Chapter 4: What Really Matters In Planning for Student Success?

As a note, each chapter poses several questions. Please do not feel obligated to answer each question by number; rather, use them as a guide for you to respond to the reading and share your thinking about the ideas in the book.


1. This chapter proposes nine attitudes and skills that are likely reflected in the practice of teachers who help a broad range of learners succeed academically. Examine the nine one by one and discuss what role each of them plays in supporting student growth and success. (Look at how each indicator would affect specific “categories” of learners—for example: students for whom English is not a first language, students who have difficulty attending in class, students who need to move when they learn, students who are academically advanced, students who struggle cognitively, etc.)

2. Quickly re-read the classroom scenarios in Chapter 4. Jot down general characteristics the scenario classrooms have in common. Discuss how they are like and different from classrooms in which differentiated or responsive teaching is not a priority for the teacher.

3. Chapter 4 poses three final questions. Do we have the will and skill to accept responsibility for the diverse individuals we teach? Do we have a vision of the power of high-quality learning to help young people build lives? Are we willing to do the work of building bridges of possibility between what we teach and the diverse individuals we teach? How would you answer those questions? Use the bullet points accompanying each question to help you elaborate on your answers.

Chapter 3: What Really Matters in Learning? (Content)

As a note, each chapter poses several questions. Please do not feel obligated to answer each question by number; rather, use them as a guide for you to respond to the reading and share your thinking about the ideas in the book.


1. To what degree do you feel most teachers in your school or district regularly reflect on what knowledge is truly essential and enduring in their content? What would most effectively guide teachers in finding answers to this question? What likely impedes teachers' movement in this direction?

2. The authors make a case that backward design helps teachers avoid the twin sins of activity-based planning and planning for coverage. In what ways does backward design help educators avoid those pitfalls? What benefits should students derive from backward design?

3. Where is backward design naturally in use in your school? What changes in planning practices (by individual teachers and teams) are suggested by backward design?

4. What is the role of content standards in UbD? In what ways does that role differ from the role of standards in classrooms that don't use a UbD-type approach to planning curriculum?

5. Can we teach to standards and still be responsive to learners (standards without standardization)? Why might teachers perceive a conflict between standards-based teaching and differentiation? Based on information in this chapter (capsuled in Figure 3.3), why are standards and differentiation compatible and not in conflict?

Chapter 2: What Really Matters in Teaching? (Students)

As a note, each chapter poses several questions. Please do not feel obligated to answer each question by number; rather, use them as a guide for you to respond to the reading and share your thinking about the ideas in the book.

1. How do the lives of Elisa, Jason, Yana, and Noah shape their school experiences? Use Figure 2.1 and the vignettes about these real students to develop your explanation.
2. Think about several students in your school or class whose biology, degree of privilege, positioning for learning, and or preferences shape experiences with school. Describe some of the specific factors in their lives that you feel cause them to embrace school as it now exists or cause them to have difficulty with it.
3. Based on your experience and ideas in this chapter, what arguments would you propose to support the idea that effective teaching responds to factors in students' lives. Explain and illustrate your thinking.
4. This chapter suggests ten approaches to teaching or patterns of instruction that should be helping in developing a classroom that is more responsive to a broad range of learners.
a. Which of the patterns seems useful in your setting? To what sorts of students would they be useful in promoting success?
b. Which of the patterns seem less likely to be effective in your setting? Why would they not benefit students?
5. The chapter concludes with 7 questions. What might change in our teaching if we persistently planned and taught with these questions in the forefront of our thinking?

Chapter 1: UbD and DI: An Essential Partnership

1. After reading the preface and Chapter 1, what logic do you find for joining Understanding by Design and Differentiation? In what ways do these arguments make sense for your school?
2. The axioms in this chapter reveal beliefs that guided development of Understanding by Design. The corollaries following each axiom reveal beliefs that guided development of Differentiated Instruction.
   1. Look at each set of axioms and corollaries and discuss what would happen if educators focused their practice on the axioms without the associated corollaries or on the corollaries without the preceding axiom? Do you see either omission happening in classroom practice in your school or district? Do you see practice which sometimes disregards elements of both axioms and corollaries in a set? What are likely outcomes of the omissions? How would the scenarios differ if the teachers in them disregarded the axioms, corollaries, or both?
   2. What other axioms or corollaries would you propose for the list offered in Chapter 1?