Differentiated instruction is a teaching approach that tailors learning experiences to meet individual student needs. It involves creating clear rubrics to guide students towards specific goals, allowing for independent or group work, and providing diverse ways for students to express their ideas.
Allowing students to work independently or in groups to complete a product
Clear rubrics with criteria to enable all students to meet a level/target should be explained so all students to work toward a clear goal/level
Products are the outcomes e.g. produced work from a learning purpose and should be designed to give students a range of choice in which to express/communicate their ideas and knowledge
Process
Offering varying time for students to complete an activity; having extension tasks to promote critical thinking, analysis and the internalisation of new knowledge/competencies for more able students.
Provide different sources of resources for the students to gather their information e.g. different stations appealing to VARK learners
All students are aiming towards achieving the same purpose
(e.g. skills and developing knowledge) but with different levels of scaffolded support and appropriate expectations for the complexity of the level of understanding and the final product
Learning environment
Setting out clear rules, expectations and procedures agreed by the class to create a safe, calm and conducive learning environment
Providing materials where possible in different languages for
EAL students and using culturally appropriate resources that embrace diversity
The learning environment should be designed in a way
to accomodate quiet learning (a chill out zone), group/collaborative working and to accomodate particular physical needs e.g. large rubber balls or bean bags for those who find it difficult to sit still
Content: is the information that
the student needs to know or the means
that the information will be accessed
Special attention should be given to students with additional
needs e.g. small group work with teacher or TA to introduce the concepts
This should be presented in different ways to appeal to
learners with different preferences (VARK)
This can be presented using the principles of differentiation
using scaffolded reading materials (e.g. bronze, silver, gold challenge); giving key words/tricky words/key phrases on a reference sheet; working in pairs to assist