Action Learning Set: Differentiation

On Friday 6th March my Action Learning Set met for the first time as part of our Subject Specialist Module. Basically we are in a group of 4 and meet for a discussion for an hour a week. One person acts as presenter and the other 3 act as questioners. The presenter presents there issues on a certain area, the questioners then make the presenter consider the issue in more detail and reflect on it by using appropriate questions. In the beginning it seemed like a pointless chore but as I consdidered it I realised it mirrored some of the work I did in my counselling training. I'm thinking particularly about the writings of Carl Rodgers in Becoming a Person. Basically it's about giding an individual to come up with their own answers and strategies.


So I took the plunge and offered to act as presenter at our first meeting. My topic was differentiation. We had a really productive session and upon reflection I posted the following summary on our own blog:

Date of Meeting: Friday 6th March 2009
Presenter: Leanne Smith
Topic: Difficulties with differentiation

On Friday I presented my difficulties to the action learning set surrounding differentiation. I find it quite simple to set extension tasks for stronger learners but I find it harder to differentiate for weaker learners.

I gave an example from my Level 2 evening class. I have one learner who is much weaker at reading and writing than the rest of the group. I also feel concerned as she is a 17 year old girl in a classroom full of older adults in their 30s and 40s who come straight to class from work and have families at home. In the past I have tended to pair her up with a stronger (dare I say motherly) learner which seems to help and I give her extra support with reading and writing tasks. I now want to think about giving her different examples of texts and easier questions but I am unsure of how to set this up without singling her out.

The questioners helped guide the discussion well and gave me a lot to reflect on and work with. We discussed a message that had been posted on ASSOC that gave the idea of setting tasks that allowed learners to work at their own speed and referring to speed rather than level or weaker/stronger.

I was asked if extra support was available in terms of Learning Support Workers, extra classes etc. This made me decide to speak to my mentor about extra support. We do have some students who are welcomed to attend other classes at the same or lower/higher levels to suit their needs. We also discussed the possibility of setting extra literacy based homework in order to take the issue outside of the classroom and to help give this learner further feedback.
We considered the possibility of using the same texts but using different/easier questions for the weaker learners. I have started to use these ideas in class – I always save the easier of my questions during targeted Q&A for my weaker learners.

Mike drew my attention to an article in The Guardian about differentiation, written by an FE lecturer. This gave me a lot of food for thought and I would recommend everybody took a look at this.Click here for the article

Ruth drew my attention to Tomlinsons report “A Differentiated Classroom” which is on our TPPELS reading list. It can also be found on Google books.

We also discussed the Skills for Life ESOL materials. In the grey teachers book there are lots of ideas for differentiation/extension. I will be looking through this for examples and will reflect further on this.

Action Plan:

As a result of our discussion I have decided to take the following action:

1. Discuss opportunities for further support/tuition with my mentor.
2. Read the article in The Guardian Education supplement and the Tomlinson report.
3. Search on teachers.tv for some differentiation clips.
4. Take a good look through the Skills for Life materials for some useful ideas on how to differentiate.

The Action Learning Set was a great forum in which to discuss issues in a supportive environment. After I posted my summary the rest of the set gave me some feedback. One of the group drew my attention to a great clip on teachers.tv on differentiation. It's about Differentiation in Secondary Schools but provides a useful insight and some interesting ideas.