Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Canned Curriculum - Wordless Wednesday (July 16th)

Happy Wednesday!

I have had one fun-packed week! I can't wait to tell all about it during Five for Friday! Today I will just keep it short by my standards for Wordless Wednesday.

The school I work at will be using Springboard throughout the 6th, 7th and 8th grade ela AND math departments. I know, I know...having a program like this in one subject isn't boring enough, let's throw it in math too! I used springboard last year, but since I was in an English class and not reading, my usage requirement was much smaller. I only used the book about once a week and was able to come up with my own lessons the rest of the time.

My question is, do any of you have experience with Springboard or any other "canned curriculum"? Do you have any advice or insights on how to make it a better learning experience for the kiddos?

Thanks for any help, I will need it!
Suzanna

P.S. I just made an Instagram account! I would love more people to follow :)

4 comments:

  1. I've never heard of Springboard! Is that bad?? :( It's amazing how many "canned" curriculum's there really are!!!
    Lori
    Mixing it up in Middle

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  2. Never heard of it but curious about it since I have one going into 8th grade.

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  3. I've used Pearson and Houghton Mifflin before. If this is like that just remember, some person at some company far away came up with a curriculum for your kids - and they've never met your students! YOu know best, so give your kids what they need, and a big dose of balanced literacy would do just the trick. I just wrote about this the other day - check it out here: http://bigtimeliteracy.blogspot.com/2014/07/let-go-of-judgment-let-go-of-expectation.html
    Michelle
    BigTime Literacy

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  4. I teach 9th grade English and we have used SpringBoard for the past 2 years in our district. Ugh! After 12 years of teaching, it has been hard to give up GREAT lessons to follow a canned curriculum. In my opinion, SpringBoard has lots of holes and while it is more rigorous (it's a pre-AP curriculum), it doesn't cover all the skills needed for college. It may prepare students for state standardized testing, but not for college. I teach English I and English I Honors. My kids despise SpringBoard. They groan when I tell them to take out their workbooks. Although we are supposed to implement the SpringBoard curriculum with 90% fidelity, I still supplement with my own lessons. I am not a fan!

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