Corwin The Standards-Based Classroom: Make Learning the Goal

My school district is changing to SBG and assigned another book to all teachers. The other book was very unhelpful so I have ended up reading the top 5+ books on the subject. This is by far the best and most helpful for someone looking to implement SBG

I highly recommend

As someone who is interested in moving to Standards Based Grading (SBG), it's hard to find books that don't just talk about the concepts, but actually describe how to implement the approach. This book does a great job of being very practical and applicable; it goes beyond pedagogy/theory and into the classroom. It's clear that the authors have actually used these practices in their classrooms, not simply researched how it could be done.I especially appreciated how they modeled their approach to SBG in each chapter by including learning progressions for the reader in each chapter as well. It gave me the experience of a students to see how learning progressions could be used and applied.My one issue with the book is the emphasis on skills targets. I'm willing to consider the possibility, but as a high school science teacher, I'm really struggling to understand how to only target skills and not content. While our standards (NGSS) do have a skills component, they also have a heavy content component and I don't have a clear understanding of how to use this approach to with that content. It is clear that the authors have experience in the humanities, which lends itself more readily to skills over content (as CCSS and other similar standards for ELA are mostly skills-based).Even so, I found the book helpful in my learning and planning for moving to SBG in the future (maybe next year?) and would recommend for anyone who's already on the SBG bandwagon pedagogically, but needs to know what it could actually look like. Especially if you teach ELA or other humanities/skills-based classes, this is a very useful guide.

This is an excellent resource to help you implement standards-based learning in the classroom. How can teachers know they’re successful if they can’t ensure that their students are learning? Starting with a standard requires teachers to be facilitators, monitors, and designers rather that lecturer alone. It requires teachers to be a bit more flexible with schedules and to continually revise and adapt. This book is divided into four sections: Articulate desired results, develop targeted assessments, design effective instruction, and monitor and communicate learning. Each chapter includes a learning scale, commentary and context, a practical section with examples, and challenges. I particularly enjoyed the rubrics and tables throughout the book and the sections on differentiation. Overall, this book is filled with practical information that will help me become a better teacher and develop confidence in my methods and in communicating those methods to students, parents, and coworkers.

I do love browsing teacher education books and have a modest library of my own, but wow, ever noticed how some of them just drone on? I am shocked to find myself celebrating the technicalities of a book, but this is a book I would almost way was written by the coldest of hearts but in the best of ways: The best practices for hitting the standards and how to do it. It's charts, examples, and pure information that make this such a stellar resource. The work is practically done for you.