We are excited to announce that all third grade Understanding by Design (UbD) science units are complete and posted to CMAPP. Each unit is tightly aligned to the NC Essential Standards for Science and designed to support teachers through best practices in science education. Stage 1 identifies and unpacks what students should know and be able to do according to the North Carolina Essential Standards for Science. Stage 2 provides assessment examples to show if students have mastered standards. Stage 3 is a collection of standards aligned learning experiences and resources to be used for instructional purposes.
The 3rd Grade Science Curriculum Map is a resource that can be used as a "sample" guide for the pacing of instructional units. We are hopeful that PLT's will collaborate and have the agency to determine scope and sequences that best suits instruction for their students and school programs. Every school and every teacher's daily schedule is different across the district. It is our goal to provide resources to help support instruction of NC Essential Standards for Science.
There are six third grade UbD units including:
- Force & Motion: Speed & Direction
- Matter: Structure, Properties & Change
- Earth in the Solar System
- Earth's Land and Water Features
- Bones, Muscles & Skin
- Plants on Earth
Stage 1 Highlights (all about standards and desired results)
Stage 1 of UbD allows a teacher to dig deep into the standards. They will discover what it is that students should know, understand, and be able to do by the end of the unit. Student understandings (or the standards) are broken into "Key Concepts" for each unit. Research on designing effective science instruction states that breaking down science content helps teachers to understand what knowledge and skills students should understand. Stage 1 also includes essential questions, specific skills, and content vocabulary. Each part of Stage 1 sets the foundation for the as it guides teachers with deeper understanding the standards. Hence, it helps us to remember the goal of the unit or "the end in mind."
Stage 2 Highlights (all about balanced assessment and evidence of learning)
Stage 2 houses a collection of assessments tasks used to show evidence of learning and identify what students understand. The assessments tasks vary in nature to create a balanced approach and they can be used formatively or summatively. Teachers might select a formative assessment probe or a multiple choice test to administer to students prior to teaching a concept. The results of the pre-assessment would be formative in that teachers would devote less time to providing instruction on the standards that students have already demonstrated proficiency. More instructional time would then be devoted to standards where students did not demonstrate understanding or proficiency. The results of the assessments will/can guide PLT discussions for science.
Stage 3 Highlights (all about planning dynamic learning experiences)
Stage 3 of the UbD units (a collection of learning resources and experiences) should be seen as a menu or toolbox that contains standards aligned, 4C's learning tasks. Teachers, as professionals, have agency to select which resources should be used to best meet the needs of students in their particular class. As we know, every student, every classroom, and every school has students with differentiated needs. Therefore, instructional tasks should be aligned to students needs! (#differentiation) With that in mind, a teacher can pick and choose from the learning tasks that include lesson plans, videos, text sets that address the ELA shifts, study aids, integration resources, field trips, guest speaker ideas, and many other resources to best meet the needs of their students.
Be sure to check out all of the great resources in every stage of the UbD units! Even if you are not a 3rd grade teacher you can use the UbD units as a model to plan your own instructional units. We are excited that our team has started developing 4th grade UbD units for the 2018 year, and will plan 5th grade in 2019.
