The Task.

Education should be for everyone.  It should promote an inclusive and welcoming environment where all human beings can develop creativity and critical thinking. From this point of view, the program frameworks should   consider  cognitive  styles,  and students’  needs .Moreover, if  want to achieve understanding as a goal , we need to develop sequential, integrated an d continuous programs which enable students to  deal with real  life situations . For example, problem solving and challenge facing.  Students should be encouraged to go beyond the classroom and create  their own ´responses. However, this process requires time and economic support from the government, who needs to involve teachers, learners, parents, professors and administrators. The task is for everyone who believes in human beings and their power of becoming highly developed people.

Undoubtedly, teaching and learning are two big ideas and two essential questions as well.

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Provocative and Reflective

PROVOCATIVE AND REFLECTIVE

If we have identified results and appropriate evidence of understanding,  we should   discuss and think  about  the most suitable  instructional activities to accomplish  the objectives . If we have clearly  recognized  the goals we want to achieve, we could focus  our planning  on  effective and engaging  activities  which make our students feel  committed and motivated  with their  own learning. Easy to write ; hard to get.( like an advertisement ).

According to these beloved authors, the best designs have to be engaging  and effective , promoting challenges , self reflection  and productive work .  They  have to consider not only the cognitive  development  of skills, but also the emotional engagement .Both aspects are relevant  to increase curiosity and  foster  intellectual efforts  to reach understanding. If we are oriented to create fascinating designs which encourage   reflection and enjoyment,  we could  stimulate our  learners´ critical and creative thinking. For this purpose, we have to identify those learning experiences which enable students to achieve  the desire results. , we have to take into account some key elements when planning  instructional activities. Wiggings and McTighe  help us  with the WHERETO  idea which offers a set of tools  that  indicates how students can get actively involved in  the process of achieving understanding.

Finally, I believe that,  committed  and motivated teachers are required   to make  decisions oriented to encourage  thinking and emotional abilities, using  fascinating and powerful  Educational designs.  

  

Facts and Skills

Repeating, memorizing, naming, recognizing and so on are common objectives 

related with learning and teaching  any content. Although they are parts of

the process, they just represent the first step for achieving understanding.

Nobody can deny the importance of these concepts, however, learning

something requires more than that. It implies to go beyond the given

information in order to build mental constructions which allow us to connect

the outside events with our personal lives.

 How could we go beyond information to foster deep and long lasting

understanding? Perhaps, if we consider not only the facts of a discipline, but

also the development of skills underlying those concepts, we could promote

long term learning   and more profound understanding.

 According to Wiggins and McTighe,  big ideas  are considered key concepts

that give meaning and connection to facts and skills. This belief implies to

count with teachers, students,  parents, administrators, program designers  

who are willing to innovate and take risks.  If there are no honest efforts to

make progress in Education, it will  go on being  a passive observation of

isolated pieces of knowledge.

   

 

  

                                                                                                                       

What is this ? Essential Questions

What ´s this ? Essential Questions.

We are born with an innate capacity of questioning. From the very beginning,  we ask questions tha lead us to understanding the world we live in .Lightbown and Spada (2006) based on Bloom (1991)  pointed out   that there are developmental   stages through  which children learn to ask questions. There is a predictable order through  which  the wh-question emerge. WHAT is the first wh-questions to be used. After that, WHERE and WHO arise very soon. WHY emerges at the end of  the second year end becomes a repeated question. As children get awareness of time and manners WHEN and HOW  come up. As you see, from the very beginning  we are tied to interrogations.

Since questioning is an essential part of our cognitive development , educational designs must include  this aspect  as a way of achieving understanding, Every single  interrogation can spark more questions and stimulate deeper thought. I have to say that I consider this  idea quite interesting from the learners´ point of view,   because they can take an active part in the process of building knowledge and developing skills on their own.

Considering the Essential Questions as a relevant feature of this kind of design, we can define them as interrogations that point to and highlight big ideas and their main purpose is to promote  thinking  skills. Students should move certain inner mechanisms in order to answer them. The best questions are the ones that promote understanding of the content of a unit, foster connections and promote transfer of ideas from one setting to another. Therefore Essential Questions must require certain characteristics:

-They must involve questions that cause genuine and relevant inquiry into the  big ideas and core content .

