Jillian
Patti
Are
Teachers Successfully Targeting the Needs of Every Child?
Introduction
"The biggest mistake of past centuries in teaching has been to
treat all children as if they were variants of the same individual, and thus to
feel justified in teaching them the same subjects in the same ways,"
(Gardner, 1994). Children are all very different in a variety of
ways. Not all children look the same, behave the same, or think the
same. Even though children may be of the same age, they each have
an array of needs. These needs follow over to education in the
classroom. Not all children learn the same. It is up to the
teachers to provide these various methods of teaching to target the individual
needs of the children. Teachers can use different methods to
differentiate teaching in order to engage all of the students in
learning. Also, teachers can modify the entire process in which they
teach to target the needs of every student. However, teachers being
human, tend to lose sight of that.
Even
though these methods are in mind when preparing to teach, teachers can lean
towards one method and forget about the other ones. I have interviewed a
teacher of the elementary school level to gather a better understanding of how
teachers apply these methods to their teaching. By using a variety of my
own methods, I have analyzed the interview transcript to study how this teacher
talks about teaching. The teacher's tone of voice, the way she laughs,
and how long she discusses certain points reveals how she truly feels about
teaching. In comparison to my findings, I have reviewed The
Differentiated Classroom: Responding to the Needs of All Learners, written
by Carol Ann Tomlinson, which gives an excellent evaluation of how teachers can
effectively target the needs of all children. Furthermore, this
study provides exceptional proof that many teachers subconsciously teach using
their favorite methods, rather than incorporating every method into their
teaching.
Literature Review
The
text that I reviewed is called The Differentiated Classroom: Responding
to the Needs of All Learners, written by Carol Ann Tomlinson. In
the text Tomlinson provides a variety of ways that teachers can effectively
make their class a differentiated classroom. What is a
differentiated classroom? “A classroom where the teachers strive to
do whatever it takes to ensure that struggling and advanced learners, students
with varied cultural heritages, and children with different background
experiences all grow as much as they possibly can each day, each week, and
throughout the year,” (Tomlinson, p. 2). Children need different
ways to learn in order to stay focused on what is being
taught. “They also accept and act on the premise that teachers must
be ready to engage students in instruction through different learning
modalities, by appealing to different interests, and by using varied rates of
instruction along with varied degrees of complexity,” (Tomlinson, p.
2). Tomlinson explains that teachers can use a variety of materials
to differentiate teaching, as well as modifying the process in which they
teach.
In
Chapter 2, Tomlinson states how the process describes activities designed to
ensure that students use key skills to make sense out of essential ideas and
information. When a teacher is teaching they may need to consider
modifying the lesson spur of the moment in order to increase the likelihood
that the learner will understand the key ideas and information. For
example, Tomlinson explains that while teaching, a teacher may need to modify
the process for an advanced student who has already mastered the skills being
taught that day. The teacher may assign an activity that is more
complex or allow a struggling student to complete an activity at a slower pace.
Methods
To
further my study on differentiated classrooms I interviewed LK, a second grade
teacher to learn how she uses a variety of methods to teach her
students. I chose to interview an elementary school teacher because
when I graduate, I hope to work in an elementary school. Before I
began the interview process, I produced a series of questions that target my
research question. I carefully picked out which questions to ask to
ensure that I would not breach anything personal with the
interviewee. To begin the interview, I asked easy questions to make
sure that LK was comfortable being recorded and to lead her up to my main
points. After a thorough interview that gave me a better
understanding of how to differentiate a classroom, I transcribed it and
analyzed the data.
Data
The
data that I collected from the interview provides proof that humans
subconsciously discuss what they prefer most when presenting any sort of
information to other people. I will be analyzing the different
topics that I presented to LK; how she teaches, different methods she uses, and
how she modifies her process when she teaches. I have divided these
topics into separate sections to make the data easier to interpret.
How LK
Teaches
In
relation to differentiated classrooms, I asked LK how she teaches. Without asking her to discuss a
specific subject, she automatically began speaking about how she teaches
LAL.
“We usually start out by reading to them and then they’ll break up into small
groups and they’ll
read on their own…. that’s supposed to be at an instructional level
but obviously for
some of the kids it’s too hard, it’s not instructional, which is why we do a
lot of that stuff
together.”
When
LK was speaking about her LAL lessons, her voice inflected when she said the
word, “supposed.” The tone of her
voice made it seem as if she knew that the lesson was not fit for all
learners. Then, I asked LK if she
has different levels for stronger students versus struggling students.
“Yes
so they are all doing the same thing but they’re not doing the same thing.
