Instructional Guide Plan: Backward Design: Education Essay

Instructional Guide Plan: Backward Design
Name:
Institutional Affiliation:
Date:
Instructional Guide Plan: Backward Design
Instructors use student surveys to gather information about their strengths, abilities, goals, and interests at the beginning of the semester to help in drafting instructional plans. The backward design allows teachers to establish instructional planning with the learning goals already in mind based on student information. Analyzing the data from student surveys helps instructors in identifying learning patterns which form the basis for structuring the lesson plans and the choice of instructional strategy. This paper offers analysis from a sample student survey for a high school STEM class for use in planning a humanities unit.
One of the noticeable patterns in the data is that most of the students have prior experience in the subjects tested. According to the data, 80% of the students had an experience with both Social Studies and English/ELA while 66% have much experience with music. However, the female students appear to be more experienced than the males in all three prior knowledge questions. The students also have diverse learning interests and capabilities judging from the results that almost half need help with assignments while more than a third do not like being challenged during learning. The diversity in the learning experiences of the students is indicated by the pattern from the fact that despite 80% having experience with humanities requiring note-taking, 69% do not like to take notes. Another pattern emerging from the data is that the students lean towards active and interactive subjects like the arts and stay away from classroom settings. This is because although the data shows more than 50% finding school boring, 71% like group works and 91% like hands-on activities. Their eagerness to learn music- 80%- also shows that the class is more interested in arts more than humanities and other in-class subjects.
The cross-disciplinary humanities evaluated in the class survey include social studies, English, and Music. This approach focuses on the common concepts in disciplines involv...