I first encountered the 40\/40\/40 rule years ago while skimming one of those giant (and indispensable) 400 page Understanding by Design tomes.<\/span><\/p>\nThe question was simple enough. Of all of the academic standards, you are tasked with \u2018covering\u2019 (more on this in a minute), what\u2019s important that students understand for the next 40 days, what\u2019s important that they understand for the next 40 months, and what\u2019s important that they understand for the next 40 years?<\/p>\n
As you can see, this is a powerful way to think about academic content.<\/p>\n
Of course, this leads to the discussion of both power standards and enduring understandings, curriculum mapping, and instructional design tools teachers use every day.<\/p>\n
But it got me thinking. So I drew a quick pattern of concentric circles\u2013something like the image below\u2013and started thinking about the writing process, tone, symbolism, audience, purpose, structure, word parts, grammar, \u00a0and a thousand other bits of ELA stuff.<\/p>\n
Not (Necessarily) Power Standards<\/strong><\/p>\nAnd it was an enlightening process.<\/p>\n
First, note that this process is a bit different than identifying power standards in your curriculum.<\/p>\n
Power Standards can be chosen by looking at these standards that can serve to \u2018anchor and embed\u2019 other content. This idea of \u201c40\/40\/40\u201d is more about being able to survey a large bundle of stuff and immediately spot what\u2019s necessary. If your house is on fire and you\u2019ve got 2 minutes to get only as much as you can carry out, what do you take with you?<\/p>\n
In some ways, it can be reduced to a depth vs breadth argument. Coverage versus mastery. UbD refers to it as the difference between \u201cnice to know,\u201d \u201cimportant content,\u201d and \u201cenduring understandings.\u201d These labels can be confusing\u2013enduring versus 40\/40\/40 vs power standards vs big ideas vs essential questions.<\/p>\n
This is why I loved the simplicity of the 40\/40\/40 rule.<\/p>\n
It occurred to me that it was more about contextualizing the child in the midst of the content, rather than simply unpacking and arranging standards. One of UbD\u2019s framing questions for establishing \u2018big ideas\u2019 offer some clarity:<\/p>\n
\u201cTo what extent does the idea, topic, or process represent a \u2018big idea\u2019 having enduring value beyond the classroom?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nThe essence of the 40\/40\/40 rule seems to be to look honestly at the content we\u2019re packaging for children, and contextualize it in their lives. This hints at authenticity, priority, and even the kind of lifelong learning that teachers dare to dream about.<\/p>\n
Applying The 40\/40\/40 Rule In Your Classroom<\/strong><\/p>\nThere\u2019s likely not one single \u2018right way\u2019 to do this, but here are a few tips:<\/p>\n
1. Start Out Alone<\/strong><\/p>\nWhile you\u2019ll need to socialize these with team or department members soon, it is helpful to clarify what you think about the curriculum before the world joins you. Plus, this approach forces you to analyze the standards closely, rather than simply being polite and nodding your head a lot.<\/p>\n
2. Then Socialize<\/strong><\/p>\nAfter you\u2019ve sketched out your thinking about the content standards you teach, share it\u2013online, in a data team or PLC meeting, or with colleagues one afternoon after school.<\/p>\n
3. Keep It Simple<\/strong><\/p>\nUse a simple 3-column chart or concentric circles as shown above, and start separating the wheat from the chaff. No need to get complex with your graphic organizer.<\/p>\n
4. Be Flexible<\/strong><\/p>\nYou\u2019re going to have a different sense of priority about the standards than your colleagues. These are different personal philosophies about life, teaching, your content area, etc. As long as these differences aren\u2019t drastic, this is normal.<\/p>\n
5. Realize Children Aren\u2019t Little Adults<\/strong><\/p>\nOf course, everyone needs to spell correctly, but weighing spelling versus extracting implicit undertones or themes (typical English-Language Arts content) is also a matter of realizing that children and adults are fundamentally different. Rarely is a child going to be able to survey an array of media, synthesize themes, and create new experiences for readers without being able to use a verb correctly. It can happen, but therein lies the idea of power standards, big ideas, and most immediately the 40\/40\/40 rule: One day\u201340 days. 40 months, or even 10 years from now\u2013the students in front of you will be gone\u2013adults in the \u201creal world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not everything they can do\u2013or can\u2019t do\u2013at that time will be because of you no matter how great the lesson, assessment design, use of data,\u00a0pacing guide, or curriculum map. But if you can accept that\u2013and start backward from worst-case \u201cif they learn nothing else this year, they\u2019re going to know this\u00a0and\u00a0that\u2013then you can work backward from those priorities.<\/p>\n
Those content bits that will last for 40 years\u2013or longer.<\/p>\n
In your content area, on your curriculum map, pacing guide, or whatever guiding documents you use, start filling up that little orange circle first and work backward from there.<\/p>\n
Which Content Is Most Important? The 40\/40\/40 Rule<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n[ad_2]
\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"[ad_1] by Terry Heick I first encountered the 40\/40\/40 rule years ago while skimming one of those giant (and indispensable) 400 page Understanding by Design<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":263387,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[173],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263386"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263386\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigandigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}