Our 30th anniversary celebration continues with the October Giveaway. (This giveaway is now closed.) This month we’re giving away four books on differentiating instruction, including a brand new title from Diane Heacox and Richard Cash:
- Differentiation for Gifted Learners
- Differentiating Instruction in the Regular Classroom
- Advancing Differentiation
- Making Differentiation a Habit
How to Enter: This giveaway is now closed. Leave a comment below telling us how you would use Free Spirit’s differentiation resources. For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks that you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry—that’s four chances to win! Entries must be received by midnight October 18, 2013. This giveaway is now closed. The winner will be contacted via email by October 22, 2013, and will need to respond within 72 hours to claim his or her prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest. Winner must be a U.S. resident, 18 years of age or older.
We welcome your comments and suggestions. Share your comments, stories, and ideas below, or contact us. All comments will be approved before posting, and are subject to our comment and privacy policies.
© 2013 by Free Spirit Publishing. All rights reserved.
I always observe my students and connect the activities to their personal interests as well as to their learning style.
Differentiation is a way to meet the needs of all students. In addition to using these resources in the class of gifted students, they would be GREAT tools to help the general education teacher feel comfortable differentiating. This not only benefits the gifted in the regular classroom, where they spend the majority of their time, but also the other students. As a consultant as well as a teacher of the gifted, general ed teachers are always asking for ways to meet the special needs of their students. These resources will be valuable tools to help meet these diverse needs.
To have books on differentiation would greatly help my lesson planning. I am a gifted education teacher. My principal wants us to use regular education standards. However, we use both gifted and regular objectives. Learning more about differentiation would enable us to do more for our gifted ed. students!
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I am a first year teacher, and any resources I can find to try and help my students are greatly appreciated.
As a gifted facilitator I work with teachers grades 1-8 in helping them to differentiate their lessons to increase the rigor. Having a library of books that give instructional ideas as well as research based information on what works for teaching the gifted/talented child would be very beneficial in the planning of those meetings and when searching for specific strategies. Thanks for your dedication to gifted children and the teachers & parents that work with them!
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I would use these resources to better assist my extra help students I have throughout the day.
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As a new teacher it would be great having this tools to help my students improve their academic skills.
I am the gifted and talented coordinator for my school (which is a GT magent for the district). These resources would be invaluable to my teachers!
I use the books to help my students in teacher education respond to the wide variety of kids in the schools.
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Angie Howell
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Angie Howell
I use the books on differentiation to lead staff development for the teachers at my school.
Angie
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I am a gifted coach at 2 elementary schools. I love free spirit resources and use them for the benefit of many teachers and gifted students.
Differentiation for gifted learners is as important as differentiation for any exceptional group. Gifted students are often underachievers who would perform better if provided with differentiated instruction or assignments.
I am the K-12 Gifted Educator in our district, and I am always looking for ways to differentiate for my students, and for the high achievers who do not qualify to be in the gifted program.
As a trainer of elementary and middle level teachers at a state university, differentiation is the world I live in…. from teaching classroom management to a course of assessment to social studies methods. Beginning with Carol Tomlinson’s work on differentiation, I realized that I differentiated instruction before I knew what it was called 🙂 I could use these books not only as resources for me, but as resources for my future educators as well!
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I’m always looking for ways to increase the ways I can reach my students. DI is just one of those things that the more you know the further you can go. Would love to read all of them 🙂
I’m a new gifted teacher and have already been asked by classroom teachers for ways to help them differentiate for my students. These books would be valuable resources for helping me meet the needs of my students.
Besides being best practice and advantageous for students, I find differentiated instruction to help me to be a more interesting, energizing, and engaging educator. It keeps me on my toes!!
As a gifted specialist and a presenter on the nature and needs of gifted learners, I am always on the look out for materials that I can readily recommend to other educators. I would love to use these resources with my students as well as share the information with my colleagues. I seem to get the most receptive audience in workshops when I share something that is “working” for me instructionally speaking. I have used similar materials and have had much success thus far. I would love to expand my resource bank.
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I enjoy professional reading. I enjoy sharing good professional reading even more. Our school’s professional library would be enhanced by the addition of materials that address differentiation. I am particularly eager to learn more and to advocate for meeting the academic needs of our gifted students.
I would love to have these differentiation books in order to help students no matter what level they are in their developmental progress. I work with an enrichment teacher for math and reading but have students below grade level in other subjects. The books would be very helpful.
I do Family Childcare and I would use the books by putting them in our associations library.
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I would use the books to help myself create a more rigorous classroom of 5th grade gifted students.
I’ve been working with the teachers at both of my schools in addressing the needs of all students. Differentiation is possible! Free Spirit’s resources have always impressed me!
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I would use the materials to offer differentiated instruction to a diverse group of learners. I am interested in ways to accommodate their learning interests and styles.
I work to transition students from alternative settings back into the general education classroom at the middle school level. I collaborate with all content areas across 6th through 8th grades. Differentiated instruction is and should be best and standard practice for all students. It is especially important for the population for which I work to make successful. I would love to learn about additional ways to continue to differentiate effectively.
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In addition, I am a talent development teacher in an elementary school, where I work to assist teachers K-5 with differentiation strategies. Having more tools available would definitely assist me in this endeavor! Thanks for all you do!
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I would use these books to help differentiate my upper math class learners! Everyone learns at their own speed and these books would help me work with different learners on the same topic!
I have always worked very hard to provide different levels of instruction within one classroom. I have worked in multi-age rooms for many years, but I am always looking for new ideas to add to my toolbox of strategies. I also network with many other teachers and i would be able to provide more ideas and share many of the exciting suggestions from these materials. I live in a rural area and funding for professional development is limited, so to have these books would not only help me but would be used by many teachers and support staff as we try to meet the needs of our students. I do not have Facebook or Twitter, so this will be my only opportunity to enter. Thank you Free Spirit.
