ED 722-Week 8 Differentiating for a Group of Students

When I began teaching, we had three main levels in my school.

• C Level - Also known as honors- very rigorous
• B Level - College prep level
• A Level - Basic level

About three years ago, under a state initiative, they collapsed the levels into two.

• Academic - college prep
• Accelerated - honors

When they collapsed the levels, we were told to teach the Academic level as a college prep level and the Accelerated level as an honors level.  This soon became an issue as there was a huge mix of students in the Academic level.  In the Academic level you had a mix of special education students, students from the "A level" and some from the "B level".  This led fro an extreme amount of differentiation. As the years progressed, I found myself teaching the class at a lower level which led to some students being bored because they were true "B-level' students.

It is now very interesting to try to differentiate in a class with students of so many learning abilities, but I try to make it work every day.  I try to incorporate group work, peer work, and projects.  All of this while I try to continually express concerns for those students who may be falling behind.  As much as I try to differentiate, what else can I do for those who still fall behind?

I really was interested in this week's DLMOOC as it hit home with the differentiation and how we need to teach to such a wide range of learners.  It is a huge issue in education and I feel it can become bigger and bigger as years progress.

Here is my storify on differentiation:
                      Week 8 Storify-Differentiation