Children Around the World History/Social Essay

d. Compare/Contrast with their own lives.

e. Work on an artistic representation of that country's culture.

f. Individually, present to small group; or group present to class with each member providing information on a specific part of the child's life in another country.

4. As a take-home activity, write a reflective essay (2-6 paragraphs, depending on level) about what you learned from this assignment, how you think the child's life differs from yours, how it is similar, and what you might change about your own life based on this assignment.

Analysis - Background -- Differentiated Instruction recognizes that students have varying background knowledge, language, preferences in learning, and interests. DI is a process designed to approach teaching and learning for students of differing abilities in the same class -- in the same lesson.

Differentiated Access -- each student will have access to a variety of written and kinesthetic materials that move from the explicit to the implicit; in this case from the concept of location of countries, shapes, products from that country, etc.

Differentiated Process -- differentiated learning styles are supported by: oral/aural (explanation of materials, videos of places, YouTube shorts; visual (pictures and real world examples); kinesthetic (use of manipulatives.Students can also be broken up into small groups based on micro-abilities for this lesson.

Differentiated Product -- the lesson is set up for differentiated learning and products based on how far and fast the individual groups research, develop and add to the particular country.

Differentiated Content -- pre-lessons provided layered and scaffolding; games involving culture, art activities, writing activities designed to talk about history, civics, social studies, geography. Reading/literature core activity provided above.

REFERENCES

Children Around the World. (2010). Discovery Education. Retrieved from:

http://www.discoveryeducation.com/teachers/free-lesson-plans/children-around-the-world.cfm

Benjamin, a. (2003). Differentiated Instruction: A Guide for Elementary School Teachers. Larchmont, MY: Eye on Education Publishers.

Williams, J. (2011). A Rich World of Thinking: National Standards for English Language Arts. Education.com. Retrieved from: http://www.education.com/magazine/article/National_Standards_English_Language/.....