The artifact is a collection of different instructional strategies that use activation, collaboration, metacognition, communication, and application. These range in a variety of rigor and use different learning styles that will benefit a range of students. All these examples ask students to either access the knowledge they have or go even further and apply their knowledge in activities like powerful questions or project-based learning. Having this artifact will help prospective teachers encourage their students and help them apply a range of developmentally, culturally, and linguistically appropriate instructional strategies to achieve learning goals. This artifact will help teachers answer questions such as—“What will I do to establish and communicate learning goals, track progress, and celebrate success?”, ”What will I do to help students effectively interact with new knowledge?”, “What will I do to help students effectively interact with new knowledge?”, “What will I do to help students generate and test hypotheses about new knowledge?”, or “What can I do to engage students?”.
As educators we are responsible for teaching the way kids learn; it should not be their responsibility to adapt to how we teach. If we used the same instructional strategies for every student all the time the students in the margins will not be reached or will not be integrated into an inclusive classroom. We need to be able to adjust the level of complexity and the way students how their evidence of learning to help curate great and ready learners. Students may need a variety of options based on interests and learning styles. Having a variety of options to demonstrate and grow students’ knowledge we are more likely to meet all the student’s needs, not just a certain sub-set.
