Instructional Practices for Deeper Learning

America Achieves and Asia Society support school systems in their efforts to improve performance. Asia Society’s Center for Global Education partners with schools and school systems to promote the incorporation of global education into policy and practice, including through the Global Cities Education Network (GCEN), which convenes city and education system leaders from the Asia-Pacific region and North America to share promising practices for addressing system-wide challenges in education. America Achieves facilitates the Global Learning Network (GLN), a professional learning community for school and district leaders from world-leading schools that are committed to improving education within their own systems and beyond based on shared best practices.

Asia Society and America Achieves contracted with Policy Studies Associates (PSA) to examine the instructional practices focusing on deeper learning skills in districts and schools participating in the OECD Test for Schools and PISA. A research team from PSA conducted site visits to high schools in four school districts in the United States and Canada to learn about the instructional practices and strategies taken by educators to promote the deeper learning competencies addressed by the assessments.

The report is intended to provide practitioners with concrete strategies and practices for supporting instructional improvement efforts. It is split into three main sections:

• What can system-level leaders do to promote instruction focused on deeper learning?
• What can school leaders do to support instructional practices?
• What can teachers do to improve instructional practices?

Each section is focused on what educators at each level of an education system can do to improve instructional practices for deeper learning. The goal is for practitioners at the system, school, and classroom level to learn from the experiences of the districts and schools in the study. One finding linked successful instruction to teaching for global competence: by incorporating local and global perspectives into instruction, teachers can better differentiate instruction and offer flexibility for all learners.

Download the report