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100% found this document useful (7 votes)
182 views41 pages

Full Download (Ebook PDF) Learning and Teaching: Research-Based Methods 6th Edition PDF

Methods

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gagayihishm
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Contents vii
Technology and Teaching : Capitalizing on Conducting Guided Discovery Lessons 324
Technology in Direct Instruction 269 Review and Introduction 324
The Role of Assessment in Direct The Open-Ended Phase 325
Instruction 271
The Convergent Phase 325
The Motivational Benefits of Effective
Closure 326
Feedback 272
Application 326
Using Guided Discovery with Different-Aged
Chapter 9 Learners 326

Lecture Discussions: Interactive Exploring Diversity: Using Guided Discovery


with Cultural Minorities 328
Instruction to Promote Assessing Learning in Guided Discovery
Learning 279 Lessons 329
Organized Bodies of Knowledge: Integrated Using Assessment to Increase
Content 283 Learning 329
The Limitations of Lectures 283
Lecture Discussions: Alternatives to Standard Chapter 11
Lectures 285
Problem-Based Instruction 336
The Effectiveness of Lecture
Discussions 285 Problem-Based Learning: An Overview 338
Planning for Lecture Discussions 286 Problem-Based Learning: Why Does It
Work? 340
Technology and Teaching: Using Technology to
Structure and Organize Content 290 Project-Based Learning 341
Implementing Lecture Discussion Essential Components 341
Lessons 292 Implementing Project-Based Instruction in the
Exploring Diversity: Differences in Background Classroom 343
Knowledge 293 Assessment and Project-Based
Assessing Learning in Lecture Learning 345
Discussions 299 Research on Project-Based Learning 346
Problem Solving 347
Well-Defined and Ill-Defined Problems 349
Chapter 10 A Problem-Solving Model 350
Guided Discovery 306 Helping Learners Become Better Problem
Understanding Guided Discovery 312 Solvers 352

Guided Discovery and Constructivism 313 Inquiry Strategies 355


Guided Discovery and Student Technology and Teaching: Using Technology as
Motivation 315 a Tool to Teach Problem Solving 356

Misconceptions About Guided Identifying a Question 359


Discovery 315 Forming Hypotheses 360
Planning for Guided Discovery Lessons 317 Gathering Data 360
Identifying Topics 317 Assessing Hypotheses 361
Specifying Learning Objectives 317 Generalizing 363
Selecting Examples and Non-examples 318 Analyzing the Inquiry Process 363
Types of Examples 318 Critical Thinking 363
Technology and Teaching: Using Databases in Knowledge of Content 365
Guided Discovery Lessons 321 Basic Processes 365
Planning for Social Interaction 323 Metacognition: Awareness and Control of
Planning for Assessment 323 Cognitive Processes 366
viii Contents

Attitudes and Dispositions 366 Chapter 13


Teaching Critical Thinking in the
Classroom 366
Assessing Learning 407
Exploring Diversity: Problem-Based Instruction Classroom Assessment 409
with Developmentally Different Formal and Informal Assessment 410
Learners 367 Functions of an Assessment System 410
Characteristics of Effective
Assessment 410
Chapter 12
Teachers’ Assessment Patterns 412
Differentiating Instruction 378 Using Assessment to Promote
Understanding Differentiated Learning 413
Instruction 379 Preparing Students 416
Principles of Differentiation 381
Administering Tests 417
What Do Teachers Differentiate? 382
Examining Results 418
Planning for Differentiated Instruction 383 Research on Classroom Testing: Implications
Pre-Assessment: The Beginning Point for All for Teachers 419
Differentiation 383
Exploring Diversity: Effective
Flexible Time Requirements 384 Assessment with Learners from Diverse
Adapting Instructional Materials 386 Backgrounds 420
Offering Different Learning Activities 387 Alternative Assessment 421
Varying Learning Objectives 389 Performance Assessment 422
Technology and Teaching: Technology as a Tool Portfolio Assessment 425
for Differentiating Instruction 389 Designing an Assessment System 426
Instructional Strategies to Differentiate Standards, Accountability, and
Instruction 391 Assessment 427
Grouping 392 Grades and Grading 429
Strategy Instruction 393 Communication 431
Peer Tutoring and Cooperative Technology and Teaching: Using Technology in
Learning 395 Assessment 439
The Challenge of Assessment in Diverse
Classrooms 398 References 449
Strategies for Differentiating Author Index 461
Assessment 398
Subject Index 465
Grading 399
Preface

