Information » Links between Planning and Instruction
eUP provides teachers with a scaffolded framework with which to develop inquiry-based curriculum. Each step of eUP guides teachers to consider ways to deeply develop their students’ understandings around concepts.
eUP can best be described as a way to create exemplary written curriculum.
While the quality of the written curriculum is vital to the work that goes on in the classroom, consideration must also be given to how this curriculum is best delivered.
Two teachers may be working from the same curriculum documents yet the learning experiences of students in their classrooms may be vastly different.
What defines this difference? It is both the quality of the written curriculum as well as the quality of instruction that leads to excellence in the classroom.
In April 2009 the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development in Victoria, Australia published the e5 Instructional Model. This model provides teachers with best practice instructional strategies that enhance the teaching process and which when rigorously applied will lead to improved students outcomes. The e5 Instructional Model outlines what a teacher should be doing to enhance the potential of their students.
The e5 Instructional Model can best be described as an exemplary way to teach any curriculum. e5 models what teachers do in classrooms. It may be used as a framework for:
To find out more about this model click here http://www.education.vic.gov.au/edulibrary/public/teachlearn/innovation/e5/E5_A1PosterTable4.pdf
All notes in italics describe teacher capabilities and are taken directly from the e5 Instructional Model. The rest of this work has been written by eUP in order to demonstrate the importance of planning when teachers are looking to improve their instructional capacity.
The e5 Instructional Model provides guidance to teachers under the headings of Engage, Explain, Explore, Elaborate and Evaluate. Each of these Domains has a specific purpose.
The quality of the written curriculum will reflect the type of thinking and tasks that students could be engaged in during a learning sequence. To this end the written and taught curriculum should be very closely aligned. A teacher’s skill is in being able to identify the needs of individual students and to respond to them in a timely and appropriate manner.
According to the e5 Instructional Model when teachers engage students they will:
How can eUP help teachers when planning to engage students?
A variety of cooperative tools found in the Toolkit can assist with fostering positive relationships with and between students. The Habits of Mind can be used to assist students to work together and respect individual differences. The open-ended nature of the thinking tools within the Toolkit allows teachers to provide for differences in the learning styles of their students.
If teachers share with their students the thinking behind the concept step they have written, this identifies to students the reasons and the thinking behind the unit being studied. This will assist with engaging students and providing them with the impetus to learn.
After Standards are selected, the Concept, Rationale, Investigation Into and Essential Questions are written and students are pre-tested and provided with immersion task/s). Teachers are then prompted to collect student questions about the concept (ways to do this are suggested in the ‘Help’ section). Bloom’s Taxonomy question stems are also available in the Toolkit and can be used to assist students with the development of high order questions. The Toolkit offers a question matrix and question cubes to support students in generating questions around their inquiry.
Teachers are prompted to use a ‘backward design’ approach and write Rich Assessment Tasks (RATS) before they write other tasks. Teachers are encouraged to consider Multiple Intelligences within the development of a Rich Assessment Task. Ideas are provided with the Toolkit.
By planning for the different ways that that students learn, there is a greater likelihood of engaging all students in a heterogeneous class.
One of the steps within eUP guides teachers to analyse the content and processes that are embedded within the selected standards for the unit. This identification of the declarative and procedural knowledge that is required to complete the assessment tasks can be shared with students, thus supporting the engagement of students.
How can eUP help teachers when planning for students to explore the material being taught?
According to the e5 Model, when operating within the Explore Domain teachers will:
The concept step in eUP is where teachers plan an inquiry around a global concept. The inquiry is developed initially by teachers as they link the concept to the most appropriate standards. The next part of the inquiry occurs after students are pre-tested and provided with immersion tasks about the concept. At this stage students are now able to engage in the inquiry process and develop their own questions that they would like to explore.
Teachers then take into account their students questions and use the Toolkit to develop tasks from low to high order levels of thinking. The Toolkit has a large number of suggestions that have been ordered using Bloom’s Taxonomy as a guide to the intellectual rigour associated with the various tools.
The development of Essential Questions at the ‘Concept Step’ allows for teachers to consider aspects of the area of study that will develop students’ alternate perspectives. Opportunities to expand perspectives and reflect on learning are also provided within the eUP Toolkit by providing a number of creative and critical thinking tools.
When planning with eUP the teacher has deconstructed the standards by identifying the content and the processes embedded within them. Tasks are then written with these in mind. Higher and lower ability students are catered for when teachers use the dedicated text boxes to modify work accordingly.
How can eUP help to teachers to plan the best ways to explain the material being taught?
Within the Domain of Explain teachers will:
Within the Toolkit there are a number of suggestions as to how students may present their understandings in both verbal and non-verbal ways. These are found in the Multiple Intelligences tools as well as in the Speaking and Listening, Reading, Writing and Spelling Tools. The Multiple Intelligences suggestions provide ideas as to how content may be presented in eight different ways to students. The Toolkit provides many varied ways to get students to connect and organise new and existing knowledge. A glossary of terms is developed in the Concept Step. This is a place where teachers may consider the language of the discipline they are teaching.
How can eUP help to support teachers when planning to elaborate the material being studied?
The Elaborate Domain of the e5 Model requires teachers to:
The way that tasks in eUP are designed by teachers will take students on a journey towards a final task or tasks that continuously extend and refine their understandings.
The concept step assists teachers in identifying concepts that are relevant to students. When teachers plan the same concept across levels, students are provided with multiple perspectives of a concept often through the lens of multiple disciplines.
For example ‘Systems’ may be studied from Level 1-4:
Thus a number of parallels about ‘systems’ are drawn for students as they progress through the school. This empowers students to generate principles and rules about concepts.
Tasks within eUP are designed that build on prior learning and develop thinking using the levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy. Tasks become increasingly more complex as students move through the unit of work. Teachers are supported in developing higher order tasks by the capacity to isolate tools in the Toolkit that are pitched at each specific level of Bloom’s Taxonomy.
An ability to create, test, make and justify decisions can be developed when teachers expose students to the many and varied tools that appear in the Evaluate and Create sections of the eUP Toolkit.
When writing tasks teachers can use the text areas for higher and lower ability students in order to adjust instruction according to the varying ability levels of their students.
How can eUP help to support teachers when planning to evaluate students?
Teachers working in the evaluate Domain of the e5 Model will:
Teachers using eUP write Rich Assessment Tasks first and the criteria for assessment are decided on before other tasks are written. This can be revisited as students progress through the learning experiences provided within the unit.
When teachers write Rich Assessment Tasks they are guided to link them to expected outcomes. This develops a professional level of accountability ensuring that teachers keep coming back to expected outcomes. Only standards that are linked to tasks appear in the audit function within eUP.
When planning with eUP teachers are provided with an opportunity to identify whether tasks will be assessed ‘as’ learning, ‘of’ learning or ‘for’ learning.
Many of the Habits of Mind found within eUP promote self-reflection and the impact of effort on achievement. The ‘Reflections’ step within eUP encourages teachers to reflect on the unit of work and this step may also include feedback from students.
The ‘Future Action’ step in eUP highlights for teachers the need to consider how this unit of study may impact on future goals of their students.
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