Rachael Del Boccio

ED450 - Differentiating Instruction Chart

Domain 1 Planning and Preparation
Domain 3: Instruction
Identify five students with diverse learning needs. These needs include a student who has an IEP, a student who has behavior issues, a student who is gifted and talented, a student who is
shy who doesn’t participate and a student who is low socio-economic. Describe in week one what you see as the student’s strengths and challenges learning and/or staying engaged. Only
use your student’s first names.

For this assignment, you will document and show evidence of how you differentiate instruction for each student and write how each student responds to your efforts. This assignment will
last all semester, documenting your efforts in week 4, week 8, week 12 and a final reflection of what differentiating strategies worked. ***Only for the duration of my first 8 weeks in NZ.
Part A: What learning/engagement strategy did you try?
Part B: How did the student respond?
Student Strengths Challenges Week 3:
IEP/504 -Willing to participate -Letter sound recognition Part A: Visual Support Cards
-Tries when things are -Decoding words
difficult -Math/basic facts Part B: Jaydah has difficulties
Jaydah -Kind recognizing what letter
-Artist corresponds to which sound. To
support her engagement in writing
lessons I have supplied Jaydah
with a card that has the alphabet
and visuals for each letter. For
example, the letter h has an image
of a house next to it. When I first
gave Jaydah the card, we went
over the card saying the letter and
the word (emphasizing the first
letter sound). Now when sounding
words out she uses the card for
support. This card works when
a peer or myself is working with
Jaydah sounding out the words.
After the first sound is isolated,
for example the h in horse, she is
able to go “h” (sounding it out) H-
like house. She then looks for the
house image on the card to see
how to write the letter h. This
engagement strategy has helped
with words she can sound out,
however if the word is not one she
has memorized, she has difficultly
sounding it out and using the
visual support card. The next step
I want to take is working on her
ability to recognize the letter and
sounds relationships, so that they
are second nature. In addition,
working on how to write each
letter.
Week 5:
Part A: Individualized/Small
Reading Groups
Part B: Jaydah had been placed
in the blue level reading group
because that is the lowest level
group the class has. I have kept
her in that group so that she has
peer support and interactions.
However, I have now created
her own group which is in the
reading group rotation. Jaydah
is at the emergent magenta
level and needs one to one
support. While working with
Jaydah during her reading
group time I focus on high
frequency words like: see, am,
and here. The follow up
activities are worksheets that
have her writing the high
frequency words and drawing
images to help her retain
information. While she write,
she needs to say the word and
spell it. The hope is that the
visual, audio, repetition will
help her gain a better
sound/letter recognition skills.
Week 7: Final reflection: What worked?
Part A: Sentence starters The differentiation that worked the
best for Jaydah was the visual support
Part B: To help Jaydah cards. By week 6 when she was
start writing I provide writing and sounding words out she
her with sentence could go: “h h h like house” and write
starters. I provide these the letter h without having to look at
for the reading group the card for the shape of the letter or
follow up activities and to identify the letter sound
for reflection writing. correspondence. I observed her doing
Two examples being: this independently from that point on.
The main character The individual reading group has
was… and I found helped her gain confidence in trying to
beginning blends sound out words before just giving up.
easy/hard because… Her ability to read high frequency
words has improved, however her
In addition, before overall fluency is about the same. Her
sending Jaydah to write reading level is the same but her
her responses, we talk confidence is growing which will help
about the reflection or her developmentally. The sentence
follow up activity to starters helped her in the beginning.
help her put her ideas However, she became too dependent
into words before on them. Jaydah would not start
having to write. writing or thinking about the follow
up until she met with me and we
talked about the topic.

