Transcript Improving Teaching and Learning through Differentiated Instruction Saraland

Improving Teaching and
Learning through
Differentiated Instruction
Saraland
November, 2009
Dr. Susan Santoli
University of South Alabama
[email protected]
Introductions
• I’m __________ and I teach__________.
Select one of the following to add:
• When I think of differentiating instruction,
I need to know more about ______.OR
• One thing that that concerns me about
differentiating instruction is ________.
Please stand up if I say something
that applies to you:
• I differentiate my instruction.
• I have given a pre-test or a diagnostic
assignment.
• I have tutored a student.
• I have given students different books to read.
• I have taught students in a small group.
• I have analyzed similarities and differences in
students’ test scores.
Session Overview
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What is Differentiation?
Differentiation Strategies
Tips for Implementing Differentiation
Differentiation Practice
Resources
Not all students are alike!
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Varying background knowledge
Readiness
Language
Preferences in learning
Interests
Motivation
Differentiated Instruction
• Students have multiple options for taking
in information and making sense of ideas.
• Teachers adjust the curriculum,
presentation of information and
assessment to learners rather than asking
learners to modify themselves for the
curriculum.
• Classroom teaching is a blend of wholeclass and individual instruction.
Elements of Differentiation
• The teacher focuses on the essentials
• The teacher attends to student differences
• Assessment and instruction are
inseparable
• The teacher adapts content, process
and/or products
• All students participate in respectful work
• Collaboration between teacher and
student
• The teacher balances group and individual
norms.
• Teacher and students work together
flexibly.
All differentiation begins with
assessment!
Assessment
• Assessment is today’s
means of
understanding how to
modify tomorrow’s
instruction
• Think of assessment
for learning vs.
assessment of
learning
• Assessment should
always have more to
do with helping
students grow, than
cataloging their
mistakes
From Carol Ann Tomlinson
What Differentiated
Instruction IS
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Having a vision of success for students
Realizing that not all students learn the same way
Allowing students some choice in their routes to learning
Providing opportunities for students to demonstrate
knowledge they know and move forward
• Offering lessons of varying degrees of difficulty to meet
the same standard
• Combining whole class instruction with individual and/or
group work
What Differentiated
Instruction IS NOT
• A different lesson plan for each student each day
• Assuming that all students learn by listening and
writing
• Assigning more work to students who have
demonstrated mastery
• Only for students who need acceleration
• Giving all students the same work/assignments
all of the time
The What…
1. Content
2. Process
3. Product
The How…
1. Readiness
2. Interest
3. Learning Profile
Teachers Can Differentiate
Content
Process
Product
According to Students’
Readiness
Interest
Learning
Profile
The Access Center. Adapted from The Differentiated Classroom: Responding to the Needs of All
Learners (Tomlinson, 1999)
Instructional Strategies that
Support Differentiation
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Anchor Activities
Centers/Stations
Layered Curriculum
Tiered Lessons
• Entry Points
• Academic Contracts
• Compacting
Anchor Activity
• Student activities that are designed to
extend and review already learned skills
• Self directed
• Can free up classroom teacher to work
with small groups or individual students
Using Anchor Activities to
Create Groups
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Teach the whole class to work independently and
quietly on the anchor activity.
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Flip-Flop
Half the class works
on anchor activity.
Other half works on
a different activity.
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1/3 works on
anchor activity.
1/3 works on a
different activity.
1/3 works with
teacher---direct
instruction.
www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/enriched/giftedprograms/docs/anchor.ppt
Examples of Anchor
Activities
• Journals or learning
logs
• Supplementary
readings
• Learning packets
• Learning/Interest
Centers
• Investigations
• Research projects
• Think-tac-toe
(example to follow)
• Learning Contracts
(example to follow)
• Webquests or web
activities
• Silent reading
Geography Anchor 6th grade
• Students create an imaginary continentcan include country names, borders,
capitals
• Can add how various governments work,
different cultures, laws, etc.
