Curriculum

New Challenges Require District Curriculum Councils to Revisit Curriculum Governance Policies

April 6, 2021 by Stu Ervay

Woman holding small chalkboard that says Think Big

America is beginning to change. So are its schools. The reasons are obvious. The COVID 19 Pandemic is one of them.

Other important reasons are associated with social disparities, funding, shifting governmental policy, and the purpose of education in a developing 21^st Century.

School boards, curriculum councils, teachers, and administrators are under more pressure than ever. Parents and school patrons demand solutions to nearly unsolvable problems. Most of which involve virtual learning, social distancing, and learning quality.

Meeting agendas often include topics shown below:

keeping students engaged using distance education,
the role of curriculum and instructional design,
the extent to which students are “falling behind,”
internet access,
availability of electronic tools like computers,
budgets that sustain the many changes in learning configuration,
family support systems,
teacher salaries and morale, and
the health of both teachers and students.

These topics have long been areas of concern. They are challenges made worse by the pandemic.

The first three topics in the list should be discussed as priorities by the curriculum council. They need both immediate and long-term attention. Subsequent E-Hints will offer ideas for solving immediate issues. However, now is a good time to ensure long-term policies are still in place and working.

Three are most important:

Ensure your district has a clear policy for academic program development, implementation, maintenance, and evaluation.

If there is a policy in place, is it being adhered to by the board, curriculum council, and administrative staff? If not, how can that problem be addressed?

Make certain your district has a long-range plan of action, a process that systematically upgrades the quality of curriculum, instruction, and assessment of student learning over time.

If a plan of action exists and is up to date, is it being followed according to policy provisions? If not, what can be done to resolve that problem?

Clear intentions for student learning called mastery statements are more essential than ever!

Teachers need mastery statements to guide their planning, instruction, and assessment. Parents and school patrons want to know what is expected of students. Three kinds of mastery statements are essential:

a comprehensive description of what students who complete a district’s full curriculum will know or do
descriptions of what students who complete each subject area in the district’s curriculum will know or do
an accurate statement of what students will know or do after completing each subject at grade level

If those three actions were taken years ago, today’s unique challenges might require a few modifications. We suggest the process start with your curriculum council. Recommendations can then be made to the administrative staff and board of education.

A Reflection on “What Works” from a Veteran Consultant

March 2, 2021 by Rhonda Renfro

As I reflect on the past 25 years or so of working directly with school districts of various sizes, I debated my last topic for an E-Hint. A staff colleague asked, “In your work, what have been the most important things districts can do to change school culture through curriculum development, instructional planning, and local assessment development?” So, I created this list of actions that I feel lead to the most significant impact for districts implementing the model. I daresay that these actions would lead to positive effects within any school district. They have led to intense study of best practice through research, consistent improvement of student learning, and powerful conversations between and among teachers, administrators, the board of education, and community members.

To achieve significant results, a district must establish:

a “district” mindset for the governance of curriculum, instruction, and assessment by a representative group of teachers, administrators, board, and local stakeholders.
- This district mindset demands that members put aside their titles and their individualism to make decisions that will positively benefit the school district.
- District personnel bring their expertise to the table, but the stakeholders are free to discuss as equal participants in the decision-making steps involved.
a climate of accountability for teachers and students along with district-level and building-level leadership.
- As with many action decisions, if no one is checking, it is natural to do what is “easier” when stress and deadlines encroach on planning. Accountability structures lead to productive actions for the entire school staff and foster a sense of daily accountability for students.
a Long-Range Plan to outline timeframes for curriculum development, instructional planning, and local assessment development.
- Teachers and teacher teams will not have to wonder when changes are to be made to a curriculum, leading to instructional planning adjustments, assessment revisions, and the potential for new resources.
- Administrators can budget time and finances, for upcoming needs in advance.
district-wide parameters for grading policies that positively impact student learning.
- Stakeholders should have opportunities for research and dialogue to identify and implement best practice grading solutions regarding the why and how students are evaluated for their performance.
- Teachers’ closely held beliefs about grading are often shared while decisions are made about what scores are “fair” to include and how to incorporate the scores into a “grade” for students.
- An environment of equity and fairness results from the discussions.
a common, local curriculum aligned to standards allows teachers of the same grade level or course opportunities to have planning conversations.
- Teachers collaborate to develop instructional plans with common outcome targets, leading to using all teachers’ expertise of the same grade level in each classroom. Teachers learn from each other in pursuit of common goals.
- The common, local curriculum establishes the Tier One curriculum on which to base intervention plans.
common assessments with descriptions of defined performance levels.
- Teachers carefully align local assessments to make sure they are assessing the established curriculum.
- Subjectivity is removed from grading as much as is possible.
- Results are shared within the grade level or courses to determine best instruction practices on a specific curricular goal and identify the most effective instructional strategies.
- Teachers can implement interventions in a timely manner.
- Communication regarding student progress can be more specific and include celebrations or clear steps for improvement.
a seamless progression of content and skills in each subject area for efficient instruction.
- There is a clear “roadmap” of the students’ journey of content and skills.
- Teachers can identify where or when students may have experienced a loss of successful learning.
- Teachers can rely on the learning in previous grade levels to provide the basis for new learning expectations.

