CASE FILE
School: Fairfax County Public Schools
Grade: Administration
Topic: Program of Study
Thinking skills explicitly taught: DSRP
Audience: the County's entire staff of PreK teachers
Challenge: When administrators unveiled their model curriculum, the Program of Study, several years ago, many teachers were left scratching their heads. They found its lingo complicated, worried that it interfered with their pedagogy, and thought it ignored the realities of their classrooms.
Executive Summary: Using the Patterns of Thinking, administrators were able to cut through the confusing language and create an internally consistent model of their Program of Studies. As a result, teachers better understood how the Program of Study related to their day-to-day role in the classroom. The school system now shares a common language to discuss the way they educate children.

A 21st Century Curriculum is a curriculum model that ensures that while students are learning facts in order to pass the tests that allow them to succeed educationally and advance to the next stage, they are also learning the skills they will need to succeed in life long into the future.
The 21st Century Curriculum was modified to meet the needs of Fairfax County Public Schools, Office of Early Childhood, PreK POS team .

Building Blocks of a 21st Century Curriculum

Teaching young children today in the 21st century requires connecting children’s thinking, concepts, and knowledge through developmentally appropriate, hands-on learning experiences. Thinking, concepts, and knowledge are interrelated. Educators must keep in mind that there are two laws of knowledge: (1) knowledge is constructed and (2) knowledge changes. Knowledge known to be fact today may change tomorrow - Pluto was once a planet and the atom was believed to be the smallest particle of matter. Teachers must ensure that students are provided opportunities at all grade-levels to learn how to think, how to construct and deconstruct knowledge, and how to find and validate knowledge.
The PreKindergarten Program of Studies (PreK POS) is comprised of seven subject areas (Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies, Art, Music, and Movement). As educators it is essential to make meaningful connections for children. Brain research supports the finding that learning happens when information is presented holistically in meaningful connected patterns.



Deconstructing the PreK POS curriculum reveals there are two major components - learning experiences and outcomes.



Taking a closer look at learning experiences reveals they are made up of Themes and Guiding Questions.



Learning Experiences are the curricular and experiential activities that facilitate children’s learning by making connections to their prior knowledge while constructing new knowledge. During these experiences children construct meaning. Examples of these experiences include water table exploration, story responses, story dramatization, neighborhood walk, or helping with food preparation. Through hands-on experiences, children build on prior knowledge to connect to new learning.

Themes

Each Theme is a coherent grouping of topics around a timeless idea that unifies content.




There are four Themes:




The Theme organizes topic and indicators, which facilitates integration of the curriculum areas. For example:

• Teaching senses and then moving to a lesson about colors arbitrarily separates ideas or concepts that can be interrelated for developmentally appropriate learning. Therefore, organizing instruction through Themes enables teachers to connect indicators from various curriculum areas around the topics.
• Focusing on a learning experience about what children do with their eyes, “What does seeing mean?” and, “What eye colors are represented within the class?” enables the children to make meaningful connections about their five senses and colors.

The following organizational chart of the Themes and related topics is included in the PreK POS as illustrated in the chart below:

Indicators, Topics, and Themes

Teachers create Learning Experiences that are comprised of Topics, and Indicators grouped by quarterly Themes. PreK POS indicators are grouped by commonality of ideas into topics. For example, learning about one’s senses is grouped with learning about self. These topics would be grouped into the first quarter Theme, Who I Am. Every Topic includes several Indicators from the PreK POS curricular areas (i.e., science, social studies, mathematics, art, physical education, music, and language arts). In addition to the content of the learning experience dictated by the Indicator, there is an underlying goal of developing children’s thinking and learning. Through the use of Guiding Questions, timeless thinking skills can easily be embedded into any learning experience.

