What is the Difference between Personalized and Differentiated?

What's the Difference between Personalized and Differentiated?

These two words get thrown around quite a bit these days, but do you really know the difference? It helps if you think about the words they are most often associated with. Personalized is commonly attached to “Learning,” while differentiated is associated with “instruction.”

The focus of personalized is the learner, and the focus of differentiation is the instructor. For many of us, the move from whole-class instruction to differentiation was a stretch. Instead of thinking about one lesson for the class, we were thinking about different activities for different groups. The amount of work to make it work seemed staggering at times.

Personalized learning is an even bigger shift, for both teachers and students. In successful personalized learning, the student is in control of his or her own learning. They actively participate in planning what will be learned, where they will find the needed information, determining the skills necessary to learn what’s needed, and accepting the responsibility for making it all happen.

Sounds great for teachers. We can just put our feet up on the desk and snooze while the students handle things. Wait! Wake up, you are only dreaming.

Teachers have different roles, for sure. For one, the list above is what happens in “successful” personalized learning, but most students don't come to us with the skills to take on their own education. We have to help them get there. We have to motivate them to want to.

But why should we want to? That sounds like a lot of work. My students' test scores are pretty good. If I just keep doing what I'm doing everything will be okay.

However, did you become a teacher to make sure kids got good test scores? I know I didn't. I wanted to change the world.

With personalized learning, you might just do that. It's great if a student has good test scores, but that won't change his or her life. But, if that same young lady learns to take control of her own education, if she can determine what she needs to know to complete a task or design a project, she is now a more capable person. Now she has the ability to establish herself in the world.

For quite some time, education has been about teaching kids “A is the best answer.” And then, giving them a test question: What is the best answer? A  B  C  D

What happens when their employer gives them a test: What’s the best health insurance policy for your family? A   B   C   D

It seems almost the same, except no one is teaching them the right answer before the test. They have to figure it out for themselves. That's what personalized learning is all about, helping kids learn to figure “it” out for themselves. And if they can do that, then you may have just changed the world.

Q What do you think are some other benefits of personalized learning?