Differentiation

Pre Assessment and Differentiation: Grade 10 Literature

Need of Pre Assessment and Class Overview:

The students started this year of Grade 10 totally online. Last year in grade nine topics such as narrator, plot, and figurative language should have been covered but only the basics. This year they should look more in details at narrative voice, point of view, plot diagram, types of figurative language and inference. The point of pre-assessment is to gauge the students needs and levels as a way to better group them for class (Pendergrass 2013).

Grade 10 ELA Pre Assess Task.pdf

Pre Assessment

The pre- assessment task was administered during the first week back to online learning through a zoom classroom. Students were given a link to the 'quiz' on google classroom and had to keep cameras open and take the quiz. By using google classroom and google quiz, the email addresses are collected and the multiple choice questions are automatically marked. Currently, our lessons are only 30 minutes so I did this pre-assessment as a stand alone and then moved them into groups for the next lesson.

I wanted to begin by teaching narrator. Before teaching I gave a pre-assessment (diagnostic) style online quiz to determine where each student was with knowing about narrator. I also included some figurative language, inference, and basics of plot to see if any are excelling in those areas already. The quiz has a short reading text with a mix of multiple choice and short answer questions that mainly focus on the narrator.

Click here for The Pre Assessment Quiz.

Grouping

Students will be put into homogenous groups according to the level on the pre-assessment. Three groups will be made: excel, threshold, and developing. These groups will be separated during our lesson via 'breakout rooms' on Zoom and each group will be assigned their work through Google Classroom before hand. Google Classroom allows for teachers to select students to assign work individually so in this way they will not know what the other groups are working on. The main objective being that students understand the follow things: narrator meaning, point of view, and perspective.

Excel:

This category of students are those that achieved 12 points or higher and were able to correctly identify things past the narrator. These students showed a knowledge of narrator and point of view as well as were able to identify figurative language and infer some things about the story. This group of 5 students will be given a worksheet to complete. They will be asked to read 4 short passages from stories and identify the point of view and explain about the narrator's perspective. They will be together in the breakout room so can share and discuss their opinions of the texts. As the teacher I will move between rooms and check they are still able to correctly identify point of view of each text provided.

Worksheet taken from : https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/read/52924738/identifying-narrative-perspective-in-the-works-of-roald-dahl

Threshold:

The students in this group missed between 4-5 questions on the pre -assessment. They need to be reinforced and have a small reminder of the material before moving on. These students will not be placed into breakout rooms but instead will be left in the Zoom main room with cameras on and microphone muted. They will be assigned an Ed Puzzle that reviews point of view and asks 9 questions to complete. This requires them to work alone to watch the video and submit answers. This task is automatically graded and recorded by Ed Puzzle and is saved for them to review it again as needed, however, questions are closed to only be able to answer 1x and they will be warned so they are carefully to watch each section to review rather than skip ahead to the next questions.

The Ed Puzzle link for Narrator Review.

Developing:

The developing students have a score of less than 10 on the pre-assessment quiz. They need to be worked with more closely to make sure they understand the meaning of narrator and can identify point of view and perspective. To make sure they are able to understand the terms, these students will be place into a breakout room on Zoom with the teacher present the majority of the time. The students will start with Quizlet flashcards and will work to master the flashcards focusing first on the meaning of: narrator, author, 1st person point of view, 2nd person point of view, 3rd person point of view, perspective, setting, plot, and infer. The students will be closely monitored by the teacher and once the students have succeed in the flashcards they will be given the short story 'Eleven' to read. At this point they will be left to work together into smaller pairs and to identify narrator and point of view from the story.

The Quizlet set is here.

The short story can be found here.


ELL and Learners with Special Needs:

Currently I teach overseas and 90% of all my students are English language learners. These students tend to achieve more with visuals and TPR. In general, the majority of my classes are already geared towards ELL learners. They are combined with their regular peers, but often I select texts that have a lower Lexile level or I adapt a text myself to make sure the language is not beyond their grasp. For this lesson I made a Storyboard That activity to illustrate the story given to the 'Developing' group.

For Learners with Special Needs, students with conditions as learning issues or physical issues, they also tend to do better with visuals and TPR. I would also incorporate the Storyboard That activity and maybe have students write a dialogue recreating the events of the story to identify the narrator. As this class is taking place on Zoom, their ability to see the TPR is limited but we do the best we can. In general these students work along side their peers and are able to have extra after school tutoring as needed.

Eleven.pdf

Resources:

Cisneros, Sandra. Eleven. 1991, www.sps186.org/downloads/basic/777685/eleven .pdf.
Coggle It, Coggle, https://coggle.it/diagram/X4HmkxiU9ObzqJ48/t/-
“Educational Hip-Hop.” Flocabulary, www.flocabulary.com/.
Google Accounts, Google, classroom.google.com/.
“Identifying Narrative Perspective in the Works of Roald Dahl.” Yumpu.com, www.yumpu.com/en/document/read/52924738/identifying-narrative-perspective-in-the-works-of-roald-dahl.
Learning Tools & Flashcards, for Free | Quizlet. quizlet.com/.
“Make Any Video Your Lesson.” Edpuzzle, edpuzzle.com/.
Pendergrass, Emily. “Differentiation: It Starts with Pre-Assessment.” Differentiation: It Starts with Pre-Assessment - Educational Leadership, Dec. 2013, www.ascd.org/publications/educational_leadership/dec13/vol71/num04/Differentiation@_It_Starts_with_Pre-Assessment.aspx.
“The World's Best Free Online Storyboard Creator.” Storyboard That, www.storyboardthat.com/.