High school teachers work hard to adapt their teaching to the specific needs of each student, but the sheer size and tremendous heterogeneity of their classrooms complicate things.
Geneviève Bergeron, researcher in educational studies at Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, conducted interviews with a dozen educators who teach French, mathematics and French as a second language to better understand their perspectives on differentiated instruction—an approach to adapt teaching methods to the students’ characteristics and needs and foster success.
She found that while all educators want to use the method, they face several obstacles, the main ones being the high number of students and groups they teach and the lack of resources and time. Teachers are also concerned that providing different tools will give some students an advantage over others.
Differentiated instruction therefore remains very reactive, and it is mainly used when teachers want to correct a problem. This type of intervention requires a certain amount of training in an approach that must understood to be preventive and aimed at the entire group.
Geneviève Bergeron also perceived tension between wanting to develop the teenagers’ autonomy and the few opportunities they are given to do so, which is reflected in the educators’ reluctance to rely on methods like teamwork and freedom of choice, mainly to avoid having to deal with difficult behaviours.
The findings underscore the importance of creating conditions that encourage the use of inclusive teaching methods through strategies like creating more balanced groups, allowing more time for planning and providing collaborative spaces and highlight the need for more differentiation training.
References:
Bergeron, G., Houde, G. B., Prud’homme, L. et Abat-Roy, V. (2021). Le sens accordé à la différenciation pédagogique par des enseignants du secondaire : quels constats pour le projet inclusif? Éducation et Socialisation, 59, p. 1-17. https://doi.org/10.4000/edso.13814
Bergeron, G., Houde, G. B., Barthos, M. et Bergeron, L. (2022). Le soutien à l’autonomie dans la gestion de classe d’enseignants du secondaire : conceptions, pratiques et paradoxes. Didactique, 3(3), p. 37-64. https://doi.org/10.37571/2022.0303