I am a school counselor in an elementary school. We are a full-inclusion school, and there are times where I believe I need more ideas and tools to differentiate the instruction in guidance classes to fully benefit our various students. I would love to be able to use these books as resources for our teachers when they consult with me on behavior issues they are seeing in the classroom. Additionally, I am the testing coordinator for our school, and I would love to have additional tools and suggestions for helping our teachers close the gaps in achievement.
I would use these books to differentiate in my classroom as I currently am the only 7th and 8th grade teacher at my school with every student from GATE to ESL to students with IEPs and everything in-between! Thank you for the opportunity!
Our school system is always urging classroom teachers to differentiate on a daily basis. As the gifted resource teacher in one of our elementary schools, part of my job is to encourage and help with differentiation. These resources would be of great value
I love free spirit books. Great for teaching kids how to behave!
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I am the SRBI (RTI) coordinator for my district – I do PD on differentiation for full range of students. I already have one of the books listed above and used that one for much of my PD last year. I am also in charge of the enrichment/gifted program district-wide and would love to see what is in the differentiation for gifted learners book so that I could share that info with our district, as well.
I’m a faculty member in a College of Education and teach a class that all our elementary education majors take on the exceptional child in the general education classroom For years I’ve shared the Free Spirit “Survival Guides” (LD, ADHD, Gifted, Autism, Behavior … I think I have them all, LOL). I show them in class, pass the around, and encourage my students to borrow them and see what it inside. They are very popular. Of course I teach about differentiation in this class and would love to share these additional resources with my future teachers.
I serve gifted students in two schools (elementary and middle) and struggle to find differentiated activities to share with regular classroom teachers that they can implement when I am not available. These books would be a tremendous resource.
As a mom of two school aged children who would benefit from this set of books, as a tutor for children with special needs and as an art teacher at two schools where there is full inclusion, these books would be extremely helpful! I wear many hats and these books would help me no matter which hat I might be wearing. Thanks for all your wonderful products, I’m a big fan of Free Spirit Press!
I am a child play therapist and have many gifted mid-teens that have a hard time being accepted by their peers. this book would help me reach them and have them accept themselves if they know about their gifts and can appreciate their giftedness! All these books would help me to tailor their therapy. Since I always dialog with their teachers, these books would also help me to assist the teachers in individual differences.
I am a gifted facilitator for K-8 and these books would be a great resource for our gifted program.
I teach courses on differentiation for gifted students online and in a teacher education program in Jamaica and I would use the resources in those courses.
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Free Spirit Resources would be an invaluable asset to my gifted program!
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I would love to have these books on differentiation. I think they would be an invaluable resource in my middle school, especially for creating centers. This would allow the students to participate in the same activities and have the same learning experiences, but allow them to work at their ability levels.
I would use it to work with students In a k-12 position.
My 2E daughter will be starting kindergarten in the fall. Collaborating with Special School District in preschool this year, we’ve worked out many great strategies for helping her wih sensory issues, over-excitibilities, sensitivity, and social skills. We see good things happening for her, and she is able to calm and regulate herself so much better now. But now we are beginning to wonder about how school (and home!) will be able to best serve her intellectual development and giftedness. In a school district where the gifted program doesn’t start until grade 2, but everyone claims that they “differentiate at all levels,” I’m concerned about what that really looks like and whether I can rely on it to meet my child where she is intellectually. I’d love to read and learn more to help us make the decisions and choices ahead of us. So far, she loves school, and I want it to stay that way!
Plus, my daughter has always loved Free Spirit books. They were always the first and best teaching tool as we dealt with separation anxiety, sitting still in story time, sharing with friends, and on and on!
I have a son in middle school who needed differentiation instruction. It was a struggle in school because teachers taught above his level of understanding. We now home school and I use differentiated instruction methods to provide materials to help him grasp concepts and he can enjoy learning new information.
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I am the mental health/ disabilities coordinator for ages 3-5. Every child in our program is different, how to understand them in their own way is another. It would be so great to have teachers sign out any of these four books and began to learn about the uniqueness of their students. Our children with disabilities and challenging behavior even requires a different style and technique of learning. I would love for my pre-school program to have on hand the four books on differentiation to help teachers and the assistants on how to assist their students in a different approach.
I am a elementary school counselor. Part of my role is to support classroom teachers to help children reach their full potential. Differentiating Instruction is such a very important part of helping children reach their goals. These books would be available for all classroom teachers to use in their classrooms. Thank you for the great offer. Free Spirit Publishing has been such a great resource of materials for our elementary counseling department
Would love to have those books as my child has been a gifted kid and I’m looking for this type of resources rhat can help him grow. I like Free Spirit Publishing books and had positive experience with them in the past.
I work with our U.S. National Teams for Wheelchair Basketball and would love to teach these principles in working with our Elite Athletes!
I am a principal of a middle school in upstate NY with a very diverse population in every way. I believe the biggest challenge my teachers face is how to meet the needs of the wide range of learners in their heterogeneously grouped classrooms. These books would be used to further our professional development on the topic of differentiation, and I am hopeful that the new learning provided would help to give our teachers more strategies to meet the needs of our students.
I am the middle school counselor at a small private school. If I were to win the four books on differentiation, I would use them to assist teachers in understanding that our gifted and talented students require significantly different instruction and curriculum from their peers. With the use of these book, I would be better able to assist teachers in understanding gifted students’ learning styles and abilities and therefore be able to help them adjust content level and tailor their teaching practices to best suit students of different needs.
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