Essential Elements of MYP
Essential Elements of MYP
Of
The MYP
Table of Contents
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Middle Years Programme (MYP) Vocabulary
Approaches to Learning (ATL): ATL skills represent general and subject specific learning skills that
students will develop and apply during the MYP and beyond. These skills are explicitly taught within a unit
of inquiry in an effort to develop an individual’s awareness of how they learn best. The five
ATL categories are:
• Research
• Communication
• Self-management
• Social
• Thinking
Command terms: Specific terms (in bold print) located within MYP rubrics that define the levels of
cognitive demand for each descriptor. Command terms cannot be altered or removed when making
task-specific clarifications (see below).
Criterion: Each MYP subject area has a set of criterion with specific MYP objectives. Subject specific
criterion are located within the subject guide. Each criterion has its own rubric.
Fundamental Concepts: The three fundamental concepts that are rooted in the IB mission statement are:
• Holistic Learning
• Intercultural Awareness
• Communication
Global Context: The Global Contexts are the lens through which a unit of instruction is taught. Teaching
subjects through these contexts allows teaching & learning to focus on attitudes, values, and skills. There are
six global contexts:
• Identities and relationships
• Orientation in space and time
• Personal and cultural expression
• Scientific and technical innovation
• Globalization and sustainability
Key Concept: Each subject guide has between 3-5 concepts that must be incorporated into units of study.
These key concepts help to create the statement of inquiry within a unit of study.
Learner Profile: A set of 10 attributes that describe the kind of student who exemplifies the spirit of the
MYP
• Inquirers
• Knowledgeable
• Thinkers
• Communicators
• Principled
• Open-minded
• Caring
• Risk-takers
• Balanced
• Reflective
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Lines of Inquiry: Lines of inquiry are questions that provoke student inquiry towards the development of
the statement of inquiry. There are three types of lines of inquiry:
• Factual- content based
• Conceptual- big picture, broad in scope, and transferrable
• Debatable- engaging and provocative
MYP Objectives: A set of subject specific statements aligned to Standards that describe the skills,
knowledge & understanding that will be assessed.
MYP Subject Areas: The eight subject areas taught in the MYP are:
MYP Rubrics: Each subject has one MYP rubric for each of its criterion.
Personal Project: A project completed in the final year of the MYP (year 5) that is the culmination of the
students’ experience in the MYP.
Related Concepts: The related concepts are used in conjunction with the key concepts to create a
statement of inquiry. Teachers may use the suggested concepts found in each subject guide, or they may
include their own.
Statement of Inquiry: The Statement of inquiry is a declarative statement that directly links the key
concept(s) and related concepts to the global context.
Task-specific Clarifications: An assessment grid, adapted by the teacher, which better identifies how the
achievement level descriptors can be addressed by the student for a given assessment task.
Unit Plan: a series of lessons, organized and focused through global contexts, statements of inquiry, and
lines of inquiry, which are designed to enable students to achieve the MYP objectives.
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MYP Common Language
*Both faculty & students should have a solid understanding of the following MYP terms:
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The Global Contexts Defined
Identities and Relationships:
Who am I? Who are we?
Students will explore identity: beliefs and values; personal, physical, mental, social, and spiritual health;
human relationships including families, friends, communities, and cultures; what it means to be human.
Possible explorations to develop:
• competition and cooperation; teams, affiliation and leadership
• identity formation, self-esteem, status, roles and role models
• personal efficacy and agency; attitudes, motivations, independence; happiness and the good life • development, transitions, health
and well being
• physical, psychological and social being, lifestyle choices
• human nature and human dignity, moral reasoning and ethical judgment, consciousness and mind
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• power and privilege
• authority, security and freedom
• imagining a hopeful future
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The Design Cycle
The Design Cycle is the basis of the MYP approach to technology. The cycle is the model of
thinking and the strategy to help students investigate problems. With this cycle they will
investigate, plan, create, and evaluate the products/solutions that they generate. Although the
Design Cycle is a requirement of all Design classes, students would benefit from using the
Design Cycle in other content areas that lend themselves to the process.
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Planning MYP Units of Inquiry
THE PLANNER
In order for subject content to be understood in context, the written and the taught curriculum
must be brought together in a meaningful synthesis through common planning, teaching,
assessing, and reflecting.
