differentiated small-group literacy instruction
In the past few years the study of learning styles has received more attention than ever. “With contemporary classrooms becoming increasingly diverse, educational authorities, teachers and school administrators are looking to teaching and learning strategies that cater for a variety of learning profiles.” (Wilson, 2012) Cathy Weselby explains that each child is unique and because of that educators should consider differentiated instruction in their classroom. (2018) The discussion of differentiated instruction came into play when achievement tests showed major gaps in students’ abilities within the same grade level. The No Child Left Behind Elementary and Secondary Education Act emphasized the need of skills based instruction. As the needs of students change so should the approaches of instruction to ensure students are equip with the literacy instruction needed to be successful in the 21st century. Tomlinson has found four ways teachers can differentiate instruction: content, process, product, and learning environment. (Tomlinson, C. 1999) Each of these ways can be implemented in small-group literacy instruction. “The goal of our literacy centers is to provide students with meaningful independent tasks in order to create time for small-group instruction or one-on-one reading conferences.” (Just Read, Florida!, 2017) Below is the final product of my findings and conclusions through researching differentiated small-group instruction. The first step of implementing effective small-group literacy lessons is to determine the students’ needs. Once a comprehensive standards-based assessment has been administered to all students the teacher can then review the results and place students into small like-ability groups.
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