Differentiated instruction to me is based on a foundation of flexibility, knowledge of student's needs, accessibility, and patience. As a pre-service teacher I have learned to be flexible and patient, as some strategies that I've used to accommodate students haven't always been as successful as I would have liked. Fortunately, this is a learning experience and each time something doesn't fall in place, I can reflect on it and make adjustments for the next time. It is also so important to me to be flexible, because no two exceptional students are the same; their needs and abilities are completely individual. This brings me to my next point. Knowing my students as well as possible is key to appropriately meeting their needs. It is important to know as much about their abilities or disabilities as possible and to be certain to be familiar with their IEP and/or 504 information in order to direct them toward the appropriate academic and behavioral goals. Differentiated instruction provides scaffolding for these students to help achieve. Accessibility is the final piece of the foundation for differentiated instruction. It is important to realize that the point of differentiating is to make the information accessible for ALL students. They will all achieve the same standard, but may get to it using a different route. Differentiation ensures that students will be able to meet standards using any means possible. Making more options available to them allows them more opportunities to succeed.
What struggles do you continue to have with the notion of differentiated instruction?
One of the major struggles I still have with differentiated instruction is that it can seem overwhelming. When you think about having to adapt a lesson to meet student's needs, and you have 23 students on completely different readiness levels with different needs to be met, it can be very frustrating. The only way I have found to cope with this, is to slowly climb in to differentiation by doing it one level at a time. My first year of teaching, I hope to be able to start small and work my way in to differentiation becoming second nature.
What questions do you still have or have arisen because of our work this semester?
I've noticed over the course of the semester, that meeting the needs of exceptional students is a combined effort by many professionals. Collaboration seems to be key when developing plans for students to meet their individual goals. A question that has arisen for me is, as a new teacher, in a new school, my first year of teaching, who in the school should be my biggest resource when seeking help in appropriately differentiating instruction for my students? What online resources can I use to access information that I may have forgotten or not learned about differentiation?
While answering these questions, share some benefits and challenges from your own personal experience you have had using the philosophy and methods covered in this course.
The biggest challenge I've faced as a pre-service teacher with differentiated instruction is failure for it to be effective. For example, I differentiated a lesson for my students this semester based on their learning styles. I provided a way for them to access information in the lesson according to their preferred style as well as a personalized assessment which also reflected their learning style preference. After completing the lesson, grading their assessments, and collecting a student survey, I learned that my lesson was not exactly successful. It turns out that their level of understanding and achievement did not increase, and their attitudes toward learning were not affected by my method of differentiation. This was extremely discouraging for me because I felt as if I had failed my students. My other frustration was that I was very unsure of where to go next with differentiation due to the complete disappointment of this lesson. I didn't know which step to take next. Should I have continued to try to differentiate based on learning styles and just try it in a new way, or should I have chosen to differentiate based on something completely different?
One of the benefits of differentiation is that when it works, it works well. If you can master your methods, the students can be very successful. An example would be a student in my collaborating teachers classroom. Before differentiation he had very low grades and levels of achievement and a very poor attitude toward learning. He had developed learned helplessness and had lost the drive to try anything on his own. I noticed when talking with this student one day that he was actually very knowledgeable in the content, but his struggles with writing caused a roadblock. He couldn't effectively get his thoughts on to paper and would ultimately give up. It does not make sense to eliminate writing all togther, because he needs practice, but to lessen the amount of writing to remove the obstacle seemed logical. So for this student's performance tasks, we allowed him to write 3-5 sentences on the topic, and then he could finish his assessment verbally or with an illustration. Verbally, he was able to show comprehension of the content, and he still had to write 3-5 sentences which forced him to practice, but not to the point of frustration. This student's level of achievement sky rocketed and he was able to regain confidence. He was even attempting to help other classmates. This was a very rewarding experience for me, because for this student, I was able to help him recover his love for learning. Differentiation made this possible.
Things as I've mentioned above make me wonder. How many students out there are fully and completely capable of learning content concepts, but are asked to display their learning in a way that creates a hurdle for them? To many times they are written off and forgotten about. My experiences with differentiated instruction this semester have not always been positive, but if their is even a small chance of helping even 1 student close the achievement gap, it's totally worth it.