Differentiated Instruction and Technology Integration
Differentiated Instruction is a district-wide goal that began this school year with the summer conference. Last year, I was asked to be a part of the teacher trainer group that was being formed to bring the information to the middle school. During those summer conference days, Linda Rice presented the course that we would be bringing to the staff. Later, we spent 3 days focusing on how to best bring the information to the staff. While I felt that I did differentiate to some extent in the classroom, focusing on differentiating specificially was something I felt I needed to do in order to better be prepared to help the teachers in my cohort group.
I started off the year with a desire to find out student interest, learning style, and background. Finding out this information in the beginning of the year in a much more intentional way has been a great way to guide my planning and to build connections. The following files demonstrate some of the tools that I used to gather some information about my students. Stacy Winslow and the other DI instructors were helpful as I planned.
As a Lightning Team, we had all of our students take a preliminary Multiple Intelligence survey at the beginning of the school year. The results were not as useful as we would have liked because of the survey we chose to use. Most, if not all, of the students had similar "numbers" in all of the learning styles. This made it very difficult for the teachers to determine the actual learning styles of the students. Members of the Reading department used an online tool that gave more accurate results. I would like to try that tool in the future in order to get an earlier feel of how my students learn best. While it didn't give clear results, it did help to see some general trends among the students. Most of the students preferred more kinesthetic activities and working in groups. This information matches the findings of brain-based research for students in this age group. Research shows that the best learning takes place in an environment where students can process the information in multiple ways, including through communication with their peers. This year, I have made it a point to make sure the students work together as much as possible and are up and moving when appropriate.
One tool that I used to get the students moving is the "Mingle Mingle Mingle" activity. Typically, when allowing students to work in groups, I would ask the students to choose a partner or to "Turn and Talk." While I did use these tools this year, I also had the students "Mingle Mingle Mingle" quite a bit. To do this, the students stand and find a partner based on a prompt similar to, "Find someone with the same hair color." After responding to a question with this partner, I then ask the students to move and chant, "Mingle Mingle Mingle" as they wonder around the room. When I signaled, the students would turn and high five the closest person, say "What up?!?" and respond again. While I was skeptical at first about the activity, the students LOVE to Mingle and ask to do it during class, proving that it is, in fact, a BRAIN thing NOT an AGE thing.
Formative Assessment is a piece of DI that I made an effort to be more cognizant of this year as I planned. I updated some old ideas and tried some new ones in my classes in order to get a better idea of what the students know. The grammar lessons that I have taught in the past have very much been "one size fits all." I thought grammar would be a good place to start as I attempted various DI strategies.
I began the short mini-unit with a pretest. I used a final test that I had created in previous years to create a pretest to assess various areas of grammar and sentence structure. I then used the results to create small groups to focus on areas of specific need. While not tiering at its best, it was a step toward tiering grammar.
As the students worked in smaller groups, I used different partner and group arrangements to make learning social.
In this unit, I also included some lessons updated to help make connections with the students. I made an honest attempt to create documents using sentences with topics that interest them (reality tv, popular music, sports, etc.). I also modified an existing powerpoint to teach sentence structure using the Simpsons.
An area of interest among many of our students is music. While teaching coordinating and subordinating conjunctions, the students worked in small groups to create songs to help them remember the words and their function. We had a lot of fun with this and the students walked away remembering the terms and their function.
Another example of DI tied with technology integration is and activity I did using the clickers. I used this activity as a piece of formative assessment, while building interest with the students. Ginger Green was able to help me with the clickers and getting this lesson together
Another aspect of my guided goal is to work on better including available technology into the English curriculum. Coming from a teaching environment in Harrisburg where each student had a laptop and the building was outfitted for 100% technology integration to the Middle School, I was forced to adapt my teaching methods and better plan how technology could be better included in my lessons. After 2 years teaching on the green team with a computer cart in my classroom, this year was the second year where I really experienced what technology integration really means at the Middle School. This year, I had the added issue of not having a classroom. Being a tech mentor for three years, I was exposed to many different tools that have a lot of educational potential. The problem, however, comes when time and resources become a problem.
The following is a description of when and how I have utilized technology in my classroom in the past and from this year with links where appropriate. I have also included links to the Pete and C wiki created and edited by Ginger Green, and to the tech mentor/ protege moodle pages.
A few years back, while teaching on the Green Team, I decided to use wetpaint.com as a forum for class discussion and class work. This site is similar to wikispaces, but also includes the opportunity for more editing and picture posting.
Overall, it was a fun experience for the students and a different way to encourage conversation and participation in class. The students enjoyed the opportunity to be on the computers for more than word processing and power pointing.
Unfortunately, the security measures I set up on the site did not cover the potential for social networking on a larger scale. The students began to abuse the site, using it to communicate across the school while in the computer lab or library, post pictures, etc. I had to dismantle student access after a large number of the students were caught using the site inappropriately.
Another issue that I did not account for was the tendency for students to fall into "text talk" even when in an educational environment. Though the students were reminded daily that they were in class and should be responding appropriately, the tendency was to immediately fall back to slang.
A consistent tool for me both last year and this year has been my moodle page. While I have not used it to its full potential as seen in college classes, I have used it quite frequently for different purposes. Quizzes and forums have been good tools with the students. Using moodle for links has always been an easy tool for getting students where you need them to be without worrying about typing a url address. In years past, while dealing with a sick daughter, I utilized moodle a lot when I was absent. Rather than having no communication with my students while I was home, I would often post class instructions, links, etc. on the moodle page for the students to do while I was out. I could see who was logged in, how long they took on lessons, etc. while home with a sick child. This year, I added the use of a virtual "In Bin" for assignments. Because the technology in our building is not consistent, there are many issues with opening/ printing/ saving from cart to cart or room to room. Having the students turn their projects or papers in online eliminated printing and saving errors that have been troublesome in the past. This also eliminated some of the excuse issue with students forgetting papers at home.