-They refer to core ideas and  inquires within a discipline

-They require students to consider different alternatives to solve the problems stated in the questions

-They encourage transfer of big ideas from one setting to another.

-They must provoke discussion  and deep thought. They must stimulate the emerging of more questions.

- They must foster connection with prior and personal experiences

Taking into consideration the Essential Questions in lesson planning means to be willing to make an effort in terms of  developing  interrogations that can lead our students  to effective skill learning.

In sum, I would say that, Essential Questions are highly related to big ideas which connect the facts and skills, that is to say, they link external events with our personal lives. The best questions can encourage thoughtful and varied students responses and therefore, promote understanding.

Gaining Clarity

Gaining Clarity on our goals.    

Have you ever planned a trip? If you are a concrete- sequential   and open- oriented person, you will have enjoyed organizing the route of your trip. The steps are carefully planned in order to reach the place where we go. The same image comes to my mind , when we talk about  clarity  on our  educational aims. Have we developed clarity  on the stages   that enable our students to achieve  understanding as a  goal ?   Sometimes, I have ;  some others ,I have lost the way , the motivation and the energy to go on.

According to Wiggins and Mc Tighe, the backward design entails three interrelated stages. Each of them   is  highly connected  to the other, since Stage 1 tells what to do in relation to the kind of the   evidence  required   in Stage 2 and  recommends  the best learning experiences  (stage 3 )  to accomplish  the stated  objectives. Therefore, we have to consider some  important aspects  found in Stage 1.

This phase has five points that we should take into account in order to gain clarity when stating the goals.  This would help us to establish clear and delimited understanding objectives. It also contributes to avoid blurred aims. There are some key concepts that we have to know and understand established goals, understanding, essential questions, knowledge and skills.

Understanding by design.

Learning has been the most repeated word that I have read during the last months. Many sentences and words have been used to mention valuable explanations about processes that are carried out to achieve desired results. However, many questions still remain in my ears and eyes. What do we have to teach and how? Why students should do this or that?  How learners can provide with evidence of understanding? Which learning experiences are best planned and organized in order to achieve certain educational goals? Answers don´t come easily to my mind. Therefore,  I only have some momentarily  responses  that  attempt  to explain  how  we could  solve this problem.

According to Wigging and Mc Tighe , there are some elements that make learning more effective  and help students and teachers  to achieve understanding  as an educational goal. That is to say that, teachers have to count with a set of ideas and practices that allow them to engage students in effective learning. What do we have to do ?

 First of all, we have to state clear goals that can guide the learning / teaching process. Having a lucid vision of desired results can lead us to plan achievable objectives. If we knew with certainty what students should understand and be able to do as a result of any plan ,we would be able to guide their learning process with more wisdom.  Secondly, standards  ( national or institutional ) can provide  with a useful bodywork   that helps to identify teaching and learning  priorities. This information is highly convenient when planning what contents and which methodologies are best tools to accomplish desired learning . ( what and how to teach ).Thirdly, we have to take into account  the diversity  of students sharing the same learning experience  day by day. They represent different  learning and cognitive  styles and  psychological types.

These elements are placed in the three stages of backward design :        

Step 1 : Identify desired results. What…? / How…?

In this step, we state achievable goals and contents based on standards (national or institutional ). We also establish the priorities and  best methodologies to apply  in relation to  objectives, needs of the students.

Step 2 :  Determine acceptable evidence. Why…? What for…? 

In this stage, students should show results. Educators should have clear understanding of what students should  be able to do as a result of well planned  lessons and activities based on  educational aims. Besides students should provide sings of the accomplishment of  goals .

Step 3 : Plan learning experiences and instruction: Which activities.. ?

With clear identified results, teachers are able to plan a  bank of graded instructional activities which enable students to achieve certain accomplishments. Relevant decisions about methods, resources and materials are made in this stage in order to equip students with the necessary tools for achieving  understanding goals.