How rocky is the waters surrounding your curriculum? Would you capsize if the words instructional design came into question while evaluating your lessons? That’s the focus today as we investigate this quote: "Education has missed the boat, with respect to instructional design. Teachers come up with lesson plans on the fly, with little thought to why they are presenting information or even who their audience is. Teacher training, at the university level and during Professional development, needs to focus on helping teachers become comfortable with instructional design principles." Do you fly by lesson planning because you have taught the lessons before? Is your text still printed in a book? If so, you might need this refresher on instructional design (ID). Professionally, I received no training on instructional design and it has never been brought up in professional development. It wasn't until this summer that the question arose in a course I am enrolled in and a few friends voiced their frustration at dealing with spinning wheels with old curriculum.
I can recall this time period - only 7 years ago - because I used the same model for my lesson plans for two years after I got my first teaching job. It was simple, Identify the objective and content and then explain what tools and methods used to teach it. We never thought about the best way to deliver that task. It was always set by the curriculum guides. Read this introduction in math, do this worksheet for enrichment or intervention and then repeat the next day. After reading this great introduction to ID here, you can see that it can be broken down into three parts: Analyzing the situation to determine needs, produce and implement the ID and then evaluate the results. There are a few specific ID models, but we will look at the flexible method created by Morrison, Ross and Kemp. This 2004 model is fluid with nine separate elements. When designing with this model, it is meant to transition between several different locations represented as the two outer ovals. This instructional design is dynamic and has found its way into technology classrooms. I used a very similar model for my science curriculum (project based learning). The ability to adapt lessons as new information and learning goals is reassessed makes it a common tool for e-learning and PBL because it allows teachers to respond directly to individual needs and gaps. This sounds like deep thinking... This sounds like work right? And over a summer break too… Well that’s a teacher’s life! If it’s for the betterment of students we have to at least search for why focusing on ID improves the classroom correct? You would be surprised how little research there is on ID in preservice and PD. That’s because the new emphasis is just now starting to branch out on its own. You can learn more about who and what they do here.
Here’s 25 questions you can use to get started on improving your curriculum brought to you by researchers Jay Mctighe and Grant Wiggins. Just perusing these simple questions will help you evaluate changes that might need to happen in your designs. You could start with an easy one like: Show your students' final assessment work to a colleague. Could they identify the outcomes you wanted by looking at it? (McTighe & Wiggins).
5 Comments
Nicole Rogier
6/8/2017 02:39:35 pm
It is unfortunate that you have only been trained to look at the curriculum guides in order to find the way you should deliver content and allow the students to demonstrate their knowledge back to you. I know you when you commented on my blog, you said that you were surprised on the training I received in college about Backwards Design, so I thought I would share the following link with you. It is all about Backwards Design and it has an outline I remember using in college to create lesson plans/units.
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David Hendershot
6/13/2017 12:06:42 pm
My original degree training was with a school district that had the guides we were expected to follow because of transient population. hanks for sharing the guides.
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Sadie Aronson
6/8/2017 06:26:15 pm
We had similar education and training in regards to lesson planning. I went through steps to create the lesson plan but they were more like checkmarks for me to work through or just copying and pasting the standards I was using. There was not a lot of "why" discussion in regards to lesson planning. I can see how curriculum guides can constrict teachers, especially those who teach courses with end of course exams. This puts a lot of pressure on the teacher to follow the guide to a T so that the exam scores are adequate. It can also be a very difficult transition when teachers are finally allowed the freedom to create new lesson plans or activities because they've been so used to planning in a 'box'.
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Jory Murry
6/12/2017 03:21:36 pm
I had the same experience as you in regards to ID training in college. I find it frustrating that you have not been exposed to anything from your school district that you are teaching in now, though. I mentioned in my reflection that it has never actually been called "Instructional Design" but I have been exposed to many professional development opportunities that focused on many of the things involved in ID. I like that you chose to focus on the Morrison, Ross, and Kemp model. I am a science teacher, and as you mentioned it goes along with PBL. I had the same thought when I read through the information on this model. I enjoy your blog posts!
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David Hendershot
6/13/2017 12:09:27 pm
Thanks for the feedback. I have slowly adapted my approach and turned many of our custom built units into PBL and I always give students time to revise and relearn. The only area I feel like we are stuck in a spot is our math curriculum because it has a very firm set of things we have to teach. It's two years new so we are expected to follow it with fidelity.
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AuthorI am a 2nd Grade teacher with years of experience in digital editing and film. I have a 2nd Degree Black Belt, am a professional wedding photographer, and instruct fine art painting classes. Archives
July 2017
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