Differentiating Instruction: Planning for Universal Design and Teaching for College and Career Readiness

Now in its second edition, this best-selling book is your one-stop resource for differentiated instruction. Whether you’re new to the concept or just looking to improve your approach, you’ll find tools to meet the needs of all your students—in a way that works for you. You’ll discover how innovative approaches, such as Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and retrofitting, can help you adapt general education curriculum to fit diverse learning styles.

Featuring case studies at the elementary, middle, and high school levels, this new edition offers

• More easy-to-use strategies to differentiate instruction in mixed ability classrooms
• A new chapter on collaborative planning and evaluation, plus a discussion of co-teaching and differentiation
• Updated lesson plans tied to the Common Core
• A greater emphasis on cultural proficiency, ELLs, and gifted students
• New technology references and resources
• A strengthened link to RTI

Every student is different—and every classroom is different, too. With multiple options to differentiate instruction at any point along the way, this essential guide will help you create the path to success for every student.

Table of Contents

A Letter to Our Readers

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

1. Why Differentiation of Instruction Now?
• What Differentiated Instruction IS (and What It Is NOT)
• Rationales for Differentiated Instruction
• Rationale #1: To Meet Needs of Diverse Learners
• Rationale #2: To Meet Legal Mandates
• Rationale #3: To Be Ethical in Implementing Democratic Values
• Rationale #4: To Dispel Myths About Students
• Rationale #5: To Be Effective Teachers
• Retrofit and Universal Design: Two Approaches to Differentiated Instruction
• Systemic Support for Differentiated Instruction
• Overview of the Book
2. Accessing the General Education Curriculum Through a Retrofit Framework
• What Is the Retrofit Approach?
• Scenario #1: Elementary Science and Social Studies
• Scenario #2: Middle Level Mathematics
• Scenario #3: Middle Level Science
• Scenario #4: High School Language Arts
• What Do You Know About Retrofitting as a Way to Differentiate Instruction?
3. Access to Curriculum Through Universal Design for Learning
• The UDL Cycle for Differentiating Content, Product, and Process
• Design Point #1: Gathering Facts About the Learners
• Design Point #2: Differentiate Content and Materials
• Design Point #3: Product or Differentiate How Students Show What They Know
• Design Point #4: Differentiate Instructional Processes
• Pause and Reflect About Student-Specific Teaching Strategies and Supports
• Putting It All Together With the Universal Design Lesson Plan
4. Gathering Facts About the Learners
• Record Review
• Family-Centered and Culturally Responsive Fact Gathering
• Interest Inventories
• Learning Preferences Information
• Learning and Thinking Styles
• Multiple Intelligences
• Data-Based Observations Including Functional Behavioral Assessments and Cooperative Group Monitoring
• Data-Based Observations
• Functional Behavioral Assessment
• Monitoring Cooperative Group Learning
• Curriculum-Based Assessments
• Making Action Plans (MAPs)
• Disability-Specific Information
• Co-Teacher Roles in Gathering Facts About the Learners
• Pause and Reflect
5. Differentiating Access to the Content of Learning
• What Is Content?
• Ways to Promote Access to Content
• Taxonomies and Objectives: Using and Not Abusing Them
• Layered Curriculum and Levels of Participation
• Differentiating Content Using Graphic Organizers and Educational Technology
• Differentiating Content With Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Techniques
• Involving Students in Determining Content
• Co-Teacher Roles in Differentiating Content
• Pause and Reflect
6. Differentiating and Assessing the Products of Learning
• Why Differentiate Assessment in a Climate of High-Stakes Testing?
• Using Culturally Responsive Techniques to Differentiate and Assess the Products of Learning
• Taxonomy and Learning Preferences Frameworks to Differentiate Products and Assessment
• Using Bloom’s Taxonomy to Differentiate Products and Assessment
• Using Learning Preferences Frameworks to Differentiate Products and Assessment
• Using Bloom’s Taxonomy and Multiple Intelligences Theory to Differentiate Products and Assessment
• Scaffolding and Curriculum-Based Assessments
• Scaffolding as Formative Assessment
• Curriculum-Based Assessment
• Differentiating How Teachers Grade Products
• Alternatives to Norm-Referenced Grading Procedures
• Adapting Criterion-Referenced Grading Systems
• Self-Referenced Systems
• Co-Teacher Roles in Differentiating Products of Learning
• Pause and Reflect
7. Differentiating the Instructional Processes
• The Complexities of the Process of Instruction (Graphic Organizer)
• Instructional Formats
• Instructional Arrangements
• Highlights on Cooperative Learning
• A Focus on Cooperative Strategies for Emerging and Struggling Readers
• A Highlight on Peer Tutors and Partner Learning Arrangements
• Instructional Strategies
• Using Taxonomies
• Applying Concepts From Learning Preferences Frameworks
• Integrating the Arts
• Social and Physical Environment
• Co-Teaching Approaches
• Pause and Reflect
8. Collaborative Planning and Evaluation for Differentiated Instruction
• The Rationale and Benefits of Collaborative Planning and Teaching
• Effective and Efficient Use of Planning and Evaluation Time
• Development of Relationships Among Team Members: It’s a Process!
• Skills for Building Trust and Establishing Team Norms
• Communication and Leadership Skills
• Creative Problem-Solving Skills
• Conflict Resolution Skills
• Are We Really an Effective Planning Team?
9. Co-Teaching to Deliver Differentiated Instruction
• Why Collaborate to Co-Teach?
• Research Base for Co-Teaching
• Who Can Be Co-Teachers?
• Four Approaches to Co-Teaching
• Supportive Co-Teaching
• Parallel Co-Teaching
• Complementary Co-Teaching
• Team Co-Teaching
• Questions About Co-Teaching to Differentiate Instruction
10. UDL Lesson Planning Cycle to Differentiate Instruction in Action: A Fourth-Grade Social Studies Unit
• Setting the Context
• Co-Teacher Professional Development Activities
• Multiple Methods for Accessing Content
• Differentiating the Products (Outcomes) of Learning
• Differentiating the Instructional Processes
• Instructional Format
• Instructional Arrangements
• Instructional Strategies
• Social and Physical Environment
• Co-Teaching Approaches
• Implementing the UDL Plan
• Using the Lesson Plan Template
11. UDL Lesson Planning Cycle to Differentiate Instruction in Action: Middle Level Mathematics
• Who Are the Teachers?
• Professional Development Activities
• Gathering (New) Facts About the Learners
• Multiple Methods for Accessing the Content for Algebra I
• Differentiating the Products (Outcomes) of Learning
• Differentiating the Instructional Processes
• Group Investigation
• Cognitively Guided Instruction
• English Language Learner Techniques
• Implementing the UDL Plan
• Using the Universal Design Lesson Plan Template
12. UDL Lesson Planning Cycle to Differentiate Instruction in Action: Middle Level Science
• Who Are the Teachers?
• Planning to Change From a Retrofit Approach to a Universal Design Approach
• Gathering (Additional) Facts About the Learners
• Pause and Reflect: Tina
• Planning Prior to the Lesson
• Planning to Differentiate Content and Materials
• Planning to Differentiate Products
• Planning to Differentiate the Process of Learning
• Finalizing the Lesson Plan
• Differentiation in Action in the Class
• Reflection

