Jessica Coates, Ed.D. @HopefulEducator

Differentiation doesn’t just apply to students. Teachers and leaders have a wide diversity of skills and experience as well. They need personalized professional development and support. Otherwise, their time will be wasted, which is the most precious resource they have.

Traditional methods of teaching that rely on live lectures and fixed pacing give students very little room for error. No matter how far behind you fall, you are still expected to learn new content at the exact same pace as your peers. For many students, that is demoralizing.

The constant pressure to “catch kids up” doesn’t actually lead to increased mastery of content or skills. You can’t rush kids through learning experiences. You can’t devalue relationship building because kids are “behind.” All you can do is work to meet kids where they are at.

✨✨✨Effective Effort Rubric✨✨✨ sbee.link/m9fd8cehug @BetterLesson #learning #teachertwitter #edutwitter #edchat

We produce our worst work when we are rushed. It’s almost impossible to engage in higher-order thinking. Yet we are often rushing students through content. It is no surprise they struggle with retention and lack investment. Depth of mastery is far more important than speed.

There are so many benefits to using STATIONS in content classes! ✅Gives choice & voice to student learning ☑️Allows Ts to work in small grps ✅Promotes collaboration ☑️Increases active learning time ✅Personalizes learning ☑️Student-centered ✅Integrates technology

Each year, when teachers return back to school they’re inundated with one-size-fits-all PD. It’s a poor use of teacher and admin time and leads to tension across buildings. Next school year, we must take what we’ve learned about self-paced learning and apply it to teacher PD.

It is impossible to truly differentiate to students’ needs if every kid has to go to the next lesson the next day. Self-paced learning allows educators to give their students the time and support they need to master content.

Equitable classrooms honor the fact that kids need multiple avenues to success. When kids are unable to attend class, or too overwhelmed to engage in learning experiences, they deserve another shot. Otherwise, instead of responding to kids’ needs, we are disregarding them.

“We expect mastery from students, but don’t create the conditions that give them the time and support to achieve it.” Check out some great resources for master-based learning.—via @cultofpedagogy cultofpedagogy.com/mastery-based-…

You can’t build equitable classrooms without building classrooms that are responsive to students’ needs. You can’t build classrooms that are responsive to students’ needs without empowering teachers to spend the large bulk of class time in 1-1 and small group discussions.

So many students feel perpetually rushed and unsuccessful in class. Instead of giving kids more time when they plead for it, we usually ignore their needs and push them through content to “stay on pace”. By doing so, we reinforce the notion that speed matters more than mastery.

This brand-new post from @Kareemfarah23 is the third in a three-part series that will help you really change the way you structure your lessons to a blended, self-paced, mastery-based system that has worked beautifully for thousands of teachers. cultofpedagogy.com/mastery-based-…

Too often we are wasteful with students’ time. We make kids sit through live lectures that either move far too fast or far too slow while trying to teach to the middle. If we care about student learning, we need to be more respectful of the precious time we have with students.

How Gamification Uncovers Nuance In The Learning Process wegrowteachers.com/how-gamificati… via @TeachThoughtPD

When we build classrooms that are reliant on live lectures and fixed pacing, we build classrooms that are unresponsive to students’ unique needs. We become inflexible when students require personalized supports. We end up focusing more on control than the whole child.

Differentiation is one of the most important and challenging practices to execute effectively in the classroom. To do it well, educators need to be able to spend the large bulk of learning time working individually and in small groups with students.

We should normalize the use of social media for learning to our kids. Some of the best PD I have received as been found using social media. Bringing social media into schools opens the door to alternative assessments with increased student voice. #change #edtech #assessment

Teachers are spread too thin to have their time wasted. Now more than ever, educators need differentiated PD that is designed to support their diverse set of needs. Teachers should feel empowered to make their own decisions about their professional learning.

We need to empower teachers with instructional approaches that allow them to spend less time at the front of the room and more time in small group and individualized discussions. Otherwise, we will continue to talk about differentiation but never really see it in action.