Planning Powerful Instruction, Grades 6-12: 7 Must-Make Moves to Transform How We Teach--and How Students Learn(Corwin Literacy)

Are you ready to plan your best lessons ever? With so many demands and so much content available for teachers, we need to put a higher value on an often-overlooked skill: planning learning experiences that will both engage and inspire our students, by design, over time. Planning Powerful Instruction is your go-to guide for transforming student outcomes through stellar instructional planning. Its seven-step framework—the EMPOWER model—gives you techniques proven to help students develop true insight and understanding. You’ll have at your fingertips: the real reasons why students engage—and what you must do to ensure they do a framework to help you create, plan, and teach the most effective units and lessons in any subject area more than 50 actionable strategies to incorporate right away suggestions for tailoring units for a wide range of learners downloadable, ready-to-go tools for planning and teaching Whether you are a classroom teacher, an instructional leader, or a pre-service teacher, Planning Powerful Instruction will forever change the way you think about how you teach and the unique value you bring to your learners.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments About the Authors Introduction PART 1: TRANSFORMATIVE PLANNING AND INSTRUCTION Chapter 1. What’s at Stake? Teaching Toward Expertise— With a Sense of Urgency Chapter 2. Making the Shift From Informational to Transformational Teaching Chapter 3. Introduction to the EMPOWER Canvas PART 2: ENVISIONING AND MAPPING Chapter 4. Envisioning the Destination Through Principled Planning Protocols Chapter 5. Mapping the Path to Mastery Through Task Deconstruction PART 3: PRIMING AND ORIENTING Chapter 6. Priming Learners Through Caring Community and Collaborative Classroom Culture: A Prerequisite “Must-Make Move” for ICA Chapter 7. Framing the Future Challenge: Priming and Orienting Learning Through Essential Questions Chapter 8. Preparing Students for Success: Priming and Orienting Learning Through Frontloading PART 4: WALKING THROUGH, EXTENDING, AND EXPLORING Chapter 9. Seeing Is Believing—and Understanding: Walking Students Through With Visualization Strategies Chapter 10. Navigating New Terrain: Walking Students Through With Think-Aloud Strategies Chapter 11. The Quest Is to Powerfully Question! Walking Students Through Expert Questioning Strategies Chapter 12. Setting Up Learners for Successful Collaboration: Walking Through and Extending Expertise With Collaborative Group Structures Chapter 13. To Speak, to Be Heard, to Listen, and to Learn: Extending Expertise With Discussions That Promote Deeper Understanding PART 5: REFLECTING Chapter 14. Moving Into the Future: Reflecting Through Assessments for and as Learning Chapter 15. Bringing It All Together: Extending, Exploring, and Reflecting Through Culminating Projects and Assessments Concluding Thoughts References and Resources Index

About the Author :
A classroom teacher for fifteen years, ?Jeffrey D. Wilhelm? is currently Professor of English Education at Boise State University. He works in local schools as part of a Virtual Professional Development Site Network sponsored by the Boise State Writing Project, and regularly teaches middle and high school students. Jeff is the founding director of the Maine Writing Project and the Boise State Writing Project. After 8 years as a classroom teacher, Rachel Bear spent two years as co-director of the Idaho Core Coaches for the Idaho State Department of Education, supporting teachers in implementing the Next Generation Standards. She currently is a Senior Program Associate for the National Writing Project (NWP). Her work at NWP involves supporting the College, Career, and Community Writers Program (C3WP), which focuses on improving academic writing in rural school districts.  Adam Fachler is a strategist, coach, and consultant for Pre-K-12 teachers and educational leaders throughout New York. Formerly a middle school teacher, staff developer, and intern principal, he left the classroom in 2014 to co-found the School in the Square, a public charter school in Washington Heights. In addition to creating the EMPOWER framework, Adam is also a leading expert in Thinking Maps®—a visual language for learning—and leads acclaimed regional certification workshops in the methodology. In all his work, Adam strives to provide educators with the engaging professional development that they deserve. Adam lives with his wife Liz in Brooklyn, NY.