Indicator

I.E.2

Home learning opportunities accommodate the range of individual differences among learners.

Definition(s) and/or Explanation(s)

Home Learning tasks provide learners with opportunities to:

Practice - Learners are provided with opportunities to reinforce newly acquired learning.

Preparation - Learners obtain knowledge necessary to establish prerequisites for new learning.

Extension/Application - Learners go beyond completed learning tasks and extend newly acquired knowledge.

Enhancing/Thinking Skills - Learners enhance their abilities to think.

Because developmental levels, ability levels, and efficacy needs vary among learners in a class, home-learning opportunities should be differentiated and/or varied to accommodate individual differences among learners.

When home learning requiring the use of home resources is assigned (e.g., special books, materials, and equipment), the teacher should make certain that these resources are reasonably accessible and available to learners.

Classroom Examples

Elementary

In a fourth-grade unit on American biographies, it is planned that learners will select one person covered in class as the focus for a home-learning project which may take any of the following forms as chosen by the learner:

• a soliloquy in first person from the perspective of the chosen person
 
• a diorama depicting a particular event in the chosen person's life
 
• a short story detailing a particular event in the chosen person's life
 
• a poem

Secondary

During a seventh-grade science unit on insects, the PLAN includes the following options for a home-learning assignment:

• the names and detailed descriptions of five insects found locally
 
• a detailed drawing of a particular insect with labels indicating anatomical features
 
• a behavioral study of an insect in the wild