Educators throughout the U.S. continue to face the daunting challenges—constraints—associated with the teaching and assessing of students’ understanding of all state standards. Among those challenges are several vitally important ones: (1) student unpreparedness for current grade-level standards as well as next grade-level standards; (2) teaching students how to achieve the different levels of rigor in the standards; (3) the influx of new educators unfamiliar with the standards; (4) the mobility of students that interrupts their learning; (5) the need to review existing standards that were selected as priorities years before but have not been reviewed and updated since; (6) the need to reprioritize new and/or revised state standards; (7) lack of coordinated efforts within a school system to engage all teachers in the selection and alignment of prioritized standards across the grades.
How can classroom teachers be expected to teach, assess, re-teach, and reassess students on every standard in a grade level or course within the limited number of school days each year, especially when there can be as many as 70, 80, and even 90 or more standards in any given content area at nearly every grade level? Realistically, they can’t—unless they default to the “inch-deep, mile-wide” superficial coverage approach to standards whereby they quickly teach a standard and then move on to the next standard whether the students are ready to do so or not.
Why do teachers feel compelled to do this, even when they know it is not beneficial for their students’ learning? Many will lament that they feel they must at least “cover” every standard before the annual state tests, fearful that if they don’t, their students will do poorly on those high-stakes assessments. Anyone who has ever taught students for any length of time knows that this instructional approach doesn’t work when the top priority is student learning. Yet this practice continues owing to the pervasive external exam pressure teachers feel to cover every standard because “it might be on the test”.
In response to the testing and accountability pressures educators are under today, this “spray and pray” method of instruction (“spray” the students with all the standards and “pray” it will stick) may seem the only viable solution. But it inevitably results in students leaving one grade or course unprepared for the next one. Teachers at the next level must then re-teach what their incoming students “should have learned” in the prior grade or course before they are able to begin teaching their own assigned grade- or course-level standards. This domino effect can continue for years, delaying educators in each succeeding grade level from teaching and assessing students on the standards they are supposed to be learning.
Herein lies the deeper reality of the teacher’s dilemma: All the standards at every grade and in every subject matter area do need to be taught, and student understanding of those standards does need to be assessed to gain evidence of student competency in those learning outcomes. Experienced educators know that certain standards are more important than others for students to learn, and that those identified standards—usually more rigorous and challenging for students—require decidedly more classroom instruction time. Given the extraordinary range of students’ diverse learning needs—especially when multilanguage learners and students with any kind of special need generally require increased instruction and assessment assistance—this is certainly an unrealistic and daunting constraint. So, what is the solution to all this?
A PRACTICAL SOLUTION TO THE DILEMMA
Is there a practical solution to this all-too-common experience that educators face when there are so many standards and comparatively little instructional time? Yes! In the face of these challenges, educators are opting for the only commonsense solution: they are abandoning the ineffective practice of “inch-deep, mile-wide” superficial instructional coverage of too many standards in favor of prioritization. They are sitting down together in PK–12 grade-level and grade-band teams to thoughtfully study each standard in their content areas and systematically classify it as being either “priority” or “supporting.”
But what exactly are Priority Standards and supporting standards? How do educators select them, and what do they do with those selections?
Priority Standards are a “carefully selected subset of the total list of the grade-specific and course-specific standards within each content area that students must know and be able to do by the end of each school year to be prepared for the standards at the next grade level or course. Priority Standards represent the assured student competencies that each teacher needs to help every student learn, and demonstrate proficiency in, by the end of the current grade or course” (Ainsworth, 2013, p. xv; 2021, p. xv).
MANY NAMES MEANING THE SAME
Priority Standards are known by many other different names across the PK-12 spectrum of education in the U.S. These names, titles, or labels vary from state to state and district to district. Here’s a sampling: Power Standards, Essential Standards, Focus Standards, Guaranteed and Viable Curriculum Standards, Core Standards, Key Standards, or Critical Content Standards. The term Essential Learning Outcomes is also commonly used, particularly in higher education. Regardless of the name or title given to learning standards, they all mean the same—instruction and assessment priorities for students to know and be able to achieve.
In my previous publications, I have used the terms, Power Standards and Priority Standards to categorize those standards that require the greatest emphasis in every grade level and course. However, in my 2024 book series, Integrating Teaching and Learning, (Volume One, Chapters 1-3) I now refer to Power or Priority Standards as Essential Standards, to convey their importance to student learning and to the building of a strong foundation necessary for creating quality units of study. For simplicity and clarity, the terms “power, priority, essential” are occasionally used interchangeably, but Essential Standards is now my preferred term.
Priority (Essential) Standards, by their very name, indicate that there are other standards students need to learn also. Those standards I refer to as supporting standards.
Supporting Standards are “those standards that support, connect to, or enhance the Priority Standards. Educators teach these standards within the context of the Priority Standards, but these supporting standards do not receive the same degree of emphasis in instruction and assessment as do the priorities. (Ainsworth, 2013, p. xv; 2021, p. xv)
As their name indicates, supporting standards support students’ learning of the more rigorous and complex Essential Standards. They include foundational concepts and thinking skills that students may need to learn first before they can learn the more challenging ones. Supporting standards serve as instructional scaffolds. Just as construction workers require scaffolds when erecting or painting a tall building so they can reach the higher floors, instructional scaffolds help educators “level up” instruction to assist students in achieving the more complex standards.
For decades, the need to prioritize academic content standards has been—and will undoubtedly remain—an essential practice that educators and leaders continue to implement in school systems throughout the nation. Why is this so? Collectively, the standards enumerate in extensive detail the competencies that prekindergarten through high school students are expected to acquire in every grade, every course, and every content area. However, the many external and internal constraints imposed on our school systems make this ideal an unreality.
Educators and leaders who are either new to the profession, and/or to the rationale and “timeless” process for identifying Essential Standards, will benefit from the information in this introductory blog and the ones to follow. Those who are already quite familiar with this topic because they have identified and implemented Essential Standards in their own schools and districts in past years may recognize much of this information. However, because Essential Standards provide the very foundation of the Integrated Teaching and Learning System©, I highly encourage those who are already quite experienced with the concept and practice to refresh their understanding of the entire process as a reminder of its vital importance to the design of quality units of study.
COMING SOON -- ESSENTIAL STANDARDS, PART 2
So, how do educators select these all-important Essential Standards and distinguish them from supporting standards? Part 2 of this blog series describes how educators are using the long-established criteria for identifying Essential Standards, underscoring the importance of “prioritizing, not eliminating” any standards in the process of doing so. Part 2 will also show the six steps of the entire process that includes aligning Essential Standards across the PK-12 spectrum and how to ensure that all educators in the system have a voice in the process.
For more information on Essential Standards, here’s the link to Volume One of my Integrated Teaching and Learning series: https://www.larryainsworth.com/#VolumeOne and to the Essential Standards workshops at www.larryainsworth.com/workshops.
For continuing information about all the “timeless essentials” for creating integrated units of study, I hope you will follow me on Facebook, Linked In, and/or Instagram!
I am always happy to answer questions you may have about Essential Standards and any of the other “timeless essentials” presented in the three-volume series. Please feel free to contact me at larry@larryainsworth.com .