Uncoverage
From: Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe (1998),
Understanding by Design.
A curriculum designed to develop understanding would uncover complex,
abstract, and counterintuitive ideas by involving students in active questioning,
practice trying out ideas, and rethinking what they thought they knew.
"Uncoverage" describes the design philosophy of guided inquiry
into abstract ideas, to make those ideas more accessible, connected, meaningful,
and useful. Uncoverage, then, must be done by design. (21)
From: Randy Bass, "Some Framing Issues for Our Work in Learning
and Technology." Colloquium on New Learning Environments: Plenary
2, February 22, 2000.
"Uncoverage" is a term that refers to the process by which
a few key terms or concepts in a course are uncovered for students. These
are concepts that are both difficult to grasp and crucial to building
a foundation for future learning.
The salient question then is how different might your syllabus look if
you begin putting a course together with the question: what topics do
I need to "uncover" in this course, as opposed to "cover"?
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