Dare to
Differentiate
Animal School
Understanding by Design
Stage 1- Desired Results
Should NOT be
differentiated
Standard(s):
Understandings
Essential questions
Knowledge
Skills
Stage 2- Assessment Evidence
Performance-based Task + Rubric
Other Evidence (quiz, write up, report, etc.)
May be
differentiated
May be
differentiated
Self assessment/self monitoring
Stage 3- Learning Plan
Daily lesson plans
Should be
differentiated
if assessment data
tells you there
is a need
Parkway Look-Fors
Elements and Characteristics of and Strategies for Differentiating Instruction
Learning Environment
Content
• Safe, challenging, and collaborative community
• Access to resource-rich classrooms
• Flexible movement and use of space
• Multiple settings and environments
• Flexible scheduling
(strategies for
delivering content)
•
•
•
•
•
Planning for differentiation
Tiering
Compacting
Accelerating
Enhancing content for
depth, complexity,
and novelty
Assessing
the
Learner
Assessing the Learners’
- readiness
- interests
- learning styles/
preferences
Process
(strategies for engaged
learning and sense-making)
• Flexible Grouping
• Questioning for Critical
Thinking
• Problem-Based Learning
• Contracting
• Learning Centers
Product/Performance
(the means by which students will
communicate understanding)
• Open-ended tasks
• Authentic/real world solutions
• Extension, innovation, creation of new ideas and products
• Multiple forms and formats using varied techniques and materials
Assessing the Learning
Assessing the Learning
Assessing the Learning
(the context in which learning occurs)
Why Pre-Assess?
•To make instructional decisions
about student strengths and needs.
•To determine flexible grouping
patterns.
•To determine which students are
ready for advance instruction
What does Pre-Assessment look
like?
• Running records
• Entrance cards
• KWL Charts and
other graphic
organizers
• Standardized test
information
• Portfolio analysis
• Teacher prepared/text
prepared pre-tests
• Traditional tests
• Teacher
observation/checklist
• Most difficult first
• Writing
prompts/samples/prewriting activity
In Your Toolbox
Pre-Assessment Ideas
A Sample from Our Amazing
2nd Grade Team…
Letter to Parents
Contract for Students
Unit 7 Objectives and GLES
Pre-Assessment
Pre-Assessment Data Analysis
Where do I begin?
• Pre-assessment should begin early in the year, term, or
unit of study.
• Pre-assessment should be on-going – not just a first step,
but a constant one.
• Pre-assessment should be comprehensive, examining
readiness (strengths and needs), interests, and learning
preferences.
• Pre-assessment should be appropriate for various cultures,
ages, genders, abilities or disabilities, and so on.
• Pre-assessment should directly match the intended
learning experiences: content, process, and product.
• Pre-assessment should rely upon a variety of methods –
not a singular approach.
When do I pre-assess?
• 2-3 weeks before the information is to be
taught
• This gives the teacher time to plan for the
novice to the expert and those along the
way.
• By administering the test early, the seeds of
excitement have been planted about all the
interesting things the students will be
learning.
CURRICULUM COMPACTING
Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 3
Exploratory Phase
Analyze Data
Advanced Level Challenge
Pre-Assessment:
Test
Conference
Portfolio conference
To find out what the
learner
Knows
Needs to know
Wants to know
Mastery: skills, concepts
What have they mastered
Needs to Master:
What else do they need to
know?
How will they learn it?
Gain with whole class
Independent study
Homework
Mentor/buddy in or out of
school
On-line learning
Investigation
Problem-based learning
Service Learning
Project
Contract
Opportunities for
Successful Intelligence
(Sternberg, 1996)
Analytical
Practical
Creative
Assessment
PACING: Curriculum Compacting
Modify and/or streamline regular curriculum to:
• eliminate repetition of previously mastered
material
• upgrade the challenge level of the regular
curriculum
• determine student “readiness”
• provide time for enrichment and/or
acceleration activities
Curriculum Compacting
1) What’s important?
2) What do students
already know or are able
to do?
3) What will they grasp at
a faster rate?
4) What skill or task can be
accomplished quickly?
Tools for Compacting
Curriculum
• Assessments (Pre, Ongoing, Formative,
Summative)
• Menus of Challenging Activities
• Product Choices Chart
• Tiered Lessons
• Working Agreements or Learning Contracts
• Anchor Activities
Write the first chapter and the
general outline of a
historical novel based on
the time period we are
studying. All aspects of the
characters, location, and
setting must be accurately
portrayed within the time
period in which it is set.
Create enough questions from
our curriculum for the class
to use in its next College or
Academic Bowl game. Give
your questions to the
teacher to use. Be sure the
answers are included.
Illustrate or demonstrate several
articles of clothing that
would have been worn by 5
characters in a novel about
this time period.
Discover how schools were run
during this time period.
Teach a lesson to the class in
the same style that would
have been used at this
particular time.
Student
Choice
Study The Timetables of History
by Bernard Grun. Design a
way to make your
classmates aware of what
was going on in the rest of
the world during a
significant period of
American history.
Create a newspaper that
contains stories and features
about actual events written
in ways authentic to the
period of time we are
studying.
Compare and contrast 2–3
novels written about the
same time period and
determine which version is
closest to the ways in which
events actually happened.
Understand ways in which the
expansion of
multiculturalism in America
has impacted our politics
and literature.
Winebrenner-Differentiating Content for Gifted Learners in Grades 6-12:
CD of extension menus and guides by content areas
Examples of Choice Boards
Dare to Differentiate
2nd Grade’s Menu
Learning Contracts
• A written agreement between the student and the
teacher which includes opportunities for the student to
work relatively independently on primarily teacherdirected material.
The student has:
– Some freedom in acquiring skills and understandings
– Responsibility for learning independently
– Guidelines for completing work
– Guidelines for appropriate behavior
– Expectations tailored to readiness level
Anchoring Activities
• Self-paced, purposeful, content-driven activities
that students can work on independently
throughout a unit, a grading period, or longer
• Meaningful ongoing activities related to the
curriculum
– A list of activities that a student can do at any time
– A long-term project
– An activity center/learning station located in the
room
• These activities must be worthy of a student’s time
and appropriate to their learning needs
Tiered Activities
Tiered Instruction features:
 Whole group introduction and initial instruction
 Identification of developmental differences
 Ladder Analogy (bottom – up; challenge/complexity)
 Increase or Decrease the:
 Abstraction/Challenge Levels (ie. application, analysis &
synthesis)
 Extent of Support
Sample
 Complexity of:
 outcomes
 resources (reading levels, types of text [on-line, magazine, etc…], based on priorknowledge levels)
 processes (way in which students obtain information)
 products (M.I. products)
Using UbD to Plan Tiered Assignments
•Clarify your essential learnings, and
how they will be assessed.
•Create the on-level task first. Then
adjust up and down as needed.
Below-Level
Task
On-Level
Task
“Adjusting the
Task”
Above-Level
Task