Understanding by Design: Chapter 1

In chapter one of Integrating Differentiated Instruction and Understanding by Design by Carol Ann Tomlinson and Joy McTighe the authors give you a brief introduction on what Understanding by Design and Differentiated Instruction’s are and how and they are part of many classes today.  The book states that the primary goal of Understanding by Design is “delineating and guiding application od sound principles of curriculum design” The main focus for Understanding by Design is “what we teach and what assessment evidence we need to collect” (pg 2). Whereas Differentiated Instruction’s main focus is “whom we teach, where we teach, and how we teach” and the primary goal is” ensuring that teachers focus on processes and procedures that ensure effective learning for varied individual” (pg 3).  The chapter explains what Axioms and Corollaries are and how the interact with UbD and DI’s way of teaching.  The axioms are associated with Understanding by Design and the corollaries with Differentiated experience. The end of the chapter gives you scenarios that make it very easy to understand the different axioms and corollaries of teaching. 

I personally liked how this chapter was set up.  I like how it presented the information, first by explaining the what and then explaining how to incorporate all of it together. The way that different axioms and corollaries were worded was hard for me to understand.  Although the scenarios that went along with those made it much clearer as to what the certain axions and corollaries really were and how to incorporate them into a classroom setting.