UbD: The Process

Developing the lesson using the UbD model brought home for me how difficult good teaching--or rather good planned instruction--really is. Taking a concept embedded in the standards, crafting it into meaningful goals and objectives and developing activities to achieve authentic learning is a complex, painstaking and time consuming process that is not fully appreciated by those who have never done it before and may not often be used by those who should.

Despite its value, I wonder how often it is used by teachers, who, like other professionals in various disciplines, may take short cuts when doing so seems more practical and useful. New teachers may start out creating and using well developed unit and block plans but day to day teaching demands, coupled with an emphasis on standardized test performance, likely make the best of plans just that—plans. While certain veteran teachers may follow the approach in some truncated way, others have clearly left the approach behind not long after they became teachers. Still, we all become complacent and change does not happen over night—particularly as change conjures up very real fears regarding out ability to adjust and succeed. Getting teachers to change their approach to developing plans may have to come in baby steps—starting with school administrators who often do not ask or expect their teachers to do what works best.

Somehow, teachers need to reconcile doing what works best with an environment that does not always support it. I don't envy them as the task seems daunting to say the least.

Overall, the experience was enlightening. The format worked for me since I'm not a teacher and I needed the structure it provides. How do you sustain this level of preparation over time?