Creating a Vertically Aligned Curriculum

There’s a certain flow to a well-designed curriculum. It connects not only between units in a class, but also over years of education and between the subjects students study. When students learn skills from the foundation up, and when teachers reinforce those skills across grades and classes, that’s called vertical alignment. This is different from horizontal alignment, which describes consistent standards. What students learn between classes, schools, districts, and states or provinces should, ideally, be equal—horizontally aligned. 

Vertical alignment is the how and when of what’s taught. It’s about linking lessons, skills, and assessments together as a holistic experience. It helps prioritize, focus, reinforce, and place learning in new contexts. It helps schools make better decisions faster—and helps learners apply those skills in new ways. 

Teaching a vertically aligned curriculum involves comparing and coordinating moving pieces, from grade-level standards to unit content. Here’s what a vertically aligned curriculum looks like and how it brings cohesion into the classroom. 

6 Ways Vertical Alignment Supports Student, Teacher, and School Success 

1. Reduces unnecessary repetition

Many subjects share the same foundational knowledge. But when teachers design curriculum independently, they don’t know what’s going on in other classrooms. It’s quite common for students to re-learn the same material across grades and subjects. 

Vertical alignment requires teachers to think beyond their classroom walls and collaborate with their colleagues. Together, they can organize around a curriculum that focuses on developing those skills further, rather than repeating them over and over at the same level. 

2. Addresses gaps in learning

Quite the opposite of repetition, you also don’t want to miss teaching any core skills. A vertically aligned curriculum helps you identify where students are currently struggling and where they need extra attention. 

Similarly, when you compare your curriculums side-by-side, you can see where you’re thin in lessons, or where timing doesn’t match up between the basics and the next level of learning. 

3. Makes knowledge more meaningful

Imagine your students are learning about Africa in geography class. Now imagine they’re learning African folklore in English Language Arts, studying the animals of the Serengeti in science, and solving word problems that reflect life on the continent in math. 

That connectivity gives students more depth because they can apply their knowledge in many ways, from many different perspectives. 

4. Sets clear expectations

Vertical alignment is an exercise in coordination and planning. Curriculum maps need to be built ahead of time to make sure students learn skills in the right order. 

Not only does it let teachers plan around what students should know before they arrive for the day’s class, it provides a way for students (and their families) to know ahead of time what they’ll be learning and track progress throughout the year. 

5. Sparks professional growth

Student development depends on teacher development. Vertical alignment brings teachers together to talk about what’s working (and what’s not working) in their classrooms. 

The nature of collaboration means teachers get to see what other teachers are doing. It gives them opportunities to share ideas and pick up new approaches to try. 

6. Makes decisions faster 

Are students struggling with one topic in particular? Is there a gap that plagues your learning experience? Vertical alignment doesn’t just help suss out where you can improve as an institution—it helps you prioritize those gaps so you can focus on filling them. 

It means being nimbler, too. Taking out the guesswork and looking at the big picture helps drive direction to inform decision-making.

How to Start Vertically Aligning Your Curriculum 

There are five main steps to creating a vertically aligned curriculum.  

1. Bring your data together

Administration, regulators, and teachers alike need to share what’s happening, identify areas where there are common goals, and find gaps in the current process. For that, you’ll want to compare some key data points: 

• Targeted standards. Knowing what your objectives are before you begin (and when you need to reach them) will help you map the best way to get there, at the right time. 
• Unit content. Go beyond borders to examine in detail what students are already learning from across the spectrum of your school. 
• Assessments. Alignment applies to the way you measure student learning, too, to reflect a logical and achievable progression between grades. 
• Course materials and resources. Textbooks don’t always support a vertically aligned agenda, so it’s important that in-class materials line up between grades and subjects, too. 
• Student performance. The best way to identify gaps is by looking at trends. If students hit a wall during that week of trigonometry, there’s probably something you can improve. 

2. Study the data

Bringing all your school’s data together will result in a lot of information, so take the time to look at what it’s telling you. Step back, look at what you’re working with, and resist the urge to begin making decisions right away. Instead, encourage everyone to think about high-level connections between skills, knowledge, and subject areas. 

3. Build curriculum maps

It’s time to put pen to paper to put together the first version of your new curriculum maps. Like any masterpiece, the first draft—which this is—won’t be perfect. That’s okay. This is the starting point from which you’ll build something much better. 

4. Hold workshops and collaboration sessions

It’ll take a couple of sessions and iterations, but you’re working towards an important goal: writing a fully connected curriculum. Compare your new curriculum maps side-by-side, with the same data points as above, and align as much as you can. 

5. Keep communication open

A curriculum isn’t a one-and-done thing. It ebbs and flows, and topics change, so your team will sometimes need to make changes—and keep everyone else on the same page. Save your curriculum maps in a shared place and encourage professional learning communities where teachers can share tools and resources. Professional learning communities are also an important part of professional development. 

While designing such a large and cohesive curriculum may sound complex on the surface, a methodical approach helps to make its creation approachable and iterative. Keeping your goals in mind and putting student learning front and center will help you find your way every time.