1. School Designs Benefits of a Unified Curriculum
A Strong Foundation for Learning Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
A unified curriculum supports quality teaching and EdisonLearning, in concert with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt,
learning by providing first-class curricula to educators is committed to providing high-quality, research-based
and students. It presents EdisonLearning® School Designs curriculum offerings to our partnership schools. These
partners with research-based programs with flexible programs support improved instruction, assessment,
resources for addressing the needs of all learners, a and professional development as well as bring greater
consistent instructional design to support teacher efficiencies in implementation.
individual and collaborative planning, and more robust,
program specific professional development.
Consistent Instructional Format Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is recognized
A highly structured, interrelated curriculum will help globally as the preeminent educational
teacher’s present lessons consistently and thoroughly.
Teachers will have more time to perfect their presentation publisher - offering best-in-class
skills, monitor students’ progress, and keep parents instructional materials.
informed of their child’s progress and advised of their own
role in their academic development.
The HMH goal is to help tailor learning
Improved Planning, Teaching and Learning to individual styles and preferences -
By providing instruction to students from Pre-K through ensuring success for all.
each ascending grade with a unified curriculum, teachers,
advisors and administrators will know more about each
student’s educational progress, his or her strengths and
weaknesses, and how to address each rather than through Implementation
a mix and match approach to planning and teaching. Using a unified curriculum streamlines instructional
The unified approach affords greater consistency across program implementation for EdisonLearning partnership
curricula and across grades. schools because together we are working with only one
publishing partner.
Supplementing the Student Support Model • Best practices surrounding instruction will be universal;
Unified curriculum programs are beneficial to the Student from year-to-year and from campus-to-campus as more
Support Model and Response to Intervention (RtI). The schools adopt the unified curriculum program.
RtI system is a preventive, solution focused, school-wide
intervention process. Unified curriculum programs and • As needs arise and change over time, EdisonLearning
their flexible resources and assessments, make it easier to and HMH can respond more quickly together because
identify students facing issues that are affecting academic the foundation for a consistent message has already
achievement. This type of continuity provides teachers been established.
with a rich array of tools and resources for differentiating • Formative student achievement data will have greater
instruction and lends itself to more productive teacher- validity due to a higher level of consistency throughout
parent collaboration surrounding areas of academic execution.
concern - the first step of the RtI process.
Instruction and Student Assessment
Enhanced Professional Development A consistent instructional model better supports effective
Implementing aligned curricula and integrated professional lesson planning. This guarantees lessons reflective of
development with focused training greatly benefits teacher standards, learner outcomes and student needs because
practice which results in enhanced student achievement. teachers, administrators and parents are better able to
measure fidelity of lesson implementation.
Pursuing a Strategic Partnership with a publisher to provide
more uniform curriculum complements EdisonLearning’s
• Lesson plans reflect more differentiated instructional
strategies because the message of differentiation is
robust Professional Development. This comprehensive
consistent.
approach to professional development was purposefully
designed in response to partner feedback and to meet • Greater formative and summative assessment
the needs of all partner school personnel so that they can opportunities as a result of regular preparation and a
better support students’ academic success. bird’s eye view of resources across the curriculum.
