M-5 Differentiation and Personalization


Students experience a personalized and differentiated learning environment, based on class and individual data, to ensure student understanding through remediation, instruction, and enrichment.

What does this look like in our schools and classrooms?

  • Use guided reading and math groups and strategies to meet students where they are
  • Provide lesson content in multiple modes, multiple times (video, kinesthetic, audio, visual, etc.)
  • Survey students to determine their learning styles and plan lessons/groups based on results
  • Use digital resources that personalize instruction (TenMarks, Newsela, Raz Kids, iReady, etc.)
  • Incorporate elements of choice and student voice in learning activities
  • Differentiate by content, process, product by readiness, level, interest
  • Regroup frequently and across multiple classrooms if needed to meet individual needs
  • Collaborate with parents to get to know a student's preferred and successful learning methods
  • Use choice boards for projects and assignments
  • Incorporate school specialists and instructional assistants to provide more 1:1 learning
  • Use adaptive release in Blackboard Learn to differentiate assignments
  • Build personalized content and resources using Symbaloo
  • Use stations and small groups to allow for more choice
  • Follow and understand IEPs to provide scaffolded support for learners
  • Provide tiered instructional resources (leveled readings, Blendspaces with different resources, etc.)
  • Plan enrichment and early finisher activities

Exemplar Lessons & Strategies


How Can Technology Support this M-Powerment Strategy?

Symbaloo
Organize resources/websites
  • Build content resources differentiated by level or interest
  • Use Lesson Plan feature to build playlists for students based on their skills

symbaloo.edu

 Blackboard Learn
Learning Management System
  • Create groups and assign activities and assignments based on student need
  • Use adaptive release to set learning paths for students
  • Create retention center alerts for struggling students
learn.mgsd.k12.nc.us

 Blendspace/TES Teach
Interactive multimedia lessons and projects
  • Incorporate material in different modalities (text, video, images, etc.)
  • Create differentiated learning tracks for students to work through
https://www.tes.com/lessons

For Future Reading, Exploration, & Learning


Educational Articles

Check out these additional research-based articles and books related to this M-Powerment Strategy. 

https://sites.google.com/a/mgsd.k12.nc.us/mgsd-big-refresh/system/app/pages/search?scope=search-site&q=M-1Self-Paced PD

To explore more about this strategy, check out some of the sessions that have been offered at previous Summer Institutes related to this strategy. Each one contains lots of strategies you can implement and resources you can use to improve your practice.

Instructional Coach-Created Resources

Newsletters and contests created by our Instructional Coaches and School Library Media Coordinators have lots of resources and ideas you can implement. Here are a few that relate to this strategy.