Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Differentiated Learning . . .
Differentiated Instruction or Differentiated Learning seems to be a catch phrase in education today. Meeting the needs of all learners. I am attempting this in my classroom, but in baby steps. I have 'differentiated' in how students are allowed to display their learning in Math - one student created a Youtube video, some used Jing and word processing, others made a video and others used kidpix. But as I continue on in this process I am wondering if I am truly differentiating. Is giving students a choice in how they demonstrate their learning differentiation?
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If you teach a concept in different ways to different learners in your class, do you consider that differentiated instruction? I would. Being sensitive to the idea that different students learn in different ways is important to their success. I think the same holds true for how they demonstrate their learning.
ReplyDeleteDifferentiated instruction is a buzz word today, and I think when you allow your students to present their learning in ways that allow them to be successful you are differentiating your instruction. Remember the days when this "task must be done this way"...surely it caused a lot of students to feel they were not "smart" enough to do it or feel unsuccessful. At the end of the day I don't think it should be so important on HOW they show their learning but rather did they have an opportunity to represent their learning in a way that was meaningful to them.
ReplyDeleteI think the tough part about differentiated learning/instruction has to do with evaluation. Does our evaluation then need to change, too? It's not so easy to see and evaluate the learning when students present their learning individually, as it was when everyone had to do the task in a certain way. I think it's right that we need to differetiate, but I don't think it's easy.
ReplyDeleteI think that it all sounds good in theory but we teachers have too many kids in our classes, not enough resources and not enough TA support to really put it into practice effectively.
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