This two-day curriculum design workshop aimed to help teachers learn and apply the Understanding by Design (UbD) framework. Over the course of presentations and work time, participants worked to establish learning goals, essential questions, assessments and learning activities for their curriculum units that promote student understanding and transfer. The workshop covered all three stages of backwards design - desired results, acceptable evidence, and learning experiences. Teachers shared their work and provided feedback to colleagues.

1. Welcome!
MCDS Curriculum
Design Studio

2. Workshop Goals
By the end of the two days, we hope that you have:
• learned a process for creaAng units that promote deep
understanding
• created or revised knowledge, understanding and transfer
goals for your unit
• created or revised essenAal quesAons and enduring
understandings for your unit
• created or revised assessments for your unit
• begun to plan or revise learning acAviAes that support your
unit goals
• shared your work with colleagues
• offered feedback to colleagues

4. Teaching for Understanding?
What do the
experts say?

5. Table Talk
What did you take away from your reading of Module A?

6. Logical Curriculum Design
Stage 1: If the desired end result
is for learners to……
Stage 2: then you need evidence
of the learners’ ability to……
Stage 3: then the learning events
(acAviAes) need to….

7. Stage 1: If the desired end result is for
learners to……

8. Stage 2: then you need evidence of the
learners’ ability to……

9. Stage 3: then the learning events
(acAviAes) need to….

10. UbD is….
• a way of thinking
• an opportunity to deepen student understanding
for the long term
• results‐oriented
• mission‐driven
• iteraAve
• focused on independent transfer
• based on research in cogniAve psychology &
neurology

11. UbD is not…..
• acAviAes‐driven
• superficial
• focused on short‐term acquisiAon of content
• test driven

12. Break

13. Stage 1: Desired Results
What are the desired student
outcomes of this unit?

14. What are the
What do I want “big ideas” in
students to be this unit?
able to do?
What do I want
What do I students to be
want students able to transfer
to know? to new contexts
independently?

15. 4 Types of Learning Goals
• How will students be able to transfer
Transfer their understanding to novel contexts?
• What will students understand as a
Understanding result of the unit?
AcquisiAon of • What will students be able to do as a
Skills result of the unit?
AcquisiAon of • What will students know as a a result of
Knowledge the unit?

16. Hierarchy of Goals
Transfer
Understanding
AcquisiAon of Skills
and Knowledge

17. AcquisiAon of Knowledge
Students will know:
• the basic food groups.
• the parts of a
microscope.
• the 13 original colonies.
• the definiAon of a noun.

18. AcquisiAon of Skills
Students will be skilled at:
• dribbling a ball for at
least 10 steps.
• following 2‐step
direcAons.
• graphing a line given
two linear pairs.

19. Meaning
Students will be able to:
• explain the importance of
maintaining a healthy
commons.
• compare a basic cell to
another enAty.
• arAculate the perspecAve of
both NaAve Americans and
missionaries.

20. Transfer: So that…?
Students will use their learning
independently to:
• make healthy choices in the
lunchroom.
• line up safely and without
conflict when moving from class
to class.
• converse with naAve speakers of
a given target language.
• effecAvely communicate their
points of view in wriAng.

21. WriAng Transfer Goals
I want students to learn
___________ so that, in the
long run, they will be able, on
their own, to use this content
to __________________.

22. New Template on Atlas!

23. Work Time!

24. Lunch!

25. EssenAal QuesAons
These are the “keep you
up at night” quesAons.

26. EssenAal quesAons:
• Promote genuine inquiry into big ideas
• Produce deep thinking
• Cause rethinking
• Require connec5ons to be made
• Require students to:
• consider alterna5ves
• weigh evidence
• support ideas
• jus5fy answers

27. EssenAal quesAons should also be:
• age‐appropriate
• posted in the classroom
• asked over and over
again throughout the
year(s)

28. Which is not an essenAal quesAon?
☐ When is the “correct” answer not the best
soluAon?
☐ Are we a democracy or a plutocracy?
☐ What is foreshadowing?

29. Enduring Understandings
These are the “morals”
of the story (the unit).

30. Enduring understandings are:
• full‐sentence statements
• gained only through guided inference‐ they
are not teachable facts

31. Which is not an enduring
understanding?
☐ CorrelaAon does not mean or ensure
causality.
☐ The Civil War
☐ Technological progress presents new
possibiliAes and problems.

32. Work Time!

33. Table Sharing
Pair with a team from
another table.
Solicit feedback on one
aspect of your design.
Offer feedback on one
aspect of the other
team’s design.

34. Welcome!
Day 2
MCDS Curriculum
Design Studio

35. Stage 2: Evidence
How do I know what my students
know, understand, and can transfer?

36. Alignment of Goals and Assessment
• What are the desired
Desired
results? Results
• If those are the desired
results, what follows for
assessment?
Learning
Assessment
OpportuniAes

37. Purposes of Assessments
FormaAve SummaAve

38. Forms of Assessment
• Tests
• Quizzes
• Discussions
• Performances
• Projects
• Journal entries
• Homework
• Group work
• InvesAgaAons

39. Analyzing Assessments
What are the goals of this assessment?
• AcquisiAon of knowledge
• AcquisiAon of skills
• Understanding
• Transfer

40. Break

41. Assessing Understanding
We need to gather evidence that students:
– have made meaning of content
– can transfer learning to new tasks or sejngs
– are able to address essen5al quesAons

42. Six Facets of Understanding
Have self‐ Explain
knowledge
Show
Interpret
empathy
Have Apply and
perspecAve adjust

43. Hierarchy of Goals
Transfer
Understanding
AcquisiAon of Skills
and Knowledge

44. Rubrics
• EssenAal for assessments of meaning and
transfer
• Allow teacher to assess students along a
conAnuum of understanding and transfer
• Vehicle by which teacher communicates
expectaAons to students

45. Global CiAzenry Rubric

46. Interdependence Global CiAzenry Balance of Systems
Children as Change Agents AdopAng a New PerspecAve

47. Work Time!

48. Lunch!

49. Stage 3: Learning for Understanding
How do I design
learning acAviAes to
ensure acquisiAon,
meaning and transfer?

50. Teacher Role
Goal Teacher Role
AcquisiAon Direct InstrucAon
Meaning FacilitaAve Teaching
Transfer Coaching

51. What does it look like?
• Direct InstrucAon?
• FacilitaAve Teaching?
• Coaching?

52. Learning OpportuniAes
Goal Students should…
AcquisiAon Calculate Memorize
IdenAfy State
Recall Select
Meaning Analyze Defend
Compare CriAque
Contrast Synthesize
Transfer Apply Innovate
Create Solve
Design Troubleshoot

53. Work Time!

54. Final Sharing

55. Thank you to….
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