What is UbD?
Understanding by Design is a way of thinking more purposefully and carefully about the nature of any design that has understanding as the goal. It offer guidance on how to tackle any educational design problem related to the goal of student understanding and help you better focus your design work on how to achieve understanding of the important ideas that you target.
Grant Wiggins, Understanding by Design, 2005, p. 7-8
What is Backward Design?
Backward Design is a method of designing an educational curriculum by setting goals before choosing instructional methods and forms of assessment. Backwards Design can be thought of as purposeful task analysis: How do we help learners accomplish a given task? What must learners master if they are to effectively perform? What counts as evidence in the field, not just the classroom? To answer these questions, you must think about the assessment before deciding what and how to teach.
Knowledge vs Understanding
Knowledge is the result of facts acquiring meaning. I know what a stovetop looks like. Understanding is the ability to use skills and facts through application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. I understand that stovetops can be hot, so I shouldn’t go around touching all the stovetops I come across.
Six Facets of Understanding by Design
Understanding is not exactly straightforward; it is multifaceted. So Wiggins and McTighe identified six facets to help characterize understanding.
What is a Big Idea?
A big idea is a way of seeing better and working smarter, not just a vague notion or another piece of knowledge. It is more like a lens for looking than another object seen; more like a theme than the details of a narrative; more like an active strategy in your favorite sport or reading than a specific skill. It is a theory, not a detail.