Adapting Instruction for Student Learning
Adaptation protects the goal while changing the route. It is a response to evidence, not a reduction of expectations for students who need a different support.
The official Element
Element 4D: Teachers vary their instructional practices to differentiate the kinds of student learning activities and levels of support needed to address the breadth of students’ identified assets and needs.
What this Element asks of an educator
Adaptation protects the goal while changing the route. It is a response to evidence, not a reduction of expectations for students who need a different support.
Read together, these indicators ask educators to make adapting instruction for student learning visible in planning, teaching, student experience, and follow-through. The aim is not to display every indicator in every lesson, but to understand the full range of the Element and select a focused practice to develop with evidence.
Official Example Indicators—and an SDLA reading
The Commission presents Example Indicators as illustrations rather than a comprehensive or required checklist. Their sequence shows the breadth of this Element and gives teachers, mentors, and coaches a shared language for focused development.
Modify and scaffold instruction
Official indicator: Modify and scaffold instruction, based on evidence-based principles of learning and development.
Group and regroup students in ways that promote academic…
Official indicator: Group and regroup students in ways that promote academic and social– emotional development.
Build flexible pathways
Official indicator: Build flexible pathways, processes, and interventions for student engagement that are inclusive and that support student success.
Determine what content
Official indicator: Determine what content, skills, instructional strategies, and learning experiences must be adjusted so that each learner progresses, paying particular attention to students with disabilities, students with Individualized Education Programs (IEPs), high- achieving students, and English learners.
Differentiate and individualize learning experiences to engage and challenge…
Official indicator: Differentiate and individualize learning experiences to engage and challenge learners who have mastered content.
Developing the practice
Plan from purpose and evidence
Connect ambitious goals with real knowledge of students, standards, curriculum, and prior learning.
Sequence for understanding
Design modeling, inquiry, practice, collaboration, feedback, and application as a coherent learning path.
Prepare to adapt
Identify likely barriers, formative checkpoints, and the decisions different evidence will trigger.
Evidence worth noticing
- plans connecting goals, learner information, experiences, supports, and evidence
- a sequence showing how understanding and independence develop
- anticipated barriers with planned access routes or formal supports
- documented adaptations tied to what students revealed
Evidence caution: No single artifact proves accomplished practice. Interpret evidence in context, center student experience and learning, use multiple sources, and avoid collecting identifiable information that is not necessary.
A pinch of data integration and digital learning
Digital systems can organize information, improve access, coordinate work, or shorten a feedback loop. They are valuable only when the educator can explain the human decision they support, the information they require, and how privacy, accessibility, equity, and professional responsibility are protected.
Fifth-grade resources
Practice adaptation within a real grade-level learning context.
Questions for reflection and coaching
- Where is adapting instruction for student learning already visible in my practice, and what evidence supports that judgment?
- Which students experience the current approach differently from the way I intend?
- Which official indicator names the most important next area for growth?
- What is one affordable, manageable adjustment I can test, and what will I look for afterward?
- Whose perspective—student, family, colleague, specialist, or community partner—would improve the next decision?
Continuum of Teaching Practice: Element 4D
This Element-specific continuum describes how practice develops from Emerging through Innovating. Compare the teacher-practice descriptions with the related evidence in students’ experience, then identify a current strength and a purposeful next step.
How to understand and use this continuum for professional growth
- Begin at Emerging and read across. Practices described at earlier levels carry forward even when they are not repeated.
- Use evidence gathered over time to identify the description that most closely reflects current practice.
- A teacher may be at different levels in different Elements, regardless of years in the profession.
- Changes in students, content, grade level, school, or responsibilities may appropriately shift practice in either direction.
- Use the continuum for reflection and goal setting, not as a stand-alone observation or evaluation instrument.
Select a level to expand it. Select it again to return to the full comparison.
Teacher practice
The teacher plans learning activities that address students’ assets, strengths, and needs.
Evidence in student experience
Students depend on the teacher to respond to the curriculum and may demonstrate knowledge of the learning goals.
Teacher practice
The teacher employs instructional practices that are modified and scaffolded to leverage students’ assets and strengths and meet their needs.
Evidence in student experience
Students may engage with the curriculum, demonstrating an understanding of learning goals and ask for help when encountering learning obstacles.
Teacher practice
The teacher consistently reflects on instructional practices and adapts the levels of support to address students’ assets, strengths, and needs effectively.
Evidence in student experience
Students begin to share responsibility with the teacher and their peers to select and implement learned strategies to demonstrate progress toward learning goals.
Teacher practice
The teacher combines various instructional strategies and assessment methods to inform targeted support to meet the students’ assets, strengths, and needs.
Evidence in student experience
Students share responsibility with the teacher and their peers to leverage their identities, strengths, interests, and assets to select and implement strategies to demonstrate progress in short- and long-term learning goals.
Teacher practice
The teacher extends the learning experience by incorporating flexible and inclusive pathways, processes, and interventions that maximize student engagement.
Evidence in student experience
Students are self-directed learners who actively shape their instructional experiences and that of their peers based on learning objectives, personal goals, strengths, and assets.
Source and attribution: Continuum language reproduced from the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, Continuum of Teaching Practice (2025), aligned with the California Standards for the Teaching Profession (2024). This publication by the Commission on Teacher Credentialing is not copyright. It may be reproduced in the public interest, but proper attribution is requested.