NOTE TO INSTRUCTORS

Planning Questions: The Guiding Framework for Curriculum Design

The planning questions are designed to guide curriculum development throughout the semester. Instructors use them to guide planning discussions on a regular basis. In addition they are an excellent tool for reflection and self-evaluation. The following are suggested options for using these questions. Choose at least one of these to help your students develop, analyze, and evaluate their instructional unit.

1) Ask students to write about each of the three sets of questions at the beginning of the course describing how they plan to address each area of the planning questions. After the unit has been designed, ask students to go back to their initial responses and elaborate upon them, adapt them, and refine them based upon their work. Ask them to reflect on how their thinking and understanding has developed. This can be a graded assignment.

2) During the unit refer to the planning questions and ask students to reflect upon how each unit component may serve to address the questions. As a final exam develop a series of authentic scenarios, for example, “ Imagine you must go before the board of education to provide a rationale for your curriculum”…these scenarios are based upon the planning questions and assess students’ ability to evaluate and support how they have addressed each set of questions.

3) Have students reflect upon the planning questions after each component of the unit has been introduced in class. For example, after introducing the cooperative learning model, ask students to reflect on the strength of the model in terms of some of the planning question foci. Hold a class discussion frequently on how different strategies serve to address the planning questions. Have students attach brief explanations to each unit component draft, explaining how their work addresses the planning questions.

UNIT PLANNING QUESTIONS

Purpose: These questions are to be used as a planning guide. They may also be used to evaluate the quality of the unit plan.

PLANNING QUESTION 1: Knowledge of Content

1) Analyze how your Content Analysis/Learning Hierarchy demonstrates deep understanding of central concepts, generalizations, modes of inquiry specific to the discipline, and local/national content standards. Provide at least 3 specific examples.

2) How does unit content correct distortions in the historical and scientific record that may be linked to racism, classism, exploitation, and oppression of particular cultural groups? How have you sought to understand and address student preconceptions and biases? Use specific learning experiences to evaluate how well your unit achieves these goals.

PLANNING QUESTION 2: Supporting the Needs of Diverse Learners

1) Discuss how your unit enables ALL learners to succeed. Discuss your selection of instructional strategies that will accommodate and challenge learners across gender, ethnicity, learning style, intelligences, disability, and social class. Address specific strategies that promote educational equity. For this question provide at least 5 examples.

2) Discuss how your assessment strategies promoted an "all can learn" environment within your classroom. Please elaborate on your authentic assessment pieces.

PLANNING QUESTION 3: Creating A Collaborative Learning Community

1) Discuss how the unit content and instructional strategies promote the development of cross-cultural relationships, collaboration, and substantive conversation among students. Describe your use of grouping structures, discussion strategies, and structured learning experiences that achieve this goal (address all three).

2) Discuss how you aggressively strive to involve the family, students, and community in decision-making, learning, and sharing information throughout the unit. Provide multiple examples.