"Personalization is an understanding that tapping into unique interests, individual styles, and specific needs can make work and learning meaningful and authentic." (Patrick Kennedy and Powell, 2013)

Personalization in education is an important concept that can change a number of our understandings about what is possible in education. The idea derives from the idea of differentiated instruction that has existed for a good many years now.

However, one thing that shouldn't be forgotten is that differentiation is not a singular theory that can be applied with a one-size-fits-all approach. It's not just a set of rules that can be applied anywhere. In fact that would go against the very point of differentiation.

"Differentiated instruction is dynamic: Teachers monitor the match between learner and learning and make adjustments as warranted." (Tomlinson, 2001)

But how does one then ensure that instruction is personalized and differentiated according to the needs and interests of the student, as opposed to the assumptions of the teacher. One of the way the teacher can do that is to get real data from the students. One way to do that would be using student journals.

How would these journals work though?

Online tools can be used in effective ways to provide templates for students to journal. This would also help students who are not particularly erudite to be able to note down their thoughts in words that help teachers to know where the students are. The teacher can then easily tailor his or her instruction to meet the students where they are. Here is an example of a possible template on the website Notion.so

A Journaling Template created on Notion

The template has a field for the student to fill in Mood for the day, Today I learnt, What I couldn't understand, and so on. There is also a free-journaling space for students who want to express their thoughts.

Advantages of the journal:

• This would enable the teacher to know where the students are and thus be able to differentiate instruction accordingly.
• This would enable the students to engage in metacognition, since the very act of writing is metacognitive in nature. But also since it makes the students think about what they have learnt, what they are feeling and so on.

References:

1. Patrick, S; Kennedy, K; Powell, A. (Oct 2013). Mean what you say: Defining and integrating personalized, blended and competency education (Report). International Association for K-12 Online Learning. Retrieved June 14, 2021
2. Tomlinson, CA (2001). How to Differentiate Instruction in Mixed-Ability Classrooms. (2nd Edition). Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development