Over the last three years, teams of teachers in
Escanaba, Michigan, have developed interdisciplinary
units of exceptional quality. Through thoughtful,
careful work, they have built these units based on
numerous sets of standards: content standards and
benchmarks, standards for technology education,
standards for teaching and learning, and standards for assessment. In addition, they have kept in front of them, as they worked, these four criteria:

• 1. The unit should be an investigation, in which students gather, organize, analyze, and communicate information to answer a central question and content area subquestions.
• 2. All content areas involved must have strong connections to the central question. If a topic does not suit a curricular area or connect with, for example, the mathematics benchmarks for the grade level in question, it is not a suitable topic. Every teacher must feel that lessons spent on the unit are a good use of class time.
• 3. Throughout the unit, there must be an emphasis on student use of technology to gather, organize, analyze, and communicate information. Students should produce a culminating task, using technology, which communicates their answer to the focus question.
• 4. The topic must have relevance for students, either because it pertains to their lives or relates to local issues or history. The pilot teams put considerable thought into tapping local resources; as a result, all of the units have a local focus.

Our process for developing high quality interdisciplinary units consists of eight steps, outlined on the Process at a Glance link. The steps vary somewhat in complexity and time needed to complete them, but each step advances toward a high quality product.

Throughout this tutorial, examples will come from units developed by five pilot teams. Take a few minutes to Meet the Teams and hear what they have to say about their units and the process of developing the units.

While the process could work for any team of teachers, we did have these support systems in place:

• at the middle school level, a true middle school, with daily team planning time and two days of release time.
• at the high school level, some compensation for unit planning time spent outside of school hours.
• at both levels, administrators who were eager to have these units developed.
• the occasional input of a resource person from our intermediate school district.
• a strong commitment to educational technology in our county which helped with training and access to equipment and software.
  

As you proceed through the eight steps, a suggested number of meetings is given for each step. Individual team members will need to think about the unit between meetings and will often have to spend time on the unit between meetings. Our meetings were forty very focused minutes during planning time or after school. The number of meetings needed depends upon several factors:

• the degree of focus and commitment of each team member
• attendance of all team members at all meetings
• and the amount of thought and work spent between meetings.
  

It is a good idea to designate a leader for the whole planning process or for each step. It would be this person’s responsibility to keep the team on task and moving forward. This person would also prepare for the next meeting by reading through this tutorial and printing any documents or forms indicated by buttons. Form Printing Information explains all about the forms. You may find it useful to document your work using these forms for presentations, so someone should also get a folder, labeled Unit Development, in which you will keep all of the forms generated along the way.
As you move through the process, this symbol is a cue that there is a form to use.

It is also important to save 4-5 minutes at the end of each meeting to clarify the next meeting.  NEXT MEETING is a link which will prompt you with these questions: 1)When and where is the next meeting? 2)What is the agenda for the next meeting? 3)What do team members need to do to be ready? 4)What do team members need to take to the next meeting?


Some of the steps have Reflect buttons designed to help the team step back, think a minute, refocus, or smile.

You will need a few resources.
For all steps, you will need computers so that all team members can see the screens easily and a printer. Many of the links are photographs and video clips. To view the video clips you will need the latest version of Quicktime.

For Step Two, you will need a copy of the content benchmarks for each curricular area for each team member, and a copy of the district, state, or national technology benchmarks for each member. The pilot teams used the National Educational Technology Standards developed by the International Society for Technology in Education, http://www.iste.org


For Step Five, you will need resources for planning assessments. The two excellent books described below are referred to in this tutorial. Check with a district assessment specialist for comparable resources. The Mindful School is out of print, but someone in your district may have a copy or another similar book.

The Mindful School: How to Assess Authentic Learning by Kay Burke. Published by IRI/SkyLight Training and Publishing, Inc., 2626 S.Clearbrook Drive, Arlington Heights, IL 60005-5310, 800-348-4474 or 847-290-6600. ISBN 0-932935-75-3 http://www.iriskylight.com Chapters in this 170 page book include Thoughtful Outcomes, Standardized Tests, Teacher-Made Tests, Portfolios, Performances and Exhibitions, Projects, Learning Logs and Journals, Metacognitive Reflection, Observation Checklists, Graphic Organizers, Interviews and Conferences, and The Final Grade. The book is full of explanations, rationales, and examples of rubrics, checklists, and prompts for student writing. Price - approximately $20.

Checklists for Super Student Projects by Sandra Lee Schuler. Grades 5-8. Published by GOOD APPLE, An Imprint of Modern Curriculum, A Division of Simon & Schuster, 299 Jesserson Road, P.O. Box 480, Parsippany, NJ 07054-0480. ISBN 1-56417-660-6

This 48 page booklet contains 37 checklists for a variety of projects. Although the checklists are reproducible, teachers may want to tailor them for their own uses. Price - approximately $8.



So why go to all this trouble? As teachers, you will find that developing a high quality unit will remind you about why you wanted to be a teacher. It is intensely creative, and the product will engage students in some very high quality learning. The key question to ask yourselves throughout the process is, “Are we improving on our best practice?”


Use this Reasons Why form to write your ideas about the value of developing your own interdisciplinary unit.

Here are some reasons pilot teams felt the unit development process was worth the trouble:

Wider range of student participants
Students understand interrelatedness of disciplines
Unifies students
Taps into different intelligences
Ownership
Teachers learn, too
New student leaders emerged
Developing collegiality
Fit with local grade level benchmarks
More meaningful
Involvement of more learners at a deeper level


You may have things to add to your Reasons Why form. This completed form could be useful for school board presentations or it could become part of your district curriculum document.