A glimmer of DI

Reading Steve's post from a few days ago was encouraging because I can relate to the frustrations he has and which the other pds interns working in urban middle schools probably have as well. It seems like these schools are stuck in a system where the students are not given any responsibility for or ownership of their own learning. In my classroom, the lessons are very straightforward and barely ever feature variety. The kids are bored and it's very easy to see, even for someone like me who has spent very little time in a school. Reading through the book on Diferentiated Instruction (DI) last week was very enlightening. The book didn't answer all of my questions about DI, but it did give me a good introduction to the topic and I started to think about it as I observed my co-op's lessons. While I was reading DI in the English Classroom, I thought, "wow, this is so not part of my experience in the classroom right now. The only variation in lessons that I've seen so far have been helper note-sheets that aid students in taking notes on the days lesson. Kids with that specific IEP need are given those helper sheets, but other than that, the lesson and the assignments are pretty much the same for all students, and there's little student choice in assignments.

The other day, though, in an intensive english section, I saw one student who had finished the assigned book early and had been given the next one in the series to start. The students are learning about elements of plot and this student was allowed to use the new book for the classwork on plot. I thought that that was pretty cool. Since she was reading ahead and really seemed to be into the book, she wasn't held back by the students that just wanted to goof off.

I see DI as being both a blessing and a curse (like most things). DI is necessary because in any classroom there are students at a variety of different academic levels. Some students are more motivated than others, or are at a higher or lower reading level. Some students love to write and others need a little bit of encouragement. The principles and strategies of DI help the teacher to serve the needs of all these different students. The tough thing for me, I suppose, is that it is really difficult to figure out how to design a DI lesson plan. It seems very complicated and even after reading the book on DI I feel pretty lost. I suppose I just need to wade through it for now and hope that I can get a grasp on it by the time I'm done with these lesson plans.