Trailblazer Publications - College Books / High School Books

Copyright

2009

2009

2009

2009

QUEST for Understanding English  series

Quest1: Adventures in Philippine Literature and Personal Leadership

Quest2: Adventures in Afro-Asian Literature and 21st Century Skills

Quest3: Adventures in British-American Lit and College/Career Planning

Quest1: Adventures in World Literature and Global Citizenship

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In the Philippines, the Department of Education revisited the national vision of learning based on a study on the most demanded workforce skills. These skills include technological fluency, communication, teamwork, leadership, problem-solving, and creativity. The officials of DepEd wanted to create a curriculum that would  ensure the development of these workforce skills and to develop a workforce able to meet the changing times. In their search for a suitable framework, they discovered Understanding by Design.

Understanding by Design or UbD is a framework for curriculum design oriented toward the development of and deepening of student understanding of “big ideas.”  Understanding by design is the brainchild of Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe (Brown, 2004, p. 12-13).

UbD is also known as Backward Design. It is backward design because it has three stages: identify the desired results, determine acceptable evidence (assessment), and plan learning experiences and instruction.  In this model assessment precedes the learning plan. This model ensures that teachers, students, and parents will clearly see the targets and ways to assess the attainment of those targets.

DepEd’s 2010 Curriculum follows this framework with results and outcomes in stage 1, assessment in stage 2, and learning plan in stage 3.

Identifying the desired results will include defining what students can learn and do at the end of a program or a unit of study. These desired results may include the following:

• Content or performance standards. Content standards define essential knowledge, skills, and habits of mind that each student must learn or acquire. Performance standards, on the other hand, define what each student will be able to demonstrate to show their understanding of content standards. 
• Essential understandings. They define major problems, issues, and themes in each discipline or course. These include big ideas. 
• Essential questions. They are open-ended questions that encourage students to discover for themselves the big ideas in a unit or in a lesson to deepen their understanding and to discover their own misconceptions. These essential questions are not factual questions such as who are the characters, what is the setting, what is the problem in a literature class. Examples of essential questions in a language and literature unit are the following:
  • i. “What is my responsibility to my environment, community, and fellow human beings? (Afro-Asian unit)
  • “How do creation stories reflect about the people who make them up? (Philippine literature unit)

After identifying the desired results, the next stage is identifying products/performances and assessment criteria and tools. These products and tools help both students and teachers to assess for understanding not just to assess understanding. Examples of these are inquiry projects or research papers that will deepen their own understanding of the big ideas.

QUEST for UNDERSTANDING HIGH SCHOOL Series follows the UbD framework. 

1. Each unit has a list of essential questions.
2. The series integrates language and literature.
3. It integrates instruction and assessment.
4. Teachers, students, and parents clearly see the targets, processes to meet those targets, and reports of attainment of those targets.
5. Each book comes with a Teacher’s Toolkit that includes maps, answer keys, teaching tips, and sample tests.