This came up last week during a PLC meeting. One of my coworkers was talking about some technology training his tech squad was given and how it really didn’t address the needs of most of the people in the group. About half are tech newbies and the other half are on the other end (one just received her degree in educational technology). The lesson was given and it was too big of a leap for the newbies and they were really struggling and it was pointless and a waste of time for the others because they were already doing it.
Before I go on, I want to be clear that I don’t blame the trainer that posted the lesson. There are genuine struggles going on and something needed to be posted. As educators, we have ALL been there at some point.
However, discussing it during our meeting, before a day of PD no less, brought this point to my mind. It was a lesson I first heard several years ago during a training at our regional service center. The guy has a whole story about the Air Force researching people to design the perfect cockpit, all these pilots were studied, they made a cockpit for an average pilot, and nobody could use it because nobody is actually average. I don’t know if that story is true, though I’m pretty sure it is, and I don’t remember all the details. What stuck with me was the lesson for my classes.
Don’t teach to the middle. When you design lessons for a completely average learner and you expect all of your students to complete it and get the same benefit, the lesson is going to fall short. Your higher level learners will feel like it is a waste of time and they won’t be pushed to grow as learners. This is often seen in our high achievers, they don’t grow as learners, but because they are already above the “average” it isn’t addressed. this leads to many problems for those students. On the other end, your struggling students aren’t going to be able to understand the lesson because it was too hard for them. The students in between the 2 extremes, but not quite in the middle are also likely to fall somewhere in between “too challenging” and “a waste of time.”
This is another reason why differentiation is so important. Unfortunately, differentiation gets a really bad reputation as being something that is going to take a lot of time and require you to build 20 different lessons for your students. Neither of those is true. This post isn’t really meant to spend a lot of time on how to differentiate, but help explain the reason why it is important. However, I will say, with the wealth of knowledge that is being shared, you can easily find lots of resources on how to differentiate and in some cases, you can find lessons that have already been created to help you.
Here are my top 2 ideas that I use and are a great place to start:
- Task cards-I love task cards so much and there are so many ways to use them in the class. You can even make them into a board game!
- Choice boards or menus-Letting students pick how they learn and show what they know can be a truly amazing thing.
If you are interested in more reading, the Cult of Pedagogy and Edutopia are two of my favorite sites and they have so many ideas from professionals that I find helpful.
Getting started can be hard and it will not look perfect, but what is most important is that we are consistently trying to teach to the edges and not the middle.
