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AR&D in Action

AR&D can be undertaken by one faculty team, many teams, or the entire faculty, simultaneously or in sequence, throughout the school year. Regardless of the number of staff involved, we suggest that a school/district conduct AR&D in four distinct areas of schooling:
  • the quality of teacher curriculum designs (units of study, including assessments),
  • the quality of feedback to students, school, and district (teacher scoring/grading/comments and other forms of feedback & guidance) aimed at improving performance,
  • the quality of performance results (results determined by credible assessments on both internal and external assessments), and
  • the effectiveness of local adjustments based on results (the ways teacher and administrative structures, policies and actions respond to knowledge gained through a review of results)
Examples of such AR&D work include:
  1. Designing and refining model curricular units. Review existing designs against standards, refine designs, teach new units, peer review, and further refine designs.
  2. Designing and refining sets of scoring rubrics and exemplars. Draft rubrics against teaching goals, apply those rubrics to student work, peer review student grades against goals, and revise rubrics to better engender desired results.
  3. Experimenting with new and promising teaching methods/approaches, as identified and prioritized by the entire faculty; gauge effectiveness by agreed-upon measures (informal and formal).
  4. Analyzing local curriculum. Assess local curriculum designs against design standards; recommend professional development strategies, design targets, and policy changes.
  5. Mapping the "taught curriculum," then creating a UbD Curriculum Map. Collect all lesson plans, assignments, and assessments; analyze the degree of alignment with content standards, curriculum frameworks, and course syllabi; make recommendations for more coherent curriculum. In a revised map, include Understandings, Essential Questions, and Core Performance tasks tied to state/district content standards. Review the new map cooperatively, working toward identified goals.
  6. Analyzing scoring/grading. Assess scoring/grading to identify the degree of consistency; compare local grading standards to credible state and national performance standards (e.g. state-wide writing, Advanced Placement, college freshman exam scoring); revise the grading protocol to reflect lessons learned.
  7. Analyzing performance results. Twice per year, review performance in key areas (student work, test results, teacher-designed units; conduct item/task analysis to identify key areas of weakness; set goals and develop strategies for improvement.
  8. Surveying students. Collect data (pre/post) from students on what is engaging/effective work, the clarity of standards and expectations, fairness, and challenge. Address lessons learned through the review of units, curriculum, grading/scoring, and/or approaches to teaching.
  9. Surveying constituencies. Collect data from parents, the next level of schooling, alumni, and/or local employers about the strengths and weaknesses of former students. Use collected information to draft a plan for improvement.