In one sentence, describe what the following article is about: Curricula are usually graphically organized in a way that includes a space for each component. Some institutions ask educators to use a standardized template, so find out what is expected of you. If no template is provided, find one online or create your own template. This will help you keep your curriculum organized and presentable. Units, or themes, are the main topics that will be covered in the curriculum. Organize your brainstorm or state standards into unified sections that follow a logical sequence. Units can cover big ideas like love, planets, or equations, and important topics like multiplication or chemical reactions. The number of units varies by curriculum and they can last anywhere between one week and eight weeks. A unit title can be one word or a short sentence. A unit about character development, for example, could be called, “Creating deep characters.” Learning goals are the specific things that students will know and be able to do by the end of the unit. You already gave this some thought when you first brainstormed ideas for the class, now you have to be more specific. As you write your learning goals, keep important questions in mind. What does the state require students to know? How do I want my students to think about this topic? What will my students be able to do? Often, you can pull learning goals right from common core standards. Use SWBAT (Students will be able to). If you get stuck, try starting each learning goal with “Students will be able to…” This works for both skills and content knowledge. For example, “Students will be able to provide a two-page written analysis of the reasons behind the Civil War.” This requires students to both know information (causes of the Civil War) and do something with the information (written analysis). Every unit needs 2-4 general questions that should be explored throughout the unit. Essential questions guide students to understand the more important parts of the theme. Essential questions are often big, complex questions that can’t always be answered in one lesson. For example, an essential question for a middle school unit about fractions might be, “Why doesn’t using division always make things smaller?” An essential question for a unit on character development might be, “How does a person’s decisions and actions reveal aspects of their personality?” Once you have an organized set of units, you can begin to think about what kinds of materials, content, and experiences students will need in order to gain an understanding of each theme. This can be covered by the textbook you will use, texts you plan to read, projects, discussions, and trips. Keep your audience in mind. Remember that there are many ways for students to acquire skills and knowledge. Try to choose books, multimedia, and activities that will engage the population you are working with. Students need to be evaluated on their performance. This helps the student know if they were successful in understanding the content, and it helps the teacher know if they were successful in delivering the content. Additionally, assessments help the teacher determine if any changes need to be made to the curriculum in the future. There are many ways to assess student performance, and assessments should be present throughout each unit.  Use formative assessments. Formative assessments are usually smaller, more informal assessments that provide feedback on the learning process so you can make changes to the curriculum throughout the unit. Although formative assessments are usually a part of the daily lesson plan, they can also be included in the unit descriptions. Examples include journal entries, quizzes, collages, or short written responses.   Include summative assessments. Summative assessments occur once a full topic has been covered. These assessments are appropriate for the end of a unit or at the end of the course. Examples of summative assessments are tests, presentations, performances, papers, or portfolios. These assessments range from touching on specific details to answering essential questions or discussing larger themes.
Summary: Make a template. Identify the unit titles within the curriculum. Create learning goals for each unit. Write essential questions for each unit. Prepare appropriate learning experiences. Include a plan for assessments.

In one sentence, describe what the following article is about: Preparing your kitchen and home for a child with a newly diagnosed food allergy can seem overwhelming.  Take time to clean out the kitchen of any foods that are unsafe for your child.  Take a weekend to spend cleaning out and reorganizing your pantry, refrigerator, freezer and any other spots you store foods.  This may take more than a day to get everything set up. Remove all foods that contain the allergen.  You'll need to read labels and ingredient lists to ensure all potentially hazardous foods have been removed. You can choose to donate or trash these "unsafe" foods if you desire.  Many times, unopened items can be donated to food banks. Consider having your child help you.  He should not touch or come into contact with these foods; however, it will be good practice to have him read labels and identify potentially unsafe items. In addition to removing unsafe foods from your house, it's important to minimize "cross contamination."  Make sure to wash and sanitize all items in your house.  Cross contamination is when allergens from unsafe foods come into contact with cookware or flatware that is supposed to be "allergen-free."  For example, if you use a knife to spread peanut butter on your bagel, but use the same knife (even wiped off) to spread jelly on your child's bread, you have cross-contaminated your child's meal with peanut allergens. All dishes and utensils need to be washed and thoroughly rinsed in hot soapy water.  In addition, rinse off dishes that have food residue on them prior to putting them in a dishwasher.  You may also want to consider labeling some flatware and cookware as "allergen-free" and only use these items to prepare and serve allergen-free foods.  Also wash these separate from other kitchen items. If your child has a food allergy, it can be difficult to limit items in your house.  This is especially true if you have other children in the home with you.  If you need to include foods in your home that contain an allergen one child has, consider labeling your foods as either "safe" or "unsafe."  This allows the child with the allergen to clearly see what products they can consume without worry. You can put green labels on "safe foods" and red labels on "unsafe foods" or create your own labeling system.  Although this can be an easy system to follow, still teach your kids to read labels and investigate foods — especially when they're outside the home. Another easy and somewhat common method of cross contamination is food, crumbs, and leftovers eaten in other rooms.  Keeping foods and eating contained to one room can help prevent this.  It's common for families to snack in front of the TV, eat in the car, or carry food to their bedrooms.  However, this exposes an allergic child to many more opportunities for an allergic reaction. Limit food storage, preparation and consumption to only the kitchen and/or dining room.  Do not allow other children or yourself take foods into other areas of the house. This can help children feel safe at home and not have to worry about unknowingly coming into contact with their allergen. Cooking and food preparation is a common time where cross contamination can happen.  Take care when preparing foods for an allergic child to avoid this situation.  Consider using specialty cookware, flatware and storage containers when preparing your child's meals or take away meals.  This can help prevent cross contamination. If you're preparing both "safe" and "unsafe" meals or foods, prepare "safe" foods first.  This allows you to know that no cross contamination has happened since you haven't prepared any foods yet with the allergen.
Summary:
Clean out your kitchen. Wash and sanitize all cookware and flatware. Consider labeling foods "safe" or "unsafe". Keep foods contained to one room. Take extra precautions when cooking.