This is the second module of the Collaborative Backward Design series This is the second module of the Collaborative Backward Design series. It will guide participants through the process of using identifying the Enduring Understandings and Essential Skills described in the curriculum document. Based on these choices, participants will then collaborate to determine the high-priority overall expectations that will inform their assessment plans.

Recall, from module 1, our vision of an assessment plan that supports rich learning for all students throughout the course.

Our goal, as defined by Grant Wiggins, is to have students leave with the ability to transfer their skills and understanding in meaningful ways.

Therefore our first steps in the Backward Design process are to define the most important skills and meaningful concepts. We do this by using the curriculum document to identify the Enduring Understandings and Essential Skills of the course. Having a clear vision of the these understandings and skills will then allow us to make informed decisions about the high-priority overall expectations.

To help in this processes, we refer to Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe. They suggest that we sort the information in the curriculum into three levels of importance: the Enduring Understandings, the things that are important to know and do, and finally the curriculum that is worth being familiar with.

Enduring Understandings represent the essence of the course or discipline. They describe the fundamental concepts that every student needs to have an understanding of by the end of the course. They should help students make sense of their learning throughout the course as well as be meaningful to their lives outside of the course. Essential Skills are those that are needed to support many overall expectations. They generally represent critical thinking skills that are used throughout the course and are transferable to other subjects and to situations outside of school. Due to their transferability and their importance to the entire subject area, the Enduring Understandings and Essential Skills are usually described in the front matter of the curriculum. To help illustrate this idea, examples have been provided from the Canada and World Studies Curriculum; The front matter describes some Fundamental Concepts. One of those concepts is the idea of culture; culture provides a conceptual framework for interpreting the world, and influences the perception of time, place, identity, significance and change. The front matter also describes many important skills required by and developed through the study of history. One particular example is the skill of assessing and evaluating.

To find the things that are important to know and do we look to the curriculum expectations. Important to know and do are typically described in the Overall Expectations along with some key Specific Expectation. Expectations in this level will form the foundation of your summative assessment tasks. Following our Canada and World Studies example into the grade 11 American History course, we find the overall expectation, “assess the influence of key individuals and groups in shaping American arts and culture;” To build the enduring understanding of culture and its impact on our perspective, and to develop the essential skill of assessing, this seems like something that would be important to know and do.

The third level is the curriculum that is worth being familiar with The third level is the curriculum that is worth being familiar with. This is the information that students may find helpful when demonstrating their achievement of the overall expectations, but that in isolation are not particularly important. Students may use some of this body of knowledge and skills during rich summative assessments, but they are not generally assessed specifically on summative tasks. Continuing our American History arts and culture example, students will find it worthwhile to be familiar with the names and contributions of key people that influenced American arts and culture. However, while some of this knowledge is needed to demonstrate the overall expectation, simply recalling the names and accomplishments of specific individuals does not demonstrate any ability to assess their influence.

A summary of these Curriculum Priorities their role in course planning has been attached for future reference.

As we begin the Collaborative Backward Design process, you may also want to refer to the attached guide, “Thinking Backwards – Making Thinking Visible in the CBD Process”

Currently we are looking at the first two stages.

Activity 1: Identifying Enduring Understandings and Essential Skills There are two activities provided to guide participants through the process of identifying the Enduring Understandings and Essential Skills. If you have not spent much time examining the front matter of the curriculum, it is recommended that you use the “Exploring the Curriculum” activity. If you are familiar with the front matter, you can either start at the right hand column of the “Exploring the Curriculum” or You may wish to use the “Identifying EU’s and ES’s” activity.

Now that you have identified the Enduring Understandings and Essential Skills, you have a foundation for prioritizing your curriculum expectations. As you move through the process, you may need to reflect back on your initial thinking and make adjustments to your EU’s and ES’s Activity #2: Identifying High-Priority Overall Expectations, provides a foundation for making choices and collaborating with other teachers.

One of the purposes of backward design is to ensure that developing the enduring understandings and essential skills takes priority in planning. For example… In addition to relevance to the enduring understandings and essential skills, there are many considerations when selecting high-priority expectations: prior experience of students, curriculum structure and organization, opportunities for assessment, complexity of expectation One of the purposes of backward design is to ensure that developing the enduring understandings and essential skills takes priority in planning. For example…

When you feel confident that you have identified the high-priority expectations that are justified by the vision described in the front matter of the curriculum document, record them on the planning template of your choice. At this point in the process, you may feel that you have identified the high-priority expectations and that your choices are supported by the vision described in the front matter of the curriculum document. As previously mentioned, it is not uncommon for teachers to reflect on their initial perceptions of the enduring understandings and essential skills of the course and make some revisions. When you have identified the high-priority expectations, record them on the course planning template of your choice.

We have now completed steps one and two of the process; defining our goal and priorities.

The next stage of the process is to design final assessment tasks that will allow for a valid, reliable assessment of the high-priority overall expectations. For support in this process, refer to section A6: Establishing Final Summative Tasks on page 26 of the LDSB Support Document. When you are ready to begin planning units, proceed to Module 3.