A tip to help you differentiate

We all find it hard at times to ensure sufficient differentiation to meet the needs of all our students.

In each lesson I try to ensure at least 1 activity is staggered so that all levels and abilities are able to access the key content of lesson. Not every lesson has to have a written activity, but it's good to use this levelling method to develop students' understanding of different 'questions' so to speak, but also helps them develop their written skills in just a short paragraph or two. 

What I personally love about this method of differentiation is that i've found if you give students a chance to pick their task, they will often aim higher.

I find the easiest way to differentiate is to break something big into 3 or 4 smaller chunks. For example, main lesson objective is to 'Identify the impacts of the Mt St Helen's Eruption'. This can be broken down into a 5-10 minute activity:

Aiming for 4? Describe 2 positive and 2 negative impacts of the Mt St Helens Eruption

Aiming for 5? Explain (using the word because) the positives and negatives of the Mt St Helen's eruption

Aiming for 6? Explain what you think the most damaging impact of the eruption was. Justify your answer.

Aiming for 7? Suggest how you think the impacts of the eruption could have been reduced. Justify how they would have helped.

I love this type of activity and ensure students always write the level they have aimed for in the margin. This helps me when I mark their work, but also means we can track their attempt against their target grade. 

Hope this helps some of you when you're struggling with differentiation!