These strategies or steps to improve curriculum, instruction, and assessment alignment lead to better communication between and among all stakeholders and provide stability throughout a school district. While these actions would lead to positive effects within any school district, it is often impossible to maintain the priority without a district-mandated structure explicitly designed to require discussion.

Returning to School During COVID-19 (Part One)

July 28, 2020 by Stacey Bruton

When the school year began last fall, no one could have imagined the events that transpired to change our educational setting for the foreseeable future. While it is easier to focus on the negative aspects of the situation, there were several opportunities for personal and professional growth. Perspective can turn those challenges into learning experiences so that the new school year can start on a positive note. As you prepare for the possibility of more uncertainty, use those recent lessons to provide the best learning environment for your students. In this two-part E-hint, you will receive suggestions to address the social-emotional needs of your students, plan to teach the curriculum, utilize various options for instruction, and check for student learning. One size does not fit all, so select those that work best for your district and student population.

Meet the social-emotional needs of your students.

Many students experienced anxiety throughout COVID-19. With the abrupt switch to online instruction, schools made their best attempt to provide support virtually. When students gather back in person, whether full-time or part-time, procedures and logistics will be new to them. Some students may feel like they are attending school for the very first time, so thoroughly explaining and modeling expectations will help to ease stress. Fulfill your students’ social-emotional needs first. Doing so may require you to use some of the time initially designated for instructional purposes.

Keep in mind, “Students have to Maslow before they can Bloom.” The meaning behind this common saying is that children’s basic needs, identified by Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy, must be met before they can embrace academics as outlined in Benjamin Bloom’s taxonomy. Students must feel safe, connected, and heard. Set aside time to talk before time to learn. If teachers feel short on time, incorporating students’ thoughts and feelings into a lesson through an art project or writing activity is one way of blending needs and academics.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Bloom’s Taxonomy

Develop a plan to teach the curriculum, and be ready to adjust.

Curriculum Leadership Institute recommends that teachers develop a curriculum pacing guide and update it at the beginning of each school year. Last year, planning was based on delivering the curriculum through onsite instruction. We now know that this may not be possible for the upcoming year. Therefore, everyone needs to be prepared to teach online to some degree.

The first step in creating a pacing guide for instruction is to prioritize the curriculum at each grade-level and in each subject area. Some targets are critical for sequential learning, but to keep students on grade-level, teachers will need to let go of some targets of lesser importance. Facilitate collaborative conversations between teachers of adjacent grades to make sure there are no preventable gaps in skills or content when prioritizing.

Next, identify any parts of your curriculum that didn’t get taught during the stay-at-home order. This should also be discussed during those grade-band conversations. If essential pieces are missing from the previous grade, students need those gaps filled before they can be successful in learning the essential grade-level material. A natural solution is to teach them consecutively. For example, consider the second-grade math outcome that was omitted last spring. It reads: Students will determine the attributes of two-dimensional shapes. Students must learn this concept before they can be successful in the third-grade outcome: Students will use the attributes of two-dimensional shapes to classify and calculate perimeter. On your pacing guide, block a few weeks for teaching attributes of shapes and plan to instruct the second and third-grade outcomes consecutively as illustrated below.

