As educators, part of our work is to translate our high hopes for students into concrete actions. When we start with the end goal in mind, not a moment is wasted in our classrooms. In this Guide for Teachers, we'll explore how Cc's Unit Planner makes backwards planning easier than ever.
Pre-work: This guide assumes that you have created an account and set up your first planbook. If you haven't done that, take a look at our Cc for Teachers video on Planbook Setup
In this guide for teachers, we'll focus on:
How to create units and stay on pace.
How to build out unit plans with standards and much-needed materials.
How to view your units and lessons side-by-side, so your daily planning will be informed by your overarching unit goals.
Here's how you can start creating your first unit in three easy steps:
From your planbook, click "Unit Timeline."
On the left side where it says "UNITS," click "ADD."
Choose the start date on the calendar and extend the length of the unit by dragging it to the right.
Give it a title by clicking on the unit itself and typing into the title field.
Next, we'll focus on how to super-charge your units with Standards, Essential Questions, and must-have resources. Once you've titled your units and selected the dates, it's time to build a masterpiece!
Here's how it's done:
From the Unit Timeline, click on the unit you want to build. Select "Show full Unit in Sidebar."
Every unit has a built-in Standards card. To add another section, click "+Add Card" and then choose "Add Text Card." You might have a section for Essential Questions or Enduring Understandings.
Don't forget to add crucial resources like assessments, student materials, or media by clicking "Attach File" and uploading from Google Drive, Dropbox, or your desktop.
As we've discussed, when it comes to backward planning, every lesson is built with the end in mind. Here's how to view your unit plans side-by-side with your daily lessons:
After you have created your first unit, click "Week" near the top of the screen to see the Week View.
Find the day and class for which you want to plan a lesson and click the title of the unit. You'll see this at the top of the lesson. You can now view both the daily lesson and the unit plan side-by-side.
And there you have it: you can now use Cc's unit planner to stay on pace, to create powerful units packed with standards, enduring understandings, and much-needed resources and materials. And, you can view your units and daily lessons side-by-side to ensure every lesson is purposeful and leading to your students' end-of-year goals.