Curriculum Writing Process

Minnewaska Area Schools

Writing Requests, Training, and Timeline:

If this process is something that interests you, you will need to first submit a request to
your building administrator. Requests for curriculum writing need to be submitted by
May 1st.

Once your submission has been approved, you must go through curriculum writing
training. This training will take place within the first two weeks of June and will require 14
(estimate) hours of your time. The content for the training will be hosted online and
contain synchronous and asynchronous learning opportunities. This course will also be
structured in the same format you are required to write your curriculum. This will help
illustrate the purpose of and familiarize yourself with course structure requirements. The
following will be covered in training:
1. Standard Alignment
2. Rigor and Relevance Framework
a. Instructional Strategies to engage and challenge your students
3. Assessment Types and Placement
4. SAMR Model: Using Technology to Serve a Purpose
5. Open Educational Resources and Teacher Time Savers
6. Course Writing Process (The rest of this document will be explained in detail)

At the end of your training, you will create a timeline for your curriculum writing process.
You do not have to write the entire course during the summer, but you can if you’d like.
You are required to have at least one quarter of your course completed by August 10th to
be reviewed by an administrator. At this point, we will reconvene our training to discuss
successes and challenges in curriculum writing along with addressing questions that
appeared throughout the process. If you choose to only have part of your curriculum
written, you must find time outside of the school day to continue writing the rest of your
course curriculum.

You will be compensated 80 hours for a year-long course and 40 hours for a
semester-long course; 20 hours per quarter at staff development rate. You can submit a
timesheet after each quarter of work is completed. Each time you submit a timesheet,
your curriculum must be submitted to your administrator for review.

Course Writing Organization

1. Your course will be organized in Google Drive under a master folder named with
the title of the course. Ex: Geometry, World History, Biology, etc.
Created by Jodee Lund in fulfillment of ED 794
 2. The master folder will contain the following:
a. 1.0 Units Folder: The “Units'' folder will contain subfolders for all units taught
within the course (see picture to the right). Each unit will require a Learner
Guide and house all content for both teachers and
students.
b. 2.0 Assessments: The “Assessments” folder will be
organized in subfolders for all units and contain
both formative and summative assessments for
each unit.
c. 0.0 Year At a Glance: Course Pacing Guide (Not a folder, but a document)

In the end, your curriculum will be transferred into our District Shared Curriculum Folder.

Year at a Glance:
● Your “0.0 Year At a Glance” is your pacing guide. Think of it as a teacher’s view to the
entire course.
● You will use this Google Doc template for your course’s “Year At a Glance”.
● Be sure the necessary resources, assessment folders, and learner guides are linked
into this pacing guide.

Units: Learner Guides and Content

● First, create a folder in Google Drive for the course you
are writing. Title it with the name of the course.
● Next, add a folder for “1.0 Units” and “2.0 Assessments”.
● In your “Units” folder, you will add a folder for each unit.
Be sure to label it with the correct format: Unit #: Unit
Title. (the format is used in the example above. This
keeps content in chronological order. The number
system for each folder is crucial. It allows someone else
to view the curriculum and know the order in which it is
taught.
● In each unit folder, your content will start with a learner
guide. Please use this template for each unit learner
guide.
○ A Learner Guide includes the following
components:
■ Title: communicate the focus and
importance of the unit
■ Essential Question: large, global questions that can be explored and
contemplated
■ Learning targets: Essential learning outcomes
■ Estimated time: Use days and/or weeks
Created by Jodee Lund in fulfillment of ED 794
 ■ Activities and lessons students complete to meet learning targets
● This is where teachers customize, create, and curate their course
curriculum.
● The content can be linked in the learner guide if desired.

Organizing Written Content

● As you write your lessons, you will
use a number system so the
lessons are listed in order that they
are taught.
○ If a lesson has multiple
components or handouts,
they will start with the same
number but the substrand
will change.
■ Example: A lesson has
5 documents. They will
be listed as 1.0, 1.1, 1.2,
1.3, 1.4. Your next lesson
in that unit will be 2.0.
If Lesson two has
multiple components,
then you would
continue the pattern:
2.1, 2.2, etc.

Assessments
● Each unit should be equipped with both formative and summative assessments.
● Teachers should utilize a variety of assessment types to authentically assess and
gauge student learning.
○ Types of assessments:
■ Formative - Most important aspect as it provides important feedback to
both students and teachers. Students can not learn without feedback.
These assessments are continuous throughout the unit and should be
placed strategically to act as checkpoints.
■ Summative - This is done post learning, after everything is said and
done.
■ Information Recall (IR) - multiple choice, true/false, matching, short
answers that require students to identify or provide the correct answer
■ Product (PR) - students are producing a tangible product
● Formal - research paper or essay
● Informal - sticky notes
Created by Jodee Lund in fulfillment of ED 794
 ■ Demonstration (D)- require students to do something and include
behaviors observable by the teacher
● Discussions, individual|group presentations, debates
■ Process (Metacognitive) (MC)- ask students to think about their
thinking
■ Performanced-Based (PB) - students demonstrate achievement by
producing an extended written or spoken answer in individual or group
activities
● Assessments will be saved in the “Assessment” folder
which will be organized by unit and further by “1.0
Formative” and “2.0 Summative”. See picture to the right.
● Please link the assessments for each unit in the correct
spot in the “Year At a Glance” document.
○ In the “Year at a Glance” document, you should also
indicate the type of assessment using the abbreviations provided above. This
serves dual purpose: teacher reflection on assessments and quick
identification of content authentically assessing student understanding.

Created by Jodee Lund in fulfillment of ED 794