Understanding by Design Unit Reflection

1. What was the focus of your UbD unit? Why and how did you select this area of focus?
The focus of my unit was argumentative writing based on studying seminal American
documents. I chose this unit based on several factors. I am currently teaching two
different courses, English I and High School English II SIOP. High School English II
SIOP is a preparatory course to help students who are English Language Learners
prepare for taking English II next semester. When I examined the pacing guides for
these two courses, the timeframe for this assignment worked well with this particular
unit in HS English II SIOP. Additionally, I have taught English I five times and feel
more confident in my curriculum plans for that course. This is only the second time I
have taught HS English II SIOP or English II SIOP and wanted to have an
opportunity to improve my instruction in that area. I chose to use the 14th amendment
and the topic of immigration for the focus of this particular unit because immigration
is a major area of interest and passion for this specific group of students. Immigration
is something that directly touches their lives and with the current climate of political
rhetoric something about which they have strong feelings. I felt that this was an
opportunity to emphasize the importance of evidentiary support in argumentative
writing, and to build informational reading and analysis skills.
2. Discuss the context for this unit. Describe your students and your school setting. Provide
any information that influences what and how you teach.
Parkland Magnet High School is the IB high school for the Winston-Salem Forsyth
County Schools, but is located in a high poverty, high minority area of town. The
school is more than 90% minority and is a Title One school, with most students
eligible for free or reduced lunch. Sadly, despite its attributes the IB program
essentially creates a school within a school culture with the IB students spending a
majority of their time in a separate building. There are regular teaching vacancies
and due to numerous factors Parkland has a major discipline issue. There are
multiple fights each week, students are regularly tardy to class, and students are
chronically disruptive. Teachers have limited recourse to deal with these factors, in
part because there are few to no consequences for this type of behavior. Many
students do not have behavioral expectations from parents or guardians and there is
limited academic support from the community. Despite this, there is a large number
of students who do want to learn and work diligently in class. There are also many
others who would be much more engaged in class if not poorly influenced by certain
peers whose behaviors are extremely problematic. Unfortunately, there is not
administrative or district level support to handle this effectively.
The class that studied this unit is a bit smaller than my others, and there are really
only one or two disruptive students. There are about three others who are totally
disengaged from school in general, and despite my efforts and those of the ESL
assistant who works with me, we have only been able to get these students to produce
limited work. These are students who do not see the point or value in education
because they plan to go to work with their parents or siblings doing construction.
They have already made the decision to drop out when they turn 16. With the needs
of the rest of the students being so great due to a vast spectrum of levels of English
acquisition and academic proficiency, I cannot devote all my time to trying to
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encourage and influence those students who truly do not want to be at school. It
would be a disservice to the students who are working hard and aspire not only to
graduate from high school, but also further themselves through career training
programs or other forms of further education, if I were to do so. With that being said,
the vast majority of the class was especially interested in and engaged in this unit, and
even students who are more reluctant learners worked hard and produced quite
impressive work. To me, this highlights the importance of finding connection points
and ways to come at a topic or unit of study that will make the material relevant and
personal.
3. Describe how you taught the unit. What was the learning sequence that you followed? Why
did you use these particular instructional practices?
I first used a documentary on the process of immigration reform to help students have
a frame of reference for the political complexities surrounding the issue. I wanted
students to be able to understand how difficult it is for legislators to actually get bills
passed and that a politicians actions may be different than his or her own beliefs or
what is said publically in order to gather or keep constituent support. I then moved
on to an anticipation guide for important vocabulary. Students were able to articulate
their own definition of the words and then we discussed a correct or complete
definition. This helped them clarify misunderstandings so students were able to
delineate between the language used in the 14th amendment, various immigration acts
and laws that have been passed in the 20th century, and the rhetoric of current
presidential candidates. They were also able to use that vocabulary knowledge when
completing a Where Do I Stand? exercise that helped them specify their beliefs not
only about immigration as a whole, but also individual aspects of immigration policy.
Students examined quotes from presidential candidates, with names redacted as to not
unduly influence the students opinions, and they worked to characterize each
statement as either pro-immigration or anti-immigration. Students then reviewed
summaries of four pieces of immigration legislation from the 20th century,
summarized them, and characterized each as encouraging or limiting immigration.
With all those pieces of information, students were then able to begin writing their
argumentative letters to the editor. I provided them with examples of letters to the
editor, and a specific framework for each component of the assignment. They
completed a pre-writing exercise in which they articulated their opinion, reasons for
their opinion, and pieces of evidence (from all the previous documents studied) to
support their reasoning. They did the same thing to articulate and refute the other
side of the argument. I believe this was an important step to ensure that students
gathered multiple pieces of strong evidence and could clearly articulate and organize
their thinking. That way when it came to the writing portion, they already had the
bulk of the letter organized in sequential order. Students then drafted their letters. A
classmate then used the assignment rubric to rate the first draft and offer editing
feedback so students could revise and complete a final copy of the letter.

4. Analyze the experience. What went well? What did not go as well as you had hoped? Offer
any insights you may have as to why these elements did/did not go well.
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5.

