Curriculum 101: Internalization strategies for teachers

I’m a “rehearser.”

Before presentations, before important conversations, even before big events, I’ll rehearse the thing that’s stressing me out repeatedly, sometimes at the cost of sleep. Ultimately, I consider this a curse that’s helped me to succeed in many difficult situations. Because I internalize complex subject matter, prepare dialogue ahead of time, and imagine the things that can go wrong, I feel prepared when the real thing comes.

How do you prepare?

If you’re here as a teacher, think about how you study something complex before you deliver it to the group. Do you spend time in the materials taking notes? Do you listen to podcasts and watch videos? Do you meditate on it while you draw up graphics or create exemplars? Do you like to video yourself explaining it, or do you teach it to a spouse or your own child before delivering it to the larger group?

These are all internalization strategies that you didn’t know you were doing!

Ultimately, you’re mastering the material so that you can prepare yourself for a more successful outcome. In this blog, we want to answer all the questions you have about internalization, what it means, why it’s beneficial, and how you can practice it to reduce workload and become a better teacher.

If you’re interested in strategies that suit your learning style, keep reading!

Table of contents

What does internalization means?

Context about House Bill 1605

What are the benefits of internalization?

The requirements of internalizing a lesson

Strategy #1 Use your PLC time to learn before your teach

Strategy #2 Rehearse the lesson to learn the material, iron out the kinks, and foresee student misconceptions

Strategy #3Do your own open-ended exploration process

Lesson internalization is easier with Beacon

Spread the word, so you can enjoy the benefits of Beacon, too

If you don’t already know, you could probably take a guess at what internalization means. To “internalize” a lesson, you must know it in your bones. Ideally, this in-depth understanding of the materials helps you to better deliver them, foresee student misconceptions, and tackle misunderstandings as they come.

One resource described a scenario in which a teacher prepares for a class by simply printing the answer document for the day’s assignment. Because they didn’t have the context for their students’ work and had the answers right in front of them, they couldn’t understand why the students weren’t understanding, and had them skip a problematic question, ultimately leaving the students with an unaddressed misunderstanding.

Encouraging teachers to internalize lessons is a step to reduce practices like this, which create inequitable environments for students.

While many Texas teachers are concerned with internalization right now due to HB 1605, teachers across the country may be curious about how they can spend time with lessons to improve their delivery, especially if they didn’t write the material themselves.

Ironically, our educators are running up against some barriers that they’ve been battling for their students. Just like students, each teacher learns and internalizes materials differently, yet many districts are requiring teachers to internalize in the same way, specifically through annotation. 

While annotation can be a great way to digest information, it’s not going to be helpful for people who don’t learn well through annotation.

If you’re not a Texas teacher, you can skip ahead to the next section, as this ultimately won’t be relevant to you.

House Bill 1605 has been a subject of some controversy since its adoption, but it ultimately has produced 3 important takeaways:

• Teachers shouldn’t have to spend huge portions of their time planning instructional materials
• Access to high-quality instructional materials (HQIM) improves engagement and drives student growth
• When teachers adopt HQIM, they need to spend time internalizing the lesson (because they didn’t write it and don’t know the materials) so they can deliver the lesson in the most impactful way

In many resources about internalization, you’ll see HQIM repeated over and over. There’s been a lot of research at the government level about what constitutes a high-quality instructional material, but it comes down to these criteria, as described in a resource by Region 13:

• Ensures full coverage of the TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills)
• Aligns with Research-Based Instructional Strategies (RBIS)
• Supports all learners

We can all agree that these are noble pursuits! We, as educators, want to support all learners and create a robust program that prepares students for continued learning and life after graduation. In an ideal world, not having to create these materials is an even bigger bonus.

However, we recognize that many people have mixed feelings about HB 1605, so we hope to provide some tips and information that can help.

Internalizing a lesson prepares a teacher to be adaptable to student needs. In theory, it helps the teacher to deliver higher-quality instruction that is tailored to the unique needs of each student.

Some experts even say that internalizing a lesson helps a teacher to be more passionate in their delivery, which creates a more engaging atmosphere (and we all know how important engagement is for student success). 

Ultimately, understanding the material at a deeper level improves delivery, which helps to close learning gaps and uplifts students to achieve at a higher level. According to The Opportunity Myth, a report by The New Teacher Project, students are leaving high school with the stamp of approval signifying that they’re reading for higher learning and careers, yet they’re underprepared for life and for college. This gap in their education costs billions of dollars to these families in remedial courses and extended stays in college every year.

Because these students lack access to grade-appropriate assignments, strong instruction, deep engagement, and teachers who hold high expectations, they leave school lacking key skills for long-term success…especially students of color, students with language differences, and those with disabilities. The report indicates, however, that higher quality instruction can close learning gaps in as little as six months. 

