Becoming an Effective Teacher

1. Becoming an Effective Teacher What does effective teaching mean?

2. Effective Teaching • Effective teaching – teaching that maximizes learning for all students • It’s the essence of being a professional • Sounds simple – IT IS NOT • Requires: • Hard work • Careful planning • Sophisticated skills

3. How would you describe your “best” class – remember – best is not favorite –

4. Student Motivation and Effective Teaching • Motivation – the energizing force behind all forms of learning • Extrinsic motivation – receive an incentive • Intrinsic motivation – self motivated • Powerful influence – student achievement • Both types can exist at the same time

5. Motivated Students • Study & learn more • Participate more in classroom learning activities • Have more positive attitudes toward school & work harder • Persist on difficult tasks and cause fewer management problems

6. Motivation: Increasing Students’ Interest • You can do a great deal as a teacher • Quickly learn names • Get to know your students • Create learning experiences that are challenging • Can reward effort and grade fairly • Attracting & Focusing Students’ Attention • Personalizing Content through Real World Application • Involving Students – the extent to which students are actively participating in a learning activity (questioning & group work)

7. Planning for Effective Teaching • Planning – Important • It makes us more effective as teachers • Effective teaching doesn’t just happen • Good planning help relieve the anxiety that inevitably comes with our initial teaching efforts • You will still be nervous, but planning does help ease your nerves

8. Planning for Effective Teaching • Good teaching begins with planning • Decisions, decisions, decisions • Select topics • What is important • Standards • Specify Learning Objectives (Targets) • What you want students to know or be able to do • Bloom’s Taxonomy

9. Planning for Effective Teaching • Prepare and Organize Learning Activities • Creating/finding high quality examples or problems to illustrate the topic • Sequencing the examples to be the most meaningful to students • High quality examples – representations of content that ideally have all the information in them that students need to learn a topic • Create Assessments • Assessments – process we use to gather information and make decision about students’ learning • Effective assessments answers 2 questions: • 1. How will I know if my students have mastered my learning objective? • 2. How can I use assessment to increase my students’ learning?

10. Planning for Effective Teaching • Ensure Instructional Alignment • The match between learning objectives, learning activities and assessments • Essential component • Planning in a Standard-Based Environment • Standards – statements that describe what student should know or be able to do at the end • Essentially statements of learning objectives – written with varying degrees of specificity