Curriculum

As the education landscape evolves, an age-old question persists: How can we help students gain deeper
levels of understanding and greater levels of proficiency? To answer this question, EDC has successfully
extended the frontiers of knowledge of sound instructional design for over 60 years. With experienced
teachers and students as our co-designers, we develop resources that make rigorous content relevant
and accessible to all learners, close opportunity gaps, and enhance achievement. Our resources
strengthen content knowledge, as well as fostering key workforce and employability skills such as
problem solving, collaboration, communication, and critical thinking. We build capacity to identify,
select, implement, and scale and sustain the use of effective curricula—knowing that powerful curricula
is necessary, but not sufficient, in school reform.

Interested? Contact us to learn how our instructional designers can help you advance your goals for
students, and explore some of our current work:

Comprehensive Classroom Curricula

Digital Curricula and Instructional Resources
Curriculum-Embedded Assessment
Instructional Design for All Learners

Comprehensive Classroom Curricula

All students are naturally curious and capable learners. Guided by this belief, and drawing upon current
research, we develop curricula that are academically challenging, align with current standards, and often
combine disciplines to enrich students' learning. We also provide teachers with professional learning
that supports them in implementing curricula and engaging students in rigorous learning that increases
achievement. Featured projects:

 Beauty and Joy of Computing Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles Course

 EDC's Interdisciplinary Science and Literacy Resources

 Math for All

 Transition to Algebra

 Zoom In to History and Literacy Learning

Digital Curricula and Instructional Resources

Through research and development, we investigate how technology can support and improve what
happens in classrooms. Digital curricula and instructional resources—challenging games, puzzles, Web
adventures—seek to increase student engagement and motivation and enhance learning outcomes. To
advance the field’s knowledge, we share our findings on how educators can effectively use these
interactive learning environments to achieve their goals for students. Featured projects:

 iPuzzle

 Ocean Tracks and Ocean Tracks: College Edition

 Possible Worlds
  Real World, Real Science

 WebLabs

Curriculum-Embedded Assessment

Assessment can play a powerful role in improving achievement. Our curricula contain effective, ongoing
forms of assessment that help educators accurately identify students’ challenges and strengths.
Teachers use our approaches—problem-based learning, formative assessment, performance tasks,
portfolios, and self-assessments as well as quizzes and tests—to observe learning over time and to refine
their practices to meet students’ changing needs. Featured projects:

 Bringing Math Students into the Formative Assessment Equation

 EDC Earth Science

 FordPAS

 Law and Justice

 PARCC Performance Tasks

Instructional Design for All Learners

Many students—including those with disabilities and second language learners—are not engaged or
well-served by traditional curricula. We believe that it is the right of all students to enjoy challenging,
rigorous learning experiences. And, we believe that it is our responsibility to ensure they do. Our
curriculum developers work to identify new ways to meet the needs of all learners—drawing upon
universal design for learning (UDL), technology, and other methods. Featured projects:

 Foundations for Inclusive Practice Courses (developed for MA DESE)

 Mathematical Thinking and Communication: Access for English Learners

 Strengthening Mathematics Intervention Classrooms

We know that curriculum in and of itself cannot meet all education reform goals. Learn about our
complementary professional development, research and evaluation, and technical assistance services.
urriculum is generally thought to be “a course of study,” or what we teach. It is much more than this,
however. In effective classrooms, teachers also think about how they teach (the instruction), who they
teach (the students, with all their varying needs), and where they teach (the learning environment). In
addition, effective teachers know they need to plan their curricula with the end in mind:

 What do students need to know? (the learning standards/big ideas/essential questions)

 How will we know they’ve learned it? (the formative and summative assessments)

 How will we help them get there? (the learning activities/learning resources)

 What will we do when they struggle or when they already know something? (differentiated
planning)

In Hendrick Hudson, guided by the standards for each content area, teams of teachers and
administrators craft a curriculum map in their area of expertise to address the outcomes, goals, and
expectations laid out by their content standards.

Curriculum consists of two important parts that together comprise the whole of what we teach. We first
develop a yearly view of our work that provides a pacing guide for planning over the course of our 40
week school year. This document shows the 'year at a glance' as teacher's begin to choose resources
and plan assessment opportunities together. The second part of our curriculum is the individual Unit of
Study. This serves to bring together, in one document, the elements of a coherent and cohesive learning
plan for our work with students.

The Unit of Study further breaks down the 'what' into three important Stages.

Stage 1 - what do we want students to know and be able to do? Provides an overview of the goals for
the Unit and the expected length of teaching time set aside for this topic. It also identifies for our
colleagues the specific learning standards that will be addressed through our teaching over the course of
this particular Unit of Study. Lastly, Stage 1 identifies Enduring Understandings (the big ideas of the
unit/topic) and includes Essential Questions that will guide student discourse through the Unit. In

Stage 2 - how will we know they learned it? Tteachers craft both formative and summative methods of
assessing the learning. Educators recognize that the question is not whether something was taught but
rather whether something was learned that is the important question to answer. Ideally, students are
provided with multiples ways to show what they know and have choice in the way this is demonstrated
to their teacher and colleagues.

Stage 3 - how will we plan for when they struggle? when they need to be stretched? This is where
teachers plan the learning experiences that will achieve the expected outcomes. Teachers share
collaborative resources (print and digital) for their instructional planning and create opportunities for
differentiated instruction within the Unit of Study.

The Hendrick Hudson school community understands that curricula needs to be coordinated across
classrooms and grade levels K-12, to avoid gaps and overlaps and to ensure that our work is aligned to
content standards/outcomes and district goals. Curriculum in the Hendrick Hudson Schools is guided by
Strategy I of our District Strategic Plan:
We will develop a coordinated K-12 curriculum, including the means of assessing student performance
to meet our mission and objectives.

PHILOSOPHY

A key component of 21st century education is the notion of constructivist learning, or learning
by doing. The theory was initially developed by Jean Piaget, and elaborated on by Vygotsky and Bruner.
It is closely related to the notion of problem-based learning, and is based on the idea that students learn
best by "constructing knowledge" in meaningful experiences. What makes an experience meaningful?
According to this theory, when faced with a challenge that has a real relationship to the learner's life,
students will learn as they solve a problem, thus constructing knowledge. An example of this might be a
student who lives in a flood area, and has seen his land and house flood every year. This student might
work in a group with other students to explore the geography of the area, the engineering of the dam
that causes the flood, and design a solution using mathematical and scientific tools. The problem is real
for the student, and thus has meaning. The skills are taught in context rather than in abstract, and thus
have greater meaning and are more likely to be retained. Finally, the role of the teacher is not as a
dispenser of knowledge, but as a learning facilitator, one who ensures that the conditions for learning
are met and that the problem is framed in a meaningful way for the student.