• Learning targets have verbs that you can visualize and measure: Examples of verbs include synthesize, analyze, determine, compare and contrast, and explain. Vague verbs such as understand, learn, know, comprehend, appreciate, and realize are hard to visualize and measure. The verbs focus on the type of thinking students will engage in versus the activities they will do.
• Learning targets have the positive, student-friendly, goal-oriented statement I can: All brains are different, and students will reach the learning target in different ways on different days, but most should be able to accomplish the learning target within a one- or two-day lesson plan. If the majority of students cannot master the learning target within a few days, then you may need to break down your learning target further or provide interventions.
• The phrase at the end of this lesson appears in the learning target: For example, At the end of this lesson, I can distinguish between main idea and details. This helps students understand the precise expectation for that lesson.
Table 2.1: Breaking a Standard Into a Learning Target
| Standard | Learning Target |
| With prompting and support, identify major events in the story (RL.K. 3). | I can identify major events in this story. |
| Ask and answer questions about key details in a text (RL.1.1). | I can ask and answer questions about key details in the text orally and in writing. |
| Describe in depth a character, setting, or event in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g. character’s thoughts, words, or actions; RL.4.3). | I can describe a character based on specific details in the text. |
Source for standard: NGA & CCSSO, 2010a.
Source: Adapted with permission from Anne Arundel County Schools, 2018.
Source for standard: NGA & CCSSO, 2010a.
Figure 2.1: Unwrapping a standard with a flowchart.
Visit go.SolutionTree.com/instruction for a free reproducible version of this figure.
• Students can self-assess where they are with that learning target: Hattie (2009) finds that the act of self-assessment has a 1.44 effect size on student achievement. We will share in chapter 3 (page 21) many ways to help students own this learning target.
Choosing the main formative assessment is the next step in lesson planning.
How Do You Choose the Main Formative Assessment?
You will informally check for student learning throughout the lesson, but deciding what formative assessment will be the biggest—but not summative—evidence of proficiency. It should be substantial and produce higher-level thinking. One- or two-page writings, short essays, graphic organizers, and role-playing are some of our favorite substantial formative assessments for those reasons.
Just giving students a chew does not mean they will engage in higher-level thinking. For example, if you ask them simply to write about what they learned without giving them the criteria for success for that writing, you are unlikely to get quality, higher-level thinking within that writing product. Brainstorm what qualities you expect in this writing. Determine this assessment’s characteristics. We take you through the steps to creating the criteria for success in the next section.
We encourage you to explore Norman L. Webb’s (1997, 1999) Depth of Knowledge (DOK) to design more level two, three, or four products or chews to truly challenge your students. Author Eileen Depka (2017) offers question help for English language arts (figure 2.2) and science (figure 2.3).
You may also consider other taxonomies, including Bloom’s (1956; Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001) revised taxonomy and universal design for learning (Meyer, Rose, & Gordon, 2014).
Figure 2.2: Using DOK in an English language arts lesson.
Figure 2.3: Using DOK in a science lesson.
How Do You Choose Criteria for Success?
The criteria for success is proof, or evidence, of mastering the learning target. It’s a student-friendly tool that makes them aware of exactly what the formative assessment asks of them, so they can assess their current performance in light of the learning target. The criteria are linked to the task or performance—the main formative assessment. It’s a list of attributes that you want to see in their assessment. Choose criteria that align with the learning target. You can request a checklist, rubric, self-assessment, exemplar, or nonexemplar.
We highly recommend having students watch you complete an exemplar and nonexemplar while they work toward the main formative assessment. We like to ask our students to explain what we expect to confirm their understanding. Every now and then, we develop them with our students, getting their buy-in and ideas. For example, some students might request to use a different website to gather information rather than the one you provide on the checklist. This criteria for success helps you differentiate and give better feedback.
Figure 2.4 is an example of how the learning target, formative assessment, and criteria for success come together to form an engaging, higher-level-thinking lesson (as shown in the student example on the bottom left). It’s just the beginning of the process. Alignment of all three is critical. It works as one more support for the students who are working to master the learning target. Notice that the fourth-grade teachers provided two different criteria for success checklists so they could meet the needs of a few students who needed sentence starters.
Source: D. Hafner, E. Kirby, & J. McKinlay, Maryvale Primary School, New York, 2018.
Source for standard: NGA & CCSSO, 2010a.
Figure 2.4: Alignment example—the learning target, formative assessment, student example, and criteria for success.
Figure 2.5 shows the first part of the lesson-plan template. The highlighted, added portions of the lesson-plan template in subsequent chapters show the elements each chapter discusses. You will see the progression of this template’s completion throughout the chapters, with the completed lesson plan in figure 8.2 (page 188). Find “The Main Idea and Detail Tabletop Graphic Organizer” reproducible on page 104, and visit go.SolutionTree.com/instruction to download a free reproducible form for recording what your students have mastered, their preferred learning modality, notes for teaching the lesson or unit, and so on.
Effective teachers know their standards and their students and plan accordingly. With the decisions in place from this chapter, you have completed step one in the planning phase. Now you’re set up to powerfully implement the remaining steps. It’s time to incorporate student data into the plan.
Source for standard: NGA & CCSSO, 2010a.
Figure