They’re all
reading biographies, they all have to look for information under the certain
headings, they
all have to talk about the same talking points but in texts that are more at
their read ability.”
Here,
LK is speaking confidently and seems to be aware that students have different
learning needs. However,
throughout the rest of the interview, she unconsciously shies away from this
method.
Methods of Teaching
When
asking LK about her different teaching methods, I specifically asked her to
discuss how she incorporates visual, auditory, and kinesthetic methods into her
teaching. Instead of discussing
how she uses these methods in everyday life, she talked about specific lessons
she has taught. “Today we did a
math lesson and we used Plato to do fractions.” Then, LK goes on to say,
“Ya
know the book tells you, they give you these little cards and the cards have
sections and
you’re supposed to put the two cards next to each other to tell what’s greater
than, less
than and equal to a half… these kinds of things… but I think the cards are too vague...”
LK
consciously admits that she is supposed to teach the fractions by the book, but
she thinks it’s too vague. Also,
when LK says “supposed,” her tone of voice proves that she is unsure of the activity
and its purpose. Then, LK goes on
to discuss her method of teaching fractions.
“So
I found this idea online, I gave them a little container of Plato and they
played with it for
about ten minutes and then I told them to cut it in half, I gave them plastic
knives, cut it
in half, and they had to make two circles using the lid of the Plato container
as like a cookie
cutter…”
LK
continues with describing the rest of the Plato, fractions activity. Here, LK spends a longer time
discussing this activity and goes into details about what she has the students
do. Originally, I had asked LK to
tell me how she incorporates visual, auditory, and kinesthetic methods into her
teaching. Unconsciously, LK
strictly discussed her kinesthetic methods and did not mention anything about
how she incorporates visual and auditory methods. The length of her discussion about teaching fractions kinesthetically
proves that she teaches her lessons according to how she feels most comfortable
teaching.
Modifying Instruction
I
asked LK how she modifies the process in which she teaches. Once again, instead of giving me a
broad answer of how she modifies her lessons, she gave me specific examples. First she talks about math lessons.
“For
math, I do a lot of, we call it, pencil I can do myself, blue I do with someone
else, red
is what the teacher said, now I know it in my head, so lets say for instance
here’s this complete
the assignment in pencil and then I’ll know and anyone else who looks at their journal
will know that this is something that they did by themselves. If they can
do number
one, five and seven by themselves but they need help with numbers two, three, four
and six, then they can pick up a blue pen and they can work with a partner but
then they
have to write their answer in a blue pen. If I help them with it and they
still can’t get it
and I have to help them with it they have to write their answer in a red pen so
it shows…
its like evidence.”
By
the length of LK’s answer regarding math lessons, she seems very confident
about how she modifies her math lessons.
The length of her answer also provides proof that she is comfortable
discussing math. Now, when it
comes to LAL, LK seems to struggle.
“As
far as writing goes I probably am not the best person to ask (laughs)… we use a
lot of
graphic organizers , a lot of graphic organizers and spend a lot of time
teaching them how
to use it but the kids that really have trouble, they can’t use it on their
own.”
LK
does not seem confident when talking about how she modifies her lessons in
LAL. LK seems to be unsure of how
to modify her lessons. When LK
laughed after saying, “I probably am not the best person to ask,” she proved
that she does not always modify her lessons. Also, when discussing the use of graphic organizers, she
makes it seem as if she only uses them because she is told to or because it is
forced upon through the curriculum.
Through
the analysis of my data that I collected from interviewing LK, I learned that
teachers subconsciously teach to how they are most comfortable doing so. In reflection to Carol Ann Tomlinson
and using different learning modalities, LK proved to teach mostly by the use
of kinesthetic methods. LK doing
so subconsciously shows that in reality, she is not using different learning
modalities. Also, in relation to
Tomlinson stating that effective teachers instruct using varied rates, LK
proved that she does not do that when she discussed modifying LAL lessons.
Conclusion
In today’s world, the way teacher’s teach, the methods they use, and how
they modify their lessons, are limitless.
According to Carol Ann Tomlinson, effective teachers do whatever it
takes in their power to strive to ensure that struggling and advanced learners
grow. However, teachers being
human, tend to lose sight of that goal.
Some teachers teach not to target each individual child’s needs, but
they teach in a way that they are most comfortable with. Most of these teachers do not
consciously do this, however, they are not aware that they are. During the thinking and writing process
of lesson plans, some teachers plan according to their needs, not their
students. In order to meet the
needs of all children in a classroom, teachers need to be more aware of how
they are teaching and the purpose behind why they are teaching. When this is realized and accomplished,
then the abilities of all children will be evident.
