Integrated-interdisciplinary instruction is an approach that allows educators to simultaneously address multiple content standards while they help their students understand the interconnections between the knowledge and skills from diverse disciplines.  Integrated-interdisciplinary instruction also provides an effective and efficient strategy for teams of educators to address and reinforce more content standards than teachers can typically undertake if they work completely independently.

Students apply disciplinary knowledge to create their own comprehensive understanding of the community issue or problem they have chosen to explore.  These Community-based investigations allow students to explore connections between natural and social systems as well as the interrelationships among subject matter areas.

Using Integrated-Interdisciplinary Instruction, educators will find the following:

• Share common educational goals and instructional plans that cross traditional disciplinary boundaries;
• Organize instruction and learning goals within the context of the natural and community setting;
• Weave their instructional plans together to create integrated units based on content and skills from multiple disciplines;
• Incorporate adopted instructional materials into the design of their units of study;
• Work in teams, jointly supervising and facilitating instructional activities during the same timeframe;
• Have students work on related aspects of the same project in several classes simultaneously;
• Focus learning on the components, interrelationships and systems that constitute the students’ natural and social context; and,
• Measure student progress by assessing both a comprehensive understanding of the context and discipline-related knowledge and skills.

Integrated-Interdisciplinary Instruction focuses on developing an understanding of the local community by studying the relevant social and natural systems, structures, functions and relationships.  Through this approach students learn to recognize connections that they were previously unaware of and they see how what they are learning fits together to explain the world around them.  In addition to providing students with their specialized disciplinary knowledge and skills, integrated-interdisciplinary teaching teams provide students with a means by which they can gain a holistic understanding of the natural and social systems that constitute their community.

Traditional Discipline-Based	Discipline-Based + Environment	Multi-Disciplinary	Interdisciplinary and Integrated
Compartmentalized Learning Connected Learning Experiences Comprehensive Understanding