Differentiation: What is it and what are effective strategies?

Differentiation involves using assessment data to make and adapt instructional decisions to suit students’ needs. This is an ongoing process that continually adapts and changes based on current data in the classroom. 

My entire role as a special education teacher revolves around differentiation. For most of the day, I pull small groups of students who need intensive individualized reading instruction. This has been extremely effective in promoting growth and independent learning. Many of my students have returned to the general education classroom because they were able to get back on track with grade-level standards. I believe this format of differentiation is extremely effective for providing short-term remediation. Unfortunately, many teachers keep their students in these small groups for years and they fall behind the general education class. 

Another type of differentiation that I provide is in the form of co-teaching. I have several special education students in a fifth-grade social studies section. I push into the classroom to co-teach with the content teacher. We utilize the following models of co-teaching to offer differentiation: one teach/one assist, parallel teaching, and team teaching. These methods of teaching allow us to shadow and accommodate students who need extra support while also allowing them to participate in the least restrictive environment. The last type of differentiation that I provide is parallel teaching. Parallel teaching is when two teachers instruct different groups of students in the same classroom on the same content area. Some learning disabilities require individualized life skills curriculum, but some students benefit behaviorally and socially from staying in the general education classroom. In this instance, I teach a separate curriculum alongside the general education teacher. 

A traditional differentiation structure is a teacher-guided small group. Clearly, this requires strategically allotted instructional time to facilitate. A teacher may be able to pull a small group while the other students are working independently, engaged in self-driven centers, or with the help of a co-teacher or paraprofessional. Another form of differentiation involves creating centers that are specifically designed with student groupings in mind. Some centers involve reading silently, writing, reading with a peer, vocabulary, decoding, or spelling work, and listening to a teacher or audio reading. Additionally, a teacher may differentiate by designing mini lessons for the entire class that target specific needs. As stated in my own experiences, co-teaching is a great way to provide differentiation. Apart from the models I explained above, teachers can also utilize station teaching which requires teachers to each oversee a differentiated station. In addition, they can also implement alternative teaching which allows one co-teacher to immediately differentiate by switching to a different model of co-teaching during the lesson to accommodate for specific needs. For example, if a student was struggling with the lesson, the co-teacher could pull them to a small group or implement team teaching to alleviate misconceptions.