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Why Big Ideas?

With Big Ideas our aim was to develop a purpose designed teaching and learning resources specifically for the VELS context. As VELS places the student at the centre of learning it was important to us that the textbooks and teacher resources did the same. As a result research into how students learn and understand was an important part of the project.

Recent studies confirm that students learn and understand better when information is connected to major ideas and themes. Such big ideas underpin all disciplines. In History big ideas include civilisations and society, in Geography, they include sustainability and diversity, and in Science, energy and matter. 

Big Questions

Combining big ideas with big questions, such as ‘Why do civilisations rise and fall?’, ‘How do we observe and represent the world?’, ‘What is sound?’ and ‘How are we governed’, creates a powerful pedagogical tool that frames enquiry and enables students to make sense of seemingly disparate facts and content.

Improved Understandings

This approach enables students to move beyond the rote learning of facts by encouraging powerful and transferable learning. Understanding the principles of sound or the development of ancient Egypt, for example, provides students with the foundations to understanding other forms of energy or the development of other civilisations.

Meaningful Connections

Oxford has also seriously considered the need for discipline-based learning to intersect with interdisciplinary learning and personal, interpersonal and social learning as required in the VELS framework. In particular, we have chosen to make strong and meaningful links with the Thinking Processes domain throughout the series.

Student Centered

In taking this approach Oxford Big Ideas enhances students’ ability to understand the changing world in which they live. They develop this by utilising a broad range of thinking skills and learning styles to promote meaningful and deep learning. This, after all, is the big idea of VELS.

To learn more about the Oxford Big Ideas philosophy visit the professional learning page.