Academies & Institutes

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Connecting Content and Kids:
Understanding By Design and Differentiated Instruction

Presenter: Dr. Jay McTighe
Workshop Time: 9:00 am - 4:00 pm each day
Registration fee: Two-day academy $349, $299 for Texas ASCD members

Dates and Locations:

February 17-18, 2010
Location: Keller ISD Administration Building (DFW area)
350 Keller Parkway - Keller, TX 76248

To register by purchase order or a check, click here or download a registration form (PDF) or call 1-800-717-2723 ext. 10 for assistance.

Summary:

Today’s educators are faced with the pressures of addressing content standards and meeting state and federal accountability requirements. At the same time, students in today’s classrooms typically represent a broad range of academic readiness, interests, and learning profiles, and teachers are expected to encourage struggling learners, challenge advanced learners, and make sure that classes are relevant and engaging for everyone.

This workshop will focus on the interrelated needs to address content standards in rich and authentic ways while remaining responsive to the diversity of learners we teach. More specifically, we’ll examine the mutually supportive connections between Understanding by Design and Differentiation through the following questions:

Can differentiation and standards really co-exist?
How can we address required content standards yet remain responsive to the differences and varied needs of our students?
How does the “backward design” approach to curriculum planning inform differentiation (and vice-versa)?
How will we know that students really understand important ideas and processes we teach?
How might we differentiate student assessments and still obtain valid measures of learning?
Can we maintain standards without standardization?
How might a grading and reporting system communicate standards-based achievement honestly and fairly?
How might we "work smarter" in curriculum design?

Dr. Jay McTighe, brings a wealth of experience developed during a rich and varied career in education. He served as Director of the Maryland Assessment Consortium, a state collaboration of school districts working together to develop and share formative performance assessments. Prior to this position, Jay was involved with school improvement projects at The Maryland State Department of Education. Jay is well known for his work with “thinking skills,” having coordinated statewide efforts to develop instructional strategies, curriculum models, and assessment procedures for improving the quality of student thinking. He also directed the development of the Instructional Framework, a multi-media database on teaching. In addition to his work at the state level, Jay has experience at the district level in Prince George’s County, Maryland as a classroom teacher, resource specialist, and program coordinator. He also served as director of the Maryland Summer Center for Gifted and Talented Students, a statewide residential enrichment program held at St. Mary’s College.

Jay has published articles in a number of leading journals and books, including Educational Leadership (Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development [ASCD]), Developing Minds (ASCD), Thinking Skills: Concepts and Techniques (National Education Association), and The Developer (National Staff Development Council). He co-authored three books on assessment – Assessing Learning in the Classroom (NEA), Assessing Outcomes: Performance Assessment Using the Dimensions of Learning Model (ASCD), and Evaluation Tools to Improve as Well as Evaluate Student Performance (Corwin Press). He is co-author, with Grant Wiggins, of the best-selling Understanding by Design series, and the newly-released, Connecting Content and Kids: Integrating Differentiation and Understanding by Design (2006), co-authored with Carol Ann Tomlinson.

Jay received his undergraduate degree from The College of William and Mary, earned a Masters degree from The University of Maryland and has completed post-graduate studies at The Johns Hopkins University. He was selected to participate in The Educational Policy Fellowship Program through the Institute for Educational Leadership in Washington, DC. He served as a member of the National Assessment Forum, a coalition of education and civil rights organizations advocating reforms in national, state and local assessment policies and practices. Jay also completed a three-year term on the ASCD Publications Committee, serving as Committee chair during 1994–95.