UbDDI+B1+Chapter+7

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Analysis: In order to dive deeper into learning, teachers need to stop "covering" content by skimming over a broad unit. Instead, they need to "uncover" but delving deeper into the material so students get a better understanding of what is being taught. One way to do this is through the use of essential questions, which students should always be thinking about and answering as they work through the unit. Essential questions help students develop higher order thinking. The six facets of understanding are also necessary to "uncover" a unit. The more facets you can use in your teaching, the better understanding your students will come to have. The WHERETO method is a framework that asks teaches to hook, engage, and equip their students so that the students can rethink, self-evaluate and learn. Synthesis: We all want our students to be engaged in their learning and constantly finding new answers for the essential questions we give them. We want them to understand how they learn and what we can do to help them achieve their goals. We all also really seem to like the WHERETO method, and seeing as we are working with it right now, we will all gain a deeper understanding of what we want our students to achieve. By Bridget

Amanda Martemucci
UbD/DI-Chapter 7: Chapter 7 focuses on teaching for understanding. The chapter suggests, “uncovering” the content rather than “covering.” “Uncovering” allows for content to be explored below the surface, where the big ideas are found. It is also helpful to use essential questions in teaching. Essential questions are formed in Stage 1 of the backward design. The content while teaching is the answers to the essential questions. The six facets of understanding (explain, interpret, apply, perspective, empathy, self-knowledge) can also be used for understanding during teaching. Not all six facets need to be used all of the time. Choosing specific facets to engage students is more successful rather than trying to incorporate too much at once. The WHERETO method is the final suggestion given in the chapter. WHERETO is a set of questions for each letter to reflect how to create understanding through teaching. Essentially teachers should know what they want students to learn, how to hook students interest, equip students for learning, have students rethink and self-evaluate, tailor the lessons for different levels of learning, and organize the learning experiences for best understanding. I personally like the WHERETO format. It encompasses many questions that lead to aspect of teaching that are important, particularly engaging students. I want my students to be engaged in learning, rethinking their ideas and understandings, and overall thinking about themselves and how they learn. WHERETO allows me to come to ways in my teaching that I can accomplish these with my students.

Moe
Teaching for understanding is characterized as “uncovering” the content you want the students to learn, rather then “covering” it by simply skimming the top of a unit. Uncovering requires deeper thought, as you are diving deeper into the information that the students should and need to know. The goal of uncovering is to attempt to address the six facets of learning with students. The best way to do this is through the use of WHERETO, which is a way for teachers to put the students perspective in their minds while preparing a unit. Along with the six facets and WHERETO, we must be continually asking and re-asking the essential questions, which we had created at the beginning of the unit, to the students.

The idea of “uncovering” versus “the traditional “covering”, really put UbD/DI into perspective me. It helped me realize that the purpose is to dive deep into the subjects that we are teaching and to put students’ needs at the helm when we are planning a unit. If I wish to see them truly understand material, according to the six facets, then I must take the time to develop units/lessons that push them deeper into the subject rather then just be content with them memorizing minimal details.

Bridget
Chapter 7: Teaching for Understanding in Academically Diverse Classrooms Understanding requires more than the memorization of facts and the ability to pass a test. “Active intellectual work” is necessary for students to truly gain understanding (108). Essential questions help students to use higher order thinking and begin to understand what they know, what they don’t, and what they wish to learn by using deep critical thinking. Teachers should remember that the ladder framework isn’t really how students learn. Learning does not happen sequentially, it is not always necessary to know the basics to explore the deeper questions; often, exploring big ideas helps to teach the basics. The WHERETO framework is also helpful in leading students to true understanding. All these ways of helping students think deeper and question further and understand better are essential for teachers to use in order to assist their students in deeper understanding.

Jesika
In this Chapter I leaned about the WHERETO framework. The framework is all about getting students to understand, and think about what they are learning as they learn it, rather than teach them the basics and then ask them to think about it more abstractly. The WHERETO Framework also aims to get the teacher to really think about what they want the students to learn and how they want them to show that learning/understanding. The WHERETO framework could be very useful in my classroom. It would help me to plan more engaging lessons and find better ways to get students to show their understanding.

Kevin
Chapter 7 begins with the idea that instead of teachers covering the content they should be uncovering the content. The chapter focuses on three instructional techniques that are meant to deepen student’s understanding of content. The first is using essential questions, this method exposes students to open-ended questions that will require students to think. In this way students will hopefully discover for themselves and from each other what they otherwise might have had to memorize. The second method for deepening student’s understanding is using the six facets of understanding to generate learning activities. The third method is using the WHERETO framework. Each letter in the acronym represents questions that the teacher needs to be sure he or she is addressing. The W is reminding teachers to make learning goals explicit. The H is how will you get them to actually want to learn? E is about uncovering content and R is about the process of learning and revising. The next E is student self-evaluation, T focuses on adjusting to your learners strengths and weaknesses, and O is about the sequence of events in which material will be learned. I like using essential questions, I think discussion is a great way for students to learn things on their own. As a social studies teacher I hope to have a lot of discussion in my room.

Chelsea
One way in which teachers are able to teach for understanding is by “uncovering” the information. In order to this teachers should “frame the content as answers to questions or the solutions to problems” (110) by asking open ended questions teachers force their students to think and encourage students to explore more deeply. When we answer our essential questions we should do so in a way that encourages understanding. Using Facets to help teacher is allows students to explore content more diversely because it allows them to engage. WHERETO is also an important element to this chapter as it encourages teacher to consider the student, who as the book says “should always be at the heart of the teaching-learning process” (120). By uncovering content and using WHERETO it creates successful teaching as it encourages deeper thoughts and explorations of the learner.

Kristen
The same list we were given in class is provided on page 117 that provides “verbs based on the Six Facets of Understanding”. The list starts with the fundamentals which are good for surface knowledge but every student needs the “basics” to understand higher order thoughts about the subject. This application can help them build their own knowledge in a way that makes sense to them. The WHERETO framework is suggested to help teachers connect all the dots. W stands for what they are learning and why they are learning it. H stands for the hook that will be used to bring them in. E stands for the experiences and the way to equip the students to master the knowledge. R is for helping students to rethink past knowledge as well as being able to revise it and refine it for better storage and future retrieval. E is for encouraging evaluation that is ongoing for the student about their work. All of these ideas are important. The thought that is most important to me is that students need something to bring them in to the subject. There is a whole list of essential questions on page 112 that I would consider to be inquisitive hooks to get them interested and thinking about whatever subject they happen to be studying.

Christina
In an academically diverse classroom, the teacher would uncover the content and use essential questions to teach with the WHERETO framework. This was discussed in chapter seven of //Integrating Differentiated Instruction and Understanding by Design//. According to the authors, to uncover the content is to use “teaching methods that go into depth to engage students in making meaning of content” (110). When uncovering the content, essential questions can be used so that the content can become the answers to questions or problems. This therefore enables students to have a “glimpse into the origin and meaning of the content they are learning in a qualitatively different way than does a surface coverage of sterile facts” (110). An important topic in this chapter was the WHERETO framework. This framework allows the teacher to create a blueprint for their instructional planning that supports the teacher in teaching to all students for understanding. As a teacher, each element of the WHERETO framework is an important aspect in acquiring the student's attention to teach in a meaningful and long-term manner.