Team Teaching and the Common Core

As a member of my high school technology team, I recently visited Columbia City's Eagle Tech Academy. The school is heavily technology based, our initial reason for visiting - we are planning on going one-to-one next year and wanted to look at some schools and how they did it. As in most educational activities, sometimes the focus changes. Many of my colleagues and I became excited with the project based learning focus of the academy as well as the team teaching.

Eagle Tech offers courses which are actually two classes in one: BioCom - Biology and Computer Applications and a current events class that combines Social Studies and English. Students have access to both teachers during the two hour block and complete projects that combine both content areas. It was this aspect of the Eagle Tech Academy that caught our attention and imagination.

Social Studies teacher and football coach, Jeff Shriver and I are now planning a U.S. History and English 11 course we have titled "American Studies." It makes all kinds of sense! 11th grade English focuses on American Literature, so it is great match with U.S. History also taken during the junior year.

Coach Shriver and I are excited about the project based opportunities that will unite our curricula. Our class will be a blocked two period class. We will collaborate on history, literature, integrating historic documents, lit analysis, critical reading, argument writing, debates and presentations all focused on the time period being studied as well as tracking themes across time periods. To me, this is exactly what the Common Core Standards are all about. Pairing content area teachers with language arts is a logical way to attack the common core as well as make learning relevant for students. We are just in the initial stages of planning, but the possibilities of this new opportunity seem exciting and endless! Stay tuned for updates on our planning and implementation of this new program!