Resources for Selecting Instructional Materials
Resources for selecting instructional materials.
To give students the instruction they deserve, teachers need strong instructional materials that will help them consistently provide appropriately rigorous grade-level content to all students. But how do you identify which materials provide rigorous grade-level content?
We recommend:
- Refer to the instructional materials reviews done by expert educators at EdReports.org and the Louisiana Department of Education, which identify how well instructional materials are aligned to college and career ready standards.
- Use the Instructional Materials Evaluation Tool (for language arts and mathematics) or NextGen TIME (for science) to evaluate the quality of materials you are considering if the instructional materials have not been previously rated. Rating the quality of instructional materials is a complex and time-consuming process, so this option should be used sparingly or as a complement to looking at the reviews linked above.
- Examine your instructional materials for evidence of bias through multiple lenses and consider intersectionality. If applicable, examine your instructional materials using the Education Justice Research and Organizing Collaborative Culturally Responsive Curriculum Scorecard or the Windows and Mirrors framework to assess whether they allow students to explore the unfamiliar (windows) and see their own lives and experiences validated and valued (mirrors).
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Imali Ariyarathne, seventh-grade teacher at Langston Hughes Academy, introduces her students to the captivating world of science.
About TNTP
TNTP is the nation’s leading research, policy, and consulting organization dedicated to transforming America’s public education system, so that every generation thrives.
Today, we work side-by-side with educators, system leaders, and communities across 39 states and over 6,000 districts nationwide to reach ambitious goals for student success.
Yet the possibilities we imagine push far beyond the walls of school and the education field alone. We are catalyzing a movement across sectors to create multiple pathways for young people to achieve academic, economic, and social mobility.