The program that our school uses, Progress Learning (formerly USA TestPrep) aligns itself with the state standards, and the content is easily separated into manageable chunks covering the sub-standards. It automatically assigns remediation if the student scores below a 70. The remediation consists of a short video, and flashcards with vocabulary words built into a game, followed by a reading with several pictures to reinforce the lesson. Then they are re-tested, if they score above 70 they move on and if not there is an additional level of remediation in the program which is set at a lower Lexile level. The program can be set in different languages to assist the ESOL students. Every Friday, the students are given a three or four-question quiz covering the weekly material. For the students who are not in need of remediation, they are able to peruse ScienceWorld Magazine, part of the Scholastic family of magazines. These always contain an interesting article on a world issue from...
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I use learning stations because I think they offer a lot of opportunities for differentiated learning and they are good tools to engage the diverse population of students that we deal with on a daily basis. A student's entry point into a certain concept or ability at a given time is determined by their level of readiness. All groupings must be flexible so that students can move to different groups at different points in time and that readiness for one concept or skill is not always an indication of readiness for another. It is also crucial that all students have the same learning targets or goals that they are working toward, that students are matched to tasks based on some type of pre-assessment data, and that all learning targets or goals are shared by all students. I planned for different learning styles by engaging students in conversation and questioning them as well as asking them to summarize lessons in their own words. This supported the auditory learners and the visual le...
I recognized three students struggling with some lessons in eighth grade science after observing my mentor’s class for a 40-minute period. The following day, I had students Javier, Elias, and Tim meet me for small group instruction and some fun while doing remediation during the lesson. I first conducted a practical assessment with the three students to gauge their levels of comprehension of the prior lecture. Concept understanding tests, interviews, learning style assessment questionnaires, and activity observation were used to gather data. Students were chosen based on how well they each understood several topic groups. Two of the three students were visual learners with one kinesthetic learner. An instructional strategy for Tim, our Kinesthetic learner would be to make sure to have many options for manipulatives and games. Another strategy would be to use games like memory or a card game...
Technology is one of the strongest tools to employ when incorporating and supporting differentiation in the classroom since it allows teachers to scaffold students' everyday instruction. In their efforts to fulfill the needs of all students in their classroom, instructors who differentiate learning are demonstrating initiative (Tomlinson, 2017). These techniques promote student interest and involvement. A website named Newsela is a technical tool that is beneficial while differentiating learning. For instructional purposes, students can use this website to access a library of publications and periodicals. With various levels of the passage based on the needs of each student, it enables teachers to assign and use the same article as the students. Because it is simple for instructors and students to use, this platform is a terrific tool for educators. Either choose a scaffolded work plan that assigns Lexile work to students based on their accomplishment l...