13. UDL Lesson Planning Cycle to Differentiate Instruction in Action: High School Language Arts

• Who Are the Teachers?
• Co-Teacher Professional Development Activities
• Gathering Facts About the Learners
• Differentiating the Content and Materials
• Key Ideas and Details
• Craft and Structure
• Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity
• Differentiating the Product
• Pause and Reflect
• Differentiating the Process
• Co-Teacher Roles
• The Planned Lesson
• Before the Lesson
• The Planned Instructional Sequence
• Pause and Reflect

14. UDL Lesson Planning Cycle to Differentiate Instruction in Action: High School Mathematics

• Who Are the Teachers?
• Co-Teacher Collaborative Planning and Professional Development Activities
• Gathering Facts About the Learners
• Anticipating Learners’ Interests, Learning Preferences, Skills, and Conceptual Understanding
• Multiple Methods for Accessing the Content of Algebra II
• Unit Theme: Reasoning and Sensemaking
• Standards Addressed in the Unit
• Differentiating the Product: Multiple Methods to Demonstrate Unit Objectives
• Implementation
• Assessment of Prior Knowledge/Mastery
• Differentiating the Process of Instruction
• Planning for Differentiation to Include Evidence-Based Strategies
• Implementing Differentiated Instructional Processes
• Using the Lesson Plan Template
• Reflections
• Reflections on Facts About the Learners
• Reflections on Content and Materials Differentiation
• Reflections on Product and Assessment Differentiation
• Reflections on Instructional Process Differentiation
• Peer Observer Feedback and Future Goals

15. Epilogue: Pause and Reflect

• Values and Assumptions About Students
• Values and Assumptions About Adults
• Why Explain Values and Assumptions?

References

Resources

Index