Accommodating individual differences
The 4MAT system is a direct instruction approach to teaching that utilizes research on brain lateralization dominance and learning style to identify specific instructional events that will be attractive to a specific type of student.
The 4MAT system seems to have considerable face validity, although there is not the a widespread research base to support it.
" The answer probably lies more within the realm of politics and expediency and therefore most likely will need to be dealt with on those terms.
The major problem with between-class ability grouping may lie more with the method of grouping than with the concept itself.
This unit examiners major areas of individual differences among learners and ways in which educational provision may be adapted to accommodate these differences in helping each student to achieve major learning outcomes.
Consideration will be given to areas of cognitive and personality differences, learning styles, and gender differences.
Cross-institutional study If you are from another Australian tertiary institution you may be permitted to undertake cross-institutional study in one or more units of study at the University of Sydney.
Retrieved [date], from are a variety of individual differences that must be of concern to classroom teachers.
The second approach is to provide some sort of grouping, either between classes or within the classroom itself, in order to reduce or accomodate for the variability with respect to student background, achievement, ability or some other characteristic.
Leveling or tracking, classroom grouping, cooperative learning, and individualized instruction are examples of this approach.
For the most part, ability groups are determined by a composite score on a standardized test of basic skills or on the subtest scores for reading/language arts and mathematics.
However, student knowledge and aptitude may not be uniform across all areas of the content being studied.
It is this cyclical nature of the impact of ability-grouping that may be most detrimental. On the whole, research tends to support within-class ability grouping as beneficial to the learning of most students.