lessons

[andyg]

I have recently started work as an ESOL teacher after 30 years in business.
The biggest problem I face is when I have 15 students in the class who are divided up into different ability levels. Trying to pitch a lesson that will meet all the learners needs takes a lot of planning. Differentiating the lesson is difficult enough but when you are teaching 5 differnt groups per week it becomes a bit of a nightmare.
Please advise on differentiation techniques


thanks


Andy

[Tdol]

Differentiation is one of those things that sounds better on paper than in practice. With a coursebook, it's doubly difficult because very few of them are designed with this in mind. If they are divided into groups, then you ccan use different materials with the groups, or give the more advanced ones more to do, but this does mean that much of the class will be spent in these little groups. This can be counterbalanced by work where the stronger have to interact with the weaker but have to do a more complex task, but this kind of activity takes a long time to design, so it's not practical on a frequent basis.

How different are the levels within the class?

[Aidan Gillespie]

Don't stray from your learning objective.
Differentiate by splitting your class into small ability groups. Give each group a different version of the task(s) pitched at their ability but moving towards achieving the learning objective.
I hope this helps!
All the best, Aidan.

[retep]

Hello!

I work as a teacher in sweden and wish to do some talking exercises with mu students. They are 15 yeras old.

Pete