five key aspects of differentiated instruction

a couple of years ago one of my students who was an undergraduate preparing to be a teacher gave me a definition of differentiation that has become my favorite one he began his definition by saying that differentiation is a sequence of common-sense decisions made by teachers with a student first orientation it seems exactly what we should be doing he went on to tell me what he thought the sequence of common-sense decisions was he listed four things and I would add a fifth one to that first he said it's critically important to consciously be aware of creating a classroom environment that invites kids to the table of learning that encourages them to take the risk of learning that helps them understand that they need to work hard and shoot high but also causes them to understand that there's a support system there to help with that so the first piece is developing an environment that actively encourages learning and my sense is that affects everything else second he said he thought it was really critical that we have high quality curriculum that engages kids and that we be able as teachers to say at any point here's what kids should know what they should understand what they should be able to do as the result of this sequence of learning in other words it matters that we have clear learning targets that they are understanding focused that they're clear to us and clear to kids and that we have organized learning around those in such a way that it makes sense to kids that it's relevant to them third he said he thought it was really important that we continue to check to see where kids are constantly relative to those learning outcomes not teach a whole unit then give a test and say well gee some have got it and some of them didn't but using pre assessment and using formative assessment consistently so that we have a good sense at any particular moment of who's confused who's behind who's ahead who's missing knowledge then he said the fourth step was that when you monitor the kids using formative assessment you're likely to find out they aren't all in the same place and so it becomes instructionally important to say okay now how do i tailor my lesson plans tomorrow or this week so that I can get to kids where they are when do I need to meet with some kids in small groups and for what purpose are there students who need to be using different resources is there a different way I can help kids that didn't understand this yesterday try to wrap around it today those were his four elements my fifth one is that we have to learn as teachers to lead and manage a classroom in which it's possible for more than one thing at a time to happen as long as we ask kids to start and stop everything together always use the same materials always do stuff in exactly the same way will hinder a lot of learning and so it becomes really critical that we learn as teachers to help kids be our partners in creating a classroom which allows for flexibility but which also has clear structures that give kids and teachers the stability and predictability that they need for me differentiation is a continuum it's not a point and you don't get to a point say okay well I finish that it's always a question of okay let me acknowledge what I do and then let me look at some rubrics some standards some examples of teachers from writing some videos anything I can look at that can continue to help me stretch and think through what I can do better the people that I know who are the best with differentiation can explain to you really clearly and articulately how much further they have to go

Channel: suzzleQ

Views: 105,817

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Id: 3TRGl3iXoAE

Length: 4min 8sec (248 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 15 2016