Full Description
"This engaging book will guide your journey through the morass of curriculum alignment, development, and assessment. Our school struggled through missteps in curriculum alignment and implementing common assessments without the benefit of Makas' wisdom and experience. I highly recommend this book for teachers, administrators, and interested parents."
—Robert A. Martin, Leadership Consultant
Oakland Schools, Waterford, MI
Raise schoolwide performance with a systematic, teacher-driven approach to curriculum development!
Purposeful curriculum design is essential to attaining consistent academic improvement. Educators often find, however, that a viable curriculum based on mandated standards can be exceedingly challenging to create, implement, and sustain.
In this book, curriculum consultant Elaine Makas provides a step-by-step guide to establishing the processes and documents necessary to build a stable, cohesive curriculum system that aligns to educational benchmarks. Based on the DAILY model (Data, Alignment, Instructional Pace Guides, Local Common Assessment, and Yearly Review), this system deconstructs the curriculum process into sequential steps that facilitate the development of instructional priorities, reveal students in need of intervention, and help ensure continuous process improvement. With numerous templates, samples, and reflective exercises, this book clearly demonstrates how to:
Collect and analyze data, identify expectations, and recognize learning gaps
Develop curriculum maps that align with standards and grade-level subject goals
Pace instruction throughout the year according to specific objectives
Create assessments that predict standardized test performance
Conduct yearly improvement reviews and documentation revisions
An essential resource for all schools or districts, whether struggling or successful, From Mandate to Achievement enables K-12 principals, district administrators, curriculum facilitators, and teacher teams to establish a consistent and accurate curriculum process that increases academic achievement and drives continuous school improvement.
Contents
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Introduction
Part I. Foundations of Purpose and Implementation
1. An Introduction to Teacher-Led Curriculum Processes: The DAILY Curriculum System
2. A Brief Theoretical Foundation: Why Build a Curriculum System Through Teacher-Led Processes?
3. Getting Ready: Planning for the Components of the DAILY Curriculum System
Part II. A Planned Journey of Curriculum Processes
4. Data First: What Is Our Data Telling Us About Our Teaching and Our Students?
5. Curriculum Alignment: Do We Have a Match Between Standards and Instruction?
6. Developing Instructional Goals: Keeping a Bridge Between Curriculum Processes and Instruction
7. Creating Curriculum Maps: The Connection Between Instruction and Standards
8. Instructional Pace Guides: Adding Instructional Depth With Key Concepts and Essential Questions
9. The Final Link: Building Local Common Assessments
Part III. Maintaining Stability and Success
10. Creating Stability: Sustaining, Monitoring, and Adjusting a Curriculum Process System
Conclusion: Reflections on a Curriculum System
Resource A: Further Reading
Resource B: Sample Agendas
Resource C: Blank Forms
Resource D: Sample Curriculum Maps
Resource E: Sample Local K?8 Common Assessment Manual for English Language Arts and Mathematics
References
Index
