Elizabeth Schuricht LMU 6080 February 11, 2009 Advanced Special Populations: Artifact As a third-year high school teacher I still struggle with differentiated instruction. The students in my classes vary in ability and motivation, and as a result, I attempt to create lessons that keep pace with the swiftest learners while making certain I don’t alienate the learners who need more scaffolding and support. Unfortunately, sometimes the time crunch and amount of outside work required of me as a teacher at a small charter high school leaves me reluctant to plan such differentiated lessons. When I do teach a well-differentiated lesson, however, my students and I are rewarded for the time invested. These lessons are naturally more engaging for a broader range of students, and they provide a more structured class period where students are guided towards autonomy and student-centered learning. In my classroom, differentiation takes many forms. Generally speaking, I regularly differentiate my tests, writing assignments, and warm-ups by providing students with choices that cater to diverse learning styles as well as learning speeds. On an exam, for instance, I often give my students a choice of which questions to answer. Not only does this eliminate anxiety for students because they don’t feel pegged into answering all the questions, but it also allows me to provide different modes of response for students with different learning styles. The following is a question from an exam based on Shakespeare’s Hamlet:
With this example, my students can choose the option that caters to their preferred method of learning with creativity, and I can still gauge their level of understanding the text. With journal entries or warm-ups, I often offer at least two options for student response. One option is often a question geared towards a personal response based on opinion or experience, while other options can include analyzing a quote or making a connection between a passage and material covered in other classes. I find that the ability to choose a warm-up that suits a particular learning style allows students to feel successful and appropriately challenged from the beginning of a class period. Additionally, I allow students the option of choosing their own essay topics within a selected range. While sometimes alternative assignments are offered, as a teacher of English Language Arts, I expect my students to learn how to write an analytical essay including composing a high level thesis statement. In order to differentiate critical, standards-based assignments, I guide my students towards topics by asking them to consider and decide which themes, characters, and symbols interest them in the readings and create their own topics or issues around those personal interests. As a result, students tend to challenge themselves to create topics that will hold their attention and in turn, increase their levels of intrinsic motivation. Seniors are often able to handle this task when reminded that it is a preview of a college level assignment in which a professor gives little direction beyond a page limit and a required number of resources. Differentiation in my classroom is a learning process. Occasionally I have exemplary lessons and occasionally the lessons fall flat. What I have learned, however, is that by providing choice for my students and offering a range of assignment options, my students are more able to meet my performance expectations. Each student may take a different route to master the standards, but the goal is mastery, the steps he took in order to reach that goal becomes less important. |