Or... do you need to sell a kidney to improve your test scores?
Recently I spent several days working with a group of instructional technology facilitators in North Carolina. Taking a break after the first morning session, the participants could not wait to share a SchoolTube video about differentiated instruction. We laughed uproariously, and they had obviously seen it many times!
Go ahead and take three minutes to watch the humorous take on lesson planning. I’ll wait here...
If you are a teacher, if you have ever been a teacher, or if you just know what a teacher does, you probably found that video very funny--and perhaps a bit sad. Because just beneath the humor of pudding, ponies, and throwing knives lies a difficult truth: teaching in the digital age is hard. The pressures created by increasingly complex curriculum, data-based assessment and technology-wired students with short attention spans might seem overwhelming.
And while created as farce, the video is also a biting commentary on the potential frustrations of 21st-century teachers.
So can digital resources help alleviate some of these pressures? The answer is yes. Providing opportunities for differentiation–tailoring tasks, activities, and assessments to students' needs, interest and abilities–is a key element of SAS Curriculum Pathways. With features such as varied levels, flexibility, and student interactivity, SAS Curriculum Pathways resources provide multiple opportunities for teachers to adapt engaging core content to the needs of individual classes and students.
Each resource includes a Lesson Guide with ideas for implementation, differentiation, and assessment. And we have recently added an entry, Differentiating Instruction, to the Tips and Tricks section of our professional development site. Here teachers can get additional ideas as they look for ways to differentiate content, pedagogy, and assessment.
One of the important goals of SAS Curriculum Pathways is to help teachers effectively differentiate and implement digital resources in their courses--without selling a kidney.
