Backward Design

Backward design is a method of designing an educational curriculum by setting goals before choosing instructional methods and forms of assessment, shifting curriculum planning toward identifying desired learning outcomes first and then creating learning activities to reach those goals. It typically proceeds through three stages: identifying the desired results, the big ideas and skills students should know, understand and be able to do; determining acceptable evidence that those results have occurred, such as culminating assessment tasks; and only then designing the learning activities and lesson sequence meant to help students reach the desired results. Backward design challenges traditional curriculum planning, in which a list of content to be taught is selected first with no formal destination identified before the journey begins; supporters liken backward design instead to choosing a destination first and then using a road map to plan the trip toward it. Although backward design is based on some of the same components as the ADDIE model, it is a condensed version of those components with far less flexibility.