Post on 06-Dec-2014
description
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
From Course to Unit to Lesson: Using Essential Questions to Guide
Learning
Presented By:Susan Carmody
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Picture Inductive Model (PIM)
First Viewing
Consider the student perspective. Record information to address the question, thinking about the student experience.
Second Viewing
Consider the teacher perspective. Record information to address the question, thinking about the teacher experience.
How do essential questions shape teaching and learning?
3 MINUTES
Power 10 Literacy Strategy to focus students’ attention and help them consider multiple perspectives while viewing a video clip.
• Make a t-chart. Label each column of the t-chart with one perspective.
• Play the video clip once, focusing on the perspective in the first column.
• Replay the video clip, focusing on the perspective in the second column.
• Collaboratively answer the overarching question.
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
How might PIM support higher level thinking when using a video clip in the classroom?
Handout 1Handout 2
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
In the more general language of UbD, the
best essential questions facilitate transfer and make
students increasingly independent as
thinkers and learners…-Wiggins & McTighe
(2011, p. 54)
Enduring Understanding:• Students must see the big picture in
order to make sense of lessons, draw connections between lessons and units, and transfer their learning to new situations. Essential questions facilitate this big picture understanding.
Essential Questions:• How can essential questions drive
course/unit planning and daily instruction?
• What impact do essential questions have on the learning environment?
Overview
Stage 1: Identify Desired
Results
Stage 2: Determine Acceptable Evidence
Stage 3: Create Learning
Plan
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Agenda
Activity Estimated Time
Introduction, Overview & Agenda 15 minutes
Types of Essential Questions 15 minutes
Eight-Corners Synectic 10 minutes
Teaching With Essential Questions 5 minutes
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Planning Overview
Lesson Planning
Unit PlanningCourse
Planning
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012 from Wiggins & McTighe, 2005, p. 116
Essential Question Chart
TopicalIntent Overarching
Open: To challenge students to think more deeply and creatively about important recurring and unsettled issues.
Teachers pose these arguable questions as means of engaging students in thinking like experts in the field. No definitive answer is expected.
Guiding: To guide student inquiry toward deeper understanding of a big idea.
Teachers pose these questions as a means of uncovering desired understandings. Students construct meaning as they wrestle with the question.
• Broad and deep• Open and alive; lasting
and recurring• Cut across unit, course,
and sometimes subject boundaries
To what extent is DNA destiny?
• Stimulate inquiry• Deepen understanding
of ideas within the unit• Not necessarily
answerable by the end of the unit
Should we require DNA samples from every convicted criminal?
• General• Cut across unit, course,
and subject boundaries• Yield one or more
understandings
How do recent developments in genetics affect the nature/nurture
argument?
• Unit-specific• Converge toward one or a
few settled understandings of important ideas
How is reliability ensured in DNA testing?
Handout 3
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Lesson PlanningUnit PlanningCourse Planning
Does literature primarily reflect culture or shape it?
What does Romeo & Juliet teach us about Shakespeare’s view of destiny?
How does point of view contribute to developing Shakespeare’s view of destiny in R&J?
How does an organism’s structure enable it to survive in its environment?
How do the structure and behavior of insects enable them to survive?
How does the structure of an insect’s eye aid in survival?
How do governments balance the rights of individuals with the common good?
In what ways does the Constitution attempt to limit the abuse of government powers?
How does the 3rd Amendment to the Constitution limit the abuse of gov. powers?
Open & Overarching Guiding & Topical
General Specific
Open & Overarching Guiding & Topical
Lesson Planning
Unit Planning
Course Planning
Write an essential question for the course, the unit, and the lesson.
8 MINUTES
Handout 4
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Agenda
Activity Estimated Time
Introduction, Overview & Agenda 15 minutes
Types of Essential Questions 15 minutes
Eight-Corners Synectic 10 minutes
Teaching With Essential Questions 5 minutes
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
QUICK WRITE
If the learning environment in your classroom is shaped by essential questions, what would you see, hear, and feel? What would the teacher be doing? What
would students be doing?
Door SeedStaircase Spider web Tree
WalletTravel Guide Book
Compass
Questions are the Swiss Army knife of an active, disciplined mind trying to understand texts or concepts and communicate that understanding to others. Some questions, like the biggest knife blade, do most of the work; other questions, similar to the corkscrew or leather punch, are more specialized, used only on rare occasions but essential when needed. It would be nice if we could just give each student such a set of cognitive tools and send them into the world; the truth, however, is that they need not only the questions themselves but the knowledge of which ones to ask and how and when to ask them.
-Jim Burke, 2010, p. 3
Essential questions are like a ______ because…
Handout 5
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Synectics
Structured group activity that uses metaphor or analogy to spark creative thinking and problem solving.
• Simple Form: Is [topic under study] more like [item 1] or [item 2]? Why?
– Are essential questions more like ice cream or spaghetti? Why?
• Four-Corners Synectic: [Topic under study] is like ____ because… from
Wal
sh &
Sat
tes,
200
5,
p. 6
6
How might the use of Synectics help students make meaning of a topic and contribute to their progression toward understanding?
Handout 5
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Agenda
Activity Estimated Time
Introduction, Overview & Agenda 15 minutes
Types of Essential Questions 15 minutes
Eight-Corners Synectic 10 minutes
Teaching With Essential Questions 5 minutes
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
When and how would you use meaning-making learning activities in your classroom?
In the Classroom
3 MINUTES
ACQUIRE MAKE MEANING TRANSFER
Help learners acquire factual information and basic skills
Help learners construct meaning (i.e., come to an understanding) of important ideas
Support learner’s ability to transfer learning to new situations
• lecture• graphic organizer• questioning• guided practice• modeling
• analogies• inquiry approaches• problem-based
learning• Socratic seminar• reciprocal teaching
• on-going assessment• specific feedback of
authentic application• conferencing• prompting reflection
Wiggins & McTighe, 2011, p. 105
Handout 6
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
Questions, Comments & Resources
Susan Carmody
susan.carmody@gmail.com
Prepared and Facilitated by Susan Carmody, 2012
References
Burke, J. (2010). What’s the big idea? Question-driven units to motivate reading, writing, and thinking. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
McTighe, J. & Wiggins, G. (2004). Understanding by Design professional development workbook. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Walsh, J.A. & Sattes, B.D. (2005). Quality questioning: Research-baed practice to engage every learner. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
Wiggins, G. & McTighe, J. (2012). The Understanding by Design guide to advanced concepts in creating and reviewing units. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Wiggins, G. & McTighe, J. (2011). The Understanding by Design guide to creating high-quality units. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Wiggins, G. & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by Design (2nd Ed.). Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Wiggins, G. (2012, February 10). What is UbD? Grant Wiggins answers, with video cases [video file]. Retrieved from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsDgfC3SjhM&feature=related.