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Learning Design Analysis: In His Majestys Service

Robert Breward
EDUC 460

In His Majestys Service: Humanism Revealed (Alberta Assessment Consortium, 2014)

is part of a Grade 8 unit assessment plan relating to the topic of Renaissance Europe. In this

assignment, students are given the role of a kings court spy and are instructed to select three
different thinkers related to humanism in different professions and collect information about
them in a graphic organizer. This graphic organizer categorizes the information collected through
questions that relate to the thinkers views on different institutions of society. This information is
then used by the student to summarize the potential impact of humanistic thinkers on the
worldview of Western Europe at the time. The rubric for this assignment is separated into three
different sections: Describing factors that shape worldview, developing and supporting position,
and communicating information. In the Program Vision section of the Alberta Education
program of studies, it is stated that a central idea in the vision of the program is the recognition
of the diversity of experiences and perspective and the pluralistic nature of Canadian society
(Alberta Education, 2005). This assignment, while not focusing on a modern Canadian context,
does encourage students to examine an emerging way of thinking in a society, which can
potentially teach critical thinking skills through examining multiple different perspectives and
institutions of society. The general outcome for the Renaissance unit expects students to
understand and appreciate how the exchange of ideas and knowledge contributed to shaping the
worldview of the Western world (Alberta Education 2005), and this outcome is very noticeable
as a central theme of this assignment.

The assignment itself is characterized by the questions and categories provided to the
student in the graphic organizer. For each thinker examined by the student, they are instructed to
examine the thinkers ideas on the areas of Social Structure, Religion, Politics, and Arts and
Sciences. In doing so, the student must answer the following questions:
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What key elements of humanism were proposed by this thinker?

What motivated this thinker to challenge long held beliefs?

What motivated the citizens to seek change?

What motivated the people in authority to limit change?

(Alberta Assessment Consortium, 2015)

Each of these questions asks the student to examine more than just look at facts the questions
encourage the student to think critically about the motivations and reasons behind change in
society, as well as the motivations for those in power to resist this change. By encouraging
students to examine these questions through their own research, and by having the teacher
facilitate the assignment rather than providing the answers to the questions outright, this
assignment shows that it is heavily based around inquiry. Two of the criteria from the Galileo
Educational Networks (2014) Rubric for Discipline-Based and Inter-Disciplinary Inquiry
Studies in particular stand out to me as integral in this assignment. First, it shows a developing to
emerging level of authenticity the assignment requires students to examine the subject from a
wide variety of perspectives from different professions as they relate to many different aspects of
society, but is somewhat limited in that it is limited to the ideology of humanism in the context
of the renaissance unit. It also shows an aspiring level of academic rigor students are expected
to inquire into the deeper reasons as to why this new ideology was emerging, who was
supporting it and why, and why those in power strove to defend the status quo in light of this
ideology, requiring students to use skills reminiscent of a justice-oriented citizen. Westheimer
and Khane (2004) describe this type of citizen as one that calls explicit attention to matters of
injustice and to the importance of pursuing social justice goals (p.243). By teaching students to
inquire into issues of social justice and social change in this way, this assignment encourages
them to develop skills that could allow them to apply this inquiry to the world around them.

Although this assignment shows great potential to engage critical thinking and attitudes
in students in a historical context, there are still several suggestions that I feel could strengthen
the assignments ability to engage students as citizens in their own time. Going by the
WHERETO concept offered by Wiggins and McTighe (2005), I present the following four
suggestions to improve this assignment:
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In order to better tailor this assignment to the individual interests and strengths of the
students, perhaps make the study of Renaissance humanism a class activity, and give the
students a selection of modern-day theories to research. Not only would this add an
additional level of authenticity to the assignment by linking the concept of social change
in the past to social change in the present and future, but it would allow students an
opportunity to explore modern-day issues that may interest them while still teaching them
about the historical issues covered by the curriculum.

Along with the following change, it would be necessary to reevaluate where the unit is
heading and why in order to accommodate for these changes. To do so, class activities
can be constructed where students examine several of the modern day issues and compare
and contrast their spread with that of humanism during the renaissance. Examining the
similarities between historical change and modern change would provide a clear
explanation to the students as to the assignment they will be undertaking at the end of the
unit, and why it is important to examine both historical and modern changes in society.

Adding a self-assessment portion to the rubric and having the teacher evaluate a rough
copy of the students work would both allow students to better evaluate their own
progress throughout the unit, as well as reflect, revise, and rethink their work before

handing it in for their final grade in the unit. This change, too, allows the student to
become more personally invested in the assignment by having a way to directly affect
their grade, as well as giving them a chance to evaluate and improve on their own work.
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Finally, changing the organization of the assignment in order to evoke deeper

understanding of the content rather than collection of facts. The graphic organizer
component of the assignment could become part of the rough copy, while the final copy
would instead have a short series of short answer questions for each thinker or proponent
of social change examined. These would be structured in such a way that would not add
additional stress or too much extra work for the students while encouraging them to do
more than simply write down point form facts about the thinkers they study.

All in all, this unit assessment plan provides an assignment that greatly supplements the program
of studies, and if expanded upon, has the potential to touch on a broad range of issues that affect
the modern world. I would definitely consider adapting and using this assignment in my own
classroom.

References

Alberta Assessment Consortium (2015). In His Majestys Service. Retrieved from

http://www.aac.ab.ca/assessment-materials/in-his-majestys-service/

Alberta Education. (2005). Program of studies: Social studies, kindergarten to grade 12.
Edmonton, AB: Alberta Education. Retrieved from
http://education.alberta.ca/media/773697/ss8.pdf

Galileo Educational Network (2014). Rubric for Discipline-Based and Inter-Disciplinary Inquiry
Studies. Retrieved From http://galileo.org/rubric.pdf
Westheimer, J, and J Kahne. (2004). Educating the good citizen: Political choices and
pedagogical goals. Political Science and Politics, 2 (4), 241-247. Retrieved from
http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/stable/10.2307/4488813

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design (Expanded 2nd ed.). Alexandria,
VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.