| Differentiation
Though differentiation in assessment and teaching are distinct, they are often confused.
Assessment
For formal assessments, differentiation may be of two kinds:
Differentiated tasks are test items specifically matched to the reach of students at predetermined levels of attainment. Differentiation by outcome applies at the marking stage of undifferentiated questions. Essentially, it is the delivery of a rank order.
Differentiated teaching
In class, differentiation by outcome is not differentiation at all; for the rare homogeneous class, this may be entirely appropriate. For teaching purposes, differentiation is, or should be, much more varied.
Differentiation by task is not the only teaching tool available. In practice, it also places heavy burdens on preparation time; these become intolerable if teachers try to match every piece of text to all the reading levels in a mixed ability class. Commonly, tasks are most effectively differentiated for groups. Individual task or textual differentiation is probably best reserved for statemented pupils, and handled as a shared responsibility with SEN colleagues.
Other forms of differentiation include: grouping by similar ability, groups (chiefly pairs) with contrasting achievements, pairing boys with girls, same sex pairings, using buddy systems, drafting pairs, proof reading groups, and many others. The message from such experienced practitioners as Geoff Hannan (1999) seems to be that: grouping, and seating arrangements, amount to a powerful, underused weapon in the teacher’s armoury; that teachers, not pupils, should control the arrangements; and that sharp gains in achievement may result, especially when clear objectives are attached to the structures used.
Hannan’s ‘a third-a third-a-third’ principle is particularly helpful. For a given period or module, pupils in a mixed gender class may be paired successively as: single sex pairs; mixed sex pairs - each as selected by the teacher - friend with friend (either sex; www.hannans.org.uk; see also Hannan, 2003). In a BSA survey (Frater, 2002c) one school operated another helpful policy: all teachers were given the reading test results of their Y7 pupils: free to take action in their own way, staff were asked to use the data when seating their classes, and to report on the differences they had made.
How oral questions are pitched and posed, and how teachers distribute time and attention in class, and between groups or individuals, are forms of differentiation that need less discussion here.
 
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