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MIXED ABILITY TEACHING
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VSRD TECHNICAL & NON -TECHNICAL JOURNAL
IN TERNA TI ONA L JOUR NAL
VSRD-TNTJ, Vol. I (1), 2010, 47-51
ISSN No. 0976-7967
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MIXED ABILITY TEACHING
1
Harleen Kaur*
ABSTRACT
As per English Collins Dictionary - English Definition & Thesaurus A mixed ability class or teaching system is
one in which pupils are taught together in the same class, even though their abilities are different. Mixed ability
teaching is a fact of not only language classes but of all courses. Since no two students can be the same in terms
of language background, learning speed, learning ability and motivation.
The differences which cause problems in heterogeneous classes are in language learning ability, language
knowledge, cultural background, learning style, attitude towards language, mother tongue, intelligence, world
knowledge, learning experience, knowledge of other languages, age, gender, personality, confidence,
motivation, and interests. As we know that differences of learning ability and performance in every human
being is just because of Intelligent Quotient (IQ). A different environment and/or a different nation, the multicultural population of the classroom may be an obstacle for the teachers in reaching the students, which
eventually results in ineffective learning as well teaching. In this paper I would like to explore the common
problems in a classroom as interest, participation and discipline etc. of the Students and how we can cope up
with these problems by hitting their common interests or better we can say by following T.S. Eliot’s theory of
Objective Co-relative which is a set of event, situation or incidence which can provoke interest in learning, as a
reader takes interest in reading any work when he reveals universality by objectivity of plot.
INTRODUCTION
All children are born with potential and we cannot be sure of the learning limits of any child.1
But we teachers make them capable enough to learn and while making them learn we face some problems of
tackling them. We make them better by our mixed ability teaching. As per English Collins Dictionary - English
Definition & Thesaurus, A mixed ability class or teaching system is one in which pupils are taught together in
the same class, even though their abilities are different. Mixed ability teaching is a fact of not only language
classes but of all courses. No two students can be the same in terms of language background, learning speed,
learning ability and motivation.
In a survey, some schools decided to divide students according to their IQ tests. However, it was seen that the
new groups still had variations among students, and it is not feasible to change these groups and the curricula
every time. Furthermore, their study indicates that even when students are grouped according to their test scores,
their progress rates will always be at different levels due to the teaching methods, materials and/or learning style
differences. Hence, the teachers become the key factor in reaching each and every student in a class. It is
important for teachers to be aware of the problems resulting from mixed abilities in their classes and to decide
on techniques and strategies that could be used to solve such problems.
The differences which cause problems in heterogeneous classes are in language learning ability, language
____________________________
1
Lecturer, Department of Applied Science
*Correspondence : kaurharleen@gmail.com
&
Humanities,
Krishna
Girls
Engineering
College,
Kanpur
Harleen Kaur et. al / VSRD Technical & Non-Technical Journal Vol. I (1), 2010
knowledge, cultural background, learning style, attitude towards language, mother tongue, intelligence, world
knowledge, learning experience, knowledge of other languages, age, gender, personality, confidence,
motivation, interests, and/or educational level. However, these variations may occur in different degrees in
different classes. Thus, if the teacher wants to ensure that all the students perform to their maximum potential,
the teacher must identify these problems and deal with them accordingly.
I would like to mention that as a teacher, our aim is to reach all our students. However, it is well known that
every student has a different way of learning, and learns and progresses at different speeds. As Tomlinson says:
Children already come to us differentiated. It just makes sense that we would differentiate our instruction in
response to them.2
Thus, while some students may find the learning task very easy to deal with, others may find it difficult to
understand. Besides it, learning also depends on what students have brought with them into class. Since each
comes from a different family, a different environment or the multi-cultural population of the classroom may be
an obstacle for the teachers in reaching the students, which eventually results in ineffective learning. Moreover,
although it is quite difficult for the teacher to know about each student and to follow what each one does during
the lessons even in small classes, it is important for teachers to monitor each and every student and to reach their
needs in a variety of ways to achieve effective teaching.
As books are primary source of teaching and textbooks are designed for an ideal homogeneous classroom
environment, teachers always have to deal with the problem that students react to the textbook differently due to
their individual differences. First of all, some students may find the textbook boring and very hard, whereas
some find it interesting or very easy. In addition, as language teaching course materials are currently based on
content-based or theme-based syllabi, some students may find the topics dull, strange, or meaningless; whereas
others find it enjoyable, familiar or interesting. Therefore, it is usually necessary for the teacher to evaluate and
adapt the materials according to his/her class.
Classrooms are the first place and only environment where a learner starts to learn, they should utilize this
chance as much as possible. However, some of the students find it difficult to speak in the target language for
many reasons ranging from interest to confidence, from age to knowledge. Other students, however, would like
to express everything they think or feel by using the new language. As a result, some students may take many
turns, while others do not speak for the entire lesson.
Involvement problems may arise due to the differences among the students in terms of their attitude towards the
subject matter and/or the teacher; their knowledge of language; and their personality. For example, some
students may find lessons boring, as the topic has no familiarity with their own life or their interests.
