During my student teaching experience, I co-taught four classes of world history where approximately one-third of students had special needs. I collaborated frequently with my co-teacher to develop appropriate accommodations for the students with special needs and also communicated with students’ case managers about their progress. One example of a lesson I planned that differentiated instruction required students to take on different roles within the group. The lesson focused on the French Revolution, and required students to work collaboratively in groups that represented different social classes involved in the French Revolution.
The groups’ roles included a leader who was responsible for creating a constitution summarizing the demands of the group’s social class. One group member was responsible for researching and preparing a debate presentation. Another role was the reporter, who was responsible for developing questions to ask students during the debate. One student had the role of graphic designer and had to produce a visual supporting the group’s assigned debate position. The final role was the music producer who had to choose and explain about a song that summarized or represented the woes and demands of the group’s social class. Groups were assigned across ability levels so each group included students whose ability level was appropriate for each of the group roles. No matter what the students’ role was for the project, each student met the objective of explaining the interests and perspective of social classes during the French Revolution. Students completed peer evaluations throughout the project to help me identify struggling or uncooperative students. This enabled me to offered these students additional support and encouragement.
