Effective Instructional Strategies: From Theory to Practice
Fourth Edition
Chapter Summary
- Chapter Summary
- This chapter focused on direct teaching methods. The main points associated with specific objectives were as follows:
- Learning Objective 1: Identify factors that should be considered in selecting teaching techniques and strategies.
- Factors that should be considered in selecting teaching techniques and strategies include students’ needs, age of students, students’ intellectual abilities, students’ physical and mental characteristics, students’ attention spans, the lesson purpose, and the content to be taught.
- Learning Objective 2: Define and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the direct teaching and exposition teaching approaches.
- Direct teaching is a teacher-centered skill-building model.
- Exposition teaching offers an effective way to convey a great deal of information in a short period of time.
- Educators are experimenting with the idea of a flipped classroom model. Under this model, instruction is delivered outside the classroom and homework is completed in the classroom.
- Exposition teaching is passive learning.
- Exposition teaching can be boring to students.
- Exposition with interaction teaching is often more effective than exposition teaching.
- The key to exposition with interaction teaching is questioning. Asking good questions is an art that is essential to the lecture recitation and textbook recitation methods.
- Learning Objective 3: Describe ways to improve lectures and teacher presentations through effective questioning.
- Lectures and teacher presentation can be improved by following up with questions over the presented material.
- Learning Objective 4: Identify and differentiate between the different categories of questions, as well as the levels within these categories.
- The recall of information requires the use of narrow questions (convergent), whereas the desire to stimulate thinking and reasoning calls for the use of broad questions (divergent).
- The Mental Operation question system categorizes questions as factual, empirical, productive, or evaluative.
- Learning Objective 5: Compare and contrast focusing, prompting, and probing questions.
- Focusing, prompting, and probing questions can be used to arouse interest and increase involvement.
- Learning Objective 6: Define and explain the benefits derived from the use of the redirecting technique, wait time, and halting time.
- Redirecting questions, using wait time and halting time, and using reinforcement can enhance questioning skills.