Chapter 3 - Curriculum and Assessment to Improve Teaching and Learning

A.
This chapter discusses how all 50 states (except Iowa) have created standards to match or surpass the federal standards for education in the United States. It goes over a list of requirements when thinking about standards such as standards being clear, accurate, brief, feasible, flexible and assessable. The chapter goes on to show how state standards should be a basis for essential questions, which should be the basis for your curriculum. The last portion of the reading focuses on assessment. Although not a extremely in-depth overview, it does offer the advice to vary your assessment, make it authentic, and valuable.
R.
This chapter gave really nice insight into how state standards are created. Its nice to know the process, so you have an idea of how to change them if it comes to that. It's also good to compare state standards across the board with each other but also with the national standards and other countries. It shouldn't be a race or competition. I think we need to work together not only as a countries but as a planet, as a race, to become as educated as we can. This chapter had great leading questions to get teachers (and students) thinking about essential questions. I am a big fan of essential questions because I feel like they cut though all the bull that has flooded our school systems. Just like the mission statement guides the teachers, the essential question needs to guide the lesson. Assessment is always a tricky one. You want it to be varied, but now it seems like as educators we're leaning towards letting our students have some say in how they are graded. I am totally fine with that, in fact I intend to find some program that allows students to insert their own grades and track their own progress in a class.