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= **Content Mapping** = Rationale and background: In 2004-2005, the ICSD developed a Strategy Plan for Equity to achieve the Board of Education's goal of eliminating race, class, and disability as predictors of student success and participation. Over 150 members of the ICSD community participated in developing the sixteen elements of the plan. During the summer of 2007, six of the elements of the Equity Plan were prioritized, by a school and community strategic planning group, as being, collectively, the most important for achieving equity. Among these six was curriculum. Following that prioritization specific action steps were developed for the 2007-2008 school year. Among these actions steps was the developent of three year plan for developing content maps in all grades and core subject. In addition to helping to develop consistent and coherent curriculum, these content maps were intended to help us analyze and support efforts to create curriculum that is fully representative of diverse cultures.

On July 1, 2008 many District curriculum chairs and teachers first met with the staff development team to begin the content mapping process. This as an experiential process which will involve many teachers in an on-going manner.


 * ~ Major Understanding ||~ Essential Questions ||
 * These are statements. Students will understand that..... Major understandings are enduring, meaningful, broad. If you don't know what the major understandings in your unit are, ask yourself, "Why am I teaching this?" || These should be phrased in language that is engaging and meaningful to kids. Essential questions should be used and posted in the classroom. They should not be rhetorical or overly specific. For example, "What caused the Civil War? ||
 * ~ Skills ||~ Vocabulary ||
 * These are the skills that are required for this unit in particular. Identify the skills that you will prioritize for this unit, for teaching and assessing. Typically, these will be literacy skills that will go across curricular areas. || Record the essential vocabulary words for the unit, not every new word you will use and teach. You will surely want to include the domain specific words, tier 3 words, such as abolition, Underground Railroad, reconstruction. ||
 * ~ Assessment ||~  ||
 * While preassessment and formative assessment are important to the unit, please make sure you record here the unit assessments that pertain to the major understandings. Choices in assessments are fine. You and your colleagues may agree that students will ||  ||
 * ~ Technology Integration ||~ Culturally Affirming Components ||
 * Here you should record the student skills and activities related to technology inte gration. We want to see what the students will know and be able to do over the course, over multiple courses, and over multiple years. || These may be major understandings (in which case please duplicate them in the major understanding area as well as here), materials, skills, or conceivably vocabulary. If they do repeat items from another field, please duplicate it here. The goal is to s ||
 * ~ Special Needs Accommodation || If there are very specific ways you accommodate special needs students in this unit, please record these. ||
 * ~ Resources || These may be texts or other resources. ||