220:150 Meeting the Needs of Diverse Learners
Alignment with INTASC Professional Standards


  1. Think deeply and critically about how classroom instruction and pedagogy supports or fails to support classroom diversity.
  2. Identify specific strategies and instructional methods to meet the needs of all learners and apply to his or her subject or content area.


  1. Understand how classroom instruction supports or fails to support classroom diversity.
  2. Identify pedagogy that supports and enhances all students learning.

  1. Understand the social, political, and historical foundations informing the education of students with diverse needs. 
  2.  Explore how difference may be defined, understood, and enacted within various contexts. 
  3. Consider how the concept of difference informs one’s schooling experiences.
  4.  Respect, appreciate, and value diversity in the classroom.

  1. Understand and use various teaching methods to design instruction to meet the needs of diverse learners (universal design, differentiation, cooperative learning, co-teaching, learner-centered etc.)


  1. Identify strategies for developing community within the classroom.
  2. Compare and contrast the advantages and disadvantages of various management strategies to support diverse learners (behaviorism, constructivism etc.)


  1. Actively participate and apply reading, writing, listening and speaking skills.
  2. Explore methods of communication necessary to foster positive relationships with students and families from diverse backgrounds.

  1. Develop lesson plans employing strategies and methods to support all students’ needs.


  1. Explore and understand how various assessment tools may inform a student’s educational experiences (standardized measures, portfolio assessment, etc.)


  1. Examine and critically reflect upon personal experiences relating to diversity.
  2. Ask meaningful questions to guide personal learning in the area of diversity and relate those questions to teaching in a classroom.
  3. Learn by listening to and observing others.


  1. Explores how to develop positive relationships with families and communities. 


  1. Understand how technology can enhance instruction to meet the needs of diverse learners.
  2. Become familiar with assistive technology to support students’ needs, including low and high tech devices and augmentative communication devices.