126 Copyright © 2016, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. Chapter 9 DOI: 10.4018/978-1-4666-9929-8.ch009 ABSTRACT By program completion teacher candidates should be able to profciently demonstrate the skills associ- ated with the teaching profession. This includes their ability to design instructional units on a set of standards. This chapter describes the process of preparing teacher candidates to design instructional units as part of the edTPA performance-based assessment. Two specifc course assignments that are completed during candidates’ junior and senior years are described. Implications for teacher educa- tion programs include the signifcance of providing candidates with multiple experiences to develop the skills associated with the performance-based assessment and providing adequate feedback to candidates throughout the entire process. BACKGROUND On a daily basis teachers take on the role of instructional designers as they take content standards, unpack their meaning, and then design instructional activities that provide their students with rich experiences to develop an understanding of the content in the standards. In educator preparation programs (EPPs) this progression often starts with the planning and creation of a single lesson, and eventually develops into the planning and creation of a sequence of related lessons sometimes referred to as an instructional unit or learning segment. In this chapter the focus is on the design of learning segments. Frameworks and models that can be used to support teacher candidates’ instructional design have been advanced by various educational leaders (Smaldino, Lowther, Mims, & Russell, 2014; Wiggins & McTighe, 2011). Smaldino et al. (2014) proposed the ASSURE model which is an acronym for the Preparing Elementary Education Teacher Candidates to Design Learning Segments: The Case of edTPA Task One Drew Polly The University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA