A Story of Units
A Story of Units
Teaching Sequences for Short-Term and
Instant Interventions
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
A master teacher is one who is very conscious of
his/her role in the continuum of a student’s journey,
who has an ever-expanding knowledge of
pedagogical content knowledge beyond that of
his/her own grade level. That knowledge is the
engine behind the responsive questioning and
delivery of instruction that can rectify a
misunderstanding in a minute rather than in an hour,
in a simple demonstration rather than with remedial
workbooks or alternate lessons.
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
Objective
Identify ways to support teachers with crafting shortterm and instant interventions that efficiently develop
student understanding.
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
A movie theater has two rooms. Room A has 9 rows of seats with
18 seats in each row. Room B has three times as many seats as
Room A. How many seats are there in both rooms?
Grade 4
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
Assess
Teach
Analyze
Plan
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
Real Time Analysis
What is the problem part?
Where is the last place the student was
successful?
What gap in the success causes it not to sustain
the next step forward?
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
A movie theater has two rooms. Room A has 9 rows of seats with
18 seats in each row. Room B ha three times as many seats as
Room A. How many seats are there in both rooms?
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
Now What?
“While one goal is to break things down to the least
degree possible, another is to do it quickly, thus
managing time and pace. Meticulously adding a thin
additional slice of knowledge to each [step in the
sequence] would be the perfect solution to getting
the students to do the greatest amount of cognitive
work, but would likely derail instruction in a series of
tedious exercises and squander time that could be
used more productively.”
(Doug Lemov, Teach Like a Champion. )
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
Planning Short Term Sequences
With your triad:
• Study the architecture of your sequence
• Record each complexity on a sticky note
With your table group:
• Compare and discuss sticky notes
• Organize them from simple to complex
• Chart your complexities as rungs on a ladder
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
A Story of Units
Where is our Teaching Community?
Assessment/data
Assess
Questioning to analyze
Teach
Analyze
Plan
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
Restraint
Planning short
interventions
A Story of Units
Supporting the Teaching Community
• Development of
content and
pedagogical knowledge
through study
• Sequences
• Assess  Analyze 
Plan  Teach
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org
• Professional development
• Pre- and post-observation
conferences
• Collaborative planning
• Coaching conversations
• Peer observation and
coaching
A Story of Units
Closing
An idea I have is…
I’m not sure…
I’ll keep thinking about…
I’m going to try…
© 2012 Common Core, Inc. All rights reserved. commoncore.org