A Journey Through Curriculum

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A Journey Through Curriculum

Instructions

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Game Pieces

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Scenario

Event

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Inspiration

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You have been sick for 7 weeks and your school does not have the funding to hire additonal cleaning staff. However, they ask if you have been wiping students desks!!Go back 3 spaces!

Expertly travel around with this piece

You came back from a long weekend motivated to center your teaching around your students. A quote from Camangian and Cariaga() stuck with you. When students are not the focus -- or subjects -- of their own studies, they do not understand themselves from their own points of view". Move up 3 spaces!

Your school required a 'teacher work day' on a snow day. Move back 3 spaces!

Teachers got a 4% raise across DPS!! But your rent increased by $600. Go back to the start.

Use this piece to experiment with the road to success

During PD admin decided the next 2 months of the curriculum you planned must be changed to prepare for CMAS. You have to make completely new lesson plans that are aligned with test questions. Go back to the start!

You took the time to get to know your students. You learned about their interests, home life, families, values, and feelings. This went a long way and they have been all in on your teaching. A reading from Gay inspired you to take the time to do this. "Some of the negative beliefs that need to be reconsidered and even abandoned are the living conditions of students of color are so dysfucntional that they cannot concentrate on learning, and some ethnic minority students disassociate from school achievement to avoid acting White". Move up 3 spaces!

You started your P.h.D in Curriculum and Instruction at DU! Move up 4 spaces!

You got feedback from your Assitant Principal for giving students too much independant work time. Move back 2 spaces.

In your second week of teaching, you stopped focusing on the holistic experience and stuck to your traditional methods. Dewey ( suggests, "This principle is involved, as I pointed out, in every attempt to discriminate between experiences that are worth while educationally and those that are not". Move back 2 spaces

Two parents raided your library and reported Harry Potter, Land of Stories, and Esperanze Rising. They do not believe their children should be learning these ideas. Your principal is making you remove them from your classroom. Go back to the start!

You connected with one of your quietest students. You showed him you cared by using some of the approaches from Dr. Michalec!He states, "They demonstrate a strong intuitive sense of humanness that resonates with a universal notion of what it means to be human, a holistic sense of human ontology, that is often missing in school practices and principles". You decided to add daily check ins to your morning meeting! Move up 3 spaces!

You spent some of your break internalizing the Common Core Standards. When you got back to school you had plans to include parents and interactive projects into your lesson! One of your influences was Neuman and Roskos, "Common standards should also facilitate conversations among all of us who care about education -- parents, teachers, and students -- in addressing these academic learning goals". Move up 1 space!

A new virus called KeystoneVirus has been spreading rapidly. Schools have decided to shut down. You will have to teach remote and rethink your entire plan for the year. Return to Start.

You made it to Thanksgiving break! Move up 2 spaces!

You helped a student that was subjected to racism. The student responded violently, but you were able to connect with them and deescalate the situation. You kept Baldwin's ideas in mind. "There is something else the Negro child can do, to. Every street boy -- and I was a street boy, so I know -- looking at the society which has produced him, looking at the standards of that society which are not honored by anybody, looking at your churches, the government, the politicians, understand that this structure is operated for someone else's benefit -- not for his". Move up 5 spaces!

Put the team on your back with this piece

Your co-teacher left in the middle of the year and you have 34 meetings for parent teacher conferences. Do not move!

Congrats! You won the Journey Through Curriculum!

Roll the dice to start your turn.

You found solace in the humor (relateability) of Abbot Elementary. Move up 1 space!

You recieved an excellence award for creating a caring environment with carefully planned curriculum that was equitable for all students. Move up 2 spaces!

You created scaffolds to support multilingual learners. Move up 2 spaces!

You pulled a small group of students that have been struggling. All of the students showed confidence throughout the lesson! Move up 1 space!

Starting from the start square, you will roll the dice to signify the start of your turn. There are 5 interactive tiles that you can land on (question, scenario, event, inspiration, or unknown). Each tile will signify how many spaces you can move forward or backward. Some questions may require a correct answer to move forward. After completing the instructions on a given tile, your turn is over. Each tile is connected to my curriculuar journey in some way. Be careful not to land on an unknown (all black) tile. The first player to the finish wins! Good luck!

You have still been sick from being coughed on all semester. You are feeling really run down, but were declined PTO because too many staff members were out. Move back 5 spaces!

Dr. Schmidt assigned a lot of readings. You spent all you free time getting them done. Move back 2 spaces!

You found a way to engage your students in multiple ways. It may not have been planned, but it was your best lesson yet. Bell Hooks would be very proud! She stated, "In fact, one of the things that we must do as teachers is twirl around and around, and find out what works with the situation we're in. Our models just might not work". Move up 3 spaces!

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You pushed back against a standard that was put in place by your school. It benefitted your students and help them gain access to grade level content. Carmona and Sleeter mention, "We do not suggest replacing one set of standards with another but rather questioning the wisdom of standardizing what everyone teaches and learns". Move up 2 spaces!

You completed your masters in Education Leadership! Advance 3 spaces.

You went to your first conference to learn and immerse yourself in gifted education! Move up 2 spaces!

You did some research, and decided to add 5 minutes of mindfulness to the start of the day. The students have become much calmer and less issues have shown up. A reading from Palmer really stood out. Palmer mentions, "As we understand that fact, we begin to see how even secular education is a covert type of spiritual formation. My effort to develop a spirituality of education is not an imposition of new and alien notions on the educational process. Instead it is an attempt to recall education to the forgotten roots and meanings of its routine practices."Move up 2 spaces!