In the ELD classroom, differentiating instruction can feel like climbing Mount Everest … incredibly challenging! Setting your students up for success often requires reading a situation and responding on the fly using your established repertoire of differentiation tactics. Here are some tactics you can use on their own or alongside your Get Ready! Scaffold and Expand teaching suggestions:
Bring Each Student’s World into Your Classroom
Your students come with a treasure trove of experiences, cultures, and stories that can enrich your lessons and make learning more accessible. Imagine the boost in engagement when you reference farming for students with an agricultural background, a current event from their country of origin, or a popular song they love. Taking time to discover your students’ cultural backgrounds, interests, and life experiences is like unlocking a secret door to more meaningful instruction. Invest in those conversations, ask questions, and provide opportunities for sharing stories. It’s a game-changer!
Let the Language Experience Approach Lead the Way
There’s something magical about seeing your students’ words come to life on the page. With the language experience approach (LEA), you’re not just teaching your students reading and writing—you’re personalizing instruction based on their life experiences and making these skills relevant. Have your students dictate a story or describe an experience, and then watch them light up as they see their words become a story. This text becomes a powerful tool for literacy activities. Shared writing or modeled writing sessions, where you “think aloud” as you write, connect spoken language to print in a way that’s both meaningful and fun, and these sessions can be implemented almost any time! Use LEA to activate prior knowledge when introducing a unit theme, new concept, video, or book. Leverage it as a tool to practice grammar and vocabulary in an authentic context. It can serve as formative or summative assessment, or as a tool for reflection or metacognition.
Make Quick Checks for Quick Wins
Keeping your finger on the pulse of your students’ progress can be simple and stress-free! Exit tickets, thumbs up/down, short quizzes, or choice boards are all fantastic ways to see who’s getting it and who might need extra support. These low-stakes assessments give you real-time feedback. These quick checks, combined with standards-tagged activities and assessments, can help you quickly adjust instruction and pacing.
Use Tiered Assignments for Tailored Success
Tiered resources with visuals, glossaries, or guiding questions increase engagement and success. If you have Get Reading! (a companion program for Get Ready!), you know the tremendous value of tiered texts and assignments with multiple entry points! With Get Ready!, you can differentiate instruction and practice by individually assigning activities, modifying assessments, and uploading or creating your own content in order to meet students where they are.
Surround Students with Language
Creating an input-rich environment sets the stage for progressive, authentic language acquisition. Label classroom objects or items for an activity, and use them playfully during transition times or quick reviews. Get Ready! offers theme-related videos, songs, virtual chats, and other activities that provide opportunities for students to hear and use the language in different contexts. Rotate tasks that activate different modalities. Repeated and varied exposure in an immersive environment makes language and culture come alive.
As you incorporate more strategies into your repertoire, differentiating instruction becomes more achievable, allowing you to create a classroom where every student feels seen, supported, and motivated—and where you and your multilingual learners can enjoy the journey of learning together.
By Debbie Simoes
Also read:
Using Consistent Curricular Routines for Multilingual Learners
Welcoming Multilingual Learners Back to School—and Meeting Them Where They Are!
