Reaching All the Students in Your Classroom Instructional Strategies W. Philip Bassett, Ph.D.

(Andrews University), and Eddie K. Baumann, Ph.D. (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) are associate professors of education at Cedarville College and faculty of the International Institute for Christian School Educators. Phil serves as chair of the education department and teaches Methods of Teaching Social Studies. Ed teaches Educational Psychology, and Philosophy of Education. Website: http://www.cedarville.edu/dept/ed/ Most teachers make it their goal to reach all the students in their class, and good teachers do just that. Our experience in training and observing teachers suggests that the best teachers know strategies that are grounded in sound educational research, and apply them to meet their students unique intellectual, emotional, and spiritual needs. The literature on good teaching comes from various theoretical and philosophical perspectives and includes a wide range of strategies and techniques. Still, we note that a few simple teaching and learning principles are shown throughout the literature to be effective for enhancing student learning. The following paragraphs will describe four basic teaching and learning principles that teachers can readily apply: wait time and student processing, active learning and responding, learning within a social context, and extending and refining knowledge. For each principle, we will explain some teaching techniques that incorporate it. Wait Time and Student Processing Research on wait time reveals that teachers typically wait about one second for students to respond to a question. When students dont respond within this time, teachers typically speak again, often asking a different student the same question, rephrasing the question, or answering it themselves (Rowe, 1987). Such practices may reflect a behaviorist view that assumes students can respond quickly to the stimulus of a question. Research in information processing, however, indicates that one second is too short a time for students to formulate a response to any question. When teachers increase the wait time to three-to-five seconds, they see dramatic effects on student learning (Tobin, 1987). Class participation increases as students feel more confident in volunteering responses theyve had time to think about. They are more likely to engage in discussion with the teacher and fellow students. The quality of the responses also improves as students are able to formulate more sophisticated responses. Finally, overall classroom performance tends to improve, probably because more students are engaging questions cognitively and all are exposed to more sophisticated responses and lines of reasoning. Also, as the quality of the responses improves, teachers tend to develop higher expectations, especially for so-called low-achievers or low-ability students. Although it is difficult, consciously counting off seconds is a simple and effective way of increasing wait time. Following are some more complex strategies: Turn to Your Neighbor Each student turns to an assigned neighbor and discusses a topic given by the teacher, reviews a list, works a problem, gives an opinion, or . . . you get the picture! Afterward, the teacher usually calls on a few students at random to tell the class what they discussed. Students are usually given only a brief time to think about and explain their ideas, unless the topic is complex. All the students are responsible to have an answer ready if the teacher calls on them.

Numbered Heads This technique is best used as a review when the teacher plans to ask several questions. The class is divided into groups of four. Each student in a group is assigned the number 1, 2, 3, or 4. The class then follows three simple steps: (1) The teacher announces a question and, if appropriate, a time limit. These should be high-consensus questions, probably drawn from the knowledge or comprehension level of Blooms Taxonomy. (2) Students in each team of four put their heads together to develop an answer. The teacher also appoints a checker for each team, who is responsible to make sure every team member knows the answer. (3) The teacher calls a number, and students with that number raise their hand to be called on. If only one or two students are ready, the teacher might give more time for groups to develop their responses. If the answer has several parts, such as naming four parts of an atom, teachers can get greater participation by calling on one team to name one part, another team to name another part, and so on. If a student response is partially correct, the teacher might ask, Is there another number 2 who can add to that response? Active Learning and Responding Students generally retain only information they actively process. Because many students tune out for at least part of a lecture, the lecture method has been widely criticized. However, lectures are efficient, flexible, and relatively easy to implement, so they remain popular. Eggan and Kauchak (1996) advocate a method they call lecture-recitations, short lectures supplemented with teacher questions that require active student responses; Lecture-Recitations First, the teacher presents information. The rule of thumb is one minute per year for the students average agefor example, seven minutes maximum for typical second-graders. Next, the teacher monitors comprehension. All students actively respond to questions that vary from recalling facts to choosing from alternative responses and providing reasons for their choices. Finally, teachers engage students in integration by having them describe relationships between different aspects of the material being learned. Thumbs Up or Down Have all the students indicate their response to a question with a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down. For example, the teacher asks, When we put in the acid indicator, will the solution turn red or blue? Thumbs up for red, thumbs down for blue, a flat hand if you arent sure. A variation is to have students indicate by the number of fingers they hold up what their response is. If you think Johnny should tell his parents what happened on the playground, show a one; if he should tell his friends only, show a two; if he should tell his teacher, show a three; if he shouldnt tell anybody, show a four. Choral Response This will strike some as a bit old-fashioned, but its fun for students of many ages. When working on simple factual material, such as state capitals in geography, or kingdom, phylum, class, and order in science, the class follows a three-step process: (1) the teacher repeats the material to be memorized; (2) the teacher and class recite together; (3) partners or small groups look at each other

