Doable Differentiation

1. Doable Differentiation Understanding how the brain works and how differentiating instruction helps students learn

2. GAME Plan • Goals • Activities • Measurement • Evaluation

3. Goals Participants will: • Gain a better understanding of differentiating instruction • Participate in several strategies for whole-class differentiation. • Learn how the brain works and how this supports the philosophy of differentiating instruction.

4. Activities • Appointment Clock • Think, Pair, Share • Hands-on Sort • Baggage Claim • 10+2 • Memory Song • ABA • Numbered Heads Together

5. Measurement • Participation in Activities • Response Card Activity • Mind Map

6. Evaluation • Plus/Delta on post-its at the conclusion of the workshop

8. Bonny Buffington • 14 years sp ed resource room teacher • 3 years intervention specialist, inclusion • 12 years teacher trainer for co-teaching, inclusion strategies • 21 years high school math teacher • 23 years district administrator • 2 years as educational consultant • Nearly 75 years!

9. Robert HutchinsThe Conflict in Education in a Democratic Society “Perhaps the greatest idea that America has given the world is education for all. The world is entitled to know whether this idea means that everybody can be educated or simply that everyone must go to school.”

10. Appointment Clock Activity • Think of one personal comment that comes to your mind when you read the Hutchins quote. • Go around the room and share your comment with others as you make “appointments” to fill in your appointment clock. • You may revise your comment as you listen to others’ opinions.

11. Robert HutchinsThe Conflict in Education in a Democratic Society “Perhaps the greatest idea that America has given the world is education for all. The world is entitled to know whether this idea means that everybody can be educated or simply that everyone must go to school.”

12. Differentiated Instruction: What it is, What it’s not Differentiated Instruction Awareness

13. When a teacher tries to teach something to the entire class at the same time, “chances are, one-third of the kids already know it; one-third will get it; and the remaining third won’t. So two-thirds of the children are wasting their time.” Lilian Katz, director of ERIC Clearinghouse on Elementary and Early Childhood Education

14. DI: What it is; What it’s not (Based on C Tomlinson, 2000)

15. Think, Pair, Share Activity Reflect on DI: What it is; What it’s not • As a student, what kind of classroom did you experience? • As a teacher, what kind of classroom did you practice? • Think of an experience you had with an excellent teacher. What kind of classroom did he/she maintain? Discuss your responses with your 6:00 appointment

16. DI: What it is; What it’s not (Based on C Tomlinson, 2000)

17. DefiningDifferentiated Instruction Differentiated Instruction Awareness

18. Differentiated Instruction Defined “Differentiated instruction is a teaching philosophy based on the premise that teachers should adapt instruction to student differences. Rather than marching students through the curriculum lockstep, teachers should modify their instruction to meet students’ varying readiness levels, learning preferences, and interests. Therefore, the teacher proactively plans a variety of ways to ‘get at’ and express learning.” Carol Ann Tomlinson

19. Key Principles of Differentiation • High quality curriculum • Ongoing assessment • Respectful tasks • Varied learning styles • Flexible grouping • Teacher/student collaboration • Student choice

20. Differentiation is: responsive teaching rather than one-size-fits-all teaching.

21. Differentiated Instruction:How? Differentiated Instruction Awareness

22. Differentiation of Instruction Is a teacher’s response to learner’s needsguided by general principles of differentiation Respectful tasks Flexible grouping Ongoing assessment Teachers Can Differentiate Through: Process Product Content According to Students’ Readiness Interest Learning Profile

23. Hands-On Sort Activity • Get with your 3:00 appointment. • Match the given activity cards with the correct space on the differentiated grid.

24. Differentiated Instruction: Why? Differentiated Instruction Awareness

25. Why differentiation? Differentiation is classroom practice that looks eyeball to eyeball with the reality that kids differ, and the most effective teachers do whatever it takes to hook the whole range of kids onlearning. Tomlinson 2001

26. Research Support for Differentiation • Research for differentiating by readiness: Vygotsky (1978), Fisher (1980) • Research for differentiating by interest: LeDoux (1996), Abrantes, Seabra, and Lages (2008) • Research for student choice: Renate and Caine (1994), Glasser (1999) • Research for using multiple learning styles: Torrance and Ball (1978), Edelman (1992), Restak (1994)

27. How Brain Research supports Differentiated Instruction Differentiated Instruction Awareness

28. Baggage Claim Activity On an index card, LEGIBLY write your response to these questions: • What do students need in order to learn? • What can teachers do to facilitate student learning?

