Learn on Your Own Course/Unit Model, Content & Skills
Lesson Content & Skills
Course or unit content should contain the following:
- content and skill objectives for 4th-8th grade students using the North Carolina Standard Course of Study or the curricular frameworks of such states as Texas, Florida, or Georgia (states that have influence over textbooks and curriculum in TIP's 16-state region). Gifted students are often one or more grade levels above their peers, so it is helpful to review a standard curriculum framework for a state and tailor your curriculum to both enrich the grade level content and/or to accelerate to the next grade levels;
- organizing concepts that create units (groups of lessons) and that lead to understandings (themes and generalizations); note that a unit may have subunits within it;
- organizing understandings (themes and generalizations) derived from these concepts;
- organized essential questions (follow for #'s 3 and 4 the Wiggins and McTighe Understanding By Design model);
- interdisciplinary connections;
- multiple intelligence activities appealing to a variety of student interests and learning styles;
- discipline-specific reading comprehension, writing, and other research skills integrated with activities;
- primary sources (print and electronic);
- process skills: research skills and thinking skills of critical thinking, creative thinking, problem solving, and logic/reasoning activities requiring upper levels of Bloom's Taxonomy (analysis, synthesis, and evaluation);
- informal and formal assessment (performances and products);
- product options determined by student choice and interests; and
- affective components (ways for students to explore personal feelings, attitudes, and perceptions).
Need a visual? View the Lesson Template here.
Download a copy of the Course Proposal.
Questions? Contact Teresa Porter of Educational Resources for more information at
919.668.9100 or il@tip.duke.edu
