How many students are on your roster this year? 20? 25? Maybe even 30 or more? Even if you are teaching a small-sized class, your students will have unique needs. So how can you get them all on the right track?
The first step is recognizing your students’ differences and embracing them! You will notice that, like all people, students have different backgrounds, prior knowledge, skills, and interests. The second step is to research differentiation techniques that you can use in your own classroom.
Why is differentiation so important?
Differentiation is essential in the classroom because it gives students the highest opportunity for learning and success. For example, teachers can incorporate strategies for various learning styles such as kinesthetic or visual components to engage students.
All types of learners–special education students, English Language Learners, and more–benefit from differentiated instruction because it promotes equity through accommodations and inclusive activities.
How does differentiated instruction specifically help with reading?
Reading is a complex skill. When students struggle with it, there could be many components that they need to work on such as fluency, decoding, and comprehension.
When students are given the appropriate texts to read, they can make meaningful connections. ReadTheory constantly adapts to students’ levels, ensuring that they are on track to becoming fluent readers.
How can I easily differentiate learning?
When you use ReadTheory, the differentiating is being done for you! Students take a pre-test to determine their reading comprehension levels and then they are given passages to read and associated questions to answer. As students complete the questions, the work adapts depending on the correctness of their answers and they are given feedback in real time.
Teachers can use the generated data to further differentiate instruction. For example, you can create small groups based on student reading levels. You could also design your assessments according to the class’s current average level.