Teachers make an enormous difference in classrooms, and this book is designed to help you
become a better teacher. The knowledge base for teaching continues to expand, confirming
the powerful influence that teachers have on students and the importance of knowledge for
effective teaching (Alexander, 2006). Research also continues to highlight the central role
teachers play in determining the quality of learning in classrooms (Darling-Hammond &
Bransford, 2005). Teachers do make a difference in how much students learn, and this dif-
ference depends on how they teach (Bransford, Darling-Hammond, & LePage, 2005).
Teachers’ powerful influence on learning is even more convincingly documented in the
research literature today than it was in 1989, when the first edition of this text was
published. Translating this research into teaching strategies that teachers can use to increase
learning in their classrooms continues to be the central goal of this text.

New to This Edition


■ New Chapter: Chapter 12, Differentiating Instruction
■ New Feature: Exploring Diversity, found in every chapter including the following
topics ition:
■ The Diversity of Our Learners (Chapter 1)
■ Urban Schools and At-risk Students (Chapter 2)
■ Personalizing Content to Increase Motivation in Students from Diverse
Backgrounds (Chapter 4)
■ Direct Instruction with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students (Chapter 8)
■ Differences in Background Knowledge (Chapter 9)
■ Using Guided Discovery with Cultural Minorities (Chapter 10)
■ Problem-Based Instruction with Developmentally Different Learners (Chapter 11)
■ Effective Assessment with Learners from Diverse Backgrounds (Chapter 13)

■ New Feature: Technology and Teaching, found in every chapter, including the follow-
ing topics:
■ Using Technology to Increase Student Learning (Chapter 1)
■ Using Technology to Communicate with Parents (Chapter 3)
■ Using Technology to Plan (Chapter 4)
■ Using Technology to Create Lesson Focus (Chapter 5)
■ Using Technology to Increase Student Involvement (Chapter 6)

ix
x Preface

■ Capitalizing on Technology in Direct Instruction (Chapter 8)


■ Using Technology to Structure and Organize Content (Chapter 9)
■ Using Databases in Guided Discovery Lessons (Chapter 10)
This book connects two areas in education. One is the research on how teaching influ-
ences learning, which includes a wide range of studies conducted since the early 1970s.
Originally grounded in the research on effective teaching, this literature has expanded
to include topics such as teacher and student thinking, constructivist views of learning,
teaching for understanding, and the importance of social interaction in learning.
Teaching methodology is the second area addressed in this book. To be usable research
findings need to be translated into teaching strategies that teachers can readily apply in
their classrooms. This edition combines the best of these two areas. We apply the research
on teaching to strategies that are theoretically sound, yet practical and usable.

Goals of This Text


We have two goals in combining these areas:
■ To influence how teachers think about teaching
■ To expand and improve their instructional strategies
The way teachers think and what they know are two major factors that influence how
they actually teach. And, the way teachers think depends on what they know; in other
words teacher thinking and teacher knowledge are interdependent. To meet our goals, this
book helps teachers acquire the professional knowledge that influences both their thinking
and the way they actually teach in their classrooms.
Without the research to provide a conceptual foundation methods become
mechanical applications of rules implemented without understanding. Without practical
suggestions for teaching practice the research literature remains abstract and irrelevant.
In this sixth edition we again try to avoid both pitfalls by emphasizing the theoretical and
conceptual underpinnings of the research and the implications of this research for
classroom practice.

