Introduction

You will join a group of 3-5 program colleagues to complete a comprehensive curriculum design project in one of your endorsement areas. You will post your group’s curriculum design project as a website, and each member of your group will have a link to this site from his/her own website. Your curriculum project site will include links that provide additional resource material. As part of this project, you will create a 4-10 minute instructional video segment that helps teach a concept that is critical to the content your project is designed to teach. You will use web skills and digital video editing skills practiced previous quarters.

Process

Your group will identity a specific grade level and a primary endorsement subject-area for which your curriculum is being planned. Your group will present an overview of your project and team teach one aspect from the project to the whole program during Week 9 or 10. Groups will sign-up for presentation times prior to Week 9. As you work on your project, your team needs to reflect on how your own group processes correspond with Cohen’s Designing Groupwork as well as other professional knowledges you have gained this year in regards to collaboration and collegiality.

Special note to students with Elementary Education endorsement: Any MIT student with an elementary education endorsement must plan a curriculum at one grade level in the range of grades 2-5. You must incorporate art and health into your curriculum project.

Evaluation

This project gives you an opportunity to design and structure a curriculum that guides teaching. In order to realize scope and sequence of concept development in a reasonable time span, your unit must cover 10 days, i.e., ten 40-50 minute instructional periods. In school jargon your curriculum might be called a “unit plan.” The curriculum is to be conceptually based around a theme and draw on the Winter Quarter work related to the program handout “Principles of Theory into Practice.” The planning expectation for your group curriculum design project should meet at a minimum the “developing teacher” rubric assessment for “Domain 1: Planning and Preparation” (from the Winter Quarter field placement handout from the Student Teaching Handbook).

In Brain Matters, Wolfe (2001) explains that

educators have tried to integrate various aspects of the curriculum into more meaningful units…. [I]n many instances the thematic units…have been designed with no apparent underlying concepts in mind. It is often difficult to determine why the theme was chosen, let alone answer questions concerning the relevance or application what teachers are teaching. (pp. 132-133)

Therefore, it is critical that you distinguish the underlying concept(s) that you are attempting to teach from the theme of your unit plan.

A lesson plan is required for each day’s lesson. You will need to follow the “Minimum Lesson Plan Components” (an item reproduced from the Student Teaching Handbook that was previously distributed to you). A lesson plan template is provided and will be posted on “voices” for use. Any changes in the template must be based on group consensus and contain the minimum lesson plan components. The lesson plans will be assessed in accordance with Domain 1.

The curriculum plan must include key concepts, lesson goals, and appropriate EALRs. The curriculum should have an interdisciplinary focus and include a multicultural approach that strives to transform the mainstream Eurocentric curriculum. The curriculum should be developmentally appropriate, student-centered, and engaging. Direct references to the instructional approaches from Teaching the Best Practice Way must be evident in your plan. Pay close attention to Domains 2 & 3 in order to make sure that your plan takes into account program expectations. In particular, the 6 elements for “Component 3c: Engaging Students in Learning” from “Domain 3” provide a useful rubric for both planning and instruction.

The curriculum should describe how computer technology is used to enhance instruction. Your plan will have a bibliography listing subject-matter sources related to your endorsement area that you consulted for the content of your project. Talk to your teachers in your current school field assignment for books and ideas. Community assets should also be considered a subject-matter resource.

Pre-assessment of actual students for this project is not possible. Therefore, you will assume that a pre-assessment revealed that none of the students had knowledge of the concepts you identified for this project.

In the initial stage of your planning your team will need to consider what are your goals or targets for this curriculum project. What is it that you want students to know and be able to do? To help you in this process, you will need to revisit your Stiggins’ text.

In curriculum planning it is preferable to think about assessment in tandem with curriculum design so that your evaluation of your students is congruent with the learning opportunities you actually provide students. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, it is important early in your planning to determine what your summative evaluation will be. Using this planning approach can help your group develop realistic learning goals and student learning activities.

At a minimum each project must create three assessment tools: (a) a rubric, (b) selected response, and (c) one other of your choice. Each assessment must be accompanied by a scoring criteria explanation. Remember that assessment is formative as well as summative.

Presentation

The aspect of your curriculum that you choose to teach to the program should be the equivalent of one class period, i.e., approximately 40-50 minutes in length and must include the instructional video your group has created. Each team should also plan to have a 5 minute introduction/overview of the curriculum that includes an explanation of how the aspect being taught to the program fits within the entire curriculum. For your presentation you will need to prepare and distribute a lesson plan to entire program based on “Minimum Lesson Plan Components” (make 40 copies).

We anticipate that you will “rehearse” your presentation with your team. You need to evaluate the effectiveness of your presentation preparation by referencing the assessment rubric for “Domain 3: Instruction” (a Winter Quarter handout from the Student Teaching Handbook). Note: During actual student teaching the minimum expectation is that a teacher candidate be at the “emerging teacher” level, but ideally demonstrating traits for the “developing teacher.” The “skilled experience teacher” level is one that we all strive for in our work as teachers.

Attached for your reference is a “Curriculum Design Project Criteria Check-List.”