Standard 4 Diversity
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Provide differentiated instruction and instructional materials,
including traditional print, digital, and online resources, that capitalize on
diversity. How does a reading or experience challenge you socially,
culturally, or emotionally? Why does it challenge you or capture your attention?
Before explaining my
personal experience in teaching differentiated instruction with an online resource,
I want to first comment on the importance of reading and how it has broadened both
myself and my students’ cultural, social, and emotional perspectives. During my
time in the classroom, my students have been introduced to a variety of
projects and readings that include, but are not limited to, Amy Tan’s “Mother
Tongue,” which discusses the importance of how language shapes and defines a
person, short stories such as “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “The Story of an Hour,”
which discusses feminism and society’s role in constructing gender conformity,
and recently, a research project called “Stand Up! Civil Disobedience,” which
highlights historical people and events that have fought for human rights.
While all of these readings and units have been eye opening to my students, I
would be lying if I said they were not also eye opening to myself. Although I have
studied a wide variety of works throughout my time in college, having the
opportunity to teach, discuss, and learn different perspectives from my
students have taught me more about English Language Arts than ever before. One of
the best things about teaching is committing to the process of lifelong learning.
I learn about how to better interact with students, parents, and colleagues. I
learn how to create a classroom environment that is engaging and welcoming to
my students. I learn thousands of new and different units, lessons, and
activities from veteran teachers, and I learn how to read texts from a
different perspective, or for a different purpose every time I introduce it to
a class. With this being said, my classroom depends on inclusion and mindfulness
about student needs in order to be successful. To ensure my students are given
the opportunity to develop their literacy skills at their own pace, I have
found an online resource called Commonlit.org that I have found to be
incredibly helpful for my struggling readers. Commonlit.org organizes roughly
1,560 different fictional and non-fictional texts into Lexile and grade level. Teachers
simply have to create a classroom profile where students can log into their own
reading library. As a teacher, I can assign texts with different Lexile levels
and topics to different students. The beauty of this ability is that every
student’s reading profile is different and none of the students in the class
know what each other is reading unless the student shares. The online source
also gives students the option to “listen” to an audio recording of the reading.
In addition to the audio and Lexile level, the website also gives students multiple
choice and discussion questions to complete. I really like working with Commonlit.org
for my students because of the many ways I can differentiate instruction with
them.
Below is a link to my Commonlit.org
and a screen shot of what a typical reading in 11th grade looks like.
Link: https://www.commonlit.org/en/texts
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