MODULE I

Production of Instructional Materials in Social

Studies

A. INTRODUCTORY CONCEPTS
Lesson 1 What is Teaching?
 Functions of Teaching
 Acts of Teaching
 Teaching and Instruction
Lesson 2  Instructional Processes
 Teaching Strategies
 Instructional System
Lesson 3  Instructional Methods
 Instructional Technique
 Instructional Media

MODULE I

INTRODUCTORY CONCEPTS

 INTRODUCTION

This module presents the Introductory concepts in teaching Social

Studies. It is hoped that you will learn to appreciate Social Studies and to
apply it to your daily lives as good citizens of our country. You will also
learn that identifying problems in our society today is best done not by
criticizing the way problems are being handled but by identifying solutions
to these problems. As we all say, the only way for the Philippines to be
globally competitive is for all its citizens to move away from the sins of the
past by moving forward.

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this module, the pre-service teacher (PST) should be

able to:

1. determine the nature of teaching in terms of its definition, functions

and acts;

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2. compare and differentiate teaching and instruction;

3. identify the different instructional processes, and strategies in
teaching;
4. discuss and compare the instructional methods, techniques and
systems; and
5. expound the concept of instructional media.

 DIRECTIONS/ MODULE ORGANIZER

There are three (3) lessons in the module. Read each lesson carefully
then answer the exercises/activities to find out how much you have
benefited from it. Work on these exercises carefully and submit your output
to your tutor or to the DOUS office.

In case you encounter difficulty, discuss this with your tutor during
the face-to-face meeting or contact your tutor at the DOUS office.

Good luck and happy learning!!!

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Lesson 1

 Introductory Concepts
Teaching is the process of
attending to people’s needs,
WHAT IS TEACHING? experiences and feelings, and
intervening so that they learn
In much modern usage, the words particular things, and go beyond
‘teaching’ and ‘teacher’ are wrapped up the given.
with schooling and schools. One way of
approaching the question ‘What is
teaching?’ is to look at what those called
‘teachers’ do – and then to draw out key
qualities or activities that set them apart
from others. The problem is that all sorts of
things are bundled together in job
descriptions or roles that may have little to
do with what we can sensibly call teaching.
Further insight is offered by looking at the ancestries of the words. For
example, the origin of the word ‘teach’ lies in the Old English tæcan
meaning "show, present, point out", which is of Germanic origin; and related
to "token", from an Indo-European root shared by Greek deiknunai "show"
and deigma "sample".

Paul Hirst (1975) concluded, ‘being clear about what teaching is

matters vitally because how teachers understand teaching very much
affects what they actually do in the classroom’.

Hirst (1975) makes two very important points. For him teaching
should involve:

 Setting out with the intention of someone learning something.

 Considering people’s feelings, experiences and needs.

FUNCTIONS OF TEACHING

Teaching is only teaching if people can take on what is taught. To this

we can add Jerome Bruner’s insights around the nature of education, and
the process of learning and problem solving:

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Broadly speaking, the function of teaching is to help students learn

by imparting knowledge to them and by setting up a situation in which
students can and will learn effectively. Considering what those we are
supposed to be teaching need, and that might be going on for them, is one
of the main things that makes “education” different to indoctrination.
Indoctrination involves knowingly encouraging people to believe something
regardless of the evidence. It also entails a lack of respect for their human
rights.

Education can be described as the ‘wise, hopeful and respectful

cultivation of learning undertaken in the belief that all should have the
chance to share in life’ (Smith 2015). The process of education flows from a
basic orientation of respect – respect for truth, others and themselves, and
the world.

For teachers to be educators they must, therefore:

 Consider people’s needs and wishes now and in the future.

 Reflect on what might be good for all (and the world in which we
live).
 Plan their interventions accordingly.

ACTS OF TEACHING

Teachers need to be able to use a range of deliberate acts of

teaching in flexible and integrated ways within literacy-learning activities to
meet the diverse literacy learning needs of our students.

These deliberate acts include modeling, prompting, questioning,

giving feedback, telling, explaining, and directing.

