Differentiated Teaching in Norway

Abstract

This research was conducted to investigate the way Norwegian teachers deal with differentiation in the classroom. Differentiation plays a very important role in the Norwegian educational system because classes have pupils from all levels and they are supposed to reach the same final goals. Altogether four teachers from different secondary schools in Trondheim were taped during a lesson and were later interviewed. Two professors from the teachers’ education program from the NTNU (Trondheim university) were also interviewed. We expected to find many different forms of differentiation in the Norwegian classroom. However, the results showed this was not the case. Because of this and because the results that came out of the second part of the interview were very interesting, it was decided to focus on the feelings and opinion of the teacher, as well as their practical teaching. The results show that all interviewed teachers feel strongly about differentiation in the classroom. Almost all feel that it is impossible to differentiate properly within the Norwegian system. They had suggestions to improve the system, one of the main things being that they wished for smaller classes, only then the ideal situation the Norwegian curriculum prescribes, can be attained. At the moment there still is a gap between theory and practice within the Norwegian school system when it comes to differentiation. There is much that can be learned from those who have to deal with differentiation in practice.