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How to Differentiate Instruction

What The Research Tells Us About Differentiate Instruction

There are three bodies of research worth mentioning. They are:

1) Brain-based Research

2) Learning Styles and Multiple Intelligences

3) Authentic Assessment

Brain-based Research on Learning

Research on the brain has been used to inform educational practice for many years and is becoming more and more popular. Brain-based research helps us to know the many influences that can affect learning. The more we understand about "how" students learn best given the variables affect learning, the better equipped we are to provide instruction that will maximize learning outcomes.

Other valuable links on this topic can be found at:

http://www.teach-nology.com/litined/brain_learning/

Learning Styles and Multiple Intelligences

Learning styles research is predominantly used to understand learning preferences that students use to receive and/or process information. Obviously, the ideal is to create instruction that will address all three learning styles: Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic.

Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences has received an overwhelming response from educators in the past several years. Gardner offers seven different ways to demonstrate intellectual ability and has recently added an eight intelligence. Understanding how students demonstrate their intellectual capacity is an important factor in designing instruction that will meet the specific learning needs of students who may be dominant in one or several intelligence as opposed to other forms of intelligence. More information on these topics can be found on:

http://www.teach-nology.com/teachers/methods/multi_intelligences

Authentic Assessment

Not enough can be said about authentic assessment. Basically, what it means is that students are tested on what they have been taught and hopefully, what they have learned. The greatest implications are that: curriculum is aligned with what is expected to be learned; strategies used to teach are according to students' needs; and assessment instruments used are flexible and adequately and appropriately used to measure on-going performance. The bottom line is that authentic assessment offers students the opportunity to "measure up" to the standards that are aligned to the curriculum. For more information on this very important topic, go to:

http://www.teach-nology.com/currenttrends/alternative_assessment/

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