Because this was a topic that the students were already interested in, they were very
engaged for the most part. The students who were not engaged were the students who
are never engaged. However, I was able to engage several students who are either
normally disengaged or are behavior problems. I was pleased that several students
who normally really struggle were working diligently, and produced work of almost
surprising quality and clarity.
Using time to build background was well worth it and students were able to clarify
some of their misunderstandings, particularly about the meanings of various words
that are regularly used to discuss immigration. I was also pleased that students were
able to make connections from the background information to their examination of
documents and rhetoric later in the unit.
The major issue with this unit was time. Because these students are English
Language Learners it just takes more time to parse through and comprehend language
even if it has been simplified or summarized. It also takes students longer to compose
their thinking and communicate it in English than it would take most native speakers.
Additionally, in my effort to be thorough in my examples and explanations so that
students could understand the nuance and complexity of the immigration debate, I
believe I included too much information. Certainly that became a hindrance
regarding the time needed to make it through the material, but it was also somewhat
confusing for some students. In my effort to encourage a depth of understanding, I
believe I may have complicated and delayed their understanding at points.

When/if you teach this unit again, what will you do differently? Explain your rationale for
these changes?

I certainly hope that I will have the opportunity to teach this unit again, though if I do,
it will likely be in a very different school setting. Because I will be moving to a state
that does not use the common core, I would have to re-examine the unit with a
different set of standards. Starting from the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOLs) I
would need to make sure that the assessment format and lesson activities are still
appropriate, and revise where necessary.
I would also likely be teaching a very different population of students who might
have much more diverse political views and opinions about immigration. I would
want to use the same framework, assessment, and progression of activity type
(assuming they align with the Virginia SOLs), but would want to pick a topical focus
that might be more relevant to the particular group of students I would be teaching.
Because one of the biggest successes of this unit came from the high interest and
passion levels that my students had about the topic, I think this would be a critical
consideration when teaching the unit again. If Im able to know my students well and
harness an innate interest, I feel confident the unit could again be successful. I would
change out the documents and adjust the materials based on the new topic, but still be
able to structure the unit the same way.

6. What challenges did you experience in crafting this unit by the Understanding by Design
model? Explain these challenges and how you addressed them.

7.

I think my biggest challenge with designing this unit was also my biggest learning
opportunity. The concept of fully planning and aligning the assessment piece in the
middle of my planning process was foreign to me. It was difficult to have to put aside
the how factor. How would my students would prepare to successfully complete that
assessment- particularly when I knew they would have to use the materials they
would collect along the way to aid them in the assessment? I think the thing that
helped me the most in addressing that challenge was forcing myself to build a rubric
for the assignment. That helped me keep the focus on addressing what I wanted
master of each piece of the standard to look like, and prevent me from thinking too
much about what they needed to know and what they needed to do to accomplish that.
Though this process seemed a bit odd and uncomfortable at first, I truly think it was
well worth it. Once it was time to design activities and learning experiences,
everything had a purpose, everything had a place, and everything was designed to aid
accomplishing that end goal.

Based on this experience of creating and implanting an Understanding by Design unit, what
have you learned about instructional planning, instructional delivery, and assessment?
From the beginning of the Salem MAT program, we have been told to start with the
standards. While I have always tried to focus on that, I have often started with the
standards and then jumped to the activities, or the how students would address
those standards. Then I would work on the assessment piece at the end, which
sometimes has resulted in a disconnect between the three. I began to realize that the
assessments didnt always measure exactly what I wanted- proficiency with the
standards- but were perhaps just an extension of an activity in the unit. Being
required to fully think through and document the end point assessment ensured that
all portions of the standards were addressed. It was then a matter of figuring out
how to connect the beginning (standards) with the end (assessment). Because this
unit was overall a big success, Ive been able to see that planning the assessment
before the daily activities, can help ensure better engagement and produce much
better results and verification that the students were really able to demonstrate
knowledge of and proficiency with the standards. The next step for me is wanting to
make sure that I more fully consider the formative assessments along the way and
determine at which points and in what order students need to master particular
concepts in order to meet the end goal of mastering all the concepts and standards
together. Thinking carefully about and more intentionally planning the formative
assessments will help keep me and the students on track, and will also assist me in
pre-planning which smaller assignments will be taken up and graded. I have the
problem of taking up significantly more work than is necessary for the students or
feasible for me to grade, and I think that pre-planning will help me to keep the
informational assessments as well as the amount of graded assignments manageable.

8. Share any additional observation or reflections on the planning and teaching of this
instructional unit.
I really enjoyed this unit. I loved seeing my students working hard and being
interested, which can often be a serious struggle with the population of students at
Parkland. I loved being able to go around the room, and jump back and forth
between students who needed help or had questions, particularly when they were
planning and drafting their letters. Though this class is the last period of the day,
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my other classes were working on a unit that require much less of my hands-on
attention. I think that staggering really helped me to have enough energy and focus
to devote to a unit that was intensive and demanding on me. I want to keep that in
mind as I plan my instructional scheduling and units in the future.