29. Rules for Baggage Claim • When I say “GO,” find a partner to share what you have written. • Explain your responses to your partner, and then give your index card to that person. • He/she will explain his/her responses to you and then give his/her index card to you. • Repeat after 60 seconds when I say “GO” again

30. The Brain Stem Differentiated Instruction Awareness

31. The Brain Stem • Involuntary actions – blinking, breathing, heartbeat • Also called “reptilian brain” • Collects and delivers sensory information to higher brain

32. The Limbic System Hippocampus Amygdala Cerrebellum Differentiated Instruction Awareness

33. Amygdala • Gatekeeper • Three levels of attention • The need to BELONG • The need to be SAFE

34. The Hippocampus • Transferring memories • Making new memories • Inhibition • Smell • Location

35. The Cerebellum • Movement • Balance

36. The Cerebellum “It's like a math co-processor. It's not essential for any activity ... but it makes any activity better. Anything we can think of as higher thought, mathematics, music, philosophy, decision-making, social skill, draws upon the cerebellum....” Dr. Jay Giedd, National Institute of Mental Health

37. 10 + 2 Activity • On a piece of paper, write down as much as you remember about the 2 parts of the brain that we have discussed. Try not to peek! • Share what you remembered with your 12:00 appointment • Look at your notes and add whatever you forgot to include

38. The Cerebrum Parietal lobe Frontal lobe Occipital lobe Temporal lobe Cerebellum Differentiated Instruction Awareness

39. The Frontal Lobe • How we interact with our surroundings. • Our judgments on daily routines. • Our expressive language. • Assigns meaning to words we choose. • Involves word association. • Memory for habits and motor activities

40. The Parietal Lobe • Location for visual attention. • Location for touch perception. • Goal directed voluntary movements. • Manipulation of objects. • Integration of different senses that allows for understanding a single concept.

41. The Occipital Lobe • Vision

42. The Temporal Lobe • Hearing • Memory • Visual perceptions. • Categorizing of objects. T

43. Memory Song ActivitySung to the tune of “10 Little Indians” Touch the appropriate area of your brain as you sing: Temporal, Occipital, Parietal Temporal, Occipital, Parietal Temporal, Occipital, Parietal Frontal, Cerebellum

44. Response Cards Activity Which lobe(s) would students mainly use when: • Sorting colors into primary, secondary, tertiary • Playing spelling Twister • Typing vocabulary words • Copying notes from the board • Listening to teacher lecture • Role playing an event from history • Completing a word find • Discussing the pros and cons of a proposal

45. A NEURON Differentiated Instruction Awareness

46. Higher Level Thinking Using the Gray Matter! • Can actually generate NEW neurons (neurogenesis) • Adds dendrites • Increases the thickness of the myelin sheath

47. Stimulating Environment Affects Learning A child's ability to learn can increase or decrease by 25 percent or more, depending on whether he or she grows up in a stimulating environment. www.brainconnection.com

48. Two times of ENORMOUS brain growth and pruning: • During the first month of life, the number of connections or synapses increases from 50 trillion to 1 quadrillion. • If an infant's body grew at a comparable rate, his weight would increase from 8.5 pounds at birth to 170 pounds at one month old. • Overproduction ends, pruning begins until about age 3

49. Second cycle of growth and pruning • Dendritic growth spurt at age 11 in girls, 12 in boys • Pruning phase during adolescence • Age 13 – 18 lose 1% of gray matter per year • If you don’t use it, you lose it!

50. The Teacher Effect • Quality of classroom instruction is most significant factor in students’ brain development. • Didactic instruction – teacher directed • Interactive instruction – student actively engaged Which type do you think grows dendrites?