If your school implements a hybrid schedule to include both onsite and online learning, encourage teachers to teach the critical pieces of their curriculum onsite. Then, online instruction can be used to review previous essentials through guided practice and real-life application. A hybrid approach to learning will require frequent updating of pacing guides. Flexibility is critical when moving between onsite and online learning.

One last note for planning is to use time during an onsite parent night or open house to share important details relating to instruction. The learning targets provided to parents should include the essentials recently determined by the grade-level teams. Also, take a moment to give parents a little online instruction regarding the features of the Learning Management System (LMS) you plan to use throughout the year. Many parents became “substitute” teachers last spring and will appreciate the opportunity to receive a little advance training if they are required to step in for instructional support.

The next segment of our two-part E-hint will focus on instructional options and checking for understanding. Stay tuned for its release to help you continue your preparation for the new year.

The End of the School Year is in Sight

May 5, 2020 by Rhonda Renfro

High School Pupils Celebrating End Of Term

Yes, the end of the school year is in sight. Teachers are worried about finishing the curriculum, checking in books, taking posters off the walls, entering grades, and all of their other year-end tasks. Administrators are ticking items off of their unique building goal lists and sending out reminders and final instructions for the last days of school, all the while contemplating their summer worklists. In anticipation of the end of the year, we experience a seemingly abrupt conclusion followed by a collective sigh. Afterward, the thoughts of “Oh, no, we forgot… “ settle into our minds.

Let’s start now to check off the tasks and items that are complete or need follow-up.

We can then take time to reflect and celebrate the positive accomplishments that we might otherwise overlook in a rush to the end. The provided checklists are republished to serve as a guide to districtwide and classroom reflection and to remind us of all the tasks that require completion or monitoring to start the next year.

Do Standards Improve Learning?

February 4, 2020 by Rhonda Renfro

Eight years later, did the Common Core Standards help or hurt? This might be the million-dollar question with equal numbers of supporters on each side of the debate. While this question can be posed regarding any set of state or national standards followed by a district in the past or present, one important distinction to remember is that not all districts providing scores started the implementation of the Common Core Standards at the same time. The debate rages based on measures of learning and implementation of instruction, which both might be valid or invalid to varying degrees. A look at some factors could lend skepticism in the use of data collected at this point, both positive and negative. No matter on which side of the debate one finds themselves, some common arguments cannot be easily dismissed. However, the cause of the success or lack of success is harder to pinpoint without taking a closer look.

In an article published by Matt Barnum in Chalkbeat, April 2019, there is a list of pros and cons of the Common Core and a summary of the reasons that student learning data is or is not as strong as expected. The descriptions of positive statements about the Common Core Standards mostly refer to the standards themselves. However, the negative statements about the Common Core Standards mostly refer to the implementation of the standards within the classroom or the district. Researcher Mengli Song of the American Institutes for Research summarizes the results of the Common Core Standards in much the same way, as Meador reported in an article for ThoughtCo in September 2019. Song also cites the lack of consistent data collection techniques and the fact that the research is lacking in reports on success.

We at the Curriculum Leadership Institute (CLI) have been working with districts for more than 25 years in finding solutions for districts to overcome the shortcomings in student success. Our hands-on research has led to conclusions supported by district and state data across the country. CLI finds that the solution is often not limited to the existence or non-existence of standards. Our use of a specific model to establish a systemic process of determining curriculum, implementing curriculum, and developing and implementing measures of success within the district affect positive gains in student learning regardless of the standards in place.

Standards are essential and can lead to comparisons across various districts and currently across states. However, standards are not curriculum, and it requires collaboration among district teachers and stakeholders to define standards as curriculum.

Curriculum without thoughtful implementation produces less success in improving student learning than expected. Collaboration among classroom teachers for best practice and in seeking professional development for improving instruction produces positive results across the district.

Developing valid student assessments to measure success also requires the collaboration of classroom teachers and other professionals within the district. Following the administration of the assessments, analysis of the data is critical to critiquing and improving instruction.

Structured, consistent collaboration among district stakeholders, classroom professionals, and local specialists produce positive results as long as there is a systematic approach to making and monitoring systemic efforts for improved student learning.

