Cross-Curricular Learning 🤝

Hey everyone,

Learning isn’t confined to the experience you curate.

Does that idea make you uncomfortable?

Relieved?

Defensive?

Curious enough to lean in?

If learning is happening everywhere anyway, the real question becomes:

Are we designing in a way that acknowledges it, or pretending our learning exists in isolation?

This issue explores the value of cross-curricular learning and why stepping outside “your lane” might be one of the most efficient ways to strengthen both your curriculum AND your community.

Stats & References

I know this newsletter reaches across multiple states, so let’s start macro:

Over 80% of U.S. states have adopted Common Core (Math/ELA), either directly or with slight modification.
Over 80% of states have adopted either the Next Generation Science Standards or an extremely close derivative.
Social Studies gets… complicated (hello, state-specific history and civics), but many frameworks are heavily influenced by the C3 Framework.
Over 50% of states have adopted some Social and Emotional standards across K-12, largely based on CASEL’s framework.

Well, if you clicked one of those, squinted, or thought “wait… really?” Mission accomplished.

A few important connections here:

The National Core Arts Standards (2014) were strongly influenced by the holistic, skills-based approach introduced with Common Core in 2010.
If you read December’s issue on cognitive load (refresher here), several of those ideas resurface throughout this piece.
The schemas learners are building require reinforcement beyond a single classroom or discipline.

Read #3 again.

if (count >=2) {

break;

}

// Cross-curricular jokes too? Dannnng!)

But, Why?

This isn’t about becoming an expert in your colleague’s discipline.

It’s about recognizing overlap that already exists, and using it intentionally to support schema development.

When you align your curriculum with the themes, skills, and thinking happening “across the hall,” you:

Strengthen transfer through repetition and various application
Share language, minimizing decoding and extraneous cognitive load
Enhance community through collaborative planning, executing, and evaluating
Focus on the whole learner, building 21st Century Skills more efficiently.

(Another set of standards? Kind of! Though they get interpreted a few ways)

But, How?

I’m blowing up my “strategies” section to ground this before it turns into:

“Sure Evan, I’ll just rewrite my entire curriculum and coordinate with seven departments.”

Step 1 📖: Read ONE other set of standards (plenty linked above)

Don’t master it
Don’t teach it
Just look for patterns, like skills or verbs (rigor)

Step 2 🧠: Align on the thinking

Supporting science doesn’t mean reteaching photosynthesis
Supporting ELA doesn’t mean assigning another argumentative essay
However, core skills of justifying choices, revising work, or evaluating evidence exist in both though!

Step 3 🗣️: Say the quiet part out loud

Students don’t automatically connect the dots because they are near each other
Try statements like “This is similar to how you…” or “This process should feel familiar from…”
Explicit connections reduce extraneous load and strengthen germane load. That’s not fluff, that’s intentional design. 💪

Step 4 🤝: Design or adopt a shared artifact cross-curricularly

Start small:

A shared rubric category (evidence, reflection, revision)
A common self evaluation process
Shared language for launching activities

Momentum builds faster than you might think, pinky promise.

Step 5 👷: Build transparency

Share your findings as much as possible (administrators, colleagues, parents, etc.)

Consistently ask (yourself and collaborators)

What stuck?
What confused learners?
How can we iterate on this?

I unpack some of this from a composer’s perspective through a YouTube video here, if you’re curious.

⚠️Warning, Strong Opinion Imminent⚠️

ALL learning should aim to develop the contributors of tomorrow.

21st century skills are guiding principles to ensure that happens.

I know I’m living in a fantasy bubble ignoring the reality of red tape and 8,000 other requirements your world slaps you with. But one small shift CAN make waves.