Behavior -Kind -Personal Space Part A: Connecting learning
Issues -Determination -Keeping hands to self material to real life (everyday
-Problem Solver -Staying on task examples). I used this strategy
Liam -Helper -Math facts throughout my lessons but for this
-Reading student specifically. When it
comes to the writing journals, I
make a point to stop by Liam
during the brainstorming session
time to ask guiding questions to
find a topic that relates to his
personal life and the learning
material. When reading to the
class I make a point to provide
personal examples to the class and
ask students for their personal
connections.
Part B: When Liam shares with
the class I make a point to
reinforce the positive behavior
and the personal connection he
made to the learning material.
This strategy works about 50% of
the time. When Liam is really
excited about the topic/experience
he writes away or participates.
However, when he is not
interested or has recently been
disciplined, he will not engage
with the class. This is something I
need to address and find a better
way of handling the misbehaviors.
Gifted and -Respectful -Filtering what to share Part A: Self-monitoring of
Talented -Karate and how much to share performance.
-Focused during -Staying on task during
Ryan independent work mat time (mat work very Part B: I created a visual flow
-Comprehension easy for this student) chart for Ryan and other students
-math facts who are struggling to know when
Part A: Behavior – Specific
Praise and Observation
feedback.
Part B: This week I introduced
Liam to math counter chips.
Liam was struggling with the
concept of subtraction. So I
showed him how to use the
counters to demonstrate the
math problem.
Whenever I am able to I only
praise positive behaviors. I
make sure to use specific
language ques and not general
statements. For example:
“Liam I like how you focused
on the task” or “I like how
when you were sounding the
word felt out you used your
robot arms.”
I also bring up his pet rabbit a
lot to show that I remember
and care. He lights up
whenever he is taking about
Nibbles. I ignore the minor
misbehaviors. After Liam
realizes that I will not be
stopping the class to correct his
behavior he knows is wrong he
usually stops. I also have given
him a small squishy pool ball
for when he is sitting on the
mat. This has helped him stop
touching his peers on the mat
and his need to scoot up and
touch the class displays.
Part A: Spelling activity:
Sentences
Part B: The last part of spelling
each day is sentence writing. I
say a sentence to the class that
Rachael Del Boccio
Part A: 100s board and Positive compliments get Liam feeling
counters. self-confidence, which helps him both
academically and socially. Connecting
Part B: the material to Liam’s personal life is
Liam was struggling critical for getting him invested in the
with counting on and writing. The pool squishy ball was a
back and with counting great tool. I had hoped it would help
by tens. I provided Liam Liam keep his hands to himself, which
with his own laminated it did. However, after getting the ball
100s board. When Liam Liam started participating more on the
is working on his math, mat. The counter chips where helpful
he knows that he can when working one on one with Liam,
pull out his board for however when left alone with the
reference. chips he would play with them.
Overall, the counters did not really
improve Liam’s ability to count back.
The 100s board did help Liam with
ability to count on and back. In the
beginning Liam was dependent on the
chart but as the days pasted his math
fact fluency started to improve.
Part A: Assignment The self-monitoring chart lost its
Menus. luster after a few weeks. The
differentiation for the spelling lessons
Part B: Rayan is very worked well. Ryan did try to add to
good at math facts and many words in the sentences and they
counting on and back. become grammatically incorrect. So