• involve students in a range of learning experiences planned in response to the MYP Lines of
Inquiry.
• build on prior knowledge of the students.
• be constructed and conducted with the Learner Profile in mind in order to promote positive
attitudes.
• require students to reflect on their learning, and encourage them to engage in responsible
action.
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MYP Unit Planner
Unit Title
Teachers
Subject and
grade-level
Duration
Stage 1: Integrate global context, key concepts, statement of inquiry, and lines
of inquiry
Statement of Inquiry
Global Context Key Concept(s) &
related concepts
What do we want students to
Which global context will be our
What are the big ideas? retain for years in the future
focus?
Why have we chosen this?
Lines of Inquiry
Factual:
Conceptual:
Debatable:
Assessment
What task(s) will allow students the opportunity to respond to the Lines of Inquiry?
What will constitute acceptable evidence of understanding? How will students show what they have understood?
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Which MYP assessment criteria will be used?
Approaches to learning
How will this unit contribute to the overall development of subject-specific and general approaches to learning skills?
TEACHING METHODOLOGIES:
LEARNING EXPERIENCES:
DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION:
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Resources
What resources are available to us?
How will our classroom environment, local environment and/or the community be used to facilitate students’ experiences during the unit?
Possible connections
How successful was the collaboration with other teachers within my subject group and from other subject groups? What interdisciplinary
understandings were or could be forged through collaboration with other subjects?
Assessment
Were students able to demonstrate their learning?
How did the assessment tasks allow students to demonstrate the learning objectives identified for this unit? How did I make sure students
were invited to achieve at all levels of the criteria descriptors?
Data collection
How did we decide on the data to collect? Was it useful?
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MYP Unit Planner GUIDE
Unit Title The title should engage students and grab their attention/ reflects
the Lines of Inquiry
Teachers
Subject and
grade-level
Duration
Stage 1: Integrate global context, key concepts, statement of inquiry, and lines
of inquiry
Which global context will be our What are the big ideas? What do we want students to
focus?Why have we chosen this? retain for years in the future
From your guide, list
1. Choose one of the following:
the Key concept(s) Combine components
-identities & relationships from the Global
-orientation in space & time that is the focus of
your unit. Context box with the
-personal & cultural expression
-fairness & development Key Concepts box to
-scientific & technical innovation Also, list any related create a significant
-globalization & sustainability
concepts that are concept statement
important to the
2. Why? “Students will development of this
explore…” planner
Lines of Inquiry
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Assessment
What task(s) will allow students the opportunity to respond to the unit question?
What will constitute acceptable evidence of understanding? How will students show what they have understood?
This is where you summarize the summative assessment(s) that will be graded using the
MYP rubrics.
□ Write the type of assessment (test, project, essay, etc.) and a brief description of what
students will be required to do.
□ The summative assessment needs to allow students the opportunity to respond to the
Lines of Inquiry written above.
□ Take wording directly from the objectives list in your MYP subject guide □ Consider how
these objectives will be assessed in the UNIT
Approaches to learning
How will this unit contribute to the overall development of subject-specific and general approaches to learning skills?
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ATL skills help students to identify the specific skills necessary to develop purposeful and
effective habits of mind. These skills must be explicitly taught.
□ Choose the ATL skills that will be the focus of the unit, and then explain how you will be
explicitly teaching the skills.
□ The five ATL categories are:
*Research
*Communication
*Thinking
*Self-management
*Social
These are the sequential lessons that will These are the instructional approaches you will
appear as detailed plans in your DAILY use to ensure that all students have equal access
LESSON PLAN binder/book to the content
□ First, how will expectations be □ First, list how you collect formative assessment
communicated? List the things you do to data
share expectations with students.
□ Second, explain the teaching methodologies
you use.
□ Next, outline the sequence of lessons □ Finally, explain how you will differentiate your
including specific learning activities unit for all students
*** See Stage 2 Planning Resource
*** See Stage 2 Planning Resource
Resources
What resources are available to us?
How will our classroom environment, local environment and/or the community be used to facilitate students’ experiences
during the unit?
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On-going reflections and evaluation
In keeping an on-going record, consider the following questions. There are further
stimulus questions at the end of the “Planning for teaching and learning” section of
MYP: From principles into practice.
