Recently there has been a lot of hubbub about backwards planning in my district and I wanted to make sure that I knew what they were talking about so I purchased this book:
The author, Harriet Isecke, wrote this book as a companion book, or even sort of a "book to turn to" because Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggens and Jay McTighe is so hard to implement. Me...I bought it because I like the cover. Plus, I have used books by Wiggens an McTighe in the past (they were the movers and shaker of standards-based teaching, so thank them for the list of standards you have today!) and knew that they use a lot of jargon-based writing. Not that this is bad...but when it is crunch time and you have to change the way you have thought, you don't need jargon....you need direction. And that is what I found in this book!
Chapter 1 of this book is especially important as it defines 'backwards plannng'. The book unfolds to explain how to plan 'backwards', check for both formative and summative assessments, progress monitoring, and project-based learning. The author also supplies tools to help you get started. I love the way she breaks it all down. I give it 2 thumbs up!
Now for the good part....win this book!!!
The author, Harriet Isecke, wrote this book as a companion book, or even sort of a "book to turn to" because Understanding by Design by Grant Wiggens and Jay McTighe is so hard to implement. Me...I bought it because I like the cover. Plus, I have used books by Wiggens an McTighe in the past (they were the movers and shaker of standards-based teaching, so thank them for the list of standards you have today!) and knew that they use a lot of jargon-based writing. Not that this is bad...but when it is crunch time and you have to change the way you have thought, you don't need jargon....you need direction. And that is what I found in this book!
Chapter 1 of this book is especially important as it defines 'backwards plannng'. The book unfolds to explain how to plan 'backwards', check for both formative and summative assessments, progress monitoring, and project-based learning. The author also supplies tools to help you get started. I love the way she breaks it all down. I give it 2 thumbs up!
Now for the good part....win this book!!!