Furthermore, some of the students may not be interested in the lesson, unless they do get the chance to express
their own ideas since the teacher talks too much during the lesson or the other students take many turns. Hence,
teachers should be aware of the different interests of the students to organize and to arrange activities
accordingly.
I have observed that some students finish the tasks given, before the other students. As a result, they create
nuances while waiting for the others to finish. The weaker students, on the other hand, cannot finish the tasks as
quickly as the strong ones and may loose their confidence and/or show ill-disciplined behaviour for a variety of
reasons related to that. Consequently, mixed abilities may result in classroom management problems.
Problems are due to variations in Intelligence Quotient and multiculturalism and these problems can be under
thumbed by having multifaceted knowledge. To raise interest a teacher can use Audio Visual Aids which should
be based on a meaningful context for all learners. To exemplify, visuals are always useful for all age and
proficiency levels, so even using coloured chalk or board markers attracts the learners’ attention to the teaching
point. Hence, teachers can make use of visuals to grab students' attention and to motivate them because even the
most passive learners are often interested in realia and/or colourful and interesting posters.
We can engage early finishers by giving extra questions, an extra exercise, a handout or a reading passage in
case they finish the tasks earlier. All students do not need to carry out an entire in-class activity. While every
student should do certain parts, only some of the students (weak ones or early finishers) do all of it. In relation to
that, the tests could include optional questions: While every student completes some parts of the test, some other
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parts may have options from which the students choose. Furthermore, different tasks can be given to different
learners according to their language progress or interest, or optional tasks can be prepared from which students
choose. We can also give them different homework tasks - easier tasks for the weaker students, more
challenging tasks for the brighter students.
Changeable chores or questions (such as writing a letter, an ending of a story/book/film, or a response to a
picture) have a variety of possible correct answers instead of a single answer. These tasks allow each learner to
perform at his/her own level. Some of the students may be good at understanding but might be weak in
expressing themselves orally or in written work; thus, open-ended tasks give them the chance to express
themselves without trying to find the one and the only correct answer.
Teachers can give exercises where the vehemence should be on eloquence and that should be changeable. An
open-ended activity allows the students to work at their own pace and for a multifariousness of responses.
English teachers can choose from a wide range of open-ended activities which can also be completed using
group or pair work techniques where the students share and produce better, or richer work than they might have
done on their own such as: brainstorming, prediction, completing sentences, planning different tasks for the
same activity.
Other open-ended activities include finishing sentences with a certain grammatical base:
 If you win a lottery, what would you do?
 How will you protect yourself on a stormy night?
 You are going for an interview and....?
Another technique for differentiating instruction is group or pair work in a mixed ability class, group work can
help English learners function better in the classroom. Some group work activities include recall and share, such
as:
 The students learn a text, listening comprehension passage or simply a list of vocabulary and they recall as
much as they can on their own and then add more by sharing ideas with each other.
 The students prepare the answer to an exercise in pairs that will be later checked with the entire class.
 Another type of differentiated teaching strategy is using individual spelling and vocabulary lists. This
technique helps English language learners master different lexical items using differentiated teaching
strategies for learning the spellings of words. The same principle can be applied to learning lexical items.
The word level is the common starting point for teachers, which also allows the students to review other core
components of the curriculum. Teachers can either reinforce that sound blends from the sound and move up
the scale to the word level or teach the sounds in an inductive way, via the words themselves. Therefore,
individual spelling and vocabulary lists represent one way for students to learn and master different lexical
items, where the responsibility to record and learn new words become that of the learner.
It is important for teachers to give students the opportunity to express their ideas, feelings and experiences,
though they may lack confidence or enough language knowledge. By personalizing the tasks, all students can
participate voluntarily. Knowing students’ personalities help the teacher to prepare and adapt materials easily in
order to make them interesting or relevant to students, which adds variety to the classroom environment and
establishes positive atmosphere.
To raise the interest of the students we can apply some games, competitions and dramatization, in between
the study. Differences in students can be abridging by involving them in aura of common interest which can be
basic instinct of human beings. These activities are useful not only for the teacher to observe students but also
for the students to cooperate and to learn from each other. When a strong student works with weaker students,
the student can be a source of language/knowledge in the group. The teacher, on the other hand, may form
groups of weaker and stronger students separated from each other. So the stronger and quicker students work
with more complicated tasks, whereas the weaker students deal with a simpler task or work with the teacher as a
group member, which inculcates the team spirit.
We can also think over extra homework which always helps the teachers of mixed ability classes. However,
considering the level and the interests of the students, extra work should be of something that the students would
enjoy doing. Therefore, a good way of dealing with mixed ability may be individual as well as team projects. In
accumulation, students would be more enthusiastic to work in such projects if they can choose their topic such
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as preparing a poster on their audacious sports like parachuting, driving etc.
Portfolios are another efficient way of dealing with mixed ability groups. Teachers may ask students to keep all
the things they have done during the term including the extra work depending on their ability or needs. As a
result, not only the teacher but also each student has a record of his/her progress during the term. This record
also shows the needs of the student for further progress.