Modeling, or “showing how”, is perhaps the most powerful and pervasive

form of instruction. Almost everything the teacher does and says in
the course of the school day provides a potential model to the
students in the classroom. Much of this modeling is implicit and
occurs without either teacher or students being conscious of it.
However, deliberate, goal-directed modeling is an essential teaching
tool. By articulating how they arrived at a solution – thinking aloud as
they go through the process – the teacher provides a model of how a
good reader or writer works. This sort of modeling makes the thinking
“visible”. It is a strategy used to great effect in shared reading and
writing, where students are learning to use the sources of information
in print along with their own prior knowledge. Modeling often
involves providing the language that the learner needs. This may be
language for encoding or decoding text, for making meaning, or for
discussing texts and thinking analytically about them.

Prompting means encouraging the learner to use what they already know
and can do. It is an effective strategy to focus students’ attention

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and to build their metacognitive awareness and their confidence. In

order to prompt effectively, the teacher needs a detailed knowledge
of the learner. Prompting may take the form of a strong hint, a clue,
or a gentle “nudge” to help students use their existing knowledge and
literacy strategies to make connections and reach a solution. A
prompt often takes the form of a question and involves allowing
“wait time” to give students the opportunity to develop and express
their own ideas.

Questioning is perhaps the instructional tool used most commonly by

teachers. Strategic and purposeful questioning is crucial to students’
literacy learning. Questions may be directed towards building a
particular aspect of students’ knowledge, such as a strategy for
encoding or decoding. At a meta-cognitive level, questions can help
to build students’ awareness. Questioning can be an ideal way to
generate thoughtful discussion and help students to develop the habit
of being critically reflective, for example, “How do you think …?” “I
wonder why …?” “What have you noticed …?” “How will your
audience feel …?” One or two well-thought out questions can be
powerful in helping students to get beyond the surface features of a
text they are reading or writing. It is important that teachers ask a
range of questions and know why they are asking them.

Feedback can be defined as “… providing information how and why the

child understands and misunderstands, and what directions the
student must take to improve” (Hattie, 1999, page 9). Like all the
teaching strategies, feedback is most effective when it relates to
specific learning goals and to the ultimate goal of enabling students
to monitor and regulate their own learning. Effective feedback
motivates students to learn. The way that students feel about and
perceive themselves affects their expectations and consequently
their performance. A simple comment can have a major impact –
positive or negative – on a student’s motivation. It is important to
consider cultural appropriateness when giving feedback (and when
using any other teaching strategy).

Telling means supplying what the student needs, such as an unknown word
or a topic for a literacy-learning task. The idea is to fill a gap at that
moment to enable the student to move on. A strategic use of telling
may involve providing the language needed to participate in an
activity. The teacher tells the students how to spell the word they
need for a piece of writing or, at the beginning of a reading task,
tells them the theme of the text. This may be the most effective way
to work with some students who do not have the background
knowledge on which to base productive prediction. Simply providing a
label or definition may be the most efficient way to move a student’s
learning on.

Explaining can be thought of as an extension of telling. Teachers may

explain the task itself, or they may explain the content of a text or

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learning activity. A characteristic of explanations is that they are

verbally explicit. Careful explanations enable students to develop
their own understandings. Throughout the many interactions that
occur during the school day, the teacher needs to be alert and ready
to explain things, picking up cues from the students and adapting
their use of this teaching strategy to supply what each learner needs.
Sometimes a direct approach is best (“Let me explain this to you”),
especially for students who are not yet familiar with the established
classroom literacy activities.

Directing is simply giving a specific instruction. Like all these instructional

strategies, it is used deliberately, for a purpose.

TEACHING AND INSTRUCTION

Lesson 2

 Processes, Strategies and System

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INSTRUCTIONAL PROCESSES

Instructional processes describe the instructional activities that

provide the means through which students will achieve the stated objectives
of a course. Processes must be included that develop or strengthen students'
general education skills, connect course activities or material to the
workplace, to subsequent coursework, or to other aspects of life, and
ensure students are actively engaged in the learning process. Instructional
processes must be descriptive of the strategies and methods employed in
the course.

Critical questions addressed by Teachers and Students throughout the entire

Instruction Process:

Teachers Students
Where is the learner going? Where am I going?

Where is the learner now? Where am I now?

What do I need to do to help the What do I need to do to close the

learner close the gap? gap?

