Maureen
(2008) cited to Ward (1961), and
stated that the concept differentiated instructions was first developed when it
is known that children have different educational, emotional,
social levels of development and needs, which can be affected by students’
learning. This is why he recommended that teachers need to plan instruction to
meet those needs.
One
of the leading experts of differentiated instructions is Tomlinson. Brad (2011) mentioned that Academic search Premier
revealed that since 1995 Tomlinson has authored more than 50 publications based
on differentiated instructions. Tomlinson
(2014) mentioned that social constructivism (ZPD) and multiple-intelligence
gave her the way to work on differentiated instruction.
Tomlinson
(2001) also, have specified more or the same
sort of concept on differentiated instruction. She believed that the very
beginning of differentiated instruction has started since from the one-room
schoolhouse. At that time, students with different ages were there in these
schoolhouses, and for all these students, the same component to be taught by a
local teacher. For a single teacher, teaching for different aged students would
be very challenging. In her research
study, Tomlinson (2001) also has mentioned that teachers had a challenge for
providing instructions to many students of different ages, different disabilities, and learning levels at the same time.
According
to Levy (2008) teachers and professors emerged to promote principles of
differentiated instruction when teaching became increasingly challenged for a diverse group of students. When Vygotsky (1975) was working on his theory of
learning (ZPD), he found that learning affects differentiated instruction. He
described ZPD as:
“
the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by individual
problem solving and level of potential development as determined through individual problem solving under adult
guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers”.
According to
Woolfolk (2013), the ZPD plays an important role in differentiated instruction,
because it allows teachers to recognize an entry point for each student’s
learning needs. Therefore, this helps to develop that student’s learning
potential.
I believe that Vygotsky’s theory of social constructivism could be the foundation of differentiated instruction. On the other hand, it was Gardener’s (1993) multiple intelligence theory that promoted ideal for how student learning differences might be observed. Gardener argued that there are many ways to be intelligent according to this multiple intelligence theory. These include linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily kinaesthetic, musical, interpersonal, and naturalistic intelligence. This intelligence helped to categorize learner variance. Furthermore, Gardener stated, that these multiple intelligences allow teachers to see through clearly the potential in every single student. This allowed teachers to stop labeling students as intelligent or unintelligent. Furthermore, Willingham (2004) stated that multiple intelligence theory is generally used as a tool by educators for understanding learner variation and an important part of differentiated instruction
As mentioned before, Tomlinson is one of the leading
experts on differentiated instruction. Tomlinson (2004) argued that all the
students are different from each other, therefore, they should be taught in
such a way where learning differences could be addressed. For these learning differences, she mentioned
that the content, process, and product of a lesson can be differentiated.
Furthermore, she added, differentiating the content, process and product
work-out with each other to support one another and is cycled through as every
single student grows and develops in their own learning capacity.
