DI/UbD: Chapter 6

Abstract:

This chapter mainly focused on "instructional decision making" in classrooms that are built on the principles of Understanding by Design and Differntiated Instruction. All students should be working with curricula that focuses on the important ideas of the subject and also requires them to think about, understand, and know how to apply the information that they acquire (different ways of doing this is great because that teaches to differentiated instruciton). It is also important to make use of classroom elements as "tools for effective instruction" (time, space, student groupings, etc.). Clustering learner needs to make instructional planning more efficient is another thing to be kept in mind, as well as thinking about how to manage your routines and ways of teaching to the multiple intelligences.

Reflection:

We liked this chapter because of the variety things that it covered. We thought about the statement discussing the evidence there is that says students who are labeled or thought of as "low-performing" do better with a rich and significant curriculum. Just because students come in with low knowledge or have difficulty understanding something does not mean we should change the curriculum to something that isn't challenging. It goes the other way, if they're already familiar with the content and have a good grasp on it we can't just teach the way were planning on anyways because it won't challenge them, classrooms and lessons need to be able to effectively educate all students even if they're on different levels.