All of these pieces have been critical parts of the CLI Model and the evolution of the model is in reaction to current research and current mandates at the state and federal levels. Need help to get it going? Contact us and we will get you started!

References:

Barnum, Matt. “Nearly a decade later, did the Common Core work? New research offers clues” Chalkbeat, April 29, 2019. https://chalkbeat.org/posts/us/2019/04/29/common-core-work-research/

Meador, Derrick. “What Are Some Pros and Cons of the Common Core State Standards?” ThoughtCo, Sep. 3, 2019, https://thoughtco.com/common-core-state-standards-3194603.

Curriculum is a Roadmap

January 7, 2020 by Emily Makelky

“Curriculum” is discussed on a daily basis in conversations within schools among administrators, teachers, support staff, and outside stakeholders. Strangely enough, it is a term that carries fundamental misconceptions that make those conversations difficult. Unless everyone involved in the conversation has the same definition for curriculum, what is said and what is heard are often very different.

Perhaps the most common misconception about curriculum is that a textbook or series is the curriculum. Textbooks or any other instructional materials are actually resources. Resources are used to teach curriculum, but are not the curriculum itself. Many textbook series have a curriculum embedded into the resource; however, it is critical that a district determine its curricula locally before resources are adopted. This is to ensure that adopted resources properly support the learning that the district feels is essential – not the hidden curriculum that the publisher values.

Another misconception about curriculum has to do with the federal government’s requirement that each state determines a set of standard skills and content that must be taught at each grade level for each content area. Although these sets of skills and content are clearly called state standards, many educators are under the false assumption that they are curriculum. It is clearly stated in most standards documents that they are not curriculum and that districts need to determine their curricula locally to assure that students meet the identified standards for content and skills.

True, local curriculum must fully employ state standards, but the district may value additional skills and content. Furthermore, standards documents may not be organized into a teachable sequence, but rather they are typically categorized according to similar attributes (strands or domains) such as reading skills, number sense, or presentational skills that would not necessarily be taught in isolation of the other strands or domains within the subject area standards.

On the following page, please examine the graphic representation of curriculum as a roadmap and note the role that resources and standards play in the student’s learning journey.

In this illustration, the journey begins with a teacher and her students. This teacher is tasked with leading her students to their final destination (the end of the “road”) which includes their ability to demonstrate skills and knowledge of the state standards and the district-defined values. This could be a daunting task, particularly if the “road” is not broken down into teachable chunks or units. The breakdown of the journey, the roadmap, is the curriculum.

Relationship between Curriculum, Resources, Standards, and Differentiation

Curriculum should be organized to include curriculum targets that can be accurately assessed after a unit is completed. The desired “outcomes” for each of these teachable units are depicted as blue flags along the road in the illustration. Essentially, these outcomes are significant checkpoints of student learning along the way.

To ensure that students can be successful at the unit outcome level, learning must be broken down further into smaller steps that will be formatively assessed on a regular basis (daily or every few days, at least). These narrow curriculum targets are depicted as footprints along the road. Each unit outcome (flag) includes its own set of footprints.

So, where do resources, best practices, and differentiation fit into this analogy? Resources are what you pack in your suitcase. They are the supplemental materials that make the trip fun, engaging, and successful. There is rarely one resource that will align perfectly to your curriculum, which is why we use the suitcase to represent resources; it is filled with many great tools and materials – some are essential, others are nice to have along.

Incorporating best practices (e.g., 21st-century skills, math practices, ELA text complexity, and ISTE standards) into instruction is like the sun that sheds light on the trip. Best practices help to produce a well-balanced experience for students.

Lastly, differentiation activities (i.e., intervention and enrichment) are the rest areas along the way. It is essential to pause to ensure all students are on board and ready to progress, using formative assessments as indicators of who might need remediation or intervention activities. It is equally important to provide engaging, relevant activities for those students who are already with you and can keep up the pace.

There are so many elements that go into effective teaching; but, the foundation of everything is to determine what students need to know and be able to do – the curriculum – and how it will fit into the time that you’re given. If you haven’t already made your roadmap, make it a priority to identify curriculum targets. You’ll feel more confident about having a plan and the chances of students arriving at the destination are much improved!

Curriculum

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Bloom’s Taxonomy

Footer