1. Module 5: Understanding by
Design
Prepared by:
Abraham Jerome M. Segundo
Lorraine

2. Objectives
After reading this module, you will be able to do these:
1. Identify the 3 stages of Understanding by Design:
▫ Desired Results, Assessment Evidence, Learning Plan
2. Should appreciate the Six (6) Facets of Understanding:
▫ Explanation, Interpretation, application, perspective, e
mpathy, and self-understanding
3. Should be able to prepare the right lesson plan for
learner or student.

3. Concepts
Understanding by Design is a framework
for student assessment. It tackles about the
importance of designing a plan to make a better
presentation of a topic or subject matter in the
class. And also it gives some information about
the three (3) stages of UbD and the Six (6) facets
of understanding.

4. Essential question
• How does Understanding by Design provide a
framework and a language to help educators promote all
students' understanding?
• How does Understanding by Design evolve since its
initial publication? What are the major changes and
trends associated with its evolution?
• To what extent can educators abstract lessons learned
about successful implementation of Understanding by
Design and then apply those lessons to the process of
strategic planning and continuous improvement?

5. Introduction
This module focused on how the educators
promoting the students understanding in
different lessons/subject matter that they teach.
And it gives some hint on how to deliver the
topics prior to the different individuals or
students in the class.

6. Lesson proper:
• Understanding by Design (UbD) is a framework for
improving student achievement. Emphasizing the
teacher's critical role as a designer of student
learning, UbB works within the standards-driven
curriculum to help teachers clarify learning
goals, devise revealing assessments of student
understanding, and craft effective and engaging
learning activities. Developed by nationally recognized
educators Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, and
published by the Association for Supervision and
Curriculum Development (ASCD), Understanding by
Design is based on the following key ideas:

7. Three (3) stages of Understanding by Design
(Adapted from format developed by Grant Wiggins and Jay
McTighe, 2002)
• Stage 1 Desired Results
Content Standard(s):
Comes from professional standards in your field (e.g. See MN Standards)
Understanding (s)/goals:
Students will understand that...
This is a goal, not an objective.
List the big ideas or concepts that you want them to come away with, not facts
that they must know.
Essential Question(s):
1.) What leading questions can you ask of students to get them to understand
the Big Ideas?
2.)Address the heart of the discipline, are framed to provoke and sustain
students interest; unit questions usually have no one obvious “right” answer

8. Student objectives (outcomes):
Students will be able to...
These are observable, measurable outcomes that
students should be able to demonstrate and that
you can assess. Your assessment evidence in
Stage 2 must show how you will assess these.
You‟re learning activities in Stage 3 must be
designed and directly linked to having students
be able to achieve the understandings, answer
the essential questions, and demonstrate the
desired outcomes

9. Stage 2 Assessment Evidence
Performance Task(s):
-Authentic, performance based tasks that have students apply
what they have learned and demonstrate their understanding.
-Designed at least at the application level or higher on Bloom's
Taxonomy.
-Rubrics can be used to guide students in self-assessment of
their performance
Other Evidence:
-Includes pre-assessment, formative assessment, and
summative assessment evidence
-Can be individual or group based
-Can include informal methods (such as thumbs up, thumbs
down, and formal assessments, such as quiz, answers to
questions on a worksheet, written reflection, essay)

10. Stage 3 Learning Plan
Outline the learning plan (teaching & learning activities). This plan should be aligned
clearly with the desired results (i.e., geared towards having students meet the
objectives, answer the essential questions, and be able to complete the assessment
activities). There are many formats that you can use for this part of the lesson plan
(e.g. Hunter Elements of Lesson Design), but the plan should include all of the
following components:
1.
Materials & resources: List all.
2.
Timeline: next to each step, indicate approximate length of time you expect each step
to take.
3.
Introductory activities: hook/capture student interest, set the stage, relate to
previous learning (review), how this fits into what is to follow (preview), tell students
what they will learn and be expected to do as a result of the lesson.
4.
Developmental activities: outline the content and outline the instructional strategies
& learning activities. Include details what you will do, how you will organize/prepare
students for tasks, and what students will do. If you plan to involve students in
discussion, list key/stem questions that you might ask to generate discussion.
5.
Closing activities: list activities that you & students will do to summarize the
lesson, reinforce what was covered, and tie everything together so students see how the
lesson fits into the context of the rest of the course (what they have already done and
what is coming next).
Also include any handouts, overhead transparencies/PowerPoint slides, and other relevant
visuals and materials.

11. What you should aim for in your plan
• Include appropriate strategies that promote student learning, active
engagement, manipulation and testing of ideas. Students are asked
to take responsibility for their own learning
• Include cultural integration. Community resources are brought into
lesson.
• Clearly tie to a standard(s). Students are asked to engage critical
thinking and problem solving as appropriate to prior
knowledge, styles and interests
• Engage students in both individual and group learning based on
personal interests. Students are able to make choices that help to
establish meaning.
• Include variety and accommodations for learning styles, and
multiple levels of development. Lesson clearly ties to curriculum
goals.
• Include activating prior knowledge, anticipating
preconceptions, exploration and problem solving, and new skill
building.

