We are about halfway through the semester, and students are now (hopefully!) starting to think about and work on their final papers or projects. Have you ever shuddered with negative anticipation just thinking about receiving another set of what seems like the same work you saw last semester and the semesters before? It’s not that the students’ work is poor, but rather the monotony of reading the same assignment year after year can really wear you down … and students are likely ready for a little novelty in their work as well.
Take a SIP of differentiated assignments
Try letting students design their own final product. Individual project design is an example of a differentiated assignment — students can produce different final products to demonstrate mastery of the skills or concepts you teach. In a traditional classroom, all students must complete the same final assignment, be it a research paper, an exam or what have you. With differentiated assignments, the parameters of design and assessment are flexible enough to be tailored to each individual student’s interests and skill sets. The idea is to let students bring their A-game to your content and show you they have learned by making the content meaningful to them.
By inviting students to imagine how they might demonstrate that they have achieved the course outcomes, you are almost guaranteed a higher level of intellectual engagement and enthusiasm around the completion of final products. While the more traditional path has led professors to final papers or exams, consider allowing your students to make movies, write and perform songs, invent video games, create a website or use any other innovative method to demonstrate the same learning outcomes associated with research papers and tests.
At first, this idea can seem unwieldy or even impossible — how can every student in the class do something different? How can I equitably grade 30 assignment models? The key lies in creating an evaluation rubric that speaks directly to the Student Learning Outcomes in your course. For example, if the SLO in your course is, “Demonstrate an understanding of the significance of the United States’ participation in World War II,” a student may be able to do that with a two-page paper, a five-minute video, a painting or a creative poem or diorama. Focus evaluation on achieving the SLO and not on the manner in which it was achieved. For some ideas on how to write this type of rubric, take a look at SIP 3.10, “Universally Designed ‘Value Rubric,’” — it can be found at the Well.
Here are some benefits of differentiated final projects
- When coursework is meaningful to students, they often go above and beyond the parameters of an assignment and produce higher-quality work. For example, answering exam questions might take a student two hours of study time and an hour of class time, but inventing their own project will require time to imagine the project, consider the course outcomes, plan for executing the project, etc. This will likely involve consultation with the professor and may provide the opportunity for conversation around other aspects of the course as well.
- You might not have time to get to know every student in your class. Inviting students to design final projects encourages them to share their interests and talents with you and the entire class — you get to know the students much better.
- Choice is empowering. When students choose how they demonstrate their understanding of the course material, they feel more confident and capable and the affective filter that might negatively impact their work product is reduced.
- It can be more interesting and fun for professors to receive a wide variety of final work products as opposed to reading a giant stack of papers or grading a mountain of final exams.
- Differentiated assignments are a good application of the Universal Design for Learning principle of “multiple means of action and expression.” Check out the CAST guidelines for UDL for more information.
Take the following points into consideration:
- Differentiated final projects work better when the Student Learning Outcomes associated with the assignment correspond to the higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy and Higher Order Thinking Categories. Use these tips to apply Bloom’s to digital SLOs and outcomes.
- If possible, build the differentiated project into the syllabus. That way, students can start thinking of how they would demonstrate their knowledge and abilities with regard to course material from the first day of class. If you want to experiment now, though, just announce to students that you are substituting or adding a differentiated assignment option and make it worth the same number of points or grade percentage. If it’s too late to do this semester, don’t worry — give it a shot next semester.
Differentiated assignments build access and equity into your class on the front end and may constitute a strong example of anti-oppressive pedagogy in your work. Enjoy your students’ creativity!
Still thirsty? Take another SIP of differentiated assignments
Explore portfolio learning. This YouTube video lecture, while perhaps a little dry, provides a good overview of the purpose of portfolio assessment and gives many useful tips on execution.
This current SIP focuses on differentiated assignments, but you may want to learn more about differentiated instruction in general. This EdWeek article provides foundational information on how to differentiate your instruction from the front end — useful if you would like to use differentiated assignments or differentiated assessment techniques on the back end.
Visit the Well for more great ideas and resources for Strong Instructional Practices in your higher-education classroom.