APIE Education for Positive Peace course...

Special Needs and Inclusive Education 

Resources / activities - Giving alternative resources or setting different activities can support different learners. For example, in Maths if you ask learners to add 3+3, you might provide one child with stones to help them count, whilst another can be asked to do the sum without the additional resources, because they are capable of calculating the answer in their head.  Alternatively, you might ask one group of learners to add 3+3 and another group of learners to add 11+3. 

Support - As the teacher, you may choose to sit with a group of learners when you know the activity is hard for them, whilst others do the activity independently. Another kind of support is through peer or group working. You might pair up students knowing that one might require support from the other one. Using "Think-Pair-Share", which we looked at in Unit 6, to promote understanding and confidence in relation to learning, is a great support tool for children with different needs. 

Outcomes - Sometimes you set everyone the same task knowing that everyone will produce different finished products e.g. in an art lesson, one learner might draw a stick drawing whilst another learner produces a detailed drawing with shading and perspective. One might answer 5 questions in an exercise whilst another learner answers 15. One learner might finish the exercise and go on to an extension task whilst another completes only what is written on the board. 

As the teacher, it is important that you first observe how your learners are coping with the tasks you set them and then actively choose different types of differentiation to best suit the needs of your learners and the objectives of the lesson.