Introduction and Differentiated Activities

Introduction

Hello! My name is Carrie Pluger, and I am a third grade teacher in the lovely city of Seattle. This is my ninth year teaching, and it is my absolute dream job. I began my teaching career in South Central Los Angeles at a charter school on an intern credential. After two years and many interesting stories, I got my credential and moved to Seattle where I taught in the most diverse zip code in the country for three years. Now I teach less than a mile from home in northwest Seattle. This is the school my children will attend. I love it and plan to stay there until I retire. When I am not teaching, I have a wonderful husband, a four-year-old daughter, and a one-year-old son who I spend my quality time with. I am learning the ukulele in the limited spare time I have.

                   Differentiated Teaching and Learning Activities

Reading 

Reader’s Workshop gives me endless opportunities for differentiating in reading. I test students for their just-right reading levels at the beginning of the year and throughout the year. This allows them to choose appropriate books for fluency and comprehension. Whatever genre we are reading, students can choose a book they like at their level rather than one I choose for them. I use a mentor text for whole-class lessons. I write a prompt for the strategy I have taught, and I show an example of how I would answer it, then I write another prompt further on in the reading and ask students to respond in their journals. Students respond to the same question but at appropriate levels of challenge for their capabilities. I check the journals right away and can take small groups or individuals to reteach or challenge as needed. Students can use the strategies I teach on their own books as well.

I also love using Smithsonian Tween Tribune or other kid’s news sites to print leveled articles for students. I will sometimes have students read the same articles at different levels or have students read articles on the same subject at different levels then jigsaw the material.

Writing

Writer’s Workshop is also naturally differentiated. Students watch me go through the writing process for each unit and help me as I go. This process is highly scaffolded.  Then they get to write about something important to them. I teach and students write and edit with a rubric. Some students get the second grade rubric, some get the third grade rubric, and more advanced students get the fourth grade rubric. They are all variations of the same concepts. I can take small groups to help specific needs. I have individual conferences, and I assign peer partners as well. The great thing is that I still teach the same lesson to all students, and they apply it at their own ability levels.

Spelling

Words Their Way is a spelling and word study program. It begins with an assessment, and from there I assign spelling groups based on developmental spelling stages. I typically have three groups. Students work on spelling lists that are appropriate for their developmental spelling stages. The more advanced students are working on Greek and Latin root words now, so the lessons are less about spelling and more about word meaning.

Genius Hour

Genius Hour is something I began a few weeks ago. I am so excited about this. I am taking students through a scientific process. Basically students choose something they are passionate about and come up with an open-ended guiding question to drive their research. Then they research their question. Finally, they come up with a project that they can share with the class, school, or the world. It is very open-ended and highly differentiated.

Science

Third grade teachers at my school include multiple intelligences projects three times per year for science. Students are currently working on one that ties to their plant growth and development unit. This is a take-home project. Students can choose to write a song, choreograph a dance, create a book or collection of poems, conduct an interview, make a crossword puzzle or board game, create a poster or model, or come up with something not even on the list. These projects are presented and displayed at school upon completion.

Social Studies

I have been working to make social studies more fun. I use the Storypath curriculum to teach social studies simulations. These units are already fairly differentiated for multiple intelligences as they include making scenery and sets, acting out scenarios, writing poems and narratives based on the situations, reading, and working in groups and independently. I have added some arts and crafts as well as ties to the real world to make the material both more fun and relevant. The photo on the left is of student-made button blankets, which students created during our unit about the Early Northwest Coast People.