This document discusses standards in education and the debate around them. It begins by defining standards as models or examples that establish expectations for how students should be educated. While proponents believe standards can improve achievement by setting clear goals, opponents argue they may narrow curriculum and lead to test-driven instruction. The document also examines different approaches to aligning curriculum to standards like frontloading, backloading, and curriculum mapping and concludes by noting the tension between accountability and pressures of high-stakes testing.

1. A Standard of Measure
Melinda Butler
EDCI 650

2. Standard of Measure
• Something established by authority, custom, or
general consent as a model or example
• As Christians we are held to high standards on
how to live a life of service to God and others
• Proverbs 3:5-7
• Colossians 1:10, 3:5-10
• We are given detailed instruction on how to
• Make decisions
• Carry them out
• Assess how we’ve done
We are also provided with rewards -- 2 Peter 1:8-11

3. Standards in Education
• Skills and levels of competency that all students
must possess in order to move through the
educational system.
• Statements that identify essential knowledge and
skills to be learned -- taught.
• Set by local, state, federal groups`
• Goal: set clear, high expectations for what all
students should know and be able to do at each
grade level.
• Assessed through standardized testing.

4. America 2000
Goals 2000
No Child
Left Behind
A Nation
At Risk
The Wave of School Reform
1983
Criticized schools
Linked decline of
U.S. Ability to
compete globally
With decline in
school quality
National Standards
Meets World Class
Standards
Accountability
2001

5. Ambitious
Standards
School
Accountability
Aligned
Assessment
Guide for
Improvement
Motivation
To Improve
Aligned Professional Development Better Teaching
School Flexibility More Instructional
Time for Remediation.
Clear
High
Expectations
For
Students

6. Benefits of a Standard
Based Design
• Changes in expectations
and accountability
needed
• This design holds the
greatest hope for
improving student
achievement
• Supports good learning
and assessment
• High expectations
• Provides focus for
educators
• Reinforces “best
teaching” practices
• Establishes
accountability
Proponents State:

7. Important Structural Guidelines
• Standards need to be:
– Clearly stated
– Free from jargon
– Succinct
• Assessment need to be
– Aligned with standards
– Remedial tools
• Teacher Quality needs to be:
– Highest quality
– Supported by professional development

8. Areas of Concern
Opponents state:
• Little empirical
evidence of
effectiveness
• Difficult for
educators to define
what students should
know
• Top-down standards
don’t consider “How”
children learn
• Test driven methods
lower quality of
education overall

9. Leading Opponents
Alfie Kohn -- W. James Popham
• “rhetoric of ‘standards’ is turning schools into
giant test-prep centers, effectively closing off
intellectual inquiry and undermining enthusiasm for
learning and teaching” (Kohn, 2000).
• “standard” is being misconstrued; tricking us into
thinking that it will become the new panacea in
education while implying standard-based
assessments becomes a tool that promotes
students’ mastery of these content standards
(Popham, 2003).

10. • Making students accountable for test
scores works well on a bumper sticker and
it allows many politicians to look good by
saying that they will not tolerate failure.
But it represents a hollow promise. Far
from improving education, high- stakes
testing marks a major retreat from
fairness, from accuracy, from quality, and
from equity. --- Senator Paul Wellstone (1944-2002).

11. High Stakes Accountability
• Concern over high stakes tests:
– Culturally biased
– Not objective measures of ability or achievement
– Used to pass judgment on teaching and schools
– Affected by inequitable dispersement of funds and
resources
If bonuses for high scores are dangled in front of teachers
or schools – or punitive “consequences” are threatened
for low scores – chances are far greater that a meaningful
curriculum will be elbowed out to make room for test-
oriented instruction. -- Alfie Kohn, 2000

12. Standards and Curriculum
Design
• Bottom Line - How to align curriculum
with standards to improve student
learning.
• Curriculum alignment - the “match” or
fit between the curriculum and the
assessment

13. Benjamin Bloom
• Bloom’s Taxonomy
– Higher Order Thinking Skills
– Cornerstone for establishing Behavioral
Objectives
• Earliest form of curriculum alignment
• Programmed/Mastery Curriculum
– 1960’s early 1970’s
– Detailed Learning Objectives formed basis for
lesson planning

14. Curriculum
Testing
Teaching
`
Curriculum Alignment Design
Continuous
Connections
Fenwick English
Leading Advocate in
Curriculum Alignment
Frontloading
Backloading

15. Frontloading
• Alignment established by working
from the curriculum to the test
• Develop curriculum first then
select,adapt, or develop the test
that fits the curriculum

16. Backloading
• Alignment established by beginning with
the test and working “back” to the
curriculum
• The content of the test becomes the
content of the curriculum
Easy - Inexpensive
• Favorite process when concerns with High
Stakes Tests

17. Combining
Frontloading/Backloading
• Backloading
– Aligns curriculum with test objectives to
raise test scores
• Frontloading
– To develop classroom assessments that
are in alignment with existing classroom
curriculum

18. Popular Designs
• Standards Linking
– Judy F. Carr & Douglas Harris
– Succeeding with Standards
• Backward Design
–Understanding by Design
–Wiggins & McTighe, 1998
• Curriculum Mapping

19. Standards Linking

20. Backward Design
Identify Desired Results
Enduring Understanding
Essential Questions
Determine Acceptable Evidence –
Assessments that are ongoing, varied
Plan Learning Experiences
Activities, Materials, Resources
that guide students to enduring
understanding
Develop Lesson Plan

21. Curriculum Mapping
Collect
Data
Use Calendar
Based
Format
Review
Data
May involve
Individual or
Group
Identify
Changes
Needed to
Align
Curriculum
Widely used by school districts
Teachers use it as a tool to keep track of what
Has actually been taught throughout the year then
Modify and refine next years curriculum
Major Benefit: School wide input and involvement
Curriculum
concepts
Standards and
State guidelines
Activities
Assessments
School Calendar
Events

22. Conclusion
Important -
Development of curriculum based on clearly
established standards.
Problems -
Accountability through Increased State and Federal
Pressures and High Stakes Testing
Effects: General School Structure, Classroom
Environment, Teaching Strategies,Student Well
Being
Assessment

23. References
• American Federation of Teachers. (1996). A system of high standards: What we mean
and why we need it. http://www.aft.org//Edissues/standards/higstan.htm
• (Retrieved February 3, 2003).
• David, J. L., Shields, P. M., Humphrey, D. C., & Young, V. M. (2001). When theory hits
reality: Standards-based reform in urban districts, Final narrative report. Menlo Park,
CA: SRI International.
• English, F.W. & Frase, L.E. (1999). Deciding what to teach and test: Developing,
aligning, and auditing the curriculum. Newbury Park, CA: Corwin Press.
• Gandal, M. (1997). Making standards matter: An annual fifty-state report on efforts to
raise academic standards. Washington, DC: American Federation of Teachers.
• Gandal, M.& Vranek, J. (2001). Standards: Here today, here tomorrow. Educational
Leadership, September, 59 (1): 6-13.
• See notes below for continuation of list