TEACHING STRATEGIES

Teaching strategies, also known as instructional strategies, are

methods that teachers use to deliver course material in ways that keep
students engaged and practicing different skill sets. A teacher may select
different teaching strategies according to unit topic, grade level, class size,
and classroom resources. Many kinds of instructional strategies are
employed to achieve teaching and learning goals and support different kinds
of students. For example, teachers may select strategies tailored to English-
language learners, students with ADHD or students with learning disabilities
according to the needs of the student and the requirements of the course.

Teachers can also select classroom activities according to

instructional method, such as using a tic-tac-toe strategy for differentiated
instruction. Specific strategies can also be employed to teach particular
skills, like strategies for problem solving. Activities that promote thinking
and discussion in small groups like think-pair-share activities are ideal for
cooperative learning, while activities that get students outside work well for
active learning frameworks.

INSTRUCTIONAL SYSTEM

An instructional system can be defined as “deliberately designed

instructional materials that are intended to function interrelated to achieve

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predetermined learning outcomes” (Harris and Harrison, 1988). Additionally,

Smith and Ragan (2005) define instruction as “the intentional facilitation of
learning toward identified learning goals”. So it can be deduced that
instructional materials are the content and result of application of the
instructional design process. In other words, instructional materials are
physically developed as a result of going through the instructional design
process. Notice that “instructional material” is part of the definition of
instructional system. This might seem to indicate that the two are the
same. However, they are not. Even though many aspects of each term
overlap and have commonalities they also have significant differences.

There are Five characteristics of an Instructional System (Harris and

Harrison, 1988):

1. instrumentation is included,
2. system-provided feedback is provided/used,
3. system is exportable,
4. summative evaluation is conducted to determine if system is
consistent and systematic review is built into the instruction

For example, a classroom text book is considered instructional material but

is not an instructional system because it does not include some of the above
characteristics. The book does not provide system feedback or systematic
review.

Lesson 3

 Methods, Techniques and Media

INSTRUCTIONAL METHODS

Instructional methods are kinds of instructional ways or activities

used to guide the facilitation of learning in each phase of the instructional
process. There are hundreds of variations. Examples are lectures, case
studies, journals, blogs, story telling, peer feedback, quizzes,
performances, brainstorming, video taping and review, etc.

Instructional methods and teaching methods mean the same thing.

Teaching strategies, for all practical purposes, means the same thing.
Regardless of what we call such processes, they are primarily descriptions of
the learning objective-oriented activities and flow of information between
teachers and students. Although some may argue otherwise, to split hairs
over whether such methods are meaningfully different adds nothing to the
process of learning to be a teacher. Direct and indirect instruction are two
main categories that many educators find useful for classifying teaching
methods, but it is, as you will see, a bit more complicated than placing all

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instruction into two categories. Any instructional method a teacher uses has
advantages, disadvantages, and requires some preliminary preparation.

Often times, a particular teaching method will naturally flow into

another, all within the same lesson, and excellent teachers have developed
the skills to make the process seamless to the students. Which instructional
method is "right" for a particular lesson depends on many things, and among
them are the age and developmental level of the students, what the
students already know, and what they need to know to succeed with the
lesson, the subject-matter content, the objective of the lesson, the
available people, time, space and material resources, and the physical
setting. Another, more difficult problem is to select an instructional method
that best fits one's particular teaching style and the lesson-situation. There
is no one "right" method for teaching a particular lesson, but there are some
criteria that pertain to each that can help a teacher make the best decision
possible.

INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNIQUES

An instructional technique is a domain-independent and largely

learner-independent method used in either human- or computer-based
tutoring. In other words, Instructional techniques are used by teachers to
help students become independent and strategic learners. These techniques
become learning strategies when students independently select the
appropriate ones and use them effectively to accomplish tasks or meet
goals.

INSTRUCTIONAL MEDIA

Instructional Media encompasses all the materials and physical means

a teacher might use to implement instruction and facilitate students'
achievement of instructional objectives. This may include computer labs,
classroom technology, Blackboard, and audio and video conferencing.

THINK!

What instructional media did you learn most from when you
were in grade school? How did you learn from it? Explain in an
essay of not more than 300 words.

Module I