Challenge Bank

The Critical Skills model of instruction builds powerful lessons in classrooms ranging from pre-K to post-graduate. The model combines experiential learning, problem based learning, and rigorous high standards within an intentionally created collaborative learning community, creating the classrooms that many educators imagine, but can't quite put together. It is the “how” in answer to the “what” of powerful classroom practice. And it was created, continues to be created, by practicing classroom teachers.

The primary methodology in use is the challenge - a carefully crafted problem to solve which connects the curriculum to its real-world application. Challenges can be highly complex or quite simple, may take minutes or weeks to complete, and are driven by the state, local, or national subject area curricula as well as by the formative assessment gained via ongoing student reflection. Elementary students may grapple with the problem of selecting the largest apple to present to the principal following a field trip, secondary students might be seeking alternative energy transportation options for the district or creating a new grammar text using only a small set of short stories and newspaper articles. The exact challenges are as diverse as the teachers who create them and the students for whom they are created. But all share three components:

The students engage
The students exhibit their learning
The students debrief their learning

Download sample challenges below.

Title	Grade Level	Subject	Type
Vermont Welcome Center Barn Replicas	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Barn Restoration Challenge	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Barns of Today and Long Ago	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Pictue Book Modeling	Elementary	English	PDF
Branches of US Government	Elementary	Social Studies	PDF
Building a School Model	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Name that Rock!	Elementary	Science	Word
The trial of John Brown	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Biography of the Land	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Pattern Challeges	Elementary	Math	Word
Science & Cooking	Elementary	Science	Word
Oral History	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Slavery	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Solar Power for Schools	Elementary	Science	Word
Recycling Challenge	Elementary	Science	Word
Wool	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Creating wool baby hats	Elementary	Social Studies	Word
Weightroom Challenge	High School	PE	Word
French Verb Tenses - Past tense	High School	Foreign Languages	Word
Planning & Implementing Snack	High School	FACS	Word
Mousetrap Cars	High School	Science	Word
Senior Citizen Fitness	High School	PE	Word
Introduction to Power Tools	High School	Carpentry	Word
Government and Personal Liberties	High School	Social Studies	Word
Of Mice and Men	High School	English	Word
PE Muscle Challenge	High School	PE	Word
Music as the Universal Language	High School	Music	Word
Vive le franVais!	High School	Foreign Languages	Word
Garden Geometry	High School	Math	Word
The Great Gatsby	High School	English	Word
Introduction to Hand Tools	High School	Carpentry	Word
Imperialism	High School	Social Studies	Word
Elizabethan Sonnets	High School	English	Word
Scenario Challenge: 11th grade English	High School	English	Word
Creative Writing: Fiction Fondue	High School	English	Word
Name That Grammar Skill!	High School	English	Word
Citizens in a Global Society	High School	Social Studies	Word
Coffeehouse	High School	English	Word
Collaborative Writing	Middle School	English	Word
Math Skills Basic	Middle School	Math	Word
Amending the Bill of Rights	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Fahrenheit 451	Middle School	English	Word
Early Explorers of North America	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Ancient Native Americans	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Animal Exhibits	Middle School	Science	Word
NH Geography	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
South American Birthday Surprise	Middle School	Math	Word
Women are from Venus, Men are from Mars, but how did they get there?	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Peterborough History	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Biography of the Land, 5th/6th grade	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Creating a field guide for macroinvertebrates	Middle School	Science	Word
Local Field Trips	Middle School	Social Studies	Word
Quilt Geometry	Middle School	Math	Word
Narrative Writing	Middle School	English	Word
Paleontology	Middle School	Science	Word
Shakespeare	Middle School	English	Word
Math Skill Building	Middle School	Math	Word
Math Skills Multiplication	Middle School	Math	Word
A Letter to the Editor	Middle School	Foreign Languages	Word
A Bilingual Story Books	Middle School	Foreign Languages	Word
Spanish Explorers	Middle School	Foreign Languages	Word
Music Styles	Middle School	Music	Word
Tornado Challenge	Middle School	Science	Word
Vocabulary Challenge	Middle School	English	Word
Salmon Brook Watershed	Middle School	Science	Word
Safety Procedures	Middle School	Science	Word
Wildlife Documentary	Middle School	Science	Word

Click here to view the Adirondack Challenges: student-centered, K-12 learning activities designed by classroom teachers to specifically help students learn about and develop appreciation for the human and natural history of the Adirondacks, as well as meet state and national learning standards.

Last Updated: 12/4/09