Beginning with the End

UbD

             Understanding by Design (UbD) was a very interesting read.  It shows a different way to approach preparing to teach.  It starts off by explain that your basically prepare backwards.  Start planning at the end with the results that you want to achieve and then move forward from there to plan the rest of whatever is going to be taught.  This sounded very familiar to me but it was in a different setting.  I will explain this later.

UbD states that you need to start with the “desired results” that a teacher wants to accomplish and make your teaching plans based on those results.  (Understanding by Design, p.8).  According to UbD the focus is too much on starting with everything else, from the textbooks, to activities, to lessons and then making the goals.  It is called backward design.  Pick the goal first then come up with a way to reach that goal. (p. 8).  I said in the beginning that this sounded   familiar.  I did this but it was in my retail experience that we did the same process.  It had different goals, to maximize sales and profit, but it was basically the same procedure.  As a manager I would have to come up with the overriding goal for something specific, for example sales for “Black Friday,” the day after Thanksgiving.  So I came up with a goal of selling to a certain dollar amount that we had to reach at a minimum.  Only after was this goal set did we go about developing a plan to reach that goal.  It makes sense in the business world, well at least in retail, and it makes sense in teaching.  Selecting the goal is more straightforward in sales whereas the process in planning for teaching a subject is a bit different.  I like how the chapter puts it, the “big idea” that needs to be found “to focus on larger concepts, principles or processes.” (p. 10).   This way the student will do more than just remember a simple fact, they will understand the idea, the meaning, and it will stay with them.  Planning this way just plain makes sense.  Once the teacher has the goals set, as well as the way to determine if the students do understand, only then is the planning to begin for the actual lesson and activities.  Since the goal is now known the planning is that much more focused.  Again I go back to my planning in retail.  Since the team knew the goals we had to hit we planned how to get there.  Again a bit different, but it is the same basic concept.

Once this “big idea” is chosen as the goal and the plan is done this will lead to understanding in the students, not just mere remembering.  This backward approach, to me, just makes sense.  Even later in the reading when dealing with questions.  It is saying that as a teacher we need to ask the right questions, what they call the essential questions.  All the planning in the world, even from the standpoint of backward planning, will fail if the right, essential, questions are not asked and explored.  This is where it differs from sales.  These questions will not have an answer per se, it will promote debate, disagreement, alternatives and thought (Understanding by Design, pp. 73-74).  They will even lead into other questions that the students may have.  This to me is where understanding and learning takes place.  As students think about and give answers, which can all be different, it will lead to further discussion about the topic.  This is where real learning and understand takes place.  It is more than remember, or more likely forgetting, a simple fact.

Starting from what you want as an end result and then planning form there makes perfect sense.  You can’t get to when you want unless you know where you are going first!