This week, we are diving even farther into trends, transitions, and revelations with technology in the classroom. Personalized learning is a tsunami of a trend that is consistently gaining momentum, and for good reason. The question I'll be answering this week is: How can I bring personalized learning into my teaching environment? Well funny story, I already have.
If I haven't gotten the chance to tell you about my school year, let me take a moment to fill you in. The 2021-2022 school year was my first year teaching 5th grade after three years teaching first grade. It was a major jump with both its benefits and pitfalls. I helped build an electives course, arts and humanities, that served as a cross-curricular opportunities as well as reading intervention that aligned tightly with social studies standards. It was so much fun to teach this course and have flexibility and freedom to think outside of the box without constraints of standardized testing. At the end of the school year, I was "volun-told" to go to a tested subject. I choose to join the math team, even though my content knowledge for elementary math stopped at a first grade level. I have worked hard to build up my content knowledge this year, and have practically lived in my instructional coach's office during my conference period. To add a cherry on top, I gained a group of 70 students with massive deficits. Out of all of my students, only 4% passed the Texas STAAR math test in the 4th grade. Let's just say, I have had my work cut out for me this year. I have literally put in my blood, sweat, and tears to help my kiddos grow.
Now that you have all of that as a background, let me dive into why personalized learning is a trend I immediately jumped on. First, with learning gaps as wide as my students have, I needed to not only amp up the engagement piece, but tap into their interests and give them choice in their learning. Clearly, what other educators did in previous years, was not working for these students. I started small with what I called "Mustard and Mayo" assignments or things they must do and then things they may do. The next large piece of my classroom is letting students be in control of their data and goal setting. I was and still am, very transparent with my kids and showed them where they started. It was probably the hardest thing to do, because many had no idea they were that far behind. From here I also pushed for and personalized instruction programs that married personalized lessons to gamification of learning standards. This last step allowed me to pace learning to their individual strengths and weaknesses, while keeping whole group instruction on pace with district and state policies.
As the school year is coming to an end, over 80% of my students have shown accelerated growth. I can confidently say that the aspects of personalized learning I have already put into place are working and effective. I'm intrigued to see the final gains these diligent students achieve!
Work Cited
4 ways to include personalized learning in your classroom. Grand Canyon University. (2019, July 16). Retrieved April 21, 2023, from https://www.gcu.edu/blog/teaching-school-administration/4-ways-include-personalized-learning-your-classroom
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