STKIP SURYA DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION GUIDE: INSTRUCTORS MANUAL

LaRaeAlcidor, Wenting (Kayla) Jiang, Robert Lengacher EME6631 Management of Instructional Development Instructional Systems Florida State University April 17, 2012

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T ABLE OF C ONTENTS
INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................................................................................ 3 GASING + DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION = SUCCESS! ............................................................................................................................................ 3 STUDENT CHARACTERISTICS ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 READINESS ................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 INTERESTS..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 LEARNING PROFILE ........................................................................................................................................................................................................ 4 INSTRUCTION................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 4 CONTENT ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 PROCESS....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 5 PRODUCT ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 5 DIRECTIONS FOR USING THE GUIDE ........................................................................................................................................................................... 5 1. GATHER STUDENT DATA.............................................................................................................................................................................................. 5 2. TARGET STUDENT CHARACTERISTICS ............................................................................................................................................................................ 5 3. CHOOSE TEACHING STRATEGIES .................................................................................................................................................................................. 6 4. DOCUMENT DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION STRATEGIES IN THE LESSON PLAN................................................................................................................. 7 5. ADJUST YOUR INSTRUCTION ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 7 6. REFLECT AND EXPAND ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 7 READ MORE... ............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 7

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I NTRODUCTION
It is the vision of STKIP Surya to produce excellent educators to help Indonesians maximize their potential both at home and internationally. An analysis of the students at STKIP Surya reveals that many lack the basic skills necessary for success in their studies. At the same time other students are able to work at an accelerated pace - even to the level of winning international science and technology Olympiads. Stated more simply, every student at STKIP Surya is unique! Each has unique needs that need to be met and unique experiences, interests, and motivations that can be exploited to help them excel in their studies. To meet the unique needs of these students, instructors at STKIP Surya are encouraged to use an innovative teaching approach invented by Dr. Yohanes Surya known as GASING, or Gampang, Asyik, dan Menyenangkan. These methods are designed to make learning fun, easy, and enjoyable, and they should serve as a model for future educators trained by STKIP Surya. Unfortunately, a recent survey revealed that many instructors still rely on lecture as their sole teaching method. This guide is designed to help you easily select teaching strategies to complement the GASING method that are specifically matched to the characteristics and needs of their students. It is hoped that these methods will make teaching more fun and rewarding for you, more effective and motivating for your students, and that teachers produced by STKIP Surya will utilize these methods to foster a love of science and technology across Indonesia.

GASING + D IFFERENTIATED I NSTRUCTION = S UCCESS !

The GASING teaching method may be complemented by an approach known as Differentiated Instruction or Differentiated Learning. Differentiated Instruction is simply adjusting your instruction to better match your students abilities, interests, and learning profiles. Differentiated Instruction can be accomplished using the following steps: Assess Your Students: Regularly use various tools (such as the Learner Analysis Tool) and methods to learn as much as you can about your students knowledge, skills, attitudes, interests and experiences. Target Certain Student Characteristics: Because students are so diverse and unique, it would be impossible to individualize instruction for everyone. Instead, choose specific characteristics of your students that may be hindering their progress in your class. Adapt Your Instruction: Choose teaching strategies that specifically address the student characteristics you are targeting and adjust your instruction by adding them to your lesson plans using the STKIP Surya Lesson Planning Template. By differentiating, your instruction will have a greater potential of being effective, and your students will exposed to a variety of GASING methods in a realistic context.

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S TUDENT C HARACTERISTICS
To effectively target characteristics of your students, attempt to gather information about the following areas: Readiness, Interests, and Learning Profile. The STKIP Surya Learner Analysis Tool has been provided to help you gather information about your students.

R EADINESS
Student Readiness refers to your students current level of skill in reading, writing, math, science, and computer skills. Th is also refers to supporting characteristics such as study skills and memory. It is important to identify your students current readiness level so you can provide just enough support to allow them to progress and learn independently.

I NTERESTS
Student Interests refers to your students experiences, cultures, goals, and outside interests that directly affect their motivation and how well they will relate to the instruction. When instruction is not matched to student interests, they are unlikely to be engaged or put forth their best efforts in studying. This aspect is vitally important for helping students from the most remote locations, like Papua, to adapt to learning and life at STKIP Surya.

L EARNING P ROFILE
Learning Profile refers to the ways that your students learn best. This includes four main dimensions: Learning Style Preferences, Cognitive Style, Grouping Preference, and Learning Environment Preference. For example, some students may like to read by reading text, others by acting out a concept. Some students may need very concrete examples, while others may be able to understand very abstract concepts. Some students may prefer to work independently, while other like to work in a group.

I NSTRUCTION
After you have targeted specific aspects of your students readiness, interests, and learning profiles, you can adapt your instruction to better match your students needs and preferences. There are three areas where your instruction may be adapted: Content, Process, and Product. It is important to note that Differentiated Instruction strategies are not designed to be a new curriculum that will solve all of your students academic problems; instead, these strategies are designed to supplement and improve what you are already doing.

