THE TEACHING ACT

(Revised 2002)

Joseph D. McNair

Listed below are seven (7) general skills (with important sub-skills listed under communication) in the teaching act. The reader should note that most of the information contained herein is derived from the objectivist (behaviorist) end of the objectivist-constructivist continuum.

 (The following are by no means presented as the exclusive or exhaustive skills. Nor do they represent original work by the writer. They are culled from the writings of prominent objectivist writers, including Madelyn Hunter, Norris Sanders, Elizabeth Simpson, and Robert M. Gagne and "strained" through the professional experience of this writer).  In designing any objectivist plan of instruction, one should account (specify) for any number and sometimes all of these skills and sub-skills in describing the process of realizing the lesson objective)

1.      Competencies of Communication --

• The ability to make clear presentations to the class e.g. to give information, instructions, directions, commands, explanations, reinforcement, pose questions, and make evaluative comments, verbally and in writing in clear and simple language, using vocabulary suitable to the audience and/or topic. The teacher should be able to write in a logical, easily understood style with appropriate grammar and sentence structure.

• The teacher should, in addition, be able to understand and interpret student communications after listening or reading. e.g. responding accurately to nuance of meaning, feeling and experience, and connecting inappropriate language usage. Communication competencies enable the teacher to organize the conditions of learning external to the learner.

Stimulus Variation --

•  The use of various motivation techniques by the teacher get the students' attention, interest them in the day's lesson, and puts them in a state of readiness to learn e.g. teacher might use a signal to get students' attention or refrain from speaking to the students until all are paying attention.

      Set Induction --

• The technique or techniques used by the teacher to "set up" in the student a state of psychological preparedness to act or respond to anticipated stimuli e.g., leading questions, anecdotal stories or examples, real or apocryphal situations, and in the process enable the student to "induce" or figure out the lesson objective --what he or she is supposed to learn or perform.

      Communication of rules, conventions, codes of conduct --

•  The ability to communicate clearly a system of rules, conventions and codes of conduct etc., which deal with personal learning, social behavior and classroom procedural matters. 

• Rules should allow students to perform all expected  tasks with a minimum of direction.

      Reinforcement of Student Participation --

•  The use of various motivation techniques inducement, persuasion, encouragement, praise, constructive criticisms, punishment, etc., to prompt desired student participation in the learning processes planned for in the day's lesson.

• Teacher should use praise to reward good a student work/contributions and to encourage students whose contributions are not always up to standard.

• Teacher should on occasion verbally challenge students to exceed expectations.

• Finally, the teacher should be open to student-initiated responses, e.g. questions, comments or other positive contributions and integrate them into the instructional delivery system.

  Fluency in Asking Questions --

• The skill of putting questions to students that are easily understood and which have a significant and demonstrable bearing on the concepts and skills which comprise the day's lesson.

• A good teacher directs questions at as many students as possible; uses such techniques as rephrasing a question, giving clues, cues or hints of the desired response, or asking another question to strengthen student response when the student answer is only partially correct.

• The Teacher should use an appropriate mixture of high and low order questions.

  Questioning Skills --

• The ability to ask different kinds of questions such as

  Memory Questions --

• Questions that require the student to recall information particularly about facts, definitions, generalizations. values and skill

  Translation Questions --

• Questions that require the student to translate or change information into a different symbolic form or language.

  Interpretive Questions --

• Questions that require the student to relate facts, definitions, generalizations, values and skills.

  Extrapolative Questions --

• Questions that require the student to theorize about what might happen,  to draw conclusions from given sets of data, to predict trends.

  Application Questions--

• Questions that require the student solve practical or simulated (lifelike) problems e.g. to identify the problem and select appropriate generalizations, processes and skills to solve 'it.

  Analytical Questions --

• Questions that require the student to - breakdown" concepts,  conceptual structures, systems and problems into their component parts. identify those parts, explain their functions and interrelationships for the purpose of understanding the concept, conceptual structure or system or solving problems.

  Synthetic Questions --

• Questions that require the student to mentally "put together" discrete parts or elements or concepts into "new" wholes, systems, structures.

• To derive a set of abstract relationships e.g. hypotheses, theories or generalizations from observed phenomena or from existing generalizations.

  Valuative Questions --

• Questions that require the student to make qualitative judgments e.g., right or wrong,  good or bad according to criteria he or she chooses

   Illustrating and Using Examples

•  The ability to clarify or explain skills or any aspect of the subject being taught by using a fact, incident, or illustration representative of those concepts, skills or aspects;

• By using audio visual or physical models or devices;

• By using modeling behavior.

  Transition--

• The ability to use a variety of techniques that allow for a progression from concrete activities to more abstract activities;

• Maintaining the particular pace of a given lesson.

  Lecturing

• The ability to present concepts, definitions, arguments and related information in a formal, orderly, well-reasoned, and extended expression of thought on a given subject.

• A well-conceived, and executed lecture should provoke thought, providing enough information to guide the student down conventional, unconventional, or innovative paths of inquiry where a more complete understanding of the subject may be obtained.

• The lecture is not the "be all and end all" of knowledge to be acquired by the student. Neither is lecturing the most effective teaching skill. At best, good lecturing is an important stimulus to independent thinking and study.

2.     Using a variety of instructional techniques --

• The ability to select and use developmentally appropriate instructional techniques suitable for meeting learner needs and different learning styles e.g. large group and small group instruction, peer tutoring, multi-sensory techniques etc.

3.      Recognizing attending behavior --

• The ability of the teacher to know when students are paying attention, to judge their attention span, and know when no more information can be assimilated.

• The teacher should know what is going on in the classroom at all times and should be able to attend to more than one thing at a time.

4.      Presenting Appropriate In-class/Homework Assignments and Activities --

• The ability to (devise and) provide students with drill, problem solving, critical thinking. learning transfer and creative activities at an appropriate level of difficulty which when completed by the student indicates mastery, partial mastery or non-mastery, of the skill(s), sub-skills, concept(s) or knowledge  content  taught in a given lesson or a series of lessons.

• Teacher must ensure that assignments are interesting and worthwhile, especially those which are to be performed independently.

• In addition, these activities should, when possible, be drawn from each learning domain -- cognitive, affective and psychomotor.

• When using games to illustrate concepts, teacher must explain the relationship of the game to the concept. .

5.      Monitoring --

• The ability to watch, observe,  check, correct, and reinforce all types of learning and appropriate social behavior, and ignore or punish all inappropriate behavior.

• The teacher must move around the room.

• Teacher must stop disruptive behavior, when possible in a low-key manner  e.g. by eye contact, nonverbal messages, proximity.

• Teacher must ensure that disciplinary action is directed accurately, fairly and fits the infraction. Homework assignments must be systematically checked, graded and returned.

6.      Planned Repetition and Review --

• The ability to repeat instruction at strategic points in a lesson or series of lessons to reinforce a concept, skill or piece of vital information, having anticipated beforehand at what point or points such repetition will be effective.

• In addition, at the end of each lesson and/or series of lessons (a unit or module) and at the beginning of next lesson or series, the teacher should be able to go over in summary fashion all of the concepts, skills and knowledge content presented, stressing the important points.

7.      Closure --

• The ability to bring a lesson to a close, to a definite stopping point. This creates in the student a psychological state of completion as well as an anticipatory state readiness for what is to come next. Reviews and exploratory (probing) questions are often features of effective closure