Individualized Instruction NOW More Than EVER

Individualized Instruction NOW More Than EVER

For all the years that I was in Teacher Education, I advocated as much as possible the process we call Individualized Instruction. What that means is that students in any classroom will be NOT taught by a sage on the stage to a group of empty vessels waiting to be filled up all at the same time on a manufacturing line, but by a guide on the side whose job it is is to help students learn that which they don't already know.  Not every student takes the same amount of time to master the skills of arithmetic. Not everyone needs to be able to read maps to the same equal level of ability.  Some kids want to learn with he Arts and others by reading and writing.   We should be working to teach each student according to his ability while constantly pushing each student forward.  Individualized instruction, however, requires far more time by the teacher and far more preparation and therein lies the rub.  Students have had varying amounts of lesson learning and completion while at home and not in school;  Some are much further ahead than others for a variety of reasons - ability, parental pushing, quietness or lack thereof at home and so forth.  So, assuming every school goes back in the fall, every classroom is going to be filled with students in any particular grade, all working and understanding at various very different levels of comprehension and ability.  It will not be an easy task to take 25 or 26 Grade 4 students and get them back to all doing the same thing because they all won't be able to.  She will have VERY Heterogenous classroom abilities and the teacher will need to program for every ability and hope for the best. No would be the ideal time have a staff of professionals who know how to teach each child at their own level. WE have been very lax with classroom teachers . Some still have their classrooms in rows and use the same assignment and assessment strategies for everyone.  Now would be the ideal time to be proficient in individualized instructon so that the children would be benefitting from working at things they truly need to be able to and at a pace not at all like any of the other students.  Individualized instruction requires much knowledge of each student, patience to be able to work with students one on one and the skill set to do that with 25 students all at the same time. Now we pay for our inability to motivate everyone to be able to do the same things but each according to their own unique style.  Let's see wha the fall brings an dhow often teachers cry out for adult education on learning in that way.