Annotation+2+-+Backwards+Design


 * EcoEd **
 * Reading Annotation Template **
 * Kelley Fischbach, March 4, 2014 **
 * Annotation 2 – “What is Backward Design?” **


 * 1) **1. ** **Full citation: **

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (1998). What is Backward Design? //Understanding by Design//.


 * 1) **2. ** **Where are the author/s located, what are their backgrounds and what kinds of expertise do they have? **

Grant Wiggins resides in New Jersey, where he currently works as the President of //Authentic Education//. He got his B.A. from St. John’s College in Annapolis and his doctorate in Education from Harvard University. Wiggins’ expertise is in educational reform, and he currently consults with schools, districts, state, and national education departments on reform matters. In addition to state reforms, Wiggins has also been an influence in the national educational reforms in China, the Philippines, and Thailand. ( [] )  Jay McTighe has earned degrees from the College of William and Mary, the University of Maryland, and Johns Hopkins University. He worked as the director of the Maryland Assessment Consortium, as which position he worked with a collaboration of school districts to share and develop “formative performance assessments.” McTighe has experience as a classroom teacher, a program coordinator, a director, an author, and a professional speaker at conferences. ( [] )


 * 1) **3. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">List at least three details or examples from the text that point to something important about culture, education and/or the challenge of environmental sustainability in the United States. **


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The author begins by noting the importance of seeing teachers as “designers” that are inherently creative in nature – often underappreciated in today’s society (page 1).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">It is stressed here that the effectiveness of a teacher is expressed by how well they understand their audience and can “design” a lesson that properly suits this audience – however, teachers are strictly constrained by what they can teach by “national, state, district, or institutional standards” (page 1).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The author comments that our society sees curriculum as a “means to an end” and focus heavily on the resources that will provide students with the necessary outcome, rather than work backwards from the desired outcome to approach the best way of teaching that material (page 2).


 * 1) **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">4. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What three quotes capture the critical import of the text? **


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">“…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 the teaching needed to equip students to perform” (page 1).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">“Backward design may be thought of as purposeful task analysis: Given a task to be completed, how do we get there? Or one may call it planned coaching: What kinds of lessons and practices are needed to master key performances?” (page 2).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">“Rather than creating assessments near the conclusion of a unit of study (or relying on the tests provided by textbook publishers, which may not completely or appropriately assess our standards), backward design calls for us to operationalize our goals or standards in terms of assessment evidence as we //begin// to plan a unit or course” (page 2).


 * 1) **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">5. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What is the main argument of the text? **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The main argument in this text is that a better design approach is needed in the current educational system. The author implies that to achieve this, teachers must use “backward design” principles which involve starting with the end goal and working their way back to find the best way to achieve these goals. This is a three-step process, consisting of 1) identifying desired results, 2) determining acceptable evidence, and 3) planning learning experiences and instruction.


 * 1) **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">6. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Describe at least three ways that the main argument is supported. **


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The argument here is supported mainly through logic. Here, it is discussed that it simply makes sense to clarify what “acceptable evidence” is required from the students before creating an exam to assess their knowledge. This is further supported by the following statement which explains its success in the classroom: “Many teachers who have adopted this design approach report that the process of ‘thinking like an assessor’ about evidence of learning not only helps them to clarify their goals but also results in a more sharply defined teaching and learning target, so that students perform better knowing their goal” (page 2).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The argument for backward design is also supported in the discussion of determining desired results. While it is impossible for students to have a deep understanding of every topic covered in a course, backward design calls for teachers to create a hierarchy of “curricular priorities” to help them better plan their lessons and assignments (pages 2-4).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The argument is further supported in the discussion of planning the lessons themselves. Without a clear direction (identified results and evidence of understanding), it is very difficult to create curriculum that will be useful to students in the learning process. Therefore, backward design is perhaps the best approach (page 7).


 * 1) **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">7. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What parts of the argument did you find most and least persuasive, and why? **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">I didn’t find much to disagree with in this article… Backward design seems to be a pretty logical means for effectively teaching a topic. However, I was particularly in favor of the backward design method of testing (thinking of necessary questions to address and for students to understand //before// teaching). I think that is still one area where teachers are failing – and therefore students are also failing. I think that teachers who have a clear direction for their course with planned outcomes are much easier to learn from and help students immensely with lifelong understanding of their topics.


 * 1) **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">8. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What kinds of corrective action are suggested by the text (either overt or implied)? **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">There is not much room for implications here… The corrective actions in this article are all quite overt. The authors call for more teachers (preferably all) to use this backward design approach. They provide many resources for teachers to use in order to apply these methods to their teachings. They also strongly oppose teaching methods that revolve around a specific textbook or article, and instead suggest that educators first assess the true goals in a certain unit and then work backwards to find the best way to address these goals.


 * 1) **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">9. ** **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Explain how the argument and evidence in the text relates to our effort to conceptualize, design and deliver EcoEd? **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">EcoEd’s efforts are very much in line with what is discussed in this article about backward design. We also find it most important to work backwards from an intended goal to teach our students. We very seldom revolve a lesson around a certain text, and instead try to think of an end-goal when creating lesson plans. In this sense, we work in a backward design manner that is very conducive to learning.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">10. ****<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What additional information has this text compelled you to seek out? (Describe what you learned in a couple of sentences, providing at least two supporting references). **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Although backward design seems very logical and natural to me, I was curious to find specific examples where backward design was successfully employed in classroom settings. One of the first links I came across was a student’s dissertation entitled, “The Effects of Backward-Designed Curriculum and Instruction on Classroom Management,” which essentially discussed the lack of any specific evidence of the effects of backward design in literature, but instead focused on the positive correlation between elements of the backward design process and “positive classroom behavior.” [] <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">I also came across an interview with Grant Wiggins (one of this article’s authors) that I found very interesting. He noted that elementary teachers tend to be better at raising “minimum standards” for education than do teachers of secondary students – there is less small group instruction in secondary schools and therefore more “difficult to give that critical feedback”. He suggests Socratic Seminars as one way to combat this in high school settings. Wiggins also stressed the importance of leaving some things ungraded – he notes that high school teachers tend to think that every assignment and assessment must be graded, while he states that non-graded assessments can be just as important and formative. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">[]