With this information, the case for internalization is strong. If deeply understanding a lesson before delivering it helps to close learning gaps and better prepare students, then let’s get into the how of internalizing a lesson.

There are resources all over the internet that list areas for teachers to consider as part of internalization. We’re going to try and distill these into one, cohesive list. Then, we’re going to break down how you can do these things in each of our three internalization strategies.

Here’s your condensed list of requirements for internalization:

• Identify the objective of the lesson
• Consider the implications for the entire unit and for vertical alignment
• Identify the standards to be covered
• Understand the skills that are going to be addressed
• Determine key components and strategize for the best delivery of these components
• Consider the group learning experience and the individual experience
• Plan instructional strategies, activities, and assessments that differentiate for the individual needs of students
• Consider local context that may increase engagement and belonging in the classroom
• Understand the pacing of instruction, including how many lessons are required to teach specific concepts
• Reflect on improved delivery and professional development opportunities

This is a long list that seems like it would take a lot of time, so for the rest of this resource, let’s look at how you can break this down into easy chunks.

Some people need the support of a group to fully flesh out and understand the material. Using PLCs to internalize lessons can save time so teachers aren’t spending their entire prep period annotating lessons, but it also creates a learning environment that draws on the diverse skills of the group to support an in-depth understanding of the material.

Once the team understands what the team is doing, teachers can better diversify their materials and methods for their own students and skills.

In this Lesson Internalization Guide, teachers are encouraged to consider, analyze, and frame the lesson through several distinct steps. We think there are a lot of great instructions in here that teachers and administrators can use for their own purposes, but for this resource, we’re going to break these down and discuss them in a group context.

Consider, Analyze, and Frame as a group

The “Consider” stage of internalization includes a lot of questions that you want to know the answer to before you teach a lesson. Here are some examples:

• Consider the objectives and how the lesson fulfills them.
• Consider the context of the lesson, including what the student already knows and what they will need to know for future lessons.
• Consider which types of lessons, strategies, and tools will best support the lesson.
• Consider how long it will take to deliver the lesson and complete the objectives.

If you’re doing this as a PLC, this is a great chunk of to-do items to tackle together. Discuss! Lean on team leads and brainstorm! If one teacher has more students in Athletics than the others, due to her block of class hours, then her strategies may include front-loading the pacing of essential lessons and pre-grouping students for when they need to leave the classroom due to games or traveling.

Each teacher can take their own notes and learn from their peers. If you know that your schedule will differ from your peers due to the nature of school scheduling, then that’s something you need to consider.

The “Analyze” stage of internalization involves immersing yourself in the lesson.

If you haven’t read the text or the lesson, or you haven’t done the activity that the students will be doing, this is your time to do it. When tackling this step with your PLC, take the time to read and analyze together. A diverse set of viewpoints coming from a group of content experts can help you to foster more engaging discussions with your students.

Plus, if you do the activities together, you can foresee problems with the activities with a wider net. You can produce more questions that may come up when students take on the activity.

Be the student for a period of time. Maybe even imagine that you’re a student who always has a lot of questions. What would they say, and how would you accommodate their needs when they came up in the classroom?

Now that you’ve analyzed the lesson, the texts, and the activities, you can prioritize how you’re going to teach and what the most important pieces are. Hence, the next step: framing.

The “Frame” stage of internalization requires you to plan how you will present the information to the student.

Here are some “hows” that will help you think about framing the lesson:

• How are you going to communicate the objective to students, so they have context for the lesson?
• How are you going to check for understanding and pivot if things don’t land?
• How are you going to present the material in an engaging, diversified way?
• How will you assess and measure performance that tells you your next steps?
• How will you capitalize on the lesson to deepen student understanding, tackle misconceptions, and transition into continued learning throughout the unit?

These are the things that may vary by teacher. Your skills and expertise will give the lesson your unique flavor, and this is what creates engagement for the students! However, in your PLC, it may be a good idea to talk about your plans so your peers can help you foresee gaps in instruction.

As you will likely share assessments, it’s important to make sure that instruction is as even as possible in terms of content and quality. If there are massive differences between classrooms, it will be much harder to get together at the end of the year and assess what is working and what isn’t in your program.

So, collaborate with your team even when you’re doing your own thing with the lesson. Feedback is an important step in this process, as it helps to create a high-quality learning experience for students, no matter whose classroom they land in!

I’ve already said that I’m a rehearser, but I think more people are rehearsers at heart than they even know.

When you’re dealing with a complex problem, how do you handle it? For me, verbal processing is key to working out my thinking. That might mean that I talk a lot of nonsense while I’m working through something, but eventually I hit a breakthrough.

Can you relate? Does your partner, friend, or family member get an earful every time you’re working through a problem? Do they hear the same problem repeatedly while you think about a new angle to the problem?

Maybe you’re a rehearser, too!