• Can work on for whatever length of time
the teacher chooses
Agendas-personalized list of tasks that a
student must complete in a specified time
– Teacher creates an agenda that will last 2-3
weeks
– A particular time is set aside as agenda time
(each day, each week)
– Students generally determine the order in
which they’ll complete agenda items
– This could also be a choice of projects or
assignments
Examples of Think Tac Toe
Projects
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East Asia
2008 Presidential Election
Language Arts
Spanish
Centers/Stations
• Spots for concentrated work on particular
skills or assignments or areas that students
move through that contain different
assignments
• Holocaust Centers
• Math Stations
• Foreign Language
Layered Curriculum
• Students have a variety of activities from
which to choose
• Choices are presented in layers, where
each represents a different type of thinking
or depth of understanding
• Generally correlated to grades of
A,B,C,
Layered Examples
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Math
Egypt
Periodic Table
French
Kathy Nunnley site
Tiered Lessons-Summary
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Things in common…
Same concept or skill
Whole class activity
Some activities in the lesson
may be the same
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Differences in…
Amount of structure
Number of facets
Complexity
Pace
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Level of
Independence
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All Tiers should…
Build understanding
Challenge Students
Be interesting and
engaging
• Be respectful
http://curriculum.leeschools.net/
Summer/Preschool/PowerPoints/
DI/World%20Languages.pp
• Tiered Activities-used when a teacher
wants to make sure that students with
different learning needs work with the
same essential ideas and use the same
study skills
Language Arts
Science
Spanish
Examples from ss textbook resources
• Great Depression Tiered Lesson PlanLibrary of Congress
http://www.primarysourcelearning.org/teach/best_practice
s/diff_instruct_bulletin_sec.pdf
• Standard for lesson plan: The student will demonstrate
knowledge of the social, economic, and technological
changes of the early twentieth century by identifying the
causes of the Great Depression, its impact on Americans,
and the major features of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New
Deal.
Same content information,
different LEARNING PROCESS
• Everyone will answer these questions:
1. Describe what you see in the photograph.
Include as much detail as possible.
2. Compare and contrast your home to the home
you see in the photograph. What is similar and
what is different?
3. In addition to the first two questions, student
pairs will each receive one of the following
questions based on academic readiness level.
• Tier 1: If we could hear the people talking
about their life, what would they be
saying?
• Tier 2: From what you see in the
photograph, explain how you think this
room might be used by the family and
why.
• Tier 3: Assess the Great Depression’s
social and economic impact on
this family from the evidence in the photo.
Same content information, same analysis
process, different PRODUCTS
• Tier 1: Create a timeline of the Dust Bowl and Great
Depression era. Include the following 10 events with
accompanying visuals and written description.
• Tier 2: Create a scrapbook depicting the life of a child
affected by the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression.
Include information about where the child lives, his/her
family’s economic and social situation, recreation,
education, and prospects for the future.
• Tier 3: In the role of a political candidate, create a
persuasive speech proposing actions to address the
concerns of the Dust Bowl farmers during the Great
Depression. Incorporate information about the farmers’
economic, social and political problems and propose how
the government can and cannot assist them. Support
your plan with evidence from both primary
and secondary sources.
Same task, 3 different
SOURCES OF INFORMATION
Choose one of the primary sources below. Examine both the
information about the item and the item itself. Take notes of
important details that will help you answer the following
question:
WHAT WERE SOME OF THE ECONOMIC, SOCIAL
AND POLITICAL EFFECTS OF THE GREAT
DEPRESSION ON PEOPLE?
Tier 1: Dorothea Lange Photograph
of the Migrant Mother, 1936
Tier 2: Mrs. Mary Sullivan-August,
1940
A Traveler’s Line
Tier 3: American Life Histories,
Manuscript from the Federal
Writer’s Project, North Carolina,
1938
Nina Boone-North Carolina
• Entry points-based on Gardner’s Theory of
Multiple Intelligences
– Begin topic with overview for whole class
– Allow students to select entry points for investigation
Entry Points
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Middle Ages
Math
Language Arts
Biology
Academic/Learning
Contracts
•Written agreements between students and teachers
•What students will learn
•How they will learn it
•Time period for learning experience
•How they will be evaluated
•Usually opportunity for student choice
Grapes of Wrath
Environment
Compacting
• Requires pre-assessment before beginning unit
of study or development of a skill
• Students who do well on the pre-assessment
should not have to continue work on what they
already know
• A plan for meaningful and challenging use of
student time will be developed
• Can also be used in giving homework
assignments
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/curriculum/enriched/
giftedprograms/docs/ppts/compactingfixed.ppt
General Compacting Example
The Crusades
Web Quests http://webquest.org/ Students complete
an online quest
Think Quests www.thinkquest.org
Students create an
online quest or complete one posted by other students
Getting Started….
• Start small
– Start with your favorite unit/lesson plan
– Begin by teaching all students an anchor activitymeaningful work done individually and silently
– Early on, you may want to ask some students to work
with anchor activity and others to work on a different
task which also requires no conversation or
collaboration
– Try a differentiated tasks for only a small block of time
– Grow slowly, but grow
– Assess students before you begin to teach a skill or
topic
– Try creating one differentiated lesson per unit
– Differentiate one product per semester
– Find multiple resources for a couple of key parts of
your curriculum
– Give students more choices about how to work, how
to express learning or which homework assignments
to do
– Develop and use a two day learning contract, then a 4
day, etc.
You cannot differentiate everything for
everyone every day!
Differentiation is an organized yet flexible
way of proactively adjusting teaching and
learning to meet kids where they are and
help them to achieve maximum growth as
learners.