Differentiated Classrooms

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Differentiated Classrooms

• Sparta Area School District

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Rationale For Differentiated Instruction

• Sparta Area School District Strategic Plan
• Mission Statement/Beliefs/Objectives
• District Teacher Evaluation-Five Standards
• Essential Challenges in the Classroom
• Motivation Issues
• Special Education
• Gifted Talented
• Legislation No Child Left Behind
• Response to Intervention (RTI)

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Differentiated Instruction Definitions

• Differentiation can be defined as a way of
  teaching in which teachers proactively modify
  curriculum, teaching methods, resources, learning
  activities, and student products to address the
  needs of individual students and /or small groups
  of students to maximize the learning opportunity
  for each student in the classroom.

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• Differentiation adapts what we teach, how we
  teach and how students learn, and how students
  show what they have learned based on readiness
  levels, interests, and preferred learning modes
  of students.
• Differentiation means starting where the kids are!

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Elements of Differentiation

• The Teacher Focuses on the Essentials
• The Teacher Attends to Student Differences
• Assessment and Instruction Are Inseparable
• The Teacher Modifies Content, Process, and
  Products

• All Students Participate in Respectful Work
• The Teacher and Students Collaborate in Learning
• The Teacher Balances Group and Individual Norms
• The Teacher and Students Work Together Flexibly

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Assessment Is Ongoing and Diagnostic

• Teachers assess as a means of understanding how
  to modify tomorrows instruction.
• Assessment may come from small group and
  whole-class discussion journal entries
  portfolio entries pretests skill interest
  inventories homework assignments exit cards
  and student opinion.

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Hallmarks of Differentiated Classrooms
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Snapshots From Two Primary Classrooms
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Examples From Two Elementary Classrooms
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Comparisons from the Middle School
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Samples from High School
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Learning Has Several Dimensions

• We can learn facts, or discrete bits of
  information.
• We can develop concepts, or categories of things
  with common elements.
• We can understand principles, which are rules
  that govern concepts.
• We can develop attitudes, or degrees of
  commitment to ideas and spheres of learning.
• We can develop skills, which help us understand
  what we are to learn.

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Examples of Levels of Learning
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Curriculum Elements

• Content
• Process
• Product
• Learning Environment
• Affect

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Content

• Content is what students should come to know
  (facts), understand (concepts and principles),
  and be able to do (skills) as a result of a given
  segment of study (a lesson, learning experience,
  a unit).
• Content is input. It could be textbooks,
  supplemental readings, field trips, speakers,
  demonstrations, lectures, or computer
  research/programs.

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Process

• Process is the opportunity for students to make
  sense of the content. Students must process the
  ideas presented to own them. They are more
  likely to incorporate them into their framework
  of understanding by utilizing activities within
  the classroom as a means of practice.

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Product

• A product is a vehicle through which a student
  shows (and extends) what he or she has come to
  understand and can do as a result of a
  considerable segment of learning.
• Product means culminating product, or
  something students produce to exhibit major
  portions of learning.

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Learning Environment

• The classroom environment should be supportive of
  a community of learners. The teacher leads the
  students in developing the sorts of attitudes,
  beliefs, and practices that characterize a really
  good neighborhood.
• Key characteristics Everyone is welcome
• Mutual respect Safe emotionally physically
  and The teacher and student collaborate for
  growth and success.

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Affect/Individuality

• Intelligence Is Variable
• Intelligence is multifaceted
• Intelligence is fluid
• Neurons grow and develop when actively used
  (Vigorous learning changes the physiology of the
  brain)

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Affect/Individuality contd.

• The Brain Hunger for Meaning
• It searches for patterns and meaning and it
• is much more efficient at retaining
  information that is chunked. Chunked information
  is organized around categories and ideas. It
  seek s to connect part to whole, connecting
  something old to new.

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Affect/ Individuality contd.

• Humans Learn Best With Challenge
• Moderate challenge is best. A task too
  difficult downshifts the learner into a
  self-protection mode, and a task too simple
  suppresses a learners thinking and problem
  solving ability, coasting into a relaxation mode.

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Building Differentiated Classrooms

• Teachers differentiate content, process and
  product according students readiness, interest
  and learning profile.
• Readiness-Tasks must be at the proper level of
  difficulty to be remain motivating.
• Interest-Tasks are engaging, satisfying, and
  personally challenging when interested.
• Learning Profile-Learning style, intelligence
  preference, and influences of gender culture.

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Differentiated Instruction Map
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Building Differentiated Classrooms

• When thinking about differentiating curriculum
  and instruction, three essential questions are
  useful for analysis
• What is the teacher differentiating?
• How is she/he differentiating?
• Why is she/he differentiating?

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• Differentiate What refers to modification of
  content, process, product, and learning
  environment.
• Differentiate How refers to modifications that
  respond to the learners readiness, interests, and
  learning profile.
• Differentiate Why addresses the teachers reason
  for modifying the learning experience.