As an expert rehearser, here are a few different ways you can rehearse that would fulfill the requirements for internalization.

Talk through the “consider” stage in a group or on video

When you’re in the considering stage of internalization, you’re ultimately imagining a variety of possibilities and how you will respond. Seems like rehearsing to me!

A lot of people find it helpful to hear their own voice, whether in the moment or on video/audio. This is helpful for administrators and curriculum developers, too. As internalization is coming with an accountability component for admins to make sure teachers are following through, videoing yourself is great documentation that you are considering and internalizing the lesson.

Deliver the lesson on video, not holding back any ideas or enthusiasm

I used to say that ninth period students got the best lesson of the day, and why wouldn’t they after I’d already solved the problems of five other periods?

I personally really hit my stride at about 4th period when I found out which metaphors landed, which jokes they thought were funny, and which questions they asked before they dove into the assignment or activity.

The great thing about videotaping your lesson is that you can watch it back yourself and fill in gaps. You can imagine where students might need an additional resource or unique strategy or where you failed to tie the lesson back to the main objective. 

You can also feel out where your knowledge of the text, the lesson, or the activity isn’t as strong as it should be. While delivering the lesson, did you have your own questions that need additional study?

If your admin needs some documentation of these changes, then you can either record another video where you talk about these observations, or write in your changes directly on the lesson plan.

You can also show your video lesson to someone else and get their feedback! 

Practice for different scenarios

It may be hard to imagine all the things that can come up in a lesson if you’re not a practiced rehearsal artist. So, here’s a list of possible scenarios that may help you come up with a response:

• What happens if a student misses the main, essential component of the lesson and can’t continue on to the activity?
• What would you do if the majority of students get angry or stressed about the activity? What does that indicate and how would you problem- solve their concerns?
• What will you do to check for understanding throughout the lesson? What questions will you ask and who will you check on to make sure that the group is ready to move on to the next piece of the lesson?
• Will you split students into groups? Will you work with them one-on-one? Will you ask them to work alone? What problems can come up with each of these models?
• What will you do to scaffold the lesson? How will you know that a student is ready to move on to independent work vs. when they need additional support from you or their peers?

This can be the most difficult part of the rehearsal process, as there are so many possibilities to think about! You can’t and shouldn’t cover every possibility (that would drive a person insane). If you’re interested in how you can work with students to meet their individual needs, check out our resource on differentiation made easy.

Project-based learning is an effective strategy for students, so why wouldn’t it work for you, too? Many people feel more confident when they’ve had an opportunity to explore, experiment, and create something based off of their learning.

Here’s how you can create a project-based learning experience for yourself that helps you master the lesson, create an exemplar, and imagine possible missteps (and interventions) for your students.

Identify the objective, learning standards, and essential skills

Write these down as you would for your students. What are they focusing on and hoping to take away from the project?

If you can put these into a few strong bullet points, it will add some clarity to a somewhat ambiguous process.

Walk through the lesson and activity yourself, writing down questions as you go

Experience this as a student might. What are you curious about? What excites you? What, if anything, draws on your previous experiences and skills, adding real-life relevance to the lesson?

Now, you’ve done the bare minimum. Are you feeling like an expert yet? Probably, you’ve got some things that you’re curious about that you should feel free to explore.

Bonus points if you consider areas of crossover that relate to what students are learning in their other classes as areas of exploration. These tidbits of extra knowledge will help them make connections to the lesson and consider real-world implications.

Head down those rabbit holes that answer your questions

Are you a podcast listener? Serial YouTube video watcher? A library frequent visitor? Well, hit up your resources and explore what’s interesting to you.

Let’s say your lesson considers identifying and separating syllables. Adults struggle with syllables probably more than children do. 

Imagine you’re curious about why we have the rules that we do about syllables. Who decided that we separate syllables based on vowel sounds?

Did you know that the word syllable is very old? In fact, it originally meant “taken together,” as in “letters that are taken together to make a single sound.”

At their core, syllables are meant to help us understand, use, and pronounce words. They’re a core learning component of our language because they help us to understand the mechanics of language construction, e.g. vowel sound + consonant sound = word?

Now, you wouldn’t convey all of this to fifth graders. However, you now have a deeper understanding of the why. You’re an even greater expert now than you were before and are more prepared to take on the lesson and answer questions that come up!

And we know that students love to ask why. Now you have an answer.

Create a project that solves a problem your students would understand

Now, what you’re doing is creating an exemplar and helping your students to see how the subject matter connects to the world around them.

If you’re still on the “why” of syllables, perhaps your project could include a survey of your peers to see what percentage of them accurately understand syllables. Then, test their spelling and pronunciation of difficult words.

Is there a correlation between their understanding of syllables and their understanding of other integral language rules that coincide with syllables?

