You know you need to differentiate, but do you need fresh ideas for HOW to differentiate? This episode is packed full of practical tips that truly make a difference for learners.
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This is the social studies teacher podcast, a show for busy elementary teachers looking for fun and engaging ways to easily add social studies into their classroom schedule without feeling overwhelmed or pressed for time. I'm curious to know if you southern teach an educator and mom who is passionate about all things, social studies, I love sharing ideas and strategies that are low prep and easy to implement. So let's dive in together.
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So just like thinking about differentiating, we hear it all the time. I know that admin would always say like, how are we differentiating our lessons, or how are we going to be differentiating in small group. But even with all of that pressure, it really does make a difference. Differentiation is basically when a teacher tailors instruction to a student's need, based on their readiness, their interests and learning profile. So taking all of that into consideration.
There are actually four different ways to differentiate, you can differentiate through the learning environment, and I had a really great episode about seven ways to differentiate your learning environment in your classroom. But there are three other ways there's through the content, you teach, the process, the different, you know, ways of students are learning and the product, how students are showing their learning. Even with all of these different ways to differentiate, it can be easy if you let it be. I'll be sharing today with you three ways to differentiate in your upper elementary classroom. And you can utilize these strategies to accommodate learning styles in your own classroom.
All right, so tip number one is to utilize hands on activities gives students the ability to get hands on with their learning. This is great for whole group stations review, or just as an extension activity. This can engage students and motivate them to learn about the topic can and increase retention of content as well, especially for those visual and kinesthetic learners. Some examples of hands on activities are doing some simulations or labs where students have to get hands on, maybe even something with playdough. Or even having students create something like creating some type of invention on their, you know, using materials, all that stuff, getting them to do stuff with their hands can help increase retention for students.
The second way to differentiate would be to include a variety of directions, make sure to explain directions for assignments, using a variety of modalities, you can display directions on the board for the visual learners include spoken directions, so you're talking to your class about what needs to happen. That's for your auditory learners. And then for your kinesthetic learners, demonstrating how students are supposed to complete the assignment having a paper in front of them showing, you know walking over to where it needs to go when they're done. And you can even have students model these examples and non examples of how to complete the task. So just by writing it on the board, talking about it and demonstrating the students, you're hitting a lot of those different learners, those different types of learners, auditory, kinesthetic, and visual, even though it might take a little extra time. It's absolutely worth it. I remember I swim in all the way up through high school, I remember where if my coach was just shouting at us what the set was that we had to do even in high school, I really had to think about it. Like what I felt like I had to have somebody a friend repeat it for me, because they're just saying, Okay, do blah, blah, blah, six, hundreds freestyle, or whatever it was on this time. So there was a lot and there was it wasn't straightforward there. Especially when you got into high school, there was a lot of things you had to really think about because you had to switch up the strokes and all of that stuff. That's why I always appreciated the coaches that would have the sets on the board for the whole day. So I could really see like what we were doing, I can visualize it. Okay, I understand the interval that we need to be swimming on the different strokes, all of that, they would sometimes have the whole set for the day, sometimes they would add it a little bit at a time, but just having it there. And then having them explain it at the same time as we went along was the best combination for me. I know some other swimmers appreciated seeing a demo of what it's supposed to look like. I didn't necessarily need that. But it did help. I know some other ones, some other of my friends.
Alright. The third tip would be flexible grouping. Flexible groups are great for stations or centers or projects. You can group these students based on readiness and understanding of the content, student interests, learning styles, you can pretty much mix and match you're flexible groups based on what you want to accomplish. Depending on that specific activity. You can also have students choose their groups, or you as a teacher can select the groups on your own. Additionally, you can make it purposeful, you can pair certain peers together or just make it completely random. I always loved to use popsicle sticks. And every student in my class had a number associated. And that was really helpful because each block like I had more than if I had two blocks, and they all had a number, I didn't have to write their names or anything like that I just had their number and I can pull popsicle sticks. Number one is together number fours together, number seven is together. And it was transferable for both classrooms because there were two number sevens and two number twos and all of that kind of stuff. So definitely grouping not every activity has to have flexible grouping, but the activities that you think could benefit from either purposeful groups or random groups, making sure you're giving students that opportunity is really helpful.
I think that differentiation overall can be fun for your students. And if you want to learn a little bit more about differentiating, I have a free 10 minute video training on how you can utilize seven strategies for differentiating in the classroom. So this is something that is completely free. Once you sign up, it will be sent to your inbox. All you have to do is go to the southern teach.com forward slash differentiation freebie so Oh, I'll make sure to link that in the show notes. So you can check that out. It's great training on for more ways. And I give you a few more examples that are more in depth than what I just shared with you on the podcast completely free. So definitely check that out.
All right, well, that's the end of this episode. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week. Thanks for listening to the social studies teacher podcast. If you enjoyed listening to this episode, hit that subscribe button and leave a review. I would love to hear your thoughts. You can also find me on Instagram at the southern teach. I can't wait for you to join me in the next episode for more teacher tips and strategies.
