Abstract:

No two children are alike. Learners enter classrooms with different abilities, interests, personalities, background knowledge, and learning preferences. Facing such diversity, it becomes more imperative for teachers to differentiate their instruction. In order to reach every learner in a classroom, a teacher should always have learners' diversity in mind when planning and designing activities, teaching, and assessing learners. Therefore, the “one size fits all” approach is not applicable in current classrooms consisting of diverse learners. Differentiated instruction is a learner-centered approach that is aimed to help learners succeed regardless of their differences. To differentiate instruction means to act on the belief that all learners deserve access to the most compelling, engaging, and rigorous learning experiences that would develop their particular strengths. It enables teachers to modify their instruction to address the strengths and needs of learners and help them to achieve maximum development. Differentiated instruction uses strategies and tools which many teachers already know and use; they often are part of the differentiated approach of teachers to their learners because they respond to learners' differences in readiness, learning profile, or interest.

The first part of the paper deals with understanding the issue of differentiated instruction and the possibility of a differentiated approach to learners in foreign language (English) lessons. The second part presents examples of using differentiated instruction strategies in several differentiated lessons aimed at the academic level of learners, their interests, and learning styles and discusses the findings from their experimental verification in school teaching and their impact on different types of learners. The aim of the research was to obtain relevant feedback directly from learners using a questionnaire survey, interview, and self-reflection sheets.

Keywords:

Teachers, learners, personality traits, differentiated instruction, instruction strategies, English languages lessons.