Planning for Instruction
InTASC Standard 7: The teacher plans instruction that supports every student in meeting rigorous learning goals by drawing upon knowledge of content areas, curriculum, cross-disciplinary skills, and pedagogy, as well as knowledge of learners and the community context.
Introduction
When I accepted my current position at West, I knew that planning for instruction would be one of the most challenging aspects of my job. Because the school has only one class per grade level, I had to plan three completely different lessons each day. Switching to a block schedule this year has lessened my daily planning load to a certain extent, although being responsible for a fourth course (algebra) means that I now have four distinct “preps” for which to plan. In addition, the size of my school means that my classes are completely undifferentiated; I need to ensure that all of my students are appropriately challenged and that the needs of both my strongest and weakest students are met in the course of a single lesson.
Fortunately, I have an extensive background in the development of learning standards and curricula from my time at the World Bank, so I am very familiar with the Common Core state standards for all of the subjects that I teach. Furthermore, my school district uses a well-designed curriculum that helps me to sequence the introduction of content standards in a reasonable way. This helps me to maintain a coherent long-term plan throughout the year and gives me more time to focus on creating meaningful, relevant learning experiences aligned with grade-level standards for all of my students. Of course, even the most effective educator cannot hope to design such experiences in a vacuum. In addition to utilizing input from students and families about activities and real-world connections that may be of particular interest to my scholars, I work closely with colleagues and other educators to identify new and exciting instructional opportunities. Although there are no other middle school math teachers at my school, I work closely with the middle school special education and science teachers and even the elementary school math teachers to craft appropriate activities for my students and design scaffolds and strategies that will allow all of them to achieve at high levels.
This collaboration helps me to plan a variety of activities to engage students. This leads to more differentiation during small-group instructional time and exposes students to an array of cross-disciplinary content knowledge. I often remind my students that everyone is a “math person” because everyone applies mathematical thinking to the world around themselves on a daily basis. I try to ensure that my instructional plans underscore this theme so that students can appreciate the real-world applications of the work they do in my classroom.
Click the buttons below to learn more the way I plan the instruction that my students receive.
Conclusion
Planning for instruction is not something that can be accomplished in one sitting or at one time of the year. Although I always begin the year with long-term and unit plans, I recognize the importance of adjusting plans based on student learning needs. Indeed, I have yet to teach a lesson this year that was not at least partially informed by data collected during previous lessons and input from students about their interests and goals. Planning ahead is essential, but so too is tailoring plans to fit the particular context of a diverse group of learners. This context includes information about family situations and community values and priorities as well as student knowledge and preferences. My commitment to designing learning experiences for particular group of learners can be seen from the home visits I conduct at the beginning of the year to learn about scholars’ strengths and interests to the student-driven, project-based model on which my algebra class is based.