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Curriculum Alignment - Book Cover

Curriculum Alignment

Research-Based Strategies for Increasing Student Achievement

Use the power of alignment to strengthen curriculum and raise student achievement!

This resource offers school and district administrators and curriculum specialists concrete, practical guidance for aligning curriculum and instruction with state standards and assessments to improve teaching and learning. The author offers research-based strategies that reinforce the importance of curriculum alignment and demonstrates how districts can: 

  • Use alignment as a major curriculum design element 
  • Translate research into usable strategies to achieve measurable results
  • Expand options for raising test results and student outcomes 
  • Connect school policy with continuous school improvement 
  • Meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind

Full description


Curriculum Alignment - Book Cover
Product Details
  • Grade Level: K-12
  • ISBN: 9781412960076
  • Published By: Corwin
  • Year: 2008
  • Page Count: 232
  • Publication date: June 28, 2013
Price: $40.95
Volume Discounts applied in Shopping Cart

Review Copies

This book is not available as a review copy.
Description

Description

"One of the few books that takes a holistic look at alignment and helps clarify the definition of alignment. Squires helped increase my knowledge as an instructional leader and showed me that alignment can be a valuable tool when used with real intent. The book engaged me in authentic reflection on my professional practice."
—Margarete Couture, Principal
South Seneca Central School District, NY

Use the power of alignment to strengthen curriculum and raise student achievement!

Aligning what is taught, written, and tested can be a powerful, systemic way of improving school performance. This guidebook, written by a long-time educator and proponent of curriculum alignment, demonstrates how to apply specific principles and recommendations to improve curriculum, instruction, and test scores.

This resource offers school and district administrators and curriculum specialists concrete, practical guidance for aligning curriculum and instruction with state standards and assessments to improve teaching and learning. The author offers research-based strategies that reinforce the importance of curriculum alignment and shows how districts can:

  • Use alignment as a major curriculum design element
  • Translate research into usable strategies to achieve measurable results
  • Expand options for raising test results and student outcomes
  • Connect school policy with continuous school improvement
  • Meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind

Comprehensive, thoughtful, and realistic, Curriculum Alignment offers a wide range of approaches to appeal to educators at every level.


Key features

• Defines curriculum alignment and shows how it can be used in mastery learning, for textbooks, and in relation to standards, standardized tests, and instruction
• Summarizes the critical research and related findings (in each chapter)
• Provides specific ideas and strategies for aligning curriculum based on the research (in each chapter)
• Offers an example of a systemic and data-driven approach to curriculum alignment using the Balanced Curriculum model
Author(s)

Author(s)

David A. Squires photo

David A. Squires

David A. Squires is currently an associate professor working with doctoral students in the Educational Leadership Program at Southern Connecticut State University, specializing in curriculum, school reform, and organizational development. Previous positions include with the Comer School Development Program at Yale University; as a central office administrator for over a decade in Red Bank, New Jersey, where student achievement improved from below to above grade level; as a research specialist at Research for Better Schools in Philadelphia; as a graduate research assistant in the Learning Research and Development Center at the University of Pittsburgh, where he received his doctorate in curriculum and super­vision with minors in language arts education and administration; and as a high school English teacher in suburban Pittsburgh and inner-city Cleveland. He heads a con­sulting firm, ABC Education Consultants, LLC, that assists school districts in writing and implementing the Balanced Curriculum.
Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Preface


List of Figures and Tables


Acknowledgments


About the Author


Part I. Alignment and Instruction, Textbooks, and Standardized Tests


1. Introduction to Curriculum Alignment

What is Alignment?

Alignment Problems

The Alignment Matrix

2. Alignment and Instruction

Introduction

The "Reform Up Close" Study and Alignment Dimensions

Instructional Alignment and Professional Development

Three Smaller Studies of Instructional Alignment

What Districts Can Do

3. Alignment and Textbooks

Introduction

Textbook to Test Alignment

Summary of Findings for Studies of Textbook to Test Alignment

Quality of Textbook Instruction

Modifying the Use of Textbooks to Improve Alignment

Summary of Findings for Textbook Alignment

What Districts Can Do

4. Alignment and Standardized Tests

Introduction

Marzano's Standards Compilation

The Webb Studies:Aligning State Standards, Assessments, and Policies

Webb's WAT Web Site

The Browder Study: Alignment in Special Education

Vertical Alignment

Science Inquiry and Alignment to Three Large-Scale Assessments

The Bowe and Kingsbury Study

The National Center for Educational Statistics Study (2007): Cut Scores for State Tests and the NAEP

Backloanding the Curriculum

Summary of Findings for Studies of Alignment of State Tests

What Districts Can Do

Part II. Alignment and Mastery Learning, Project 2061, and TIMSS


5. Alignment, Reteaching, and Mastery Learning

A Personal Ntoe

Introduction

Bloom's Theory of School Learning

Cohen: Instructional Alignment

The Wishnick Study

Summary of Findings for Studies of Mastery Learning

What Districts Can Do

6. Ideas From Project 2061 of the American Association for the Advancement of Science

Introduction

Project 2061

Summary of Findings for Project 2061

What Districts Can Do

7. Alignment and the TIMSS Analysis

Introduction

The TIMSS Methodology

Curriculum and Student Acheivement

What Districts Can Do

Part III. The Aligned Curriculum


8. Criteria for a Useful and Useable Curriculum Incorporating Alignment

Introduction

The Many Meaning of Curriculum

The Common Definition of Curriculum

Our Definition of Curriculum

Criteria for a Useful and Useable Curriculum

9. Addressing Alignment Through a Curriculum Design: The Balanced Curriculum Model

Introduction

Results from School Districts

The Balanced Curriculum Model

Is the Balanced Curriculum Useful and Useable?

What Districts Can Do- A Conclusion

10. How the Balanced Curriculum Meets This Book's Recommendations for Districts

11. Summary of Alignment Research and Recommendations

Introduction

Summary of the Book

Summary of the Book's Chapters

The Reasearch Posted on the Alignment Matrix

Major Findings From the Alignment Research

Resource A: 10 Criteria for Structuring a Useful and Useable Curriculum


References


Index


Reviews

Reviews

Price: $40.95
Volume Discounts applied in Shopping Cart

Review Copies

This book is not available as a review copy.