UBD is Greek to me

Understanding by Design (UBD) changed how I think of what it is I will be doing. Instead of thinking of myself as a teacher-to-be, UBD shifted my perspective so that I'm now regarding my role more as that of an instructional designer. That's no small move in thought.

The overall "backwardness" of UBD called to mind Aristotle's fourth cause, a thing's end, goal, or telos, which he considered the most important of all because it allows something to progress to its fullest and most logical conclusion (e.g., an oak tree is the acorn's telos just as a finished building is the end for an architect). This habit of mind takes some getting used to but--not to sound like Spock--it's actually quite logical. The other differentiating factors of UBD also appealed to me. Discriminating and ranking facts and concepts from among the universe of knowledge is necessary. As this article points out, why waste time teaching students to memorize every river in South America (which will not really help them unless they are quiz contestants or cruciverbalists; which they will forget anyway by the time they graduate; which they can look up in a few seconds on the Web) instead of focusing on the most important: the Amazon. There's nothing wrong with peeling away the skin and cleaning off the pith to get at the fruits of real knowledge: 1. Those things worth being familiar with; 2. Those concepts/tasks that are important to know/do; 3. Those big ideas that will endure and prove useful over a lifetime. Likewise, because a teacher's purpose is to help students arrive at understanding, they (the teachers) need to really comprehend the concept. Asking what it means to truly understand something and becoming familiar with the six facets seems to be fundamental, root-level knowledge. I also liked how these UBD proponents don't automatically cast aside traditional assessment tools, but argued for knowing when to use them and when not to.

The presentation of UBD had an unmistakable egghead flavor, what with the Venn diagrams and the mnemonic acronyms. But I think putting UBD into use in my Technology Integrated Unit/Lesson will help me sort out my WHERES from my GRASPS. The ultimate value is that it helps design instructional units that go deep to reach knowledge that will stay with students and provides a framework to develop assessment tools beyond the familiar tests, quizzes, informal checks, etc. It makes perfect sense, but is also somewhat intimidating, in all honesty. I'm looking forward to see how I pan out as an "instructional designer."