Thanks Rick and Bill for your thoughts! I do games once in awhile but I do more elaborate communication tasks using menus and surveys which involves complete sentences. Sometimes a nice bingo game just gives a little umfff to the class.

Hi -- I don't have an opinion on the book as I have not yet read it, but I see Deborah Blaz's name a lot of places. Let us know if it's any good -- I'm definitely interested in reading it! -- Rick

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Thanks Rick. Just so you know they use this book at the University of Rhode Island. savas


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Rick I attended your seminar on differentiated instruction in February. I enjoyed it and want to start expanding differentiation into my assessments. My interest is to see if differentiating assessment based on learning profiles will increase a students long term retention and allow them to preform better on a traditional test. Do you have any information or suggestions on this? I sent this initial request for information on assessments to NELMS directly and they instructed me to contact you directly. Thanks for your time in advance.

Hey Dawn -- Thanks for inquiring and thanks for exploring the possibilities. You are basically asking two questions: 1) does responding to students' learning profiles in your instruction increase long-term memory of curriculum, and 2) does responding to students' learning profiles improve test performance. Those can be very different things, as performance on a standardized test doesn't always equate with long-term memory of material. In addition, "learning profiles" is a GIGANTIC category . It's basically anything that impacts a student's learning. You're talking about learning styles, multiple intelligences, personal history (family, schooling, culture, poverty or not, interests, giftedness or not, transiency or not, fetal-alcohol issues or not, ELL, etc.). This means it will be very hard to research and conclude anything but, "Yes, this stuff matters."

What you might want to do is focus on one aspect of learning profiles, such as multiple intelligences, learning styles, etc. For each of these, there is a lot of research out there, and I'd start with Web sites dedicated to the individual topics to get citations. Another thing to consider is that we can improve test scores just by teaching students test-taking savvy (how to read and interpret test prompts, how to respond according to the formula, etc.) but that doesn't mean the students actually learned the material well or moved it into long-term memory: they just became better test-takers. You'll have to be very careful in the connections you make, isolating very specific variables, and minimizing influence from other variables. You'll have to discern whether or not something a correlation or a causation, too.

In short, you're asking if we respond to our knowledge of the unique needs of our students via our adjustments to their instruction, will it matter? This is a worthy research pursuit, if for no other reason to confirm what's already out there, but to also pose new questions we may not have considered. Find a few authors of DI material that you respect - maybe Benjamin, Marzano, Tomlinson, Northey, Campbell, Grant, Forsten, Hollas, Winebrenner, Bender, and others -- and read through the citations in their books to launch your investigation.

As you feel comfortable, throw out questions to those of us on this listserv, and definitely let us know how it's going.

Anyone else want to chime in with advice for Dawn? -- Rick Wormeli
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Edited by author 03-09-2008 11:48 AM
I have a preference for McCarthy's 4MAT to identify learning styles. If you go to her website www.aboutlearning.com, go to the section on differentiation. There are quite a few tools to set you on your way for using learning styles as a layer of differentiation. I also recommend http://www.cse.fau.edu/~maria/COURSES/CAP5...LearningStyles.html
It is a site that allows students (I've only used in on Gr 6 and above) to take a 15 question learning style inventory based on 4MAT. It is a great resource because it explains the learning style type well for each student. I used learning styles extensively as a teacher and found that when I created a group with a Type 1,2,3,and 4 together and designed the group work based on roles for each type, the group work was incredibly powerful and productive. Hope that helps!

This is great, Rose. I've used 4MAT quite often in my own classroom. We were trained in it school-wide in the 80's and 90's. It's very helpful. One quick correction, however: the Web site is www.aboutlearning.com, not www.aboutlearnin.com. [ 'Probability a sleep-deprived keystroke on this first day when we had to set our clocks back an hour. :-) ] -- Rick
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Thanks for the website catch Rick! See you at the NELMS Annual Conference. Your general session sounds great!-Rose

Edited by author 03-13-2008 12:39 AM
Hi Rick,
One of the quotes that I heard you mention at the conference in Sturbridge that I emphasize daily in my instruction is that "practice makes permanent".
I agree and can you assist me with some additional information and perspectives on that philosophy. I am trying to get together a short presentation for the faculty at the middle school that I teach at. I to support the premise of that statement. I highly support and believe in that train of thought. I just thought it would be a good idea to get your perspective on that quote.
Thanks for injecting me with enthusiasm to differentiate instruction in my pedagogical practice and "bag of tricks".

Mike B.

