Differentiation

=Differentiation=

Differentiation is teaching at a variety of levels and in a variety of ways, so as to be more suited to the needs of your students. It is actually something that should be occuring in every classroom regardless of the presence of gifted students, but is particularly important for those with extremely high ability.

The first step to a differentiated classroom is having an appropriate learning environment for gifted students - one that is supportive, personalised, culturally responsive and promotes student autonomy.

Next we must be clear what we mean by a differentiated classroom, a differentiated classroom should:
 * **Be proactive rather than reactive** - planned in advance, rather than reacting to students for whom the lesson is not working on the spot.
 * **Use grouping effectively** - small groups of three of four students working together on similar material, and being taught as a group has been shown to be more effective than no grouping.
 * **Vary materials and resources** - more able students may need more comprehensive and difficult texts than weaker students.
 * **Use variable pacing** - allow students to work at their own pace. Usually this means gifted students will move through material more quickly than others.
 * **Be student-centred** - there should be ongoing formative assessment and a focus on students sense-making. Students should have a choice in the level of material they engage with.

(Tomlinson, Brighton, Hertberg, Callahan, Moon, Brimijoin, Conover & Reynolds, 2003)

It is not differentiation if gifted students are simply provided with more of the same work - and this includes setting everyone a graded exercise from a textbook and expecting that more able students will move faster and therefore arrive at the more difficult questions near the end of the exercise while weaker students will not. So differentiation should involve qualitative, rather than quantative changes.

There are three main areas of differentiation, and it is important that each of these is included in a classroom programme. They need not all be present in every lesson, but must be included at different stages of the students learning where appropriate.

Content
This is the mathematical concepts and information that are studied. Content for gifted students should be more **concept-focused**, **abstract**, **complex**, and **varied** than for the majority of students. The extension page has some suggestions for topics completely different from those typically studied, while the enrichment page shows some activities that could compliment the standard curriculum.

Process
This is how the content is taught, learned and engaged with by students. Processes for gifted students should involve **discovering** (rather than being told) concepts, **open-endedness** in problems, **choices** of ways in which to engage with material, **faster pacing**, interaction and discussion in **groups**, **higher-level thinking** processes, and problems requiring **metacognition**.

Product
This is how learning is evidenced. For gifted students it is particularly valuable to include a **variety** of products which may be **self-selected**, results of **real-life** mathematical problems are particularly important, and these may be addressed to a **real audience**, products may also represent **transformations of knowledge** through originality and creativity. It is important to also consider the means by which these products are **evaluated** - students need appropriate feedback, but should also be involved in self- and peer-evaluation. Some gifted students may consider it unfair to be marked at a higher level and on more difficult work than average students, and it is important to allow for this.

(Moltzen, Riley & McAlpine, 2000) (Maker & Nielson, 1995)