Weekly Backward Planning for Co-Teachers: Start From Friday

Start in the classroom

Two co-teachers have 20 minutes on Monday to plan the week. Instead of asking “What are we doing Monday?”, they ask “What should students be able to do by Friday, and how will we know?”

Once that is set, the rest falls into place. Wednesday needs more practice and more student talk, so they choose parallel teaching: each teacher guides half the class through the same analysis (Strategies). Thursday needs a check, so they choose one teach, one observe, with the observer gathering preselected evidence on who is ready.

Twenty minutes, one week, and both teachers know their job every day.

The principle: evidence first, then strategy, then roles

The For Teachers page lists five decisions to make before class:

1. What should students know or do?
2. What evidence will show whether they learned it?
3. Which co-teaching strategy best supports that learning?
4. What will each teacher do before, during, and after the lesson?
5. What one question will we use to debrief?

Notice the order. The strategy is the third question, not the first. As the site puts it, choose the structure “after you define the objective, evidence, learners, space, time, and each teacher’s expertise.”

Co-Teaching Evolved, by Matthew Rhoads and Dr. Belinda Dunnick Karge, frames this as planning “efficiently while keeping equity, inclusion, and learning at the center” (The Book).

Two free tools for the week

Weekly Backward Planner (Chapter 5, two pages). Work backward across the week from desired learning and evidence to daily instruction.

Backward Planner and Strategy Tool Kit (Chapter 5, two pages). Pairs the weekly planner with options for engagement, collaboration, assessment, feedback, metacognition, and all eleven co-teaching strategies.

Before, during, after

The site describes a complete lesson cycle (For Teachers):

• Before: agree on the objective and evidence, select the strategy, assign visible roles, plan learner supports.
• During: use both teachers’ expertise, gather evidence, and adjust grouping, explanation, prompting, or modeling.
• After: compare intended roles with what happened, review student evidence, and choose one adjustment.

Short on time?

The site’s FAQ answers the most common worry: with little or no shared planning time, “start with one objective, one evidence check, explicit roles, and a low-preparation structure such as supportive co-teaching or graze-and-tag.” For graze-and-tag, agree on natural transition points and a simple tag signal before class.

Try it this week

1. Write Friday’s learning goal and evidence at the top of the Weekly Backward Planner.
2. Work back day by day.
3. Pick one strategy per day and write each teacher’s role next to it.
4. End the week with one debrief question.

Get the full framework in Co-Teaching Evolved by Matthew Rhoads and Dr. Belinda Dunnick Karge (Solution Tree).

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