and recite to each other at the same time, encouraging all students to participate. Using a catchy rhythm or tune, or creating a rap, can make this even more fun. This technique is effective for material the teacher wants to emphasize or have students memorize. Learning Within a Social Context Both Piaget and Vygotsky proposed that social interaction is critical to the cognitive development of students. Piaget saw the desired social context as one where learners test and validate their understanding of the world. Vygotsky believed that working on problems with more advanced individuals (e.g., peers, parents, teachers) enables students to develop more sophisticated strategies and thought processes. For both researchers, the learning activities should be active, with all participants helping to shape the interaction (as opposed to being teacher-directed), and should be aimed at achieving a goal or solving a specified problem. Social interaction is useful in the acquisition of new learning as well as the integration of previous learning. Most cooperative learning activities take advantage of a social learning context, so techniques that were mentioned previously apply here. (For more detail about cooperative learning techniques, see Cooperative Learning by Spencer Kagan.) Some cooperative learning activities are brief and have a narrow focus, while others are more complex. Examples of both kinds follow: Think-Pair-Share Each student develops an individual response to a topic assigned by the teacher. Then students share their individual response with a partner from their group of four. Finally, students each explain their partners response to the other pair in their group. Jigsaw Students work in groups of three or four with content that has been divided into three or four parts (e.g., a list of spelling words, or sections of a social studies chapter). Students each study their assigned Apiece and then teach it to their group. When assigning something complex, like reading a section of a chapter, teachers need to be very specific about what students should teach to their group. For example, they may give students a set of questions to answer or a section to outline or identify the main ideas. In Expert Jigsaw, students meet with two or three students from other groups who studied the same material in order to check their work before they teach it to their own group. Extending and Refining Knowledge Effective learning is learning that is retained longer than class time and used outside the classroom. Such learning occurs when students develop an in-depth understanding of content. To do so, learners must extend and refine the knowledge they acquire (a process known as elaboration). For example, when we ask students to integrate faith and learning, we are asking students to engage in extending and refining their understanding of an academic or other subject with their understanding of Scripture. Students who engage in elaboration activities more effectively store and recall information (Anderson, 1990) and link it to new information. Eventually, they develop the habit of processing information in this way, and thus they become more independent learners (Marzano and Pickering, 1997; Ormrod, 1998). Learning activities that promote the process of extending and refining include comparison, classifying, abstracting, inductive and deductive

reasoning, constructing support for a position, analyzing ones own or anothers errors, or identifying and examining the reasoning behind differing perspectives (Marzano and Pickering, 1997). Three-Minute Pause This technique gives students an opportunity to process information the teacher has presented. The teacher pauses and assigns pairs of students to do the following in three minutes or less: 1. Summarize what they have experienced or studied. 2. Identify interesting aspects of what they have experienced or studied. 3. Identify any confusion they have, and have their partner help them clear it up or formulate a question if confusion remains. At the first pause partner A takes the lead in sharing. At the second pause, partner B takes the lead, and so on. The teacher may then answer questions or simply proceed with the presentation. Team Statements Each student writes a one- or two-sentence statement about an assigned topic (e.g., a summary of what has been presented in class or an opinion about a topic). Then groups of four combine to write a team statement, which should include ideas or language from each persons individual statement. Team statements are often much different from any individual statement, and they are usually of higher quality. The four principles examined here can dramatically improve your students learning and their enjoyment of your classes. Though many techniques and strategies incorporate these principles, the few described above are simple (not necessarily easy) to learn. They are likely to serve you well as you seek to make your classroom a stimulating place for learning.
References Anderson, J. R. Cognitive Psychology and Its Implications (3rd edition). New York: W.H. Freeman, 1990. Eggan, P. and D. Kauchak. Strategies for Teachers: Teaching Content and Thinking Skills. Needham Heights, Massachusetts: Allyn and Bacon, 1996. Kagan, Spencer. Cooperative Learning. San Clemente, California: Resources for Teachers, 1994. Marzano, R. J., and D. J. Pickering. Dimension of Learning: Teachers Manual (2nd edition). Alexandria, Virginia: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 1997. Ormrod, J. E.. Educational Psychology: Developing Learners (2nd edition). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Merrill, 1998. Rowe, M. B. Wait Time: Slowing Down May Be the Way of Speeding Up. American Educator 11, no. 47 (1987): 3843. Tobin, K. The Role of Wait Time in Higher Cognitive Level Learning. Educational Researcher 57 (1987): 6995.