Standards Alignment

In a standards-based learning system, meeting standards is the goal, so it is essential that proficiency against standards be the priority of the instructional process. Analyzing standards and developing learning progressions help teachers more effectively and efficiently use standards in a relevant and meaningful way.

Identify Course Standards

Standards are the what of learning and instruction is the how.

Course standards represent the skills and concepts taught in each course.

Below you will find a chart that identifies which standards are taught in each course. The names of the standards align with the names found in Atlas Rubicon. This document will be audited annually to check for accuracy and alignment to the most current version of standards. For additional information about the specific standards within each course, refer to either Atlas Rubicon or Iowa Core.

Course Standards List

Determine Power Standards

Definition & Purpose: Power standards are identified as the most essential learning standards that students must master for success in current and future academic endeavors. They represent the most crucial knowledge and skills students need. Power standards are selected because they have leverage (applicable across multiple disciplines), endurance (valuable beyond a single test date), and readiness (necessary for the next level of learning).

Selection: Teachers work together to analyze the standards to identify which standards meet the criteria of leverage, endurance, and readiness. This process ensures that the selected standards are aligned with the overall goals of education and address the most significant learning outcomes.

Implementation: Once power standards are identified, they become the focus of instruction, assessment, and reporting. Teachers design their lessons and assessments around these standards to ensure that students are mastering the most important content. This helps streamline the curriculum and allows for more in-depth exploration of key concepts.

Assessment and Reporting: In a standards-based learning system, assessments are designed to measure student proficiency in power standards. Reporting systems are adjusted to reflect students' progress towards mastering these standards, rather than just providing a single overall grade. This approach provides more detailed feedback to students, parents, and educators about specific areas of strength and need.

Benefits: Focusing on power standards helps clarify learning expectations for students and teachers. It allows educators to prioritize their instructional time and resources on the most critical areas, leading to improved student outcomes. Additionally, it supports a more equitable education system by ensuring all students have access to the essential knowledge and skills they need for success.

Questions to ask when determining Power Standards:

Endurance

Will this standard provide students with knowledge that is of value beyond a single test?

Leverage

Will this standard provide students with knowledge that is of value in multiple disciplines?

Readiness

Will this standard provide students wth knowledge that is required for the next level of learning?

Distribute Standards

All standards (powered and unpowered) need to be included in the course map
Standards should be distributed across the course
Standards may be included in more than one place but it is recommended that you focus on including standards when they are explicitly taught and assessed

Analyze Standards

Alignment between standards and instruction is the process of analyzing and unpacking standards to create meaningful learning progressions that allow students to move from the simplest to the most sophisticated demonstrations of learning. Strong alignment makes the instructional sequencing and progression transparent so students (and teachers) understand how individual skill development contributes to mastery of the full standard.

Analyzing and unpacking standards are the first steps to creating instructional alignment in a standards-based system. Through analysis, teachers identify the specific content and skills that students need to learn and the specific complexity of the standard (DOK).

Analyzing Standards Template

Analyzing Standards

Example

Create Learning Targets

Learning targets are the increments of learning that make up the journey to achieving the overall standard and include all of the skills and concepts students must acquire to master the standard.
Learning Targets communicate to teachers and students the goals for learning that will lead to proficiency of the standard.
Learning targets are assessed through formative assessments.

Learning Targets Template

Develop Learning Targets

Example

Develop Purposeful Learning Progressions

Learning progressions lay out, in successive steps, more sophisticated understandings and describe the typical development of a student's understanding. Learning progressions provide teachers with a blueprint for instruction and assessment. They also communicate to students how the learning will progress toward the standard.

Learning progressions are documented on the standard Proficiency Scale.

Sequence your learning targets by putting them in order from simplest to most complex.

Example

Develop Proficiency Scales for each Power Standard

Enter the full standard in the left side of the "Meeting" row (students must meet the full standard in order to be "Meeting"
On the right side of the "Meeting" row, list, in order, the specific learning targets that lead to proficiency of the full standard.
Define the "Approaching" level by identifying the scaffolded targets needed to meet the standard. These skills may define what it would look like for a student to have partial success at the "Meeting" level or may include descriptors of skills/ content that shows partial depth of application that is required at the "Meeting" level.
Define exemplary performance. "Exemplary" level performance shows in-depth, transferable, and sophistication/automaticity in application of the standard.

- Examples of this type of learning may include: applications for real-world use, using information to solve problems in a different context, explaining connections between ideas, demonstrating a unique insight, and/or creative application of skills.
- These are not just harder tasks, but learning that requires deeper or more rigorous thinking.

For additional clarity, it is permissible to add additional notes to clarify the levels of "beginning" and "no evidence", but it is not required.

Proficiency Scale Template

Revised CCSD Proficiency Scale Template

Example

SL.8.1 Example CCSD Proficiency Scale Template

Report abuse