From Adaptive Teaching Theory to Classroom Practice: A Design-Based Research Protocol for Diverse Learners

Abstract

The theory–practice gap remains a persistent problem in education because research often produces abstract principles, whereas classroom teaching requires situated judgment under conditions of learner diversity, curricular constraint, and uncertainty. This paper presents a design-based research (DBR) protocol for developing and refining an Adaptive Teaching Framework (ATF) intended to translate established principles of adaptive teaching into an observable and revisable classroom decision architecture. The framework integrates research on adaptive teaching, differentiated instruction, inclusive pedagogy, formative assessment, scaffolding, and teacher professional judgment. Rather than introducing new mechanisms of adaptation, the ATF organizes established principles into six interdependent decision functions: planning for learner diversity; interpreting learner needs; selecting an adaptive response; enacting and calibrating support; evaluating learner response through formative evidence; and reflecting and recalibrating instruction. The framework is explicitly recursive, with both in-lesson and between-lesson feedback loops, and is constrained by an inclusive-pedagogy principle requiring adaptation to preserve participation in shared curricular purposes. A two-cycle DBR protocol is proposed in authentic school settings, combining teacher co-design, classroom implementation, observation, interviews, teaching artifacts, formative evidence, and documented framework revision. The study asks how teachers interpret and enact the framework, which design features support or constrain its use, how contextual conditions shape adaptation, how the framework changes across iterative cycles, and what evidence of student participation and learning should inform revision. Because fieldwork has not yet been conducted, no findings are reported. The intended contribution is to provide an empirically revisable account of how adaptive-teaching principles are translated into classroom decision processes and how classroom evidence, in turn, modifies the framework and its underlying design principles.