12. Six (6) Facets of Understanding

13. Facet 1 - Explanation
Sophisticated and apt explanations that provide knowledgeable
and justified account of event, actions and ideas. Why is that so?
What explains such events? What accounts for such action? How
can we prove it? To what is the action connected? How does this
work?
Provide thorough and justifiable accounts of
phenomena, facts, and data.

14. Facet 2 – Interpretation
Narratives, translations, metaphors, images and artistry
that provide meaning. What does it mean? Why does it
matter? What does it illustrate in human experience?
How does it relate to me? What makes sense?
Tell meaningful stories, offer apt translations, provide a
revealing historical or personal dimension to ideas and
events; make subjects personal or accessible through
images, anecdotes, analogies, and models.

15. Facet 3 – Application
• Ability to use knowledge effectively in new
situations and diverse contexts. How and where
can we apply this knowledge, skill, process? How
should my thinking and action be modified to
meet the demands of this particular situation?
• Effectively use and adapt what they know in
diverse contexts.

16. Facet 4 – Perspective
• Critical and insightful points of view.From whose point
of view?From which vantage point? What is assumed or
tacit that needs to be made explicit and considered?
What is justified or warranted? Is there adequate
evidence? Is it reasonable? What are the strengths and
weaknesses of the idea? What are its limits? What is a
novel way to look at this?
• See and hear points of view through critical eyes and
ears; see the big picture.

17. Facet 5 – Empathy
• The ability to get inside another person‟s feeling and
worldview. How does it seem to you? What do they see
that I don‟t? what do I need to experience if I am to
understand? What was the author, artist or performer
feeling, seeing and trying to make me feel and see?
• Find value in what others might find odd, alien, or
implausible; perceive sensitively on the basis of prior
indirect experience.

18. Facet 6 – Self-Knowledge
• The wisdom to know one‟s ignorance and how one‟s patterns of
thought and action inform as well as prejudice understanding.
How does who I am shape my views. What are the limits of my
understanding? What are my blind spots? What am I prone to
misunderstand because of prejudice, habit and style? How do I
learn best? What strategies work for me?
• Perceive the personal style, prejudices, projections, and habits of
mind that both shape and impede our own understanding; they
are aware of what they do not understand and why
understanding is so hard.

19. Learning Activities and Teaching Methods
• To describe the learning activities of the students
and the teaching methods of the staff; effective
module design by should result in a varied range of
active learning experiences for students – including
learning activities which are „research-like‟ - across
modules and the programmed as a whole.
• Activities should, of course, motivate and encourage
deep learning (reflection on wider meanings, rather
than superficial memorization of information). They
should also be varied and flexible enough to
accommodate different learning styles and
orientations, and allow for inclusivity of students
from different backgrounds and with different kinds
of learning abilities.

20. • Learning activities therefore need to include
reference to independent, interdependent (peersupported) and online activities, as well as
participation in different kinds of taught class.
• In determining the proportion of time spent in each
type of activity you should use the convention that
one credit point equates to 10 learning hours. The
time in scheduled learning and teaching activities
and in placements will need to be accurately
measured; the proportion in guided independent
study will be derived as the number of hours
remaining after taking into account hours spent in
placements and scheduled learning and teaching
activities.

21. Sample teaching and learning activities
• We sometimes struggle trying to think of
different ways to present teaching and learning
activities to students. Are you tired of using a
brainstorm, exhausted of trying to engage
students in class discussions, and then continue
reading!
• Below are a few different teaching and learning
ideas that will help you present content in a
slightly different way. These strategies will
support students to question knowledge and
take an active role in their learning.

22. 1. Artifacts strategy
▫ This strategy can be used as an introduction to the
reading of a specific text or prior to viewing a
video. The objects you choose as artifacts could be
headlines, graphics, photos, words, phrases or
quotes or everyday objects that relate to the issue
being discussed.
2. Cooperative conflict resolution strategy
▫ The cooperative conflict resolution strategy
encourages students to see both sides of an
argument and can be used as an introductory
activity for a class debate. It promotes
communication, cooperative problem solving and
critical thinking.

23. 3. R.A.F.T. strategy
(role, audience, format, topic)
▫ The RAFT technique provides an easy, meaningful
way to incorporate literacy skills into the PDHPE
class room. The R.A.F.T strategy involves students
or the teacher making decisions about four aspects
of the writing task prior to students starting to
compose their written piece.
4. Internet scavenger hunt
▫ An Internet scavenger hunt is a short inquiryoriented activity. Students use information from
the Internet to complete questions to develop their
knowledge of a topic. They then answer a big
question or complete a task that requires them to
utilize higher-order thinking skills.