RISK FREE BLOG, Week 3

Differentiated Instruction
When given the assignment to take picture we where given the instruction that it could only be of shapes and lines. This could be for individuals with learning disabilities for other students they would have to take pictures of landscapes and scenes. Also the picture that I have chosen has more that one shape rectangles and circles. A simpler picture could only contain one shape. We where also told to have partners. Students who are not capable of taking the pictures and doing the assignment all on their own have a a partner to help and assist them, but still allow them to participate and join in on the activity. Something else that could be done is when explaining things such as line segments and circumference in a math class. Allowing students to go out and take pictures of the objects may help them to understand the concepts being presented.
Briefly explain the six ways to accelerate students, as described by Stanley?
Student acceleration= passing students through the educational system as quickly as possible.
Stanley came up with six ways of accelerating students. These include early school admission, skipping grades, telescoping grades, advanced placement, dual enrollment in high school and college, and early college admission. Early school admission means that a child that seems above the others is allowed to enter kindergarten at an earlier age than normal. Skipping grades means that a child can skip a whole semester or an entire grade all together. Telescoping grades this simply means that the same amount of material is covered at a much faster pass (completing high school in three years rather than four). Advanced placement is when students take college credit classes while they are still in high school. This is designed in order to shorten the time in which the student is in college. Dual enrollment in high school and college means that while the student is finishing high school they are also enrolled in college. Early college admission, there are students who are so accelerated that they are capable of completing college as early as thirteen years of age.
Just as all students are at different levels of learning all students who are gifted and talented are at different levels. acceleration programs are designed to aid the students, if a student is learning things that they already know and are never being challenged this is going to begin to stunt their learning process. These students are going to become content and there learning is going to come to a halt.
All of these actions are not weighed lightly though. There is also a serious possibility that some of these actions can seriously damage a student socially. Going to college as a thirteen year old can be very damaging. I could not imagine at that age going through the actions i am going through now. Although they may be educationally ready for college are they mature enough.
How can we modify curriculum to accommodate the student's special gifts and talents?
One way of changing the curriculum to accommodate students with gifts and talents is curriculum compacting. This adds in students having to learn things that they "already know" rather than sitting around and having to learn things over again they are able to move at their own pace. If they are ready they can move on to other material and show the assessment when they are ready. This could be either a large test or a portfolio of work that they have done. The best areas for compacting are those that deal with mastering basic skills, vocabulary, basic application skills, factual knowledge in a given subject, and basic comprehension in reading.
Another way of changing the curriculum is content sophistication. This is used to challenge students to use higher levels of thinking to understand ideas that average students of the same age would find difficult or impossible to understand. What is trying to be achieved her is to get these students to understand important abstractions, scientific laws, or general principles that can be applied to many circumstances.
The idea behind changing the curriculum is to have all students at different levels be learning in the same classroom. You don't want to hinder one student from learning because they are far above or far below the others you want students to be learning at some level at all times.
It is not just the curriculum that needs to change the person doing the teaching needs to change to a certain extent as well. It is a combination of the both molding and reforming in order to accommodate children with gifts and talents. Although the curriculum being changed can help these students to a great degree unless the teachers understand that they need adjust there teaching strategics the curriculum is not nearly enough. The teachers need to realize that everyone is not the same and having different levels in there classroom is a challenge but it is manageable if worked on thought about and with time al will mesh well. Teachers must have the ability to reach children with learning disabilities, those with gifts and talents and all those inbetween at come point in thier lesson.