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What, How, Why Example
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Instructional Strategies That Support
Differentiation

• Stations
• Agendas
• Complex Instruction
• Orbital Studies
• Centers
• Entry Points
• Tiered Activities
• Learning Contracts

• Compacting
• Problem-Based Learning
• Group Investigations
• Independent Study
• Choice Boards
• 4MAT
• Portfolios

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Stations

• Stations are different spots in the classroom
  where students work on various tasks
  simultaneously. For purposes of differentiated
  instruction, stations allow different students to
  work with different tasks. They invite flexible
  grouping. Not everyone needs to go to all
  stations nor spend the same amount of time at
  each station.

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Agendas

• An agenda is a personalized list of tasks that a
  particular student must complete in a specified
  time. A teacher usually creates an agenda that
  will last a student two to three weeks. Students
  can determine the order in which they complete
  the agenda. A particular part of the day is set
  aside as agenda time.

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Complex Instruction

• Complex instruction deals with academic ranges
  that frequently exist in a classroom, that are
  academically, culturally, and linguistically
  heterogeneous. Its goal is to establish equity
  of learning opportunity for all students in the
  context of intellectually challenging materials
  and through the use of small instructional groups.

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Complex Instruction Tasks
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Orbital Studies

• Orbital studies are independent investigations,
  generally weeks in length. They orbit, or
  revolve, around some facet of the curriculum.
  Students select their own topics for orbitals,
  and they work with guidance and coaching from the
  teacher. Orbitals work from the premise that all
  learners are dignified by developing and sharing
  knowledge and skills.

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Centers

• A learning center is a classroom area that
  contains a collection of activities or materials
  designed to teach, reinforce, or extend a
  particular skill or concept.
• An interest center is designed to motivate
  students exploration of topics in which they
  have a particular interest.

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Entry Points

• Entry Points is a strategy for addressing Howard
  Gardners multiple intelligences.
• He proposes student exploration of given
  topics thorough as many as five avenues or Entry
  Points.

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Entry Points Contd.

• Narrational-presenting a story or narrative about
  the topic or concept in question.
• Logical-Quantitative-Using numbers or
  deductive/scientific approaches to the topic or
  question.
• Foundational-Examining the philosophy and
  vocabulary that undergird the topic or concept.
• Aesthetic- Focusing on the sentence features of
  the topic or concept.
• Experimental-Using hands-on approach where
  students deal directly with materials.

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Tiered Activities

• Teachers use tiered activities to allow students
  to focus on essential understandings and skills
  but a different levels of complexity,
  abstractness, and open-endedness. By keeping the
  focus of the activity the same, but providing
  routes of access at varying degrees of
  difficulty, the teacher maximizes the likelihood
  that each child is challenged.

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Developing a Tiered Activity
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Learning Contracts

• A learning contract is a negotiated agreement
  between teacher and student that gives the
  student some freedom in acquiring
• skills and understandings by working
  independently on material that is largely teacher
  directed.

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Compacting

• Compacting encourages teachers to assess students
  before beginning a unit of study or development
  of skill. Students who do well on the
  preassessment should not have to continue work on
  what they already know. With 3-stage compacting,
  teachers document (1) what the student knows, (2)
  what the preassessment indicates the student
  doesnt know, and (3) a plan for use of time the
  student will buy because they already know the
  topic/skill.

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Problem-Based learning

• Students are placed in the active role of solving
  problems. The teacher presents a problem and the
  student seeks additional information, defines the
  problem, locates and appropriately uses valid
  resources, makes a decision about solutions,
  poses a solution, communicates the solution to
  others and assesses the solutions effectiveness.

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Group Investigation

• This strategy focuses on students interests and
  carefully guides students through investigation
  of a topic. The teacher helps with planning the
  investigation, carrying out the investigation,
  presenting findings, and evaluating outcomes both
  individually and as a group.

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Independent Study

• Teachers help students develop curiosity, pursue
  topics that interest them, identify intriguing
  questions, develop plans to find out more about
  those questions, manage time, and set goals and
  criteria for work, assess progress according to
  those goals and criteria, present new
  understandings to audiences, and then begin the
  cycle again.

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Choice Boards

• With choice boards, changing assignments are
  placed in permanent pockets. Students can make a
  work selection from a group of assignments
  designed for the student. Full instructions for
  the task is given at the place the student works.

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4MAT

• 4MAT hypothesizes that students have one of four
  learning preferences. Teachers plan instruction
  for each of the 4 learning preferences during the
  course of several days on a given topic. Some
  lessons focus on mastery, some on understanding,
  some on personal involvement, and some on
  synthesis. All students take part in all
  approaches.

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Portfolios

• Portfolios contain a collection of student work.
  They can be a powerful means of showing growth,
  setting learning goals, and having the students
  reflect and evaluate their work. They are
  motivating because of the heavy emphasis on
  choice and they provide an ongoing channel of
  assessment of the individual in reference to the
  individual.