For two years, I was able to attend the Pete and C conference in Hershey. At the conference, I was able to attend sessions regarding technology integration. This link will take you to the session notes from Ginger Green which have also been edited by myself.
In class this year, I have made an effort to include more technology in my instruction rather than just in student production. I have utilized various web sources including Wordle.com and weblinks that are unit specific to help the students to "see" what we are working on. I have used powerpoint daily to project the agenda and lessons. I have noticed that students truely do appreciate the added effort of embedding links and animation. This helps to build interest and keeps their attention.
During my poetry unit, I relied heavily on the internet and the resources available. I used many videos and audio clips of poets reading and performing their work. I put a lot of focus on finding poets that the students could relate to sharing poems that the students were interested in. The students also completed a poetry anthology where they read and analyzed poems of their choice using guided internet searches. The also wrote and illustrated their own poems to include in the anthology.
Differentiated Instruction and Technology Integration
Differentiated Instruction is a district-wide goal that began this school year with the summer conference. Last year, I was asked to be a part of the teacher trainer group that was being formed to bring the information to the middle school. During those summer conference days, Linda Rice presented the course that we would be bringing to the staff. Later, we spent 3 days focusing on how to best bring the information to the staff. While I felt that I did differentiate to some extent in the classroom, focusing on differentiating specificially was something I felt I needed to do in order to better be prepared to help the teachers in my cohort group.- I started off the year with a desire to find out student interest, learning style, and background. Finding out this information in the beginning of the year in a much more intentional way has been a great way to guide my planning and to build connections. The following files demonstrate some of the tools that I used to gather some information about my students. Stacy Winslow and the other DI instructors were helpful as I planned.
- As a Lightning Team, we had all of our students take a preliminary Multiple Intelligence survey at the beginning of the school year. The results were not as useful as we would have liked because of the survey we chose to use. Most, if not all, of the students had similar "numbers" in all of the learning styles. This made it very difficult for the teachers to determine the actual learning styles of the students. Members of the Reading department used an online tool that gave more accurate results. I would like to try that tool in the future in order to get an earlier feel of how my students learn best. While it didn't give clear results, it did help to see some general trends among the students. Most of the students preferred more kinesthetic activities and working in groups. This information matches the findings of brain-based research for students in this age group. Research shows that the best learning takes place in an environment where students can process the information in multiple ways, including through communication with their peers. This year, I have made it a point to make sure the students work together as much as possible and are up and moving when appropriate.
- One tool that I used to get the students moving is the "Mingle Mingle Mingle" activity. Typically, when allowing students to work in groups, I would ask the students to choose a partner or to "Turn and Talk." While I did use these tools this year, I also had the students "Mingle Mingle Mingle" quite a bit. To do this, the students stand and find a partner based on a prompt similar to, "Find someone with the same hair color." After responding to a question with this partner, I then ask the students to move and chant, "Mingle Mingle Mingle" as they wonder around the room. When I signaled, the students would turn and high five the closest person, say "What up?!?" and respond again. While I was skeptical at first about the activity, the students LOVE to Mingle and ask to do it during class, proving that it is, in fact, a BRAIN thing NOT an AGE thing.
- Formative Assessment is a piece of DI that I made an effort to be more cognizant of this year as I planned. I updated some old ideas and tried some new ones in my classes in order to get a better idea of what the students know. The grammar lessons that I have taught in the past have very much been "one size fits all." I thought grammar would be a good place to start as I attempted various DI strategies.
- I began the short mini-unit with a pretest. I used a final test that I had created in previous years to create a pretest to assess various areas of grammar and sentence structure. I then used the results to create small groups to focus on areas of specific need. While not tiering at its best, it was a step toward tiering grammar.
Sub- Pred 3 pre.doc
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- As the students worked in smaller groups, I used different partner and group arrangements to make learning social.
- In this unit, I also included some lessons updated to help make connections with the students. I made an honest attempt to create documents using sentences with topics that interest them (reality tv, popular music, sports, etc.). I also modified an existing powerpoint to teach sentence structure using the Simpsons.
Sentences with the Simpsons-revised.PPT
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- An area of interest among many of our students is music. While teaching coordinating and subordinating conjunctions, the students worked in small groups to create songs to help them remember the words and their function. We had a lot of fun with this and the students walked away remembering the terms and their function.
- Another example of DI tied with technology integration is and activity I did using the clickers. I used this activity as a piece of formative assessment, while building interest with the students. Ginger Green was able to help me with the clickers and getting this lesson together
grammarclickers.ppt
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Another aspect of my guided goal is to work on better including available technology into the English curriculum. Coming from a teaching environment in Harrisburg where each student had a laptop and the building was outfitted for 100% technology integration to the Middle School, I was forced to adapt my teaching methods and better plan how technology could be better included in my lessons. After 2 years teaching on the green team with a computer cart in my classroom, this year was the second year where I really experienced what technology integration really means at the Middle School. This year, I had the added issue of not having a classroom. Being a tech mentor for three years, I was exposed to many different tools that have a lot of educational potential. The problem, however, comes when time and resources become a problem.The following is a description of when and how I have utilized technology in my classroom in the past and from this year with links where appropriate. I have also included links to the Pete and C wiki created and edited by Ginger Green, and to the tech mentor/ protege moodle pages.