From Common Core Standards to Curriculum: Five Big Ideas

Gina Ruocco

From Common Core Standards to Curriculum: Five Big Ideas

McTighe, J., & Wiggins, G. (2012). From common core standards to curriculum: five big ideas. Retrieved from:  http://www.stancoe.org/scoe/iss/common_core/ela/ELA_planning_tools/five_big_ideas.pdf.

CA

Article summary:

This article highlighted misconceptions surrounding The Common Core Standards and identified and explained five big ideas that could serve as recommendations for educators working with the Standards. The recommendations are meant to help educators use the Standards in a way that will guide students to their full potential and to ultimately arm them with independent transfer skills.

The five big ideas in the article included :

1. Big Idea # 1 – The Common Core Standards have new emphases and require a careful

reading;

2. Big Idea # 2 – Standards are not curriculum;

3. Big Idea # 3 – Standards need to be “unpacked”;

4. Big Idea # 4 – A coherent curriculum is mapped backward from desired

performances;

5. Big Idea #5 – The Standards come to life through the assessments;

Evaluation:

I found this article extremely helpful in defining sometimes ambiguous educational terminology (standard, curriculum, assessment). I also thought the writers did a great job communicating how daunting it is as a teacher to be presented with new Standards and revamp a curriculum in order to meet the new Standards. The idea that it takes time to unpack the Standards and plan backward is key and could perhaps galvanize administration into providing more time for teachers to backward plan and prepare for the upcoming units.