Not only would this information help students to understand why it’s important to learn the rules of syllables, but it might be funny to get a laugh at teacher expense (maybe with some anonymity, so there’s no student-teacher bullying).

Prepare your lesson based on the things you found interesting and relevant to real life

So, you’ve read the material, considered possible questions, you’ve done the assignment and deepened your understanding of the material. Now it’s time to frame and prepare your lesson.

What did you encounter during your exploration that helped you consider real-life and cross-subject crossover?

Can you use any of the materials that helped you learn in your lesson? Can you find materials that are more age appropriate, if not?

If the materials used in the HQIMs aren’t as engaging as you’d like them to be, can you find some that supplement the material and still tackle the objectives?

Did the objectives that you lined out help you to focus on the outcome of the lesson? Where did you feel like the lesson was incomplete when you went through it? What inspired your curiosity and what confused you?

When you deliver your lesson, it may be helpful and fun to tell your students about your exploration! What did your project-based learning look like? What did you create to showcase your learning and apply it to real life?

All in all, these steps could help you create an expertly crafted lesson that is engaging, relevant to life, and well-prepared against hiccups and hangups.

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Beacon is our new instructional tool. Believe it or not, it’s going to revolutionize internalization for Texas teachers and educators across the country. Let’s break it down in terms of the consider, analyze, and framing steps from earlier in the article.

How Beacon helps teachers in the “consider” stage of planning

Let’s tackle each bullet point at a time:

Consider the objectives and how the lesson fulfills them.

Each lesson is tied to Scope and Sequence, so you can see where the lesson fits into the larger learning narrative, which standards are being addressed, and which objectives need to be prioritized.

Consider the context of the lesson, including what the student already knows and what they will need to know for future lessons.

Beacon is collaborative, so you can work within your team to ensure that each lesson is vertically aligned and supports the scope of each unit.

Consider which types of lessons, strategies, and tools will best support the lesson.

In Beacon, you can create your own go-to list of tools and strategies and drop them into the lesson. Your tool belt is color-coded and easily accessible, so it’s quick to strategize and track which accommodations, activities, and strategies are working for your students.

Consider how long it will take to deliver the lesson and complete the objectives.

Your lessons live in the planner, so you can see at a glance where lessons live in the scheme of big assessments, unit changes, and holidays. If your pacing is off and you’re behind, your administrator can reach out to support you.

Next, Beacon’s centralized learning hub makes it easy to analyze lessons

While you’re reading through material, doing activities, and creating exemplars, you won’t have to leave Beacon for another window or program. Everything you need is in the centralized resource hub which your team can build and contribute to for a more robust library.

Let’s say you print and annotate your lesson plan, it can live in the hub for easy reference. If you create an exemplar or find additional resources on the internet, select and upload it straight from Google Drive.

Ready to present your finished activity to the class before they dive into the activity on your own? It’s right there! No more digging through folders and hoping your search terms are accurate enough to get results.

Finally, Beacon makes it easier to frame your lesson

Let’s look at the “how” bullet points we mentioned earlier in the article.

How are you going to communicate the objective to students, so they have context for the lesson?

Your lessons live in the planner along with your strategies. All you have to do is fill it out to your satisfaction.

How are you going to check for understanding and pivot if things don’t land?

Drag and drop your strategies! You may even add an attachment with your list of preconsidered questions and misconceptions so you’re prepared when they come up in the classroom.

How are you going to present the material in an engaging, diversified way?

Did you film yourself practicing? Are you adding resources that you found in your exploration that may help students with language or cultural differences? They also live in your resource hub so they’re easy to attach to lesson plans.

How will you assess and measure performance that tells you your next steps?

Beacon works with our assessment platform, Aware, so that you can plan assessments as part of curriculum, include retests as part of your intervention and growth strategies, and assess student metacognition strategies through reflections and student confidence scores.

Plus, with the planner, you can make sure that students know everything they’re supposed to know before they take the test! Keep pacing appropriate for student learning while staying on-track to assess and address learning gaps.

How will you capitalize on the lesson to deepen student understanding, tackle misconceptions, and transition into continued learning throughout the unit?

If you’re assessing throughout the lesson using group discussions, one-one-ones, or even bell ringers, then you can document those strategies in the planner! As you assess gaps and strengths among students, you can then plan strategies for intervention and enrichment, including dividing by misconception into monitor groups (which live in Aware with their assessment scores), and tracking their progress via Mastery Tracker.

The strategies and tools that you use can be easily tracked and implemented from one window.

Pretty cool, huh?

We’re confident that our tool will help teachers, administrators, and district leaders to implement internalization while connecting teams, lowering time spent in unrelated software screens, and increasing student engagement. If you're interested in using a tool that will take the massive time burden of planning and internalizing off of your shoulders, forward this blog to your administrators. Tell them about Beacon! Follow us on socials. You deserve a tool that simplifies your processes, and we can be that solution for you.

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