Instruction to Meet the Needs
of Diverse Learners
Effective Teaching Practices to
Insure Student Success
Inclusion
Legally Required: LRE
Access to General Curriculum
Access to Peers
Better Curriculum
Higher Expectations
Inclusion Issues
• Assuming that exposure to class is
enough
• Placement without pre-planning
• Not individualizing placement
• Over or under using paraprofessionals
• Focusing on activities-not objectives
• Not utilizing explicit instruction
Successful Inclusion
All teachers responsible for ALL students
Teach skills needed for success
All teachers us effective teaching and
behavior management-Universal Design
Special Ed. provides ongoing support
Frequent, regular monitoring of teachers
and students (data gathering)
Team problem solving
Universal Design
School established effective practice goals
School wide rules
Uniform classroom rules
Procedures/expectations taught to all
students
High levels of OTR-Opportunities to
Respond and student engagement
Learning/study and organizational
strategies explicitly taught to all students
Teaching Practices
Good teaching produces higher levels of
appropriate behavior
Good teaching produces higher levels of
academic skills
Good teaching produces greater learner
progress
Good teaching is a planned process-not a
“seat of the pants” proposition
Effective Learners
Are engaged
Are interactive
Have a wide knowledge base
Are active in their learning
Are motivated from within
Are goal driven
Monitor their learning
Can adjust behavior to not interfere with
learning
Ineffective Learners
Are passive
Do not interact appropriately
Have a limited knowledge base
Are not able to effectively monitor learning
Externally motivated/controlled
Are not goal oriented
Behaviors interfere with learning
Good Teaching
New material is presented through teacher-led
instruction
Effective instructional methods used
Practice activities are varied, motivating, and
promote generalization of skills
Students are engaged more that they are not
Students participate in group activities
Students are successful most of the time
Learning is more rewarding than not learning
Multi-Level teaching
Homogeneous groups for reading and math
instruction
Whole group instruction for Social Skills, Social
Studies, Science
Paras assist with groups where available
Use peer-tutoring, learning centers, projects,
paired learning, etc. for students who are not
with teachers
Teacher should regularly teach every student
Instructional Activities and
Arrangements
Large Group
Small Group-most time here
Individual
Direct Teach (one on one)
Direct Instruction-most time here
Practice
Ensuring Student Learning
 Provide high rates of active student responding
(OTR)
 Provide immediate and complete error
correction
 Teach Vocabulary!!
 Teach students learning tools (mnemonics,
learning strategies
 Use research-based instruction
 Priming
 Conspicuous strategies
 Mediated scaffolding
 Judicious review
Opportunities to Respond
New Learning
4-6 opportunities per minute with 80%
correct
Review
8-12 opportunities per minute with 90%
correct
Active Student Responding
Choral Responses
Response Cards
Guided Notes
Choral Responding
Provides high level of OTR
Allows “anonymous” participation
Teacher provides cue for when to respondvisual or auditory
Uncertain responses-do firming
Listen for errors-correct immediately
Use individual responses for assessment
and differentiation
Response Cards
Strong research support
High motivational value
Used in large groups, individually, in pairs
Pre-printed or write on
Teacher asks question, provides wait time,
cues-students respond with cards
Many variations-all effective
Guided Notes
 “Tree” outline
Flow Charts
Venn Diagrams
“Framing”-go to
www.graphicorganizers.com for ideas
Guided notes provide a structure-beneficial
if all students in a school are taught a
basic “frame” in common.
Error Correction
Be explicit
Be immediate
Lead to independence (refer to rule or
strategy during correction)
Explicit Instruction
 Tell students what you want them to learn
 Give very clear, direct instructions
 Demonstrate/model/guided practice/independent
practice
 Model/lead/test format
 Clear, consistent error correction
Correct response-acknowledge
Incorrect response-correct
Uncertain response-firm
www.cast.org/publications/ncac/ncac_explicit.html
www.xnet.rrc.mb.ca/glenh/understanding_by_design.htm
For good ideas for lesson design and evaluation
Priming Background Knowledge
Relating knowledge that students must
know to learn a new skill, concept, or
strategy
Plan before lesson-”What do students
need to know before they can learn this?”
