At my school we are working with a program that allows us to utilize a variety of differentiation skills so that we are better assisting our students' needs. We are also ensuring all of our students are receiving high quality instruction by revisiting our curriculum and unit plans. We are looking closely at questioning in the classroom and utilizing Webb's Depth of Knowledge (DOK) stems with our questioning. It is through this that we are also looking at the tasks we are giving our students. We are making sure it is based on student choice, interest, and skill level. These tasks are also created through DOK levels as well (Analyze, Create, etc). The obstacle we are facing now is time because this type of planning takes a lot of time. We try to plan together once or twice a week so we are not all doing this alone but it still is taking a lot of time to put all of this together. The only good thing about this planning is we will be more prepared for next year.
Sunday, March 24, 2013
At my school we are working with a program that allows us to utilize a variety of differentiation skills so that we are better assisting our students' needs. We are also ensuring all of our students are receiving high quality instruction by revisiting our curriculum and unit plans. We are looking closely at questioning in the classroom and utilizing Webb's Depth of Knowledge (DOK) stems with our questioning. It is through this that we are also looking at the tasks we are giving our students. We are making sure it is based on student choice, interest, and skill level. These tasks are also created through DOK levels as well (Analyze, Create, etc). The obstacle we are facing now is time because this type of planning takes a lot of time. We try to plan together once or twice a week so we are not all doing this alone but it still is taking a lot of time to put all of this together. The only good thing about this planning is we will be more prepared for next year.
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I love the idea of differentiation as it provides teachers with different ways to meet the needs of the students. Studying differentiation also support STEM because it builds the higher order skills that students need to function in today's society. Collaborative planning is also good because widens the pool of ideas and helps to build better understanding of the concept of differentiation.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely! When I first started teaching I thought it would be so very difficult to differentiate for each and every student but then I started to work smarter not harder. I let the students choose their products they want to submit for mastery so that they can choose by level and challenge themselves when needed. Its a great way to put the students in the driver seat instead of me telling them they have to complete a task because I "said so".
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