Differentiation

Read the following scenario, and then answer the questions that follow.

Martin

Martin, an English as a Foreign Language student in grade eight with low to intermediate proficiency in written English, hated to read. Martin’s oral speaking abilities were much better than his reading and writing. On a reading survey, he once wrote, “Reading is my worst thing to do. I hate it.” When asked why, he repeatedly said, “It’s boring,” and “It’s a do-nothing.”

Martin had average and slightly below average marks in most of his classes, including social studies. He generally did his homework but often didn’t complete all of it, and rarely entered into class discussions. When assigned some reading in English as a Foreign Language, he would read some of it and, once it was explained, would declare, “If it’s a really good story, I’ll read all of it.” When asked what would have to be in it to make it “good,” he said he didn’t know. “It just has to be good.” Martin also said that he could never find any good books to read and wasn’t sure what kinds of books would be interesting anyway.

In social studies, Martin usually glanced at the chapter he had to read but didn’t read or attempt to read it in depth. He looked at the headings and subheadings, checked out the pictures and graphs and always searched for the cartoon – most of the chapters had at least one cartoon.

When asked about a fiction text, Martin could answer questions about characters’ names or settings and could recall the sequence of events in a story. However, Martin struggled with anything beyond literal questions. In social studies, he could name main characters and identify some events, but he balked at explaining sequences, causes and effects, or making any other connections to meaning.

When asked what he did when he realized the text was confusing him, he said, “Do? I don’t know. I mean, what can you do? If you get confused, you wait for the teacher to explain it.”

Martin saw himself as “an okay reader” but admitted, “I don’t try real hard with it because sometimes I just don’t get it and sometimes, it’s like, what’s the point? Most of it just seems boring and then some of it, sometimes it’s, like, just too hard.”

(Adapted from When Kids Can’t Read, Beers, 2003)

Your task:

Martin isn’t the only student in this class with this attitude and this skill level.

As the teacher, what differentiation would you provide to support Martin’s learning? Consider what you know about learning styles, the reasons for differentiation, and then look back over the teaching tools that have been presented in this section and earlier in the unit. Organize your response by using these headings:

·  Texts

·  Tasks

·  Instructional strategies

·  Support