A teacher’s mindset in a classroom is a significant factor affecting the progress of their students as well as efficiency in learning. Any teacher who would like their students to learn the concepts and get the content, will consider the interests individual students as per their gifting and try as much as possible to improve on them.

Differentiation is actually about the way a teacher directs the learning according to the way they think. Tomlison and Imbeau (2010) argues that any teacher with a growth attitude will work from a mindset that any student is capable of learning if they have the will do learn. Teachers who want to succeed in application of differentiated learning will teach analytically showing their students on how to contrast and compare; critique and judge. Even though they will teach using different methods to different students, their aim is teaching common content and concepts to all students.

In my academic life I once experienced difficulty in the classroom with a reason I attribute to the mindset of my teacher. We had a subject teacher who discriminated against slow learners. She favored students who instantly answered her questions in the classroom. I was not one among them and this led to deterioration in my studies. Almost half of the class was affected in that only an average percentage attained the average mark.

The teacher with a negative mindset on non-performer students’ needs to be reminded that people are gifted differently. They need to be re-introduced to differentiated learning and the principles emphasized to so that they can achieve efficiency in their teaching. They will need to make their students understand their similarities and individuality.

Reference

Tomlison, C. & Imbeau, M. (2010). Leading and managing a differentiated classroom. USA: ASCD Publications

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