Differentiated Language Arts and Math

One of my goals this year is to use more pre-tests to inform my instruction.  My first experience with this was in Language Arts.
As a fifth grade team, we identified vocabulary skills as a weakness in our students.  Part of that is knowing how to use a dictionary.  The first day of school, I gave my students a pre-test on the skills of using a dictionary to define multiple meaning words, using a pronunciation key, putting words in alphabetical order (to the third letter), and using guide words.  Using their scores, I created a personalized packet for each student with just the skills they needed.  Two students demonstrated mastery in the pre-test, so they had challenging activities which they completed as a team.

 

Three students did very poorly, so they worked with an aide in a small group on slightly easier skills.  

The rest of the class participated in a mini-lesson each day on a different skill, then worked independently on their packets.  

Today I gave the post-test and 90% of the class passed.  Go kids!
My second experience with pre-tests was did not go as smoothly.  I pre-tested my Math class for the first unit.  Most of the material should have been review, but clearly it wasn't.  So I greatly reduced the scope of the unit, since I had only alloted two weeks for it.  My original plans were to teach factors, multiples, arrays, prime, and composite numbers, prime factoring, multiplication properties, and divisibility rules.  I decided to stick with factors, multiples, primes and composites.  We spend a week on factors alone because it was so difficult for them.  We did many activities:  Venn diagrams, foldables with examples and rules, games from our Math series, and traditional worksheets.  We even color-coded a hundreds chart with colors that represented the different multiples.  Students were allowed to use their interactive Math notebooks, their student reference book, or the definition wall during the test.  
Despite all of this, many students failed the test.  When I thought about why I had two very different outcomes, I came to the conclusion that my Language Arts students corrected their own pre-test.  They knew what they needed to work on.  I also used differentiated instruction with my Language Arts class where I didn't do as much of that with the Math class.
For the Unit 2 pre-test, I came across a site called Mastery Connect.  Mastery Connect is a site that links Common Core assessments in Reading and Math and tracks student progress.  The basic service is free.  I couldn't find an assessment that really matched the skills I will teach in Unit 2, so I made one and posted it to the site.  It was easy to add the scores to my "tracker" and visually track what skills students have and need.