Running the Classroom

Effective Teaching and Learning

What is effective teaching? To me, effective teaching is using your knowledge, skills, and resources to teach your students the course material in a way that the information will stick with them long term. Effective teaching takes many forms as to how you teach effectively varies with the circumstances of the lesson, for example, an effective lesson for high school students, on a given topic, would not be taught in the same way as an effective lesson for elementary students, on the same topic. This is because elementary students have not yet developed the cognitive skills have not yet developed to the point where they can understand more complex ideas. As a teacher, it will be my job to work to determine what methods are best to use for each lesson with students of different age groups. By doing so I will help to ensure that as many students as possible are learning effectively.

What is learning? Learning by definition is the acquisition of knowledge or skills through experience, study, or by being taught. In addition to its definition learning is also a complicated process that varies between individuals. While everyone falls into three basic categories for how you learn best, these being visual, auditory or tactile, we all have the ability to learn using all three strategies. Learning is also done at different rates between individuals, with some picking up on certain tasks, skills or knowledge right away but others may take many times longer to pick up on the same information. Due to the differences in how people learn as a teacher, it is key to try to find the best way to teach the individual lessons to your students to maximize their potential to learn.

In order to maximize student learning potential, you must decide what and how to teach. To determine what you are going to teach first you would need to look at what subject you are planning to teach. Once you know the subject area you can divide the subjects into units and lessons to make it more manageable for yourself and the students. Once what you are teaching is decided you will also have to determine how to teach it. Whether you use a lecture or an activity will change the way students learn the information, as they will be getting the information through different means. By taking factors including, how your students learn best, what teaching methods you are most confident with, what lesson you are teaching, what facilities you have available and what method works the best to teach a specific subject, you can determine how to teach the subject. By determining what to teach and how to teach it you will be able to teach the lesson with the most learner success.

Questions

To my future students, what are some ways that I can better help you to learn the lesson material that I am trying to teach you? In which ways do you learn best? What learning activities do you wish to take part in?

To Dr. McLean, how do you know how to adjust your teaching methods when your students aren’t learning at the pace you expected them to? When teaching the same class during multiple class periods how do you adjust your lessons if classes are learning at different rates?

To my cohort, how do you plan to adjust your lessons to help your students learn the necessary materials? What teaching methods do you plan to use the most?