One solution to this problem is to give up lockstep teaching (If a class is working in lockstep, all the students are
doing the same thing at the same time) for at least parts of the lesson, so that the teacher can work intensively
with a sub-group of the class while the others work autonomously. This, of course means that suitable materials
for self-directed study need to be available. These can be in any format, but if computers are available in the
classroom, the easiest solution is undoubtedly the use of on-line materials.
The most radical way of using the materials would be to make them the sole basis of the lessons. Each student
would spend the lesson working through a course at his/her own level while the teacher circulated – monitoring
and giving individual help, explanation and practice as necessary. With some groups, containing students of
widely differing levels, this may well be the best solution. But with others, where the difference is not too
extreme, it’s also possible to incorporate the autonomous work into the regular class lessons.
I would like to mention my class of 60 students. The students are varied in terms of their background, language
knowledge, motivation and interest in English. As Professional communication class, we would study Technical
Communication, Business Correspondence, Presentation Strategies and a little amount of literature through the
semester. The students are good at reading and understanding what they read, but they are not very good at
expressing what they think orally and through written work. Once I put a LCD projector for Power point
presentation to encourage them to speak and write by synchronizing the theme, which they found difficult,
although they had the chance to use monolingual and bilingual dictionaries. After reading about open-ended
activities, I thought it would be effective to use such tasks with my class so that all students could write and
express their feelings according to their level.
To begin with, I asked each student to write a letter to someone who knew nothing about him/her. This person
could be a favourite leader, a successful actor or a cricketer. The aim of the letters was to introduce
himself/herself to that person. Thus, there would be more than one correct answer since all the students could
freely talk about themselves and express their ideas, thoughts and feelings. In addition, this was an opportunity
for me, as a teacher, to learn about the interests of my students.
At the beginning of the activity, I explained clearly what they would do and gave them examples. Then, I
informed them that they could use their monolingual and/or bilingual dictionaries in order to find the words they
wanted to use in their sentences. I did not put any word limit on the letters, but I told them that the letter should
give information on many aspects of themselves from physical appearance to education, from hobbies to
dislikes.
When the students started writing, I tried to monitor all and to help them when it was necessary and required.
While some students started writing right after I finished the instructions, some others tried to find something to
start with. Hence, I tried to give some ideas by asking “Which is your favourite sport?”, “Where do you like to
spend your holidays?”or “Do you own a car?”
Since some students are fast in writing and good at expressing their ideas easily, they finished earlier than most
of the students. Therefore, I made the early finishers exchange their letters among themselves to give
suggestions about the content and to correct the mistakes, which gave time to the slow students to finish their
letters. When all of the students finished writing their letters, I collected all the letters, mixed them up and then
chose one of them. I read the letter without saying who had written it, and I asked the students to guess the
writer of the letter as each letter gave information about its writer. The student who guessed it correctly came
and chose another letter to read to his friends. At the end of the lesson, most of the letters were finished and all
the students had listened to the letters and guessed the writer.
Moreover, I read all the letters after the lesson on my own for correction and wrote short replies (to give
feedback). On another day I gave the letters back to the students and asked them to revise their letters according
to my comments and rewrite it. The students put both the in-class version and rewritten version into their
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Harleen Kaur et. al / VSRD Technical & Non-Technical Journal Vol. I (1), 2010
portfolios.
.
I believe this activity was effective for all students, as they really liked to express their ideas, thoughts and
feelings through a letter as if they had written it to someone, who knew nothing about them. They used the
language at their own level; writing about themselves and personalized the task and they were all successful at
the end as they finished their letter. Being quicker is not a disadvantage for the early finishers; they enjoyed
giving feedback to a piece of work, which is a useful eventuality plan to improve language.
The only problem was that some students could not decide what to write about as quickly as the other students.
However, that may have been due to the fact that they rarely write to express themselves in the target language,
so they were not used to it. It is for sure that with these kinds of activities for mixed abilities, will help them to
get used to it.
Teaching mixed ability students is a big responsibility for the teachers as teachers are the builders of the future
generation and students are the future of any nation. Keeping this point of view in mind we should know how to
deal and tackle the students of mixed ability so that all of them get, gain, grasp and acquire the knowledge
according to their requirements. The classes should be taken keeping in mind the differences which cause
problems in assorted classes like language erudition knack, lingo acquaintance, edifying background, learning
technique, approach towards language, mother tongue, acumen, world acquaintance, learning experience,
knowledge of other languages, age, gender, persona, confidence, inspiration, wellbeing, and/or educational
level. Above mentioned elucidation can be used and taken care of to overcome the problems faced to teach
mixed ability students. Our motive is to raise the intelligence and confidence level of the students and groom
their personalities so that they are capable of facing the challenges and surviving in this era of cut throat
competition of globalization.
REFERENCES
[1] Fisher R. .Teaching children to Learn.( Cheltenham: Nelson Thornes Ltd) 2001, 1.
[2] Tomlinson C.. The differentiated Classroom: Responding to the Needs of All learners.(Alexandria:
ASCD).1999,24
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