Teaching with and without Differentiated Instruction

Solution Preview

The extent of the differentiated instruction for a lesson depends upon the level of the lesson you are going to teach. Lessons requiring higher-level skills would be more complicated to implement, but I will assume this is a general lesson you wish to implement with students who have some kind of identified learning disability. The depth to which you choose to develop a lesson depends on successful learning of materials, the positive and tolerant learning atmosphere the students are willing to foster, and the capabilities of the students.

WITHOUT USING DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION, I would teach the short story to the class as follows.

Prior to reading, I would prepare students by giving them a list of vocabulary words from the story, discussing them, and testing them within the week prior to reading the story.

To activate prior knowledge, if I were having my students read the short story "The Most Dangerous Game," I might talk about hunting in general with my students as it is practiced today. I live in the northeastern part of the US, so hunting is perhaps not as widespread as in other regions of the country, but students of 9th grade would have some familiarity with the concept, if not with the actual activity/sport.

Next, I would have students complete a type-one writing, giving me 8-10 lines about what they know of hunting. I would collect it.

Based on the writing, I would ask students if they hunt or know anyone who hunts. If no one could respond, I would ask about what students know about hunting in general. Then I would ask about what kind of hunting takes place in the US, and ask students to compare it to big-game hunting in Africa.

I would then introduce the characters of the story, and have students read the story silently or as a class. (I still enjoy reading to students, and believe many of them enjoy it as well. I try to do this every so often: it reminds many students of bedtime stories.) Upon finishing, I would have students respond with another writing about the main characters, Rainsford and Zaroff, discussing how they are similar and the different, and which character is evil, which is not, and WHY.

The story "The Most Dangerous Game" is pretty straightforward when read on a literal level. The idea (in case you haven't read it, and you should: it's marvelous) is that a very rich Cossack general, who is also an accomplished hunter, gets bored hunting animals, so he buys an island and shipwrecks passing vessels, using the survivors as his prey.

The ...