UNDERSTANDING BY DESIGN

1. UNDERSTANDINGBY DESIGN PREPARED BY; GÖZDE YILDIRIM 2008106009

2. UNDERSTANDING BY DESIGN • Understanding by design (UbD) is a theory developed by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe for educational planning based on ‘teaching for understanding’. • They wrote a book with the same name ‘Understanding by Design’, published by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development in 1998. • The key terms of the UbD are ‘backward design’, understanding understanding, ‘six facets of understanding’, performance assessments, design meaningful curriculum and instruction.

3. UNDERSTANDING BY DESIGN • Its ultimate aim is to increase students’ achievement and the teachers are regarded as the designers of the students’ learning. • According to Wiggins and McTighe, it is a framework for;designing curriculum and instructions to engage students in exploring and to deep their understanding of important ideas, the content you teach, and also designing performance assessments to reveal the extent of their understanding. • Wiggins and McTighe have played important roles in the growth and maturation of performance assessment. • They have seemed as source of hope in the field of education, especially performance assessment, curriculum and instruction when the field of education had troubled times because of the inadequacy of tests used to assess student learning.

4. Howit does explain the meaning of curriculum and assessment? • Curriculum:is more than the content of courses (syllabus) and stating the topics and materials, it focuses on the activities, assignments and assessments are used in order to achieve intended learning outcomes. • Assessment:determining to what extent students understand, depend on stated learning outcomes, collecting evidence about understanding. It is not only formal assessment like end of the teaching tests. Bothinformal and formal assessment during a course including observations, performance tasks and projects, dialogues, traditional tests and quizzes and also self-assessments of the students about their own learning experiences.

5. Continuum of assessmentmethods Informalchecks for understanding Observation& Dialogue Quiz & Test Academicprompt Performancetask & Project

6. Howit does explain the meaning ofunderstanding? • The starting point of them is Bloom’s Taxonomy in Cognitive Domain. Bloom classified the range of possible intellectual objectives (learning outcomes) from the cognitively easy to the difficult. Each level requires different thinking skills.

7. Howit does explain the meaning ofunderstanding? • In Bloom’s Taxonomy ‘understanding (comprehension)’ is the second level and Bloom refers to ‘understanding’ as a commonly sought but ill-defined objective. • To start with Bloom’s Taxonomy, Wiggins and McTighe said that ‘‘Knowing the facts and doing well on tests of knowledge do not mean that we understand.’’ • They regarded this misconception as a universal problem and to solve this problem they have developed a multifaceted view of mature understanding. (SixFacets of Understanding)

8. Sixfacets of understanding • Accordingto Wiggins and McTighe, when we truly understand, we can explain, can interpret, can apply, have perspective, can empathize and finally have self-knowledge so for a complete and mature understanding all of these six facets are required.

9. Sixfacets of understanding CRITERIA FOR EACH FACET

10. Filters for selectingunderstanding • Represent a big idea havingenduringvaluebeyond the classrom. • Reside at the heart of the discipline (involve’’doing’’ the subject) • Requireuncoverage (of abstract oroftenmisunderstoodideas) • Offerpotential for engagingstudents ‘‘Enduring’’ understanding

11. What is design & backwarddesign? • According to Oxford English Dictionary,design is to have purposes and intentions; to plan and execute. • In educational perspective; teachers are the designers of curriculum, learning and assessment by considering the needs of students,developmental levels, prior knowledge and learning styles. But what is backward design? What makes it different from the other designs?

12. What is design & backwarddesign? • According to Wiggins and McTighe, backward design is the most effective curricular design. They declared the reasons of it as following; “We do so because many teachers begin with textbooks, favored lessons, and time honored activities rather than deriving those tools from targeted goals or standards. We are advocating the reverse: One starts with the end-the desired results (goals or standards) and then derives the curriculum from the evidence of learning (performances) called for by the standard and teaching needed to equip students to perform.”

13. What is design & backwarddesign? • Backward design has three main stages;

14. Bigpicture of a designapproach

15. Bigpicture of a designapproach

16. Whatoverarchingunderstandingsaredesired? ----------------------------------- ----------------------------------- Whatare the overarching ‘‘essential’’ questions? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A designtemplate IDENTIFY DESIRED RESULTS Whatwillstudentsundertand as a result of thisunit? ------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------- What ‘’essential’’ and ‘’unit’’ questionswillfocusthisunit? ----------------------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------

17. A designtemplate DETERMINE ACCEPTABLE EVIDENCE Whatevidencewillshowthatstudentsunderstand-----------------? PerformanceTasks, Projects --------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------- Quizzes, Tests, AcademicPrompts -------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------- OtherEvidence (observations, worksamples, dialogues) -------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Student Self- Assessment ------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------

18. A designtemplate PLAN LEARNING EXPERIENCES AND INSTRUCTION Given the targetedunderstandings, otherunitgoals, and the assessmentevidenceidentified, whatknowledgeandskillareneeded? Studentswillneed t know -------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------- Studentswillneedto be ableto ------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------- Whatteachingandlearningexperienceswillequipstudentstodemonstrate the targeteunderstanding? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

19. references • Bloom, B. S. (1956). Taxonomy of Educatioal Objectives: Classification of Educational Goals. New York. • Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (1998). Understanding by Design. Virginia, USA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.