Starter ActivityRead the quotes that are stuck around the room.

What is your response to these? If you could reply to the author what would you want to say / ask?

meridianvale.wordpress.com

Differentiation is ….

Not handicapping the learning of one student through the choices we make in teaching another one

….taking the trouble to notice the individual qualities of each apprentice – and responding to them in a way that

allows them to make their best progress

….making mixed-ability teaching (which is ‘all’ teaching manageable

“…When we segregate students for instruction based on what we perceive they are capable of doing, we have already sent many of them messages that homogeneity matters more than community and that we

believe only some students are truly smart.”

Carol Ann Tomlinson - Educator and Author of ‘How to Differentiate Instruction in

Mixed-ability Classrooms’

…the most effective differentiation takes place inside the teacher’s thought-processes. It’s having as wide a range of possible techniques, strategies and organisational options; knowing the students’ individual traits, characteristics and needs; and making perceptive judgements about what will work, for whom, in what context, to achieve that end.

meridianvale.wordpress.com

‘Lower ability’ classes support a "pedagogy of poverty," reflecting two

realities. First, most students in the lower ability classes are from low-income backgrounds. Second, the quality of learning in those classes seems a

guarantee that the students in them will remain poor.

Martin Haberman – Educator and Editor of the ‘Journal of Education’

“Just offer them all accessible tasks which can be extended at different rates and depths. This

is the fundamental basis of differentiation.”

@MichaelOllerton

“Learning shouldn’t be a competitive sport that not

everyone can succeed at. …When children rank

[themselves] as top or bottom of the class, they

miss the point of what learning is all about.”

Head Teacher -James

Biddulph

"You think I'm not smart so you're gonna put me in a remedial class and slow down what I do. At the

same time, the other kids will keep moving ahead, and you think

someday I'll catch up?“

Bart Simpson

Inclusive Questioning

‘This is the teacher’s great skill: to bring all students in a class into a question and answer

exchange.. adjusting the level of questioning to the student in a subtle way. Mini-whiteboards are

brilliant for this...so you can feed off the answers. Think-Pair-Share is another superb method. But the spirit of differentiation makes these things completely automatic, embedded, everyday

features of lessons. Everyone engaged; everyone challenged.’

headguruteacher.com

Differentiation needs to be seen as the aggregation of the hundreds of subtly different interactions that you have with each of your students... real differentiation [is]: pushing, prodding, nudging, stretching…slow, subtle, nuanced, a step at a time, working around the class from lesson to lesson”

headguruteacher.com

When considering differentiation “Teach Up," plan first for advanced learners, then scaffold instruction to

enable less advanced students to access those rich learning experiences.

Carol Ann Tomlinson

Differentiating through questioning.

Promoting higher levels of thinking. Differentiating through support.

Identifying starting points.

Within class grouping.

Freedom of choice (with clear success criteria.)

Encouraging metacognition.

Differentiating by Task.

Differentiating by Expectation.

Sort these into the Diamond Nine, most effective at the top.What do these mean to you?When do you use these techniques?Who do you use them with?

Differentiation by:-• Task – Pupils work on different tasks with the lesson.

• Support – Some pupils work with a teaching assistant.

• Explanation – Pupils receive different teacher input at different times throughout the lesson.

• Questioning – Different types of question are asked of pupils and posed by pupils.

• Outcome – The same stimulus leads to open ended responses. (‘Multiple Entry and Exit Point Tasks’ or ‘Low Threshold High Ceiling Tasks’.)

• Expectation –There are various learning goals that are shared with pupils. Pupils are taught how to and encouraged to self select the appropriate learning goal, for example through reference to a learning journey.

Strategies – What will this look like in our lessons

Difficulties – What problems might arise / currently arise

Solutions – How can we reduce or overcome these

difficulties

Differentiation by Task

Strategies – What will this look like in our lessons

Difficulties – What problems might arise / currently arise

Solutions – How can we reduce or overcome these

difficulties

Differentiation by Support

Strategies – What will this look like in our lessons

Difficulties – What problems might arise / currently arise

Solutions – How can we reduce or overcome these

difficulties

Differentiation by Explanation

Strategies – What will this look like in our lessons

Difficulties – What problems might arise / currently arise

Solutions – How can we reduce or overcome these

difficulties

Differentiation by Questioning

Strategies – What will this look like in our lessons

Difficulties – What problems might arise / currently arise

Solutions – How can we reduce or overcome these

difficulties

Differentiation by Outcome

Strategies – What will this look like in our lessons

Difficulties – What problems might arise / currently arise

Solutions – How can we reduce or overcome these

difficulties

Differentiation by Expectation

Expected practice

• Everyone should choose one to work on as a personal goal and a form a coaching pair with a colleague who will encourage / support you to develop this.

Expected Practice Strategy Inadequate Practice

Plan your explanation Think about which parts of the explanation are relevant to the whole class. Talking to the whole class from the front should be kept to less that 10 minutes.

Expecting pupils to listen to lengthy explanations that are not relevant to them.

Differentiate your questions Plan inclusive questioning that is open and probing. Hands up questioning and an over reliance on closed questioning

Ensure that all pupils have access to the full range of differentiated tasks.

Encourage pupils to reflect on their learning journey and select an appropriate task but remember that it is your responsibility to direct them to the appropriate task when necessary.

All pupils completing the same task.

Know the lesson before you teach it and tweak it to suit the needs of your learners.

Read the lesson plans, ask questions of colleagues, consider how your most able and least able students will respond to the task.

Not planning for your class.

Focus on learning and allow opportunities for pupils to reflect on their learning. Refer to the learning journeys at the start, end and at least once during a unit.

Ask pupils to think about what they understand now that they didn’t understand before. During a lesson get them to reflect on the task they have chosen, is it appropriate ? Is it moving their learning on?

Focusing on performance.

Develop pupils skills at Inquiry Use the strategies suggested by BL. Create opportunities to see colleagues facilitating an Inquiry and create opportunities to be observed facilitating an Inquiry.

Ending an Inquiry when pupils begin to flounder.

Differentiate homework tasks. A minimum of 3 different levels of task should be set on www.mymaths.com

Setting one task for all.

Differentiate your probing questions Model a correct method for one of the questions that the pupil answered incorrectly and set a probing questions that will allow the pupil to demonstrate their understanding of this.

Setting a probing question which the pupil could already answer or one which is several steps further along their Learning Journey.

Area for development:

Description of practice:

1. What change do you want to see? What are your objectives?

2. What actions are you going to take in order to achieve this?*

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3. Finally, how can your coaching partner help you to achieve this e.g. drop ins / informal conversations etc.