Differentiated Instruction
I believe one my most important responsibilities as a special educator is to individualize instruction to the greatest degree possible. This starts by getting to know each of my students at the beginning of the year, but continues throughout the year as I deliver instruction. During reading instruction, I use a variety of methods to teach phonics depending on the level of the student. For one very low-level reader, much of my reading instruction focused on sound-symbol correspondence. This particular student also required a kinesthetic approach to lessons rather than merely responding verbally so I created a variety of activities for her to show her competence in this area. The following activity is one warm-up that I used with this student.
My student would listen to my instructions and respond by drawing the appropriate shape. For example, I might say, "Draw a square around each picture that begins with a tongue scraper sound [/k/ /g/]." This would not only give her an opportunity to move her hand, but she would be practicing her listening skills and have to practice isolating sounds as she "read" each picture.
For a slightly higher level student I would include more letters on the page, but still isolate single syllable words. This is an example of a worksheet that I might send home for homework.
For a student working on multi-syllabic words, I use sheets like the above to work on segmenting and labeling syllables. The student would be expected to use the "dot and grab" technique to isolate each syllable. They might label the syllables prior to reading them and then use their decoding skills to read each syllable in isolation before blending them together to read the word as a whole.
While teaching fourth and fifth graders, I individualized a history project so that each student could complete the project with a partner working at their own pace. Our class was learning about American explorers so each student worked with a partner to learn about a particular explorer. Some students were able to complete several activities while others focused on one activity. Each student was expected to read and learn about their explorer but they were then able to choose which activities they would like to focus on. Allowing students to have flexibility in what they could complete not only kept them more engaged in the project, but at the end of the assignment students were able to share their unique experiences with the class.