I'm wondering if what I did today is a good idea, or whether it is misguided. We were having a quiz on ratios, rates, and proportions. Yesterday the students passed in their study guidelines sheet that they did for homework and I reviewed it. There were quite a few students still struggling with the concepts,even though they could use resources to fill out the study guide. It got me thinking, maybe not everyone is ready for the quiz. So, I made up a review packet and new study guide for them to fill out. But thought it wouldn't be fair to those who were ready to take the quiz to make them do more review and put off the quiz. This morning's bellwork was to write me a note "are you ready to take the quiz? why or why not?". I then split the class, those ready to take it set up in quiz formation and those not ready went into small group and we practiced more. I was able to instruct them and give them more practice, even in the same classroom as those taking the quiz. These students will do the review packet over the weekend and take the quiz Monday while the other students work on independent activities. My questioning really comes down to, was this a fair way to go, was I setting my students up with unrealistic expectations going forward (in other words, will they no longer prepare when required thinking they have extra time)? BTW, I always allow retakes on quizzes and tests, but in this case I assumed these students would have needed the retake so I was trying to "beat the system". Thoughts and comments are appreciated, please.

Liz, you used a very reasonable approach. In my opinion, as you continue to honor the readiness of your students and coach them to always give their best, they will value it and probably not take advantage of the situation. If you detect anyone taking advantage, a private conversation might be in order. They will soon see that the purpose of the quiz is to assess their ability to master the content/skills and not to 'catch' them for not studying. The quiz grade certainly has more meaning and is a true reflection of a student's mastery.

Hi Liz -- 'Sorry I haven't responded before now. I was out of the country and on spring break with my wife and children. I purposefully left the laptop and e-mail behind. :-)

You did the right thing. Ask yourself if it does any good to give students a test they are not ready to take. My answer: It doesn't. The grades don't mean anything -- they're not accurate or useful as declarations of final proficiency, and you just confirm one more time for insecure students how dumb they are, or at least that's their perception of it.

In addition, you're basing your worries on the few students who may not have studied all along or took the time to prepare for the test. If this actually happens -- they do something less than responsible, it's not the end of the world that they got away with it. It happens. If it's a pattern, however, that's when you need to act, changing whatever you're doing with them. You're right, too, to not make those other students go through more review when they've already proved themselves regarding the topic. Thanks for doing that.

If you want to do so, in these situations go ahead and give the test to everyone, regardless of readiness and call it a summative assessment for some, a formative assessment for others. The data gained from the struggling students' sense of the topic will be helpful for planning and feedback. This is basically what we do when we allow re-takes and do-overs.

Students have an innate wish to be productive, to progress. We have to accept the premise (because it's true) that students want to avoid being left in the shallow end of the pool. As they see their classmates move forward, they will want to do so as well.

Fairness is not really the issue. On the pretense of wanting to teaching accountability, we sometimes do unfair things such as test students when they are not ready to be tested. Most of our students are sincerely trying. We should design our instructional policies around those students, not the exceptions to the rule who occasionally test the limits. Of course, we come up with adaptations of policies for those who need them; one size policy doesn't fit all situations.

'Not sure if this helped or you others agree, but it's my initial response. -- Rick Wormeli
 

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Rick,
I'm not sure how to word this, but basically my question is, what will I get out of going to the NELMS Differentiation conference this coming February if I already went last year? Or, would it be better to encourage another teacher from my school to attend and I'll just stay home and be jealous :)

Hey Liz -- Great question, and thanks for advocating for yourself. To be honest, not much! I wouldn't come. The only thing you might get is if you tried some of the ideas and you want to explore them further. For example, you might have tried one thing and it didn't work and you want to throw that across to me and we discuss it together -- how to improve upon things, insight you've gained that you can share, etc. You can also revisit some of the concepts to reinforce them, and you can clarify ones that didn't make sense last year. These are all nice advantages if you had plenty of time and money, but in this day and age, I'm not sure that's worth it. It would be a better use of time and money to encourage someone else to go.
I'll be here no matter what you do, however, if you want to explore any of the ideas further. Thanks again for writing. -- Rick

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Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. I will definitely ask that one or two other staff attend the conference. As it is, I've been facilitating differentiated instruction workshops at my middle school the last 2 years. This year, we purchased copies of your new book for everyone to use as a reference and book discussion. I think it's great! I'm more interested now in helping others at my school move into more differentiation and better understanding of assessment in a differentiated classroom (lots of contention, there!)

'Sounds good, Liz. I'm always up for conversation or ideas on how to improve things, however, so please send new insights along, if you get the chance. The books I write are hopefully launching pads for individuals who take the ideas farther than any of us could ever dream. :-) -- Rick
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