Core Principles of the Falcon Curriculum

The core guiding principles of developing the Falcon Curriculum Project were collaboration and sustainability.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Report asserts that “Leveraging the power of collaboration and partnerships” is an essential approach to address the challenges imposed on the world due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic has had catastrophic consequences in educational communities, wiping out 20 years of education gains and causing a 9% increase in the number of children in first through eighth grade not proficient at grade-level reading. ^[1]

This Falcon Curriculum will demonstrate how the collaboration of educational communities can create sustainable resources that are meaningful, engaging, and relevant that also align with established educational curriculum framework standards. We drew from the aforementioned SDG report and connected with K12 educators, the Du Bois Falcon Team, and wildlife experts and entities to explore how we could create an open, free curriculum to bring the falcons into the classroom.[1] The goal of this curriculum design is to give teachers flexibility and creativity in how they want to teach standard lessons in the Massachusetts Common Core but also remain focused on meeting the requirements.

In developing the curriculum, the first step was to meet with our collaborators and examine what sources of falcon data and information we could use to create a diverse, multimodal open educational resource (OER) for all to use. Our collaborators, local elementary and early childhood teachers, shared that they were using the Du Bois falcon cam in their classrooms and following the season through the falcons’ Twitter account. They expressed how much their students loved to observe and discuss the birds, especially how the chicks developed into fledglings. Throughout the nesting season, the teachers would reach out to the Twitter account with questions that their students had, and the falcon team would promptly answer them.

The teachers also spoke about how they were able to connect the falcon cam with ongoing lessons and curricula in the science and social science history areas of the Common Core. Building out these connections was the second step; we needed to ensure that the Falcon Project aligned with the current Massachusetts Common Core standards and systems already implemented in public schools. We reviewed all of the Common Core lesson standards for the disciplines of Science/Engineering and Technology and History and Social Sciences for grades Pre-K to High School, selecting specific grade-level lesson standards to which the Falcon Project could apply. We identified four general areas in which the Common Core and the Falcon Project aligned best: geography, anatomy and life cycle, animal behavior, and conservation and policy.

To ensure sustainability beyond its open-access status, the falcon curriculum is built on the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) guidelines, “which offer a set of concrete suggestions that can be applied to any discipline or domain to ensure that all learners can access and participate in meaningful, challenging learning opportunities.” ^[2]. Some small examples of this include using multiple means of action and expression, engagement, and representation.

This Falcon Curriculum is a successful case study of creating an accessible, open-access curriculum that uses a unique and local resource, the peregrine falcons that nest on the W. E. B. Du Bois Library at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, to explain concepts in both the Science and Engineering/Technology and Social Science and History standards for PreK-12 as outlined by the Common Core^[3]. The curriculum answers the call to participate in “open in action” and promote creative and engaging learning opportunities while also addressing the need for “exceptional measures…needed to get students back on track after a catastrophic year for education” [1].

We hope you find joy in learning from our curriculum and find ways and inspiration to make your own!^[4]