What does effective planning look like?

I have had the opportunity to plan with Brooke Sims and Ashley Minton in our math coach meetings this past year. The way these two think about planning and work together to create exemplar experiences for their learners is extraordinary. I asked them a few questions that might give you some ideas for when you are planning for your own learners...

Who are you? (Name, grade, years of experience, subjects you teach, what you love to do, etc)

Ashley Minton - 6th year teaching math/science

• taught 5 years looping 2nd/3rd grades

• first year teaching 5th grade, will loop back down to 4th grade next year
• Outside of school, I love to crossfit and spend time with family and friends.  I have 2 adorable nephews and one sweet niece that I love to visit as often as I can. :)

Brooke Sims

• this is my 5th year teaching
• I taught 3rd grade (self-contained) my first year in my hometown of Burkburnett, Texas
• I was hired at Town Center as the GT Specialist
• I have been looping with 4th/5th grades in math and science for 3 years
• Outside of school, I love to hang out with my husband and my family and soon with my baby girl!
  
  

How long have you two been teaching together?

This is our first year to work together.

When you sit down and start thinking about what you are going to be planning next, what is the first thing that you do? Why?

• We usually look at the 9 weeks as a whole and map out what TEKS we need to cover first.  
• We then group the TEKS into logical categories and  try to come up with a bigger picture.  We ask ourselves:  How is this related to the real-world?  What is the bigger picture that they need to know in 20 years?  What do they need to know in 5 years?  What do they need to know this year? (This is the megaspore idea from Understanding by Design).  
• After we come up with our enduring understandings and essential questions, we focus on developing a real-world performance assessment that includes all of the TEKS and requires open-ended problem-solving, critical thinking, and choice.   
• After we have designed a performance assessment, we look at what learning experiences we could do that would help them gain the knowledge necessary to be successful with the performance assessment.  
  
  

How do you come up with your performance assessments?

• Think about real-world connections
• Try to create something open-ended that allows for natural differentiation
• Incorporate technology, creativity, and choice
• Think about career connections
• Follow the UBD or PBL way of thinking

Do you follow a specific process when planning? What is it?

Same as question about planning above :)  

How do you make sure to differentiate for all your learners?

• We have found that if the performance assessment is open-ended enough, it differentiates itself, and we don’t have to come up with alternative activities.  We just support those that need more support as they work on the project.   
• Another way we differentiate often is using “ports” based on pre-assessments.  The students get back their pre-assessments at the beginning of a unit, and they are responsible for correcting them as they learn new knowledge throughout the unit.  The pre-assessment also helps them know what they need more practice on and helps them be responsible for their learning.   For example, during a fractions unit, there may be a “port” on equivalent fractions, a “port” on simplifying fractions, etc.  If a student has mastered finding equivalent fractions, he/she does not have to visit that “port” or complete those activities.  If they need more practice, they complete the activities in that “port” or visit with the teacher in small group time.
• We do a lot of blended learning so that we are more free to work with small groups and re-teach when necessary.  They are also able to watch the videos as many times as they need.  

 

What are some resources that you like to use when planning?

• Discovery Education
• Defined STEM
• LearnZillion for blended learning videos
• Pinterest for ideas, but then we change everything to make it fit our needs  

What would you say has been the key factor in making your planning sessions successful?

• We work well together!
• We divide up the tasks, and we know that we can depend on one another to be responsible in getting that part done.  
• We do most of our planning in google docs, which makes our lives easier!  
• We do a lot of frontloading with our planning.  We sit and plan for a unit for a longer portion of time at the beginning, then there is not a lot of daily or weekly planning until our next unit.  

I hope this gives you some ideas for how to make your planning just as successful. Feel free to email these awesome educators with questions!