A teaching strategy is the method used to deliver information in the classroom, online, or in some other medium. There is no one best strategy; we can select from several instructional strategies for just about any subject.
Learning Style
Learning style is an individual's natural or habitual pattern of acquiring and processing information in learning situations. A core concept is that individuals differ in how they learn. The idea of individualized learning styles originated in the 1970s, and has greatly influenced education. Proponents of the use of learning styles in education recommend that teachers assess the learning styles of their students and adapt their teaching strategies to best fit their students' learning styles.
One conceptualization of different styles of learning identifies three main modalities: visual learning, auditory learning, and kinesthetic learning.
Visual Learning
Visual learning is a learning style in which ideas, concepts, data and other information are associated with images and techniques.
Recommended Techniques
Graphic organizers are visual representations of knowledge, concepts, thoughts, or ideas. To show the relationships between the parts, the symbols are linked with each other; words can be used to further clarify meaning. By representing information spatially and with images, students are able to focus on meaning, reorganize and group similar ideas easily, make better use of their visual memory.
Auditory Learning
Auditory learning is a learning style in which a person learns through listening. An auditory learner depends on hearing and speaking as a main way of learning. Auditory learners must be able to hear what is being said in order to understand and may have difficulty with instructions that are written. They also use their listening and repeating skills to sort through the information that is sent to them.
Recommended Techniques
Teachers might use these techniques to instruct auditory learners: verbal direction, group discussions, verbal reinforcement, group activities, reading aloud, and putting information into a rhythmic pattern such as a rap, poem, or song.
Kinesthetic Learning
Kinesthetic learning (also known as tactile learning) is a learning style in which learning takes place by the student carrying out a physical activity, rather than listening to a lecture or watching a demonstration. Tactile-kinesthetic learners make up about five percent of the population.
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When learning, it helps for these students to move around; this increases the students' understanding, with learners generally getting better marks in exams when they can do so. Kinesthetic learners usually succeed in activities such as chemistry experiments, sporting activities, art and acting; they also may listen to music while learning or studying. It is common for kinesthetic learners to focus on two different things at the same time, remembering things in relation to what they were doing. They possess good eye-hand coordination. In kinesthetic learning, learning occurs by the learner using their body to express a thought, an idea or a concept (in any field).
Effective Teaching Strategies
A teaching strategy comprises the principles and methods used for instruction. The choice of teaching strategy or strategies to be used depends largely on the information or skill that is being taught, and it may also be influenced by the learning style, aptitude, skills, and enthusiasm of the students.
Lecture
Lecture is the process of teaching by giving spoken explanations of the subject that is to be learned. Lecturing is often accompanied by visual aids to help students visualize an object or problem.
Demonstration
Demonstrating is the process of teaching through examples or experiments. For example, a science teacher may teach an idea by performing an experiment for students. A demonstration may be used to prove a fact through a combination of visual evidence and associated reasoning.
Demonstrations are similar to written storytelling and examples in that they allow students to personally relate to the presented information. Memorization of a list of facts is a detached and impersonal experience, whereas the same information, conveyed through demonstration, becomes personally relatable. Demonstrations help to raise student interest and reinforce memory retention because they provide connections between facts and real-world applications of those facts. Lectures, on the other hand, are often geared more towards factual presentation than connective learning.
Collaboration
Collaboration allows students to actively participate in the learning process by talking with each other and listening to other points of view. Collaboration establishes a personal connection between students and the topic of study and it helps students think in a less personally biased way. Group projects and discussions are examples of this teaching method. Teachers may employ collaboration to assess student's abilities to work as a team, leadership skills, or presentation abilities.
Collaborative discussions can take a variety of forms, such as fishbowl discussions or group projects. After some preparation and with clearly defined roles, a discussion may constitute most of a lesson, with the teacher only giving short feedback at the end or in the following lesson.
Learning by Teaching
In this teaching strategy, students assume the role of teacher and teach their peers. Students who teach others as a group or as individuals must study and understand a topic well enough to teach it to their peers. By having students participate in the teaching process, they gain self-confidence and strengthen their speaking and communication skills.
Experiential Learning
Experiential learning is the process of making meaning from direct experience, i.e., "learning from experience. " Experiential learning focuses on the learning process for the individual. An example of experiential learning is going to the zoo and learning through observation and interaction with the zoo environment, as opposed to reading about animals from a book. Thus, one makes discoveries and experiments with knowledge firsthand, instead of hearing or reading about others' experiences.
Effective Teaching Strategies
Effective teaching strategies appeal to a diversity of learning styles.