Supporting students across a range of abilities requires teaching strategies that allow flexibility in the way students move through a unit of work. Cognitive and Cooperative learning tools like the ones below are excellent examples of thinking tools that give this flexibility without having to devise separate activities or risk leaving any one individual struggling to keep up. A major focus in teaching for differentiation is to always be aware of the cognitive (Bloom’s Taxonomy) level of the question/activities since it is much easier to ensure there are opportunities for differentiation at the higher-order thinking levels of Analyse, Evaluate and Design. This is even more pronounced when appropriate thinking tools are linked to the activities.
The tools below can be accessed via the ‘Course Cart’ and provide interactive graphic organisers/templates and videos to instruct students on the methods you choose to use.
Pre Assessment.
The content of a lesson can be differentiated based on what the students already know. An effective way to do this is using a strategy called a KWHL which stands for What do I KNOW, What do I WANT to know, HOW will I find out and what have I LEARNED.
This gives the student and teacher a clear idea of the student’s current level of knowledge on a subject. It also gives the student ownership of how they will proceed by the student self identifying what it is they need to find out and identifying how they will do that. The final step can form part of the assessment as it allows the student to present their findings in some form like, lists, Power Point or Prezi, a writing task or speaking. The 'Want to Know' section also allows students to differentiate their levels of curiosity and the 'How will I Find Out' section allows them to differentiate in their skills and ingenuity in research techniques.
Content
Teaching the information the student is expected to engage with can be challenging when trying to attend to the various knowledge levels in the class. A teaching strategy or thinking tool that caters for different ability levels (by itself or when combined with other strategies) makes the teacher’s job much easier. This is of course much simpler than having 3 different activities going on at the same time.
The simple KWHL above can in itself meet this requirement depending on the content being taught. Other suitable strategies are the Y-Chart, a SWOT Analysis and the PCQ (Pros, Cons, Questions).
Process
Using the right tool can make for a far more efficient teacher. Well scaffolded learning and thinking tools can allow the advanced student to work at their level. It also allows moderate or less advanced students to operate at theirs, all the while working on the same project. If a teacher lends their golf clubs to the number one player on the US Pro Circuit, that person would (presumably) play at a higher level than the teacher. But they are using the same tools for the job and therefore it is tool that allows the user to show a difference in ability.
Here is an example. If a teacher asks a student to write about their vacation and left it at that you would have a variety of different results but no guarantee of any solid thinking and process.
If however you first asked students to list 10-14 activities from their vacation and then asked them to choose their most memorable activity, the Elimination Draw would be an appropriate tool at the Bloom's Evaluate cognitive level. Follow this with a Split Y-Chart asking students to describe or explain what this activity sounded like, looked like and felt like (using the split of positives and negatives in each of the three segments). Now they have a clear list of what they did, a clear favourite activity (via the Elimination Draw), a great deal of data and description (via the Split Y Chart) and they are now able to present their Product (see next paragraph).
This will produce a better structured result while all ability levels are catered for.
Product
How a student demonstrates their understanding at the end of this process can remain flexible. The teacher may offer students four types of assessment. A writing piece, Power Point or Prezi, a speaking piece or even a labelled drawing with all/many of the items from the Split Y-Chart mentioned. The important part has been that the scaffolding is there and every student could operate at their own ability. The good news is that the teacher only had to produce ONE lesson plan!