Inclusive Classrooms

As part of a Culturally Inclusive Classroom (CIE) , teachers need to "assign projects that enable students from diverse groups to work together both collaboratively and effectively." This is a step away from the traditional approach where students "were expected to learn on their own, in isolation, responsible for their own achievement." (CIE 72-72) We have discussed the need to provide students with opportunities to be involved in the same project while at the same time acknowledging that they each have various challenge zones.


The resource Using Multilevel Texts introduces Multilevel texts as a way of engaging students at different levels using the same text. The resource is published of What Works? Research into Practice which is produced by a partnership between the Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat and the Ontario Association of Deans of Education

A levelled text is a text that is written for a certain reading ability and is usually assigned a level. For example, during the PM Benchmark reading assessment, students are given a text of a particular level to evaluate their reading ability. That text is meant to only be read by a student of that ability, and only that ability. A student tested at level 15 would find a book at level 13 to be too easy and would have some difficulty with level 16.

In contrast, a book that is multileveled is written for multiple levels, usually at least two. That means that the student that reads at level 13 and the student at level 15 would both be able to read the text. In these texts, the same story can be represented in multiple formats, genre or reading level.  An example of this is The Three Pigs by David Wiesner. Within this resource is a list of texts that can be used that are Multilevelled.

These texts make he classroom more inclusive since all students are reading the same text. In improves participation as students who are less skilled can focus on a specific aspect of the book for e.g. the text bubbles, captions and headings while the more skilled students can focus on the prose. Students can be assigned roles more easily for e.g. they can be the narrator reading the text or the characters reading the speech bubble. This allows teachers to group together students of different reading ability on the same text and have a meaningful conversation about it. 

The level of reflection that would be engaged in here is pedagogical reflection. Teachers are encouraged to learn about their students and provide them with texts that will engage them at their level while enabling them to still work with their peers who might not necessarily be at the same level. Teachers are to learn about the ability of the student and find the necessary resource to ensure that they are able to reach the goal of having the student participate in the classroom activity.