Creating Instructional Objectives: A Chapter from Where Great Teaching Begins: Planning for Student Thinking and Learning

In order to create great lessons, a teacher needs to know the curriculum, know the lesson content, know the students, and know how to set objectives that will engage these students as thinkers and put them on the path to learning. In this excerpt from Where Great Teaching Begins, Anne R. Reeves introduces and illustrates a step-by-step process for analyzing complex academic standards—like those in the Common Core—and translating them into lesson objectives that are specific and learner-focused, describe learning outcomes rather than activities, and engage higher-order thinking skills.

• Where Great Teaching Begins: Planning for Student Thinking and Learning
• The New Art and Science of Teaching: more than fifty new instructional strategies for academic success
• The Elements of Teaching
• The First Days of School
• How to Write a Lesson Plan: Introduction to Basic Lesson Design and the 8 Keys to Good Planning
• Transformative Assessment in Action: An Inside Look at Applying the Process
• Language Arts: Patterns of Practice
• HEART!: Fully Forming Your Professional Life as a Teacher and Leader
• The Art and Science of Teaching: A Comprehensive Framework for Effective Instruction (Professional Development)
• Helping Young Children Learn Language and Literacy: Birth Through Kindergarten