the student must demonstrate mastery of before moving on to that next level
Remember, they have an entire year to meet that objective. To ask them to get there all the way at one time is unrealistic and really unproductive to what we're doing in education. Rather, we're going to identify little points and scaffold them so that the student is able to break down and work toward that year-end objective.
So first, I'm going to say that the student needs to be able to identify what the text says explicitly. It's important that a student is able to first and foremost take away from that text what it is saying. Then I'm going to build on to that by saying that the student is then able to use textual evidence to support what the text says explicitly. So not only are they drawing very explicit elements from the text, but they're also then finding evidence from that text to support it.
Then we'll move on to the more difficult element of that year-end objective, which is drawing inferences from the text. Do you know how to create an inference, how to draw that inference from the text that we're using? And then once they're able to do that, then going back and building upon to use specific textual evidence to support those inferences.
I've broken down that entire objective and arranged it in a way that I think are going to be the easiest for my students to stair step their way up to so that by the end of the year they've achieved that objective.
Now that we've reached the end of our lesson, you are able to analyze the alignment between the subject area standards and the technology standards in practice looking at real content standards and aligning them to real student technology standards to show how we get at those objectives, both those year-end objectives and the little points that we hit along the way.
Now I would like to take just a moment for reflection. As you reflect on all of this information, what are the challenges that you foresee if you start implementing this alignment of content standards, as well as technology standards, in your lesson plans? Feel free to pause the video for a moment if you need to as you think about your answer to that question.
For more information on how to apply what you've 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 additional resource. That is all we have for right now. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day.
(00:00-00:45) Intro
(00:46-00:58) Objectives
(00:59-02:41) Standards & Competency Practice: Foreign Language Standards
(02:42-04:28) Standards & Competency Practice: CC Math Standards
(04:29-06:26) Standards & Competency Practice: CC ELA Standards
(06:27-08:57) Developing Year End Objectives
(08:58-09:27) Review
(09:28-10:08) Reflection
New Hampshire Department of Education Resource
New Hampshire Department of Education Resource
This site includes a Rubric to assess course level competencies.
https://www.education.nh.gov/innovations/hs_redesign/competencies.htm
North Carolina Public Schools Standards Based Education System
This is a comprehensive webpage that offers an overview of the resources and instructional tools that North Carolina used in their standards based education system. Scroll down to the content area links to find your content area. The link will being you to curriculum, resources, and trainings developed by North Carolina connected to the CCSS in those subject areas.
http://www.ncpublicschools.org/curriculum/