The Application of Differentiated Instruction in a Sixth - Grade EFL Classroom: An Action Research Approach

• Main Author: 戴立華
• Other Authors: 沈添鉦
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2017
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/63494533869022065716

碩士 === 南臺科技大學 === 應用英語系 === 105 === Since the implementation of 12-year compulsory education in Taiwan, Differentiated Instruction (DI) has been part of an ongoing discussion in the field of English teaching. With the growing awareness of students’ varied needs in the classroom, more and more researchers have been investigating the effect of Differentiated Instruction (DI) in the classroom. The results of these studies show that DI has a positive effect in English teaching; however, there are not many studies that provide more specific and practicable strategies in the elementary English classroom. This action study has three main purposes: (1) to develop what differentiated strategies can be designed and implemented to meet different students’ needs in an EFL English classroom; (2) to examine if these strategies are effective in enhancing students’ learning achievements and attitudes in the English classroom; (3) to explore the difficulties and problems that teachers may encounter when implementing differentiated instruction. The participants were 29 sixth-grade students in one class at an elementary school in Tainan city. Differentiated Instruction was given twice a week for forty minutes each time, and continued for 12 weeks. While the data analysis was mainly qualitative, some quantitative data were included as well. The instruments consisted of a pretest, a posttest, a questionnaire, formal interview and informal interviews, observations, field-notes, and a teacher’s reflective journal. The results and major findings are summarized as follows: 1. Most students showed a positive attitude towards the researcher’s Differentiated Instruction strategies: 5 kinds of tiered tasks based on Multiple Intelligence theory and Scaffolding theory, tiered worksheets, tiered assignments and flexible grouping. 2. Through Differentiated Instruction, the low-achieving students have improved learning motivation. 3. Although implementing Differentiated Instruction needs a lot of time to prepare, it is essential for students to have such an instruction. 4. After taking 12 weeks of Differentiated Instruction course, the students did not show a significant improvement in their learning achievements; however the Differentiated Instruction is likely to have a certain influence on those low achieving students. However, the researcher met some difficulties summarized as follows: 1. Due to insufficient DI teaching experience, the researcher spent a lot of time preparing the lesson plans for students, so there was a heavy burden regarding preparation. 2. The overall teaching style is turned into grouping teaching, so the teacher needed to focus on several groups simultaneously, which resulted in some class management limitation for the researcher. 3. Without hi-tech teaching equipment available, the researcher needed to work even harder to vivify the teaching process by using some substitute materials, in order to achieve a certain teaching goals. 4. Implementing Differentiated Instruction, the researcher was under some pressure from the school’s formal teaching schedules and tests, which meant that the DI teaching time had to be compressed Finally, based on the results, pedagogical implications for further studies are provided for those teachers who want to implement Differentiated Instruction in the future. Keywords: Differentiated Instruction, Tiered task, Flexible grouping