Question-discuss-review this background
knowledge BEFORE presenting new skill
Examples of Priming
K-W-L: What do I know, what do I want to
know, what have I learned?
Direct instruction curricula (scripted
lessons)
Beginning of class warm-ups
Graphic organizers
Conspicuous Strategies
 Teach learners the “tricks of the trade”-what the
experts know
Examples:
Reminder acrostics
“Rules”: Silent “e” makes the vowel say its name.
How do “experts” find the main idea of a passage/
How do “experts” set up a math problem from a
story problem?
Mediated Scaffolding
High levels of support in the early stages
of learning
Gradually fade support as student masters
skills
For ideas: go to
www.projects.edtech.sandi.net/staff
development/presentation/scaffolding.htm
Judicious Review
Well thought out
Well planned
Carefully reflects what they need to know
Continuous-spirals with additional
knowledge throughout the year
Vocabulary
Vocabulary knowledge has been proven to
be critical to school success
Vocabulary development is a fundamental
goal for early grades
The vocabulary gap widens in early
grades
Explicitly teaching vocabulary is essential
at all grades
Teaching Vocabulary
Provides students skills and opportunities
to learn vocabulary independently
Teaches students the meanings of
unfamiliar words and concepts
Fosters an appreciation and awareness of
words and their use
Brings words to life-encourages word play
Direct Vocabulary Instruction
Provides clear, understandable, kidfriendly definitions
Uses both definitions and context
Provides lost of varied opportunities to
interact with words
Provides lost of review and opportunities
for learning
(English language learner dictionaries are a
good source of kid friendly definitions)
Vocabulary Strategy-LINCS
1) List the word and definition
2) Indicate a reminding word (looks likesounds like)
3) Note a LINCing story
4) Construct a LINCing picture
5) Self-Test
LINCS Example
• Compromise
Essential definition: an agreement, where
each gives up something
Reminding word: promise
LINC-ing story: Both promised to give up
something to reach an agreement.
LINC-ing picture:
Levels of Vocabulary
No knowledge
General sense
Narrow context-bound knowledge
Knowledge of a word without ability to
recall and use it in appropriate situations
Rich, decontextualized knowledge of a
word’s meaning, its relationship to other
works, and its extension to metaphorical
uses (Beck, McKeon & Kucan, 2002)
Mnemonics
Keywords
Letter Strategies (acrostics,acronyms)
Pegwords
Research supports the use of
mnemonics as a learning strategy for
diverse learners. These techniques
make learning easier.
Keywords
For vocabulary or pairs of information
Involves elaboration and imagery
Students use background knowledge to
learn new concepts and vocabulary
Ex: Arkansas-picture of an ark being sawed in
half
Ex: Handel-Baroque composer
Picture of a man bringing broken(baroque)
handle bars (Handel) to a bikeshop
Letter Strategies
ROYGBIV-order of colors in rainbow
Please excuse my dear aunt Sally-order of
operations in math
FACE-space notes
Every good boy does fine: line notes
Use letter strategies for lists of information.
Pegwords
For numbered or ordered information
Involves elaboration and imagery
combined with pegwords (words
associated with numbers)
In general, teach all kids one set of
pegwords- Scruggs and Mastropieri have
one, Quantum list is another-kids can
“tweak” as they wish
Pegword Example
one is a bun
two is a shoe
three is a tree
four is a door
five is a hive
six is sticks
seven is heaven
eight is a gate
nine is a line
ten is a hen
Other methods much like pegwords are also useful: go to
www.memory-key.com/mnemonics/list-learning.htm
Learning Strategies
There are many learning strategies that have been
field tested with students with disabilities:
Decoding-DISSECT
Writing-TOWER
Math-DRAW
Listening-SLANT
Test-Taking-SCORER
Organization-PREP/WISE
http://www.ku-crl.org (materials for purchase)
www.ldonline.org
www.teachingld.org