Dr. Gwen Frank,

SUNY College at Oneonta

Best Practice Conference - 2012

MEETING THE NEEDS OF ALL STUDENTS INCLUDING ADVANCED AND GIFTED

STUDENTS

AGENDA

• Welcome

• Activity – What kind of instructional issues plague professional educators when they have advanced students in their classrooms?

• Two differentiation strategies to meet the needs of advanced learners

• Curriculum Compacting

• Orbitals

ACTIVITY• Individually - Somewhere in your Best Practice

brochure, make a list of challenges educators have with prescribing curriculum for advanced students.

• Partner

• Total group

Differentiating in Mixed-Ability Classrooms

“Teaching should respond to what we know about the learner(s)”

CURRICULUM COMPACTING

STUDENT BEHAVIORS WHICH MAY SUGGEST THAT COMPACTING IS

NECESSARY•Consistently finishes tasks early• Work is usually well done and correct• Seems to have some advanced familiarity with the material• Expresses interest in pursuing alternate or advanced topics•Consistent high performance or motivation• Creates own puzzles, games, or other diversions in class

CURRICULUM COMPACTING

The classroom practitioner needs to decide:

• What is important in the unit that the student needs to know?

• What do students already know or are able to learn quickly?

• What can be skipped or eliminated?

• What can be accomplished quickly –within a normal unit?

• Is there a child who is bored?

• Is there a child who you instinctivley knows the material is easy? Are they always making 90’s or above with little effort?

• Is there a child who says they are “bored” and you may just want to give them more work for just saying that?

• Is there a child who is misbehaving because his/her work is complete and the work has earned a 80% or above?

CURRICULUM COMPACTING

• Is a teaching strategy that “buys time” for acceleration and/or enrichment

• The goal is to modify or “streamline” the curriculum to allow students to move at a quicker pace and then have time to pursue an alternative topic or go into greater depth in an area of study.

HOW DO YOU DO THIS?

• Pre- assess – use a chapter or teacher created test

• You may offer it to all students or just a few – your choice

• 80% should be considered mastery

• They have earned the grade, so document that in the grade book keeping a copy of the student test

• Prescribe alternate activities – acceleration or in depth study

• Never more of the same assignments that students have already indicated that they have mastered by the pre-assessment

ORBITALS

STRATEGY ENCOURAGES STUDENTS TO:

• Raise questions of interest to them individually

• Helps them to find out

RESOURCES

• The Differentiated Classroom – Responding to the Needs of all Learners -

• Carol Ann Tomlinson – ASCD – 1999

• How to Differentiate Instruction in Mixed-Ability Classrooms

• Carol Ann Tomlinson –ASCD - 2001

• Teaching Gifted Kids in the Regular Classroom

• Susan Winebrenner – Free Spirit Publishing, 2001

Dr. Gwen Frank

Assistant Professor

SUNY College at Onenonta

Gwen.frank@oneonta.edu

607-436-3420

THANK YOU