to raise their hand or keep their
comment to themselves. When I
first put the chart up I went over it
with the whole class. This was to
insure that no one felt singled out
and to make sure all students
understood how to follow the
chart. For the first half week I
would remind ‘random’ students
to look at the chart before raising
their hand or as I called on them.
Ryan struggled to remember to
look at the chart without
reminders the first week. After
about the two week mark
however, I would see him looking
on his own. One thing that I had
not thought of was having a
questions/statement box for the
students who wrote down their
comments. After students
bringing me many papers
throughout the day, I finally
realized that their needed to be a
place for the comments to go
because the students handing me
the comments was not working.
So there is now a small plastic bin
that students can put their
questions/ statements in.
Shy & -Singing - Focus is topic dependent Part A: Verbal and visual spelling
doesn’t -Kind/Polite -spelling instruction.
participate -Participates
-Respectful Part B: Matai does not participate
Matai -High Math fluency during spelling, I believe this is
due to his difficultly with the
subject. A strategy I incorporate
into the lesson to help him, and
others, is the robot arms. Before I
have students write the words, we
robot the sounds in each word.
B(one arm up,-L(other arm up)-
i(one arm down)-p(other arm
down)-finger motion across blip.
This seems to help Matai gain
confidence in his abilities. When I
ask for a student volunteer to do a
solo robot demo, he volunteers.
contains one or more words
that have the beginning blend
of the day. Ryan would finish
in 20 seconds. So I have
instructed him that instead of
writing the sentence I say to
the class he needs to write a
sentence of his own containing
2 or more words with the day’s
blend. After spelling is
complete Ryan brings his white
board to me so that I can check
his work.
Part A: Tic-Tac-Toe Board
Part B: An activity that I have
created for Matai is a tic-tac-
toe board full of spelling
activities. To provide Matai
some choice in his spelling
practice, he has to choose three
of the nine spelling activities,
making three in a row. Some of
the activity options include
rainbow words, waterfall
words, draw your word, and
capital/lower case writing. For
each option Matai has to use
five of the weeks spelling
words. Before Matai can reuse
Rachael Del Boccio
Ryan is working above an adaption I made after was that he
his peers and has moved could write as many sentences with
onto subtracting in the blend of the day as he could in two
parts. I created a Math minutes. The sentences could contain
Menu for Ryan that he more than one word with the blend but
had to select three the sentences had to be grammatically
activities to do each correct. The Math Menus were also a
day. The menu has an success! Ryan was challenged like he
appetizers, entrée, and had never been before, after the initial
dessert selection. Each shock of having to apply himself in
section is leveled and math, he enjoyed the menu. By week
Ryan has to select an eight he was asking if he could skip
activity from each the appetizer part and do an extra
section. The appetizers entrée or dessert instead.
are a review of counting
on and back. The Entrée
and dessert section are
about subtracting in
parts, the levels of the
two sections are
different. At first, Ryan
seemed mad that he was
not finishing his work
faster than all his peers.
As time progressed he
was able to move on
and he liked the
challenge of the new
material/activities.
Part A: Flipgrid Out of the differentiated instruction
approaches I used with Matai, the
Part B: Matai struggles Flipgrid has been the most beneficial.
putting his words into He is not as self-conscious when
writing. For his blog talking to the camera about his
reflections and other reflections. Before when writing his
assessments, I have responses out he would shut down
Matai use the website because he was unsure of how to write
Flipgrid. He logs into his thoughts into words. The Tic-Tac-
the class Flipgrid page Tow board has also improved Matai’s
and he can record a engagement in spelling. He has a
video of him saying his choice of nine assignments/activities
reflection. From there instead of being told which ones he
he can upload the videos has to do. Matai currently chooses the
to his blog. I also have same three activities, but knows he
access to the videos has to use different spelling words
through the class each time. Hopefully as time
Flipgrid page.

This strategy also helps him with
the letter/sound correspondence
when he writes the word later.
Low Socio -Problem solver -Lack of food Part A: Helper Buddy
Economic -Resilience -Tired/home life
-Kind -Math Part B: John continues to come
John -Late to school every day late every day. When he comes in
(comes 2 hours late) he puts his belongs away and sits
with her peers on the mat or
desks. However, he has missed
the morning lessons and the
beginning of the current lesson. I
work with John during S.S.R
(super silent reading time), while
his peers read I cover the morning
lessons that he has missed. This
however was not fixing the
problem of when John arrives he
just sits there spaced out because
the current lesson had already
started. That is where his Helper
Buddy, Rafi, comes into the
picture. John knows to sit by Rafi
when he comes in late because
Rafi can explain what has
happened and what is expected of
the students at that moment. John
has also gone to Rafi throughout
the weeks following at all times of
the day for help. John has been
more focused and on task.
a word that day he has to use
each word at least once.
Part A: Popsicle sticks
Part B: When working on place
values, I had given students a
chart for writing the number in
the hundreds, tens, and one’s
place. This was difficult for
John so to help him visualize
the amount, I made three cups
each with a labels. John then
had to count out the needed
amount of popsicle sticks for
each place value. He then had
to fill in the chart. I also used
this to help him with the
concept of adding. Example: if
starting with 16 and you add 4
more, how does that change the
numbers in each place value?
Rachael Del Boccio
continues he will gain confidence to
try other activities.
Part A: Math mountains The popsicle sticks helped John with
the place value work. However, it
Part B: John struggled added to his confusion for the adding
with the concept of and how the amount of sticks in each
counting on and back. group changed when a group of ten
To help him visualize was reached. The math mountains did
this concept I laminated help him with his addition and
a printer size math subtraction facts. He was really
mountain. There was a engaged with the hands on activities
spot for him to write the because he is a visual learner.
equation and three
boxes (one at the top
and two at the bottom).
John used a dry ease
marker to fill in the
equation and boxes. He
then could use counter
chips to show the
counting on or back
process.