There are no Vultures!

Ahhh... Clarity! I find myself writing (and talking) with more exclamation points lately. I'm so excited about what I've been learning! (good example) The readings this week have finally clarified and solidified the idea of what differentiation is for me. Robb's concrete examples are what I needed to understand how and why differentiation works.

Good Book!

I really like her practice of using read alouds as a main teaching tool. If I'm interpreting correctly, it looks like a read aloud would have a theme such as in/justice, acceptance, etc., and that students would then break up into groups using a different text with the same theme. I love this! Would this be a practical way to teach little ones though? I'm guessing not. I would like to see an example of what differentiation looks like at different grade levels, especially the little ones, and especially using the read aloud format, something the smalls already love.

Ruetzel's article also turned on a light for me! He uses magic as an analogy to reading and writing. If one doesn't understand how it works, it's a complete mystery. Showing students the "back stage production" side of reading and writing, how they fit together and enhance each other, lets them see that they can do it too! I never considered - until I began this program - that there is a process to my reading and writing. Even writing

David Copperfield

this entry, I still don't think about how I'm doing it. Understanding the process, even as I type, really takes some effort.

The only problem I see, with my own interpretation of Ruetzel (and no specific passage comes to mind, it's just an overall impression I have), is that an idyllic differentiation situation is so impractical that it's impossible. This is frustrating for me. To know something I can do with a few students will help all of them but with too many students I can only help some. How will I know which ones are slipping through the cracks before it's too late?

During a conversation Kelly and I had one day, he suggested when trying to find a particular kind of differentiation, that I look for " brand names." Reading the description of small-group differentiated reading instruction -whew! a mouthful! - I was struck by the similarity to "Daily 5", a much catchier and easier thing to say: A brand name. More lights! (and exclamation points) I have done this before!! This connection to real life, real practices, made me want to read more!

Walpole and McKenna helped me to understand tiered instruction. This goes back to a discussion we had earlier about not grouping students according to age. "Differentiation by Assessed Needs" is a flexibility group. Constantly assessing and moving students from this group to that, or creating whole new groups based on current needs, means there are no Vultures! (And what a terrible name for a reading group anyway!)

While I understand that in graded classrooms, we do still put children in based on age, it looks like tiered instruction is a great model for breaking away from the assembly line learning that our society is stuck on. Is this a good way to use tiered instruction? What happens when a student "tests out" of the grade s/he is in? Would we skip that student to the next grade or keep her/him in her/his age level classroom?

I have a much better and deeper understanding of what differentiation is now. The concrete examples have helped me to connect these ideas to what I have already seen and practiced. Everything I read gives me more questions, a desire to learn more, and, more exclamation points!