Guiding Questions

Guiding Questions, based on the Patterns of Thinking™ Method developed by Dr. Derek Cabrera at Cornell University, are timeless anywhere-anytime, keep-in-mind questions for teachers to use in the classroom, PreK through grade 12 that: (1) help children construct their knowledge through thinking, (2) develop timeless thinking skills, and (3) gain a deep understanding of content. The Guiding Questions focus on the following Patterns of Thinking™ Method which is made up of four patterns each having two interrelated elements. The Patterns of Thinking™ are:

Distinctions: the interaction between Identity and Other	What are some [examples | attributes | descriptors] of _? What are some NON [examples | attributes | descriptors] of _? How is _ [different from | similar to] _?
Systems: the interaction between Part and Whole	What are some of the parts that _ is made up of? What are some things that _ is part of?
Relationships: the interaction between Cause and Effect	How is _ related to _?
Perspectives: the interaction between Subject and Object	What's your point of view on _? What does _ look like from _'s point of view? How would _ look if you were a _?

It is important to incorporate the Guiding Questions into learning experiences. The following chart provides sample questions that can assist teachers in using the Patterns of Thinking™ Method. The sample questions provide a starting point; teachers may embed them in learning experiences in a variety of ways not solely through the examples below:





In this model, the Guiding Principles and thinking outcomes are fixed (they do not change) whereas the Learning Experiences and Outcomes vary for each child depending on the child’s skill and functioning levels (they change). No matter what learning experience one is teaching, there is an underlying and more important lesson embedded – keeping the focus on teaching thinking. Content is the medium for teaching these timeless thinking skills. All learning is directed toward certain outcomes. As children learn, it is expected that they will demonstrate their understanding (i.e., Outcomes). What Outcomes are expected?
When referencing the model, Outcomes are a reflection of the Learning Experiences.



The Guiding Questions result in Thinking Skills. The teaching of Themes leads to Essential Understandings. The many Indicators that are taught over the course of the year can be measured as Benchmarks. Benchmarks are the intended outcome of a specific set of indicators from subject areas. They are used by teachers to assess children’s progress. As long as the Learning Experiences include diverse themes, topics, and indicators, children will meet benchmarks. As a result of the Learning Experiences infused with Guiding Questions, content learning is much more meaningful. Within this model, teachers have a very specific role, to choose Indicators that fit an existing Theme. The example below takes place during the first part of the school year when the Theme is “Who I Am.” The teacher selects several Indicators that are part of the topics included in this theme. At all times, teachers use the Guiding Questions based on the Patterns of Thinking™ Method as a “lens” or perspective. Teachers plan a Learning Experience using the Guiding Questions, Theme, Topics and Indicators.
The result is a Learning Experience that leads to deeper understanding of content, as well as, the acquisition of timeless thinking skills. What would this look like in terms of what a teacher does to assess these outcomes? Teachers observe each child demonstrating, or asking questions in a way that reveals, his/her understanding of the content and thinking skills that make up the Learning Experience. For example, if a teacher was teaching about the five senses one could record the learning demonstrated on a checklist like this:

Glossary

21st Century Thinking Skills	The intended outcome of the Guiding Questions and Themes
Activities	Things the teacher does that result in Outcomes
Benchmarks	The intended outcome of specific set of indicators from subject areas
Creative Thinking	To create new ideas and lines of thought
Critical Thinking	To analyze, deconstruct, and evaluate ideas
Curriculum and Construction Program of Study	A system of activities that lead to desired outcomes of timeless thinking skills and deep understanding through construction of content
Distinctions	The interaction of identity and other
Essential Understandings	The intended outcome of specific set of indicators from subject areas
Guiding Questions	Based on the Patterns of Thinking Method, these are timeless anywhere-anytime questions teachers keep in mind PreK through 12 that: 1) help children construct their knowledge through thinking 2) develop timeless thinking skills 3) gain a deep understanding of content
Interdisciplinary Thinking	To unify, transfer, synthesize, and integrate
Learning Experiences	The combination of pedagogical, curricular, and experiential activities that lead children to learn by accessing prior knowledge and constructing new knowledge
Outcomes	The intended result of Learning Experiences facilitated by the Guiding Questions
Perspectives	The interaction of subject and object
Prosocial / Emotional Thinking	To build relationships through compassion, concern, and shared experience
Relationships	The interaction of cause and effect
Scientific Thinking	To observe, hypothesize, predict, and validate with evidence
Systems	The interaction of part and whole
Systems Thinking	To understand complex patterns in context
Theme	A coherent grouping of topics around a timeless idea that serves to unify content, standardize student experience across classrooms, and result in Essential Understandings
Topic	A group of similar indicators that can be taught together and related to the Theme