Software for Differentiated Instruction

What is it?

Differentiated instruction is adjusting the way concepts are being taught so that all students can learn. The teacher makes adjustments to their style of teaching and presentation of the material in hopes that the content can be comprehended by more students.

Why differentiate?

“Children learn in different ways and it’s helpful to present content in multiple formats to increase the odds of reaching more learners.” (Carolan 2014) With the help of software, students can get differentiated learning on their own while the teacher is giving specialized instruction to one small group. Students can work at their own pace and at their own level; this ensures that all students are learning.

Examples:

This article “10 Best Apps to Support Differentiated Instruction” gives some great examples of technology that provides differentiated instruction. One listed is Kahoot! which is an interactive quiz app. The teacher and students can create questions to review concepts. It is timed and more points are awarded for those who finish first. Although this is fun, I personally don’t prefer this because those students who do not think as quickly or need more differentiated practice, this can be stressful and overwhelming. I enjoy Blooket which is similar but it will give you the same question more than once, reviewing the material again and again. The students don’t get the same question at the same time, so there is no stress of feeling raced to answer first. A couple other software programs I am familiar with are ST Math and Lexia. ST Math is a completely visual learning software where students are doing math without any reading! Students work at their own pace and the software alerts teachers on which students need help on which concepts. Lexia is a literacy program where students are working at their own pace and again, teachers are notified of students’ progress and areas in need of assistance.

References:

Carolan, Jennifer. “How Software Can Make a Differentiated Difference.” Edsurge. 2014. ​​https://www.edsurge.com/news/2014-09-16-opinion-how-software-can-make-a-differentiated-difference

Bayliss, Jessica. “10 Best Apps to Support Differentiated Instruction” http://blog.whooosreading.org/apps-support-differentiated-instruction/