Get Your Students Hired
Mark,
Thank you sharing this example with us. You kept seeking a solution to support the learning needs of your students and you found it. This enabled them to move forward and you to feel good about the progress these students made. A win win for all.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
I was recently teaching thesis statements and I had a couple of students whom I was unable to reach. I used PowerPoints, Prezi presentations, text, and YouTube videos. No matter how I delivered the information, I was obviously not getting through as these students continually made the same mistakes. We've heard it all before at in-services or best practices meetings, but it wasn't until I placed them into groups that the light bulbs lit up.
Adults have one prominent learning style and not all adult learn the same. Therefore, offering a variety with allow all students to become successful and retain information.
It is important to vary your teaching to help the students stay engaged. Because we all learn in different ways it is also important to change it up in the classroom. You don't want to have a bored, sleepy and day dreaming room of students.
Gary,
Students like change of pace and variety in their instructional delivery and the more you can incorporate both the more engaged they will be.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
This keeps the students engaged in the material they are learning which allows them to retain more of the information.
Dorothy,
What are some of the ways you do this with your students?
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
Because students learn differently and all styles need to be addressed and demonstrated so all students have the same learning opportunity.
Heather,
Your second sentence is a powerful one that we instructors need to remember. We need to include every student in the learning process. Some will be easier than others but through effort we can get all of them to participate if they have any interest at all in the content being covered and the field in which they are preparing to enter.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
Everyone learns differently. As an instructor, it is important to incorporate all of these into the lesson. You want to ensure that everyone has equal opportunity to learn.
Steven,
Right you are and this is why it is so important to think through and plan how we are going to offer variety in your instructional delivery. The results will be many but one of the most important ones will be engaged students.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
Hi Gary,
Students absorb information differently by either written word, auditory, tactile and visualization. It is essential not to forget that the attention span of most adults are 15-18 minutes. We generally only remember 25% of what we hear. We retain 40% of what we read and listen 4 times faster than we speak. The accomplishment of these facts pose to be a challenge but it enhances the instructors personal growth as well.
Because people learn through differnt ways, it is important to adjust to those different learning styles to optimize student learning.
It is important to offer a variety of instructional delivery methods in classes because different students have different learning styles. Accommodating different learning styles means using a variety of instructional delivery methods, from the visual to the auditory to the kinesthethic. It is the responsibility of the instructor to vary instructional delivery based on the individual needs of the students.
Not one method of instruction is right for all courses or all lesson plans. The instructor must try to change things a bit for his students or risk putting his students to slep if he/she only lectures. Classes need to be dynamic! From demonstrations to lectures and hands on exercises are some of the methods effective teachers utilize to engage his/her students.
Mariann,
This is a challenge for some types of courses and it requires some effort to get the students into the material and seeing value from what is being taught. You are doing a good job of this via your use of hand outs and other instructional materials.
Gary
Gary Meers, Ed.D.
Some classes are very difficult to vary content, so I supply a lot of different hand outs and instructional materials for them to go over. They still have difficulty grasping some of the material and we have a weekly quiz on the immediate chapter and then move on. Sometimes you just have to hope you get the majority.