Bible Students

Thoughts on “Strategies and Models for Teachers” by Eggen and Kauchak (chapters 9 and 10)

Direct instruction is especially useful for low-performing students. Teachers first model the method for learning, and then ask the students to repeat their own model. This can be done for math through giving math examples which the teacher helps them walk through, and then asks them to solve new problems on their own which follow the same method as the previous math problems. Simple procedural skills are especially useful for this model. This can be math problems, grammatical usage, or reading a map. 

The more the students practice this method, the more they are able to easily complete the problems without teacher intervention. The direct instruction model is designed to give repeated exposure to students in order to become more familiar with the process of discovering the solution. The goal is to make finding the solution a natural process, which become autonomous. For example, doing mental math is a result of the multiplication process becoming autonomous after repeated exposure of multiplication through direct instruction. 

Similar scenarios must be used to find solutions through the same process. There should be a few examples as a part of the lesson which are explored through the day. The new skill must be presented and explained with high-quality explanations. After the student is assessed and the necessary prior knowledge is there, the examples should be explored. Then, the students should be able to do their own problems. After, the teacher should add new types of problems which share the essential process, but have a more complicated method for arriving to the solution. Then, students should be able to solve their own problems. Throughout the process students should be able to explain why they are doing what they are doing in order to demonstrate proper formation of the paths of learning for the students.

The students should be shown how to identify different attributes of a map. After, the teacher should shift to asking questions about identifying attributes of a map. Finally, the students should be able to identify attributes of a map on their own. This process moves from extreme help from the teacher to no help from the teacher, eventually weaning the students off of the need for the teacher to walk them through. The students should do independent practice on their own during class hours in order for it to be monitored, and for questions to be answered in class. There will be those who are not able to answer questions as well as the rest of the students. They may not have gained an adequate understanding of the lesson through asking questions, and may need additional personal tutoring from the teacher, or the lesson overall may need to be changed if many students are not attaining the proper knowledge. 

Critical thinking can be encouraged during lessons by asking how the students have arrived at their answers. School can be additionally confusing for students of diverse cultural backgrounds. Problems and examples may be more difficult to understand for students who are not native to the United States or who come from a different social background than the teachers. Examples should be made socially and culturally diverse in order to appeal to all different people. 

Students may immediately be able to understand information better when given new examples which appeal to their culture. Additionally, the direct instruction model may be especially helpful for those of diverse backgrounds who are not appealed to by the regular examples from mainstream culture. Direct instruction can be a great method for catching up the rest of the class in order to have a nearly-uniform baseline for all students understanding the material. If the purpose of the teacher is to help the students to understand the information well, they should be willing to do this kind of teaching, even if the brightest students are not especially appealed to through this. 

Examples, whether attempting to appeal to cultural normative or divergent students, must be carefully thought through. In order to have meaningful learning, the lessons must be planned well and be well-organized. Apart from organization, students will not be able to place structural context in their minds for the learning. This will lead to a decreased ability to learn. Students must be given the learning structure of organization in order to make a contextual connection of the information to other information for better recollection and retainment, rather than learning information without context. 

The students ultimately should be able to describe how they are understanding the material. If the material is mathematics-based, the teacher should provide examples, then guide the students through more examples, and then ask the students to go through their own examples. At all stages, the students should be asked how they are arriving at the solutions they are coming up with. If the students are not able to supply an answer as to how they arrived there, they should not be considered as understanding the material. Only if the students understand how they arrived at the solution should the lesson be considered a success. 

Students should be able, at the end of the assessment, to create their own cohesive examples, understand what the process should look like, and be able to ask the questions of their classmates. Students should be able to test their classmates. Both students should be able to walk through the process to attain the solution, while also checking each other’s work with confidence. The students are able to do peer review and discussions at this point, and be able to point out the mistakes of their classmates. When the student is able to teach other students about the concept, they have truly attained an understanding of the material. If they are not, the lesson may need to be reviewed again. 

Information must be properly organized, otherwise the students will not understand it as well, if at all. Concepts outside of organization will lack the concept needed for longterm recollection. Students should be able to present problems to other classmates while understanding contextually the surrounding information needed to give proper room for understanding from the other students. For example, if the student asks another classmate the solution of 7×8, they should have the contextual understanding to know where the incorrect answer of 49 comes from (7×7, rather than 7×8), and that context should give the basis of proper correction which brings the classmate back on track for properly solving the problem of direct instruction.