C ONTENT
Differentiation strategies based on content will most often be used during the Activation and Demonstration phases of the STKIP Surya Lesson Planning Template. Most often, you will adapt content based on student readiness and interests. Oftentimes, the curriculum that students must learn for your course may not be changed; therefore, the best way to adapt content is to use the Revised Blooms Taxonomy. For students with low levels of readiness, you expect them to start with content at the three lower levels: Remember,

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Understand, and Apply. For students who have high levels of readiness or who achieve mastery, you may expect them to work at the higher levels of the taxonomy: Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. A key thing to remember is that all students are expected to learn the same information; however, some will work with the information at a higher or lower level of complexity based on their needs. You may also supplement the lesson content by adding stories or contexts that match your students interests and experiences.

P ROCESS
Differentiation of instructional processes occurs during the Activation and Application phases of the STKIP Surya Lesson Planning Template. Based on targeted aspects of your students interests and learning profiles, you may adjust the activities in which students engage or how the students are grouped for different lessons and activities. These adaptations are made to provide students with activities that are designed to help them make sense of the content and build knowledge in ways that are most compatible with their interests and learning profiles.

P RODUCT
Differentiation of instructional products most often occurs for all students during the Application phase of the STKIP Surya Lesson Planning Template, and during the Integration phase for students who have achieved mastery. Differentiating the instructional product means asking students to provide evidence of their learning in ways other than just a written test. You may adjust your expectation for product assignments based on all targeted aspects of your students in all three areas: readiness, interests, and learning profile. These alternative products are not expected to replace written tests, but they should be used in cases where motivation is a problem. They may also be used if you suspect that a student understands a concept, but they normally perform badly on written tests.

D IRECTIONS FOR U SING THE G UIDE

Our Differentiated Instruction Guide is designed to provide you with an easy way to select effective strategies that will meet the individual needs of your students and hopefully make teaching more fun! The instructions below will teach you how to use this guide.

1. G ATHER S TUDENT D ATA

A number of sources will provide basic information about your students readiness, including test scores and grades from othe r courses. A great way to gather data about your students interests and learning profiles is to use the STKIP Surya Learner Analysis Tool. This tool can be administered in print or online using Google Forms, and the questions are grouped based on relevant learner characteristics. Instructions for using the tool are found in a companion document.

2. T ARGET S TUDENT C HARACTERISTICS

After you have gathered data from various sources, including the Learner Analysis Tool, you will need to analyze the results to find areas you would like to target for differentiation. It is important to note that it is not practical to provide individualized Differentiated Instruction

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strategies for every student, instead focus your attention on adjusting your lesson based on just two or three characteristics. For example, most of the Papuan students and others have extremely low levels of readiness, so content should always be considered for differentiation. A worksheet for targeting these characteristics is provided with the STKIP Surya Learner Analysis Tool.

3. C HOOSE T EACHING S TRATEGIES

Once you have a list of two or three student characteristics that you would like to target for differentiated instruction, use the following steps to locate a matching teaching strategy in the STKIP Surya Differentiated Instruction Guide.
Step 1: In the first column of the teaching strategy tables are codes and student characteristics that correspond to the Learner Analysis Tool Data Summary Worksheet. Locate all strategies that match your targeted characteristics. Step 2: In the second column, note the name of any teaching strategies that match your targeted student characteristics. The names of the strategies you use will be recorded later in your lesson plan. Step 3: Carefully read the Description and Example for each the teaching strategies you are considering. Choose one or two strategies to use during your lesson, and think of how you will match them to your students characteristics. Step 4: Decide on the phase of the STKIP Surya Lesson Planning Template where the strategy should be used. Suggested phases are listed in the fifth column. Often, more than one phase is suggested, but you only need to choose one.

F IGURE 1

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4. D OCUMENT D IFFERENTIATED I NSTRUCTION S TRATEGIES

IN THE

L ESSON P LAN

Once you have chosen one or two Differentiated Instruction strategies and you know in which phase of the lesson they will be used, document them in your lesson plan. Within each phase of the lesson, there is now a place to document the Differentiated Instruction Strategy you plan to use. Please record the name of the strategy that you plan to use with your students. You may also add additional notes about how you plan to customize the strategy based on your students characteristics. Although there is a place for a strategy in all four phases, you do not need a strategy for all four. Please only choose one or two strategies for each lesson to keep things manageable.

5. A DJUST Y OUR I NSTRUCTION

Once you have added one or two differentiated instruction strategies to your lesson plan, try them with your students. Some strategies will require advance preparation, so be sure to plan ahead.

6. R EFLECT

ON

Y OUR E XPERIENCE
F IGURE 2

As you use these strategies with your students, keep track of what works well and what does not. Take notes on the strategies, and involve your students in the reflection process as well. As time passes, you will develop a set of reliable strategies that work well with your students.

7. A DD Y OUR O WN S TRATEGIES
It is also important to create new strategies and add them to your list. Be creative! Nobody knows more about your students than you, so try to invent new ways to meet their unique needs, interests, and learning profiles. The wide variety of needs and abilities among students at STKIP Surya guarantees that you will always have more problems to solve and more strategies to try. When you find a strategy that works, be sure to share it. The experience of differentiating instruction is an opportunity to grow for your students, your colleagues, and you.

R EAD MORE ...

Tomlinson, Carol (2001). How to differentiate instruction in mixed-ability classrooms (2 ed.). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. ISBN 0871205122.