Instructional Materials and Assessments

Instructional Materials

The IFL offers instructional materials in English language arts, history, mathematics, and science. Materials can be flexibly integrated into existing curricula.

Designed around core concepts in each discipline, our materials apprentice students to read, write, talk, inquire, and reason as scientists, mathematicians, historians, readers, and writers. Students learn to use an array of tools to manage, assess, and reflect on their learning.

Our units and lessons are also educative for teachers. We provide:

    • rationales for tasks;
    • ways to differentiate tasks for the variety of learners in today’s classrooms;
    • ways to help students engage in the intellectual struggle of learning;
    • questions and tasks to assess and advance students’ learning; and
    • routines for generating and sustaining academically productive talk and collaboration.

Our materials are designed to empower teachers to make instructional decisions based on informal and formal assessments of students’ learning.

The IFL’s instructional materials can be used as:

    • high-quality curricula to advance student learning and fill gaps in existing curricula;
    • models of coherent and challenging curricula to advance educators’ learning; and
    • templates to guide the development and revision of school, district, or state curricula.

Curriculum-Embedded Formative and Summative Assessments

    • Formative Assessments: The IFL’s instructional materials in English language arts, history, mathematics, and science provide multiple opportunities and methods for teachers to assess students’ learning during teaching.
    • Summative Assessments: The IFL’s instructional materials also include summative assessments that are designed to assess students’ learning at the end of units and sets of lessons. Summative assessments include scaffolded and independent tasks that ask students to use, apply, and synthesize what they have learned.