Differeniated Learning

Differentiated Learning

The relationship between teaching and learning is very complex. Added to the complexity in classrooms, is the integration of students with unlimited types of special needs. In the past, schools have provided "pull-out" programs, special education classes and enriched groupings. These programs sometimes created a "sense of isolation experienced by students" (Brown, 2004). In the classroom today the students that would have historically been placed in these programs, are now integrated to create a "multi-level" environment. Teaching in today's heterogeneous classrooms, which have students at varying levels of readiness, interest and learning style preferences, I know I will need tools and techniques to address the range of requirements.

Providing for these differences is my challenge. Theories and research have developed that address what is seen in the classroom, the development of children and how students learn. A number of these theories present their information so that it may be easier for me as a teacher to understand what I see in the classroom, however, truly using these theories as a tool in the classroom for instruction can be limiting. I believe that differentiated instruction and learning can be used to incorporate several of the theories, to provide for a classroom that is meeting more of the learning needs of all of the students. However, differentiated instruction has its drawbacks that must be addressed, especially for fairness, development time and grading.

"Differentiating instruction means changing the pace, level, or kind of instruction you provide in response to individual learning needs, styles or interests." (Heacox, 2002). So then in order to provide for the individual, as a teacher I must first assess where the individual is currently situated. But situated where and in relation to what? The curriculum provides a standard of concepts and exemplars that I can use, to relate the students work to this standard achievement. So if I developing my language arts program and I want to incorporate a word study program, then I need to first develop some sort of assignment to assess the current level of spelling that each individual is at and set a goal that the individual is capable of working toward, within the curriculum guidelines. With a word study program this may be easy because the process of instruction can be differentiated around the development levels in the program; but what about science?

With differentiating instruction you can have the option to "differentiate the content, process or product" (George, 2005). In the situation of my science class, I may choose to differentiate the content, rather then the process. I could "launch my curriculum from key concepts and principles to ensure that struggling learners focus on what is most important" (Tomlinson, 1998). The differentiation in the classroom would focus around the development of the complexity of the content from within the curriculum unit, with struggling learners reviewing and manipulating the information so that they can make links to their everyday life, the average learner would access the information provided and use it in different ways to create meaning within a scope of ideas and the advanced level learners may use the information to create new understanding and to relate it to a different topic or idea.

Ongoing assessment is essential with the differentiated classroom to provide information and informal feedback to the student, parent and teacher on the success of the instruction for the student's ability to form knowledge from the content. The product for evaluation that students produce to demonstrate their knowledge of the content should allow for the individuals best means of expression, such as writing an essay or a poem, creating a poster or a program. For the learners outside of the norm of expectations, then the product may also be "varied as to difficulty and complexity" (Dull, 2005).

Varied content, process and product can create issues of fairness within the classroom, between students but also in my mind as the teacher. The most convincing of statements that I have read to deal with this issue was in Tomlinson's 2005 article, were she quotes herself from an earlier article, stating that "fairness in academically diverse settings is best conceived not as treating everyone alike, but working to ensure that each student has the support he or she needs to succeed". This statement addresses for me the issue of additional supports and structure, as well as differentiated product and content for students. I do also strongly believe that providing these supports to the students who need them is an essential part of providing for the heterogeneous classroom, however, Brown in her 2004 article makes a strong point that