Week 4: Backwards Design Stage 2: Determining Acceptable Evidence

• Explain how you identify the desired results, how you come up with essential questions and determine what understandings are desired.

When I am trying to determine my desired results from a class, I will usually pick one outcome per lesson per week.  Going back to the ELA essential goals:

 Established Goals: 

RI.6.3 - Analyze in detail how a key individual, event, or idea is introduced, illustrated, and elaborated in a text (e.g. through examples or anecdotes)
RI.6.4 - Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative, connotative, and technical meanings.
RI.6.6. - Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text and explain how it is conveyed in the text.
RI.6.7. - Integrate information presented in different media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words to develop a coherent understanding of a topic or issue.

I know that making sure that I incorporate every one of these goals into one lesson and having the students fully comprehend the work is going to be very difficult. Instead, I will incorporate one main idea per lesson, and then slowly add the other essential goals as the week goes on. 

I'm not 100% familiarized with the ELA standards, but the music department has started to make it our goal to improve the ELA regents, so I'm slowly getting acquainted with them. 

• Explain how you determine what knowledge and skills that students should acquire as a result of learning (connecting to college and workforce readiness)

Since we are forced to differentiate our lessons, I feel that student assessments should also be differentiated. I believe that the students can do whatever type of project they would like to do, as long as they are making sure that they are meeting the requirements of the rubric. I also have very different assignments that I give in order to make sure that they still understanding the music aspects of music. One project that I think is a good example of this, is that I'm having my kids work in groups to create their own songs. The song has to have lyrics, different instruments, and some type of beat. While I can see this being viewed as the same assignment, those are the only rules I've given them (besides the lyrics having to be clean and school appropriate). They are allowed to use any instruments they wish, as well as deciding as a group with genre they can work in the best. This project is great for getting them college and workforce ready because they are going to have to work with people that they may not know, and they are going to have to learn how to come to compromises with each other in order to be successful.