Students and teachers
What did we find compelling? Were our disciplinary knowledge/skills challenged in any way?
What inquiries arose during the learning? What, if any, extension activities arose?
How did we reflect—both on the unit and on our own learning?
Which attributes of the learner profile were encouraged through this unit? What opportunities were there for
student-initiated action?
Possible connections
How successful was the collaboration with other teachers within my subject group and from other subject groups? What
interdisciplinary understandings were or could be forged through collaboration with other subjects? Assessment
Data collection
How did we decide on the data to collect? Was it useful?
This section of the planner is to be completed after the conclusion of the UNIT. It is used as
a reference when planning the next iteration of the UNIT.
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IB PLANNER STAGE 2 RESOURCE
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Social Collaboration • Communication
• Cooperative learning: roles & responsibilities
• Co-creation of work
• Conflict /resolution,
• Teambuilding
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MYP Key Concepts
・Aesthetics deals with the characteristics, creation, meaning and perception of beauty and taste. The study
of aesthetics develops skills for the critical appreciation and analysis of art, culture and nature.
・Change is a conversion, transformation or movement from one form, state or value to another. Inquiry into
the concept of change involves understanding and evaluating causes, processes and consequences.
・Communication is the exchange or transfer of signals, facts, ideas and symbols. It requires a sender, a
message and an intended receiver. Communication involves the activity of conveying information or
meaning. Effective communication requires a common language (which may be written, spoken or
non-verbal).
・Communities are groups that exist in proximity defined by space, time or relationship. Communities
include, for example, groups of people sharing particular characteristics, beliefs or values as well as groups
of interdependent organisms living together in a specific habitat.
・Connections are links, bonds and relationships among people, objects, organisms or ideas.
・Creativity is the process of generating novel ideas and considering existing ideas from new perspectives.
Creativity includes the ability to recognize the value of ideas when developing innovative responses to
problems; it may be evident in process as well as outcomes, products or solutions.
・Culture encompasses a range of learned and shared beliefs, values, interests, attitudes, products, ways of
knowing and patterns of behavior created by human communities. The concept of culture is dynamic and
organic.
・Development is the act or process of growth, progress or evolution, sometimes through iterative
improvements.
・Form is the shape and underlying structure of an entity or piece of work, including its organization,
essential nature and external appearance.
・Global interactions, as a concept, focuses on the connections among individuals and communities, as well
as their relationships with built and natural environments, from the perspective of the world as a whole.
・Identity is the state or fact of being the same. It refers to the particular features that define individuals,
groups, things, eras, places, symbols and styles. Identity can be observed, or it can be constructed, asserted
and shaped by external and internal influences.
・Logic is a method of reasoning and a system of principles used to build arguments and reach conclusions.
・Perspective is the position from which we observe situations, objects, facts, ideas and opinions.
Perspective may be associated with individuals, groups, cultures or disciplines. Different perspectives often
lead to multiple representations and interpretations.
・Relationships are the connections and associations between properties, objects, people and ideas—including
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the human community’s connections with the world in which we live. Any change in relationship brings
consequences—some of which may occur on a small scale, while others may be far reaching, affecting large
networks and systems such as human societies and the planetary ecosystem.
・Systems are sets of interacting or interdependent components. Systems provide structure and order in
human, natural and built environments. Systems can be static or dynamic, simple or complex.
・The intrinsically linked concept of time, space and place refers to the absolute or relative position of
people, objects and ideas. Time, place and space focuses on how we construct and use our understanding of
location (where and when).
LANGUAGE ACQUISITION
Phases 1-2
Phases 3-4
Phases 5-6
Economics
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Resources Scarcity Sustainability Trade
Geography
History
Integrated Humanities
SCIENCES
Biology
Chemistry
Physics
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Integrated Sciences
MATHEMATICS
THE ARTS
Visual Arts
Performing Arts
DESIGN
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MYP Assessment Criteria
Course
MYP Subject A B C D
group
Sciences Knowing and Inquiring and designing Processing and evaluating Reflecting on the impacts
understanding of science
Physical and Knowing and Planning for performance Applying and performing Reflecting and improving
health education understanding performance
Design Inquiring and analyzing Developing ideas Creating the solution Evaluating
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