Curriculum Mapping with Rubicon Atlas
Why Electronic Curriculum Mapping ?
Electronic curriculum mapping promotes
a smooth transition for students
• Facilitate the process of
collecting and
communicating data
• Provide an overview of
what is actually
happening in the
classroom
• Context for looking at a
student’s actual
experience over time
• A way to see
“The Big Picture”
Source: Atlas Curriculum Mapping
Electronic curriculum mapping promotes
a smooth transition for students
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Identifies Gaps and Repetition
Promotes Accountability
Aligns Curriculum with Standards
Meets the Need to Share
Highlights Best Practices
Encourages Collaboration
Facilitates New Course Design
Orientation of New Faculty
Capture Data One Time at the Source
Source: Atlas Curriculum Mapping
Intended results
• Staff owns and explores their district’s
curriculum, making informed decisions on
what to teach and how to assess.
• Students who move from district to district
would encounter similar methodology and
assessment protocols.
• Teachers receive aligned professional
development to meet personal, building,
and district goals.
Intended results
• Communication improves through sharing
of instructional and assessment strategies.
• Revenue for purchases are used more
efficiently to meet the learning needs
of all students.
• Assessment of student achievement will be
documented more thoroughly to provide a
fuller picture than MEAP results alone.
Authentic Academic Achievement
Authentic Academic Achievement
• Construction of Knowledge
producing meaning
from prior experiences
• Disciplined Inquiry
cognitive work
for in-depth understanding
• Value Beyond School
meaning apart from documenting
competence Newmann, Secada, and Wehlage, “A Guide to
Authentic Instruction and Assessment”, 1995
Mapping Categories
Align to AAA
• Essential
Questions
• Assessment
Tasks
• Key Concepts
• Instructional
Resources
Essential Questions Guidelines
• 1-3 questions to guide inquiry during the unit of study.
• These are not questions with predetermined answers
scripted by the teacher.
• The questions are problematic to the learner;
the question is open ended.
• Each question should require construction of
understanding of key concepts rather than mere
reproduction of information by students.
• The answer to a question would have to be expressed in
sentences or even paragraphs.
Examples of Essential Questions
• How could we help people who have no
money to meet their need for food?
• What makes one plant different from
another?
• How can we protect the environment
from urban sprawl?
• When it is appropriate to use a fraction,
decimal, and percentage?
Assessment Tasks Guidelines
• Each assessment task within the unit of study should
assess at least one benchmark in the Michigan
Curriculum Framework. Using Atlas, benchmarks are
matched to the assessment tasks by clicking a box next
to the listed benchmark.
• A well-designed unit might have two or three
authentic assessment tasks.
• Each task should be presented briefly, in one or two
succinct sentences, and should be expressed as a task
to be performed by students.
• Implicit in each task should be the actual product
(discourse, performance, or tangible object)
to be generated by students as a result of performing
the task.
Examples of Assessment Tasks
• Discourse
– speech, written report, essay,
group discussion, letter to editor
• Performance
– presentation, lab experiment, recital
• Tangible Object
– portfolio, project display, model
Key Concepts Guidelines
• At most, six concepts would be listed during the unit of
study.
• Each should be highly pertinent to the topic of the unit
and appropriate to the developmental level of students.
• These concepts should be “powerful ideas” of major
significance to a discipline, not merely new vocabulary
terms.
• They are central ideas of the unit - the ones the teacher
intends students to understand and use for a lifetime.
• Construction of an understanding of these concepts by
students is a major learning priority of the unit.
• Students are expected to use these concepts when
generalizing about the content of the unit.
Examples of Key Concepts
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natural resource
culture
nonviolence
natural selection
voice
satire
molecular
structure
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rhythm
harmony
religious liberty
equilibrium price
genetic
inheritance
• solar system
• electrical energy
Instructional Resources
Guidelines
• This is a list of selected, high quality materials that
would equip a teacher to teach the unit of study.
• A citation should furnish sufficient information to
enable a teacher to identify and locate the resource
being cited.
• Published works should be listed as bibliographic
citations including, author, title, publisher, and
copyright date.
• Actual pages or portions of a copyrighted work being
recommended for use in teaching the particular unit
should be specified.
• Unpublished works should be identified by author, title,
and date.
Examples of
Instructional Resources
• a portion of a textbook
with its accompanying
teacher’s manual
• a story
• a video
• a computer software
program
• a CD ROM
• an Internet Web site
• a sand table
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costumes
a microscope
a script or musical score
manipulatives
photos
maps
field trips and speakers
“homemade”
teacher-produced
materials
Questions?
Stan Masters
Coordinator of Curriculum, Assessment,
and School Improvement
Lenawee Intermediate School District
4107 North Adrian Highway
Adrian, Michigan 49921
517-265-1606 (phone)
517-265-7405 (fax)
smasters@mail.lisd.k12.mi.us
http://curriculum.lisd.k12.mi.us/