UbD

Lesson plans, activities, pre-k state guidelines, and TEKS, (Texas Essential Knowledge Skills) oh my! It is enough to make your head spin. Once it stops spinning you can start thinking about what your students need to know, what you want them to accomplish, and what activities will get them to their destination. My district has a certain guideline it wants us to teach on a certain week. We have to follow that as a guide and they have suggested activities they want us to do. In pre-k we have state guidelines, not TEKS. The guidelines are a nice place to start. They are very basic. I love being able to put my own spin on things.

We started with Fink’s 3 column table with a BHAG and then used the Wiggins and McTighe’s Understanding by Design - Backwards Design Process.

The 3 column table with the BHAG allowed me to start with a broad idea. My BHAG is ….. Learners (Pre-K students - four year olds) will become digital collaborators and digital communicators with a sense of good digital citizenship which they will use to build foundational knowledge for their educational future. This was a good place to start. It is an overview of what I want for them. The picture in my mind is like a funnel, wide a the top and then it becomes narrow at the bottom.

I preferred the UbD because working backwards is starting with the end goal in mind. I believe the UbD allows a more focused plan which will help us attain our goals and it lends itself to add more details and be specific.

This is the same thing that I do in my own life. I start with the end goal. For instance, when I want to go on vacation, I need to decide where I want to go and how much money I will need for the vacation. Then I decide how many weeks it is until the date of the vacation and figure out how much I need to save per week.

Using the WHERETO acronym helped focus the learning activities. By using the UbD plan, I have been able to expand my own thinking and think outside of the box for lessons for these curious four year old students.

With the following goals in mind…….

• X.A.4 Child uses technology to access appropriate information.
• X.A.5 Child practices safe behavior while using digital tools and resources.

then I can decide what I need to do to get to our destination. I have to use our adventurous road map to get to our “vacation spot” also known as our pre-k state guidelines.

Now I have to decide on what bumps in the road we will face and what curves we will have to take. One of the main focuses of pre-k is to instill new vocabulary words. They are supposed to learn over 6,000 new vocabulary words. I want them to do more than learn them. I want them to experience them. Since technology is the way of the future, they really need to understand the basis of how to access information as well as practice safe behavior. These skills are an essential part to completing my innovation plan of using ePortfolios in pre-k.

My students will need to learn the basics before they can successful build their own ePortfolios. We have been slowly working on these skills in class. The students are excited to learn more and are always asking questions and using their problem-solving skills to help them expand their own knowledge. From other activities that we have completed in class, I think they will enjoy making a poster of their favorite apps. They seem to love to cut, glue, color, and decorate. Even though they love using technology, they still love those “old school” type lessons as well.