What does differentiation actually mean?
You have heard the word a million times before and you are pretty sure that differentiation means changing the way you teach to reach all the learners in your class. But what does that exactly mean?
Here’s the low-down on what differentiated teaching is and what it isn’t.
What it’s not!
I used to think that differentiated instruction was meeting the individual needs of a student through individual instruction and 'remedial' practices. Differentiated teaching is not:
1... about individual instruction
Although there will be times that individual instruction happens in
Interesting post, although your article asks teachers to consider the different learning styles which may exist in the classroom yet hyperlinks to a previous Teacher Toolkit post which states learning styles theory is ‘codswallop’ (which it is).
I agree that differentiation is more about summative than formative assessment, but I think that factors such as washback and teaching-to-the-test will affect whether and how we ‘do’ differentiation in our classrooms. While we might try to consider different needs and the fact that (in spite of the learning styles myth) one size does not fit all, at the end of the course or term most of us will end up asking our learners to sit at individual desks and silently complete test papers. How can differentiation be reconciled with the requirement for standardized tests?
Hi Martin, thanks for the comment. Well-spotted. We aim to publish all teacher views on the site; noted that past articles do dispel the myth – this is posted here for the reader to decide and is hyperlinked. Differentiation and standardised tests? Well, there’s a challenge …
I had the same reaction when I was reading this. This made me NOT link on the book.
One of the things that my co-teacher and I struggle with when differentiating tests and other math assessments is that we do not want to make it too easy for our struggling students. We want the degree of rigor to remain the same but at the same time do not want the students to freeze up when they see the assessment. The ways that we have done this so far this year with some success was fewer problems per page, two step word problems are broken down into more “bite-size” pieces, and changing some of the language from the “test language” to more student-friendly language. However, I feel as though I am doing a slight disservice to them because when they get to a standardized test they will see it as the way the state designs it. I agree with Martin above about possibly differentiating the standardized tests to better suit our students. Students with disabilities get test accommodations but they do not get a test that is built to their accommodation and when they see a state test they freeze up because of the length or the font size.
Hi Christopher. Thanks for the comment. Have you read End of Average by Todd L Rose? He writes a great deal about standardised tests and alternatives; not sure it will fix the immediacy of differentiation in your classroom, but it may make you feel a bit easier on yourself.
Thank you very much for the insight. Being in a 3rd grade classroom with 12 IEP students and 33 general education students means there are a variety of learning levels. I have students who currently are learning between Kindergarten and 4th grade. So far we have closed many gaps this year but I am always looking for new ways to understand and teach to the students who are struggling. My hope is that each gap is significantly closed by the end of the year. Using boost, blast, HD Word, and LLI have proven very successful. Are there any other reading programs that are fun yet innovative to help close the gap?