Text Themes
Today’s schools are changing and these changes present both opportunities and challenges.
To address these changes we have organized the sixth edition around three powerful and
pervasive forces in education. These forces are translated into three themes that are inte-
grated and applied throughout the text:
■ Standards and accountability
■ The diversity of our learners
■ The use of technology to increase student learning
Standards and accountability are reshaping the ways teachers teach and students learn.
Every state has created standards to guide student learning, and there is a movement to cre-
ate national standards in areas such as reading and math. To respond to this movement, we
have made standards and accountability a major theme for this text. We introduce the
Preface xi
theme in Chapter 1 and relate the process of teacher planning to it in Chapter 4. In addi-
tion, we discuss how standards influence assessment as well as the implementation of spe-
cific teaching strategies in later chapters. The diversity of our learners, the second theme for
this text, reflects the growing diversity of our classrooms. This diversity has important
implications for the way we teach. In addition to an entire chapter on diversity (Chapter 2)
and a new chapter on differentiating instruction (Chapter 12), we also address the topic of
diversity in a feature, Exploring Diversity, found in every chapter.
Chapter 1: The Diversity of our Learners
Chapter 2: Urban Schools and At-risk Students
Chapter 3: Challenges to Home-School Communication
Chapter 4: Personalizing Content to Increase Motivation in Students from Diverse
Backgrounds
Chapter 5: Teacher Attitudes and Learner Diversity
Chapter 6: Involving Students from Diverse Backgrounds
Chapter 7: Using Cooperative Learning to Capitalize on Diversity
Chapter 8: Direct Instruction with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students
Chapter 9: Differences in Background Knowledge
Chapter 10: Using Guided Discovery with Cultural Minorities
Chapter 11: Problem-Based Instruction with Developmentally Different Learners
Chapter 12: Entire chapter focuses on differentiating instruction
Chapter 13: Effective Assessment with Learners from Diverse Backgrounds
Technology is the third theme of this edition. Technology is changing the way we live,
as well as the way we learn and teach. Various forms of technology, including white boards,
document cameras, computers, and the Internet are all changing our classrooms.
Tomorrow’s teachers need to know how to integrate technology into their teaching. We
address applications of technology in the feature, Technology and Teaching, found in
every chapter.
Chapter 1: Using Technology to Increase Student Learning
Chapter 2: Employing Technology to Support Learners with Disabilities
Chapter 3: Using Technology to Communicate with Parents
Chapter 4: Using Technology to Plan
Chapter 5: Using Technology to Create Lesson Focus
Chapter 6: Using Technology to Increase Student Involvement
Chapter 7: Using Computer-Mediated Communication to Facilitate Cooperative
Learning
Chapter 8: Capitalizing on Technology in Direct Instruction
Chapter 9: Using Technology to Structure and Organize Content
Chapter 10: Using Databases in Guided Discovery Lessons
Chapter 11: Using Technology as a Tool to Teach Problem Solving
Chapter 12: Technology as a Tool for Differentiating Instruction
Chapter 13: Using Technology in Assessment
We also added new sections on Standards in Today’s Schools, Professional Organizations’
Standards, and National Standards to help teachers understand how this reform will affect
xii Preface

their teaching. These changes reflect the evolving realities of modern classrooms, as well as
the new responsibilities today’s teachers are being asked to undertake. In addition we have
added feedback for our Preparing for Your Licensure Exam feature to help students master
each chapter’s content. We hope these changes in the sixth edition prepare you for the
challenges of teaching in the twenty-first century.

Supplements

Instructor Manual/Test Bank


We’ve designed this manual to help you use Learning and Teaching, 6th edition, as
effectively as possible. Many of the ideas contained in this manual come from years of using
this text in our own classes as well as our continued work in the public schools. Others are
the result of feedback and discussions we’ve had with teachers, students and our colleagues.
We hope you find the suggestions useful.
The manual is organized by chapters. Each chapter contains chapter overview, objec-
tives, chapter outlines, presentation outlines, multiple choice and short answer test items
and an answer key. The presentation outline is organized in terms of the major topics in
each chapter. Under these topics you will find teaching suggestions including ways to use
large- and small-group activities, as well as ways to integrate the discussion questions and
portfolio activities into your instruction. Following the presentation outline you’ll find
Feedback for Preparing for Your Licensure Exam: Questions for Analysis prior to the test items
and answer key.

The power of classroom practice:


Teacher educators who are developing pedagogies for the analysis of teaching and
learning contend that analyzing teaching artifacts has three advantages: it enables
new teachers time for reflection while still using the real materials of practice; it
provides new teachers with experience thinking about and approaching the
complexity of the classroom; and in some cases, it can help new teachers and teacher
educators develop a shared understanding and common language about teaching.
(Darling-Hammond & Bransford, 2005)

As Linda Darling-Hammond and her colleagues point out, grounding teacher education
in real classrooms—among real teachers and students and among actual examples of
students’ and teachers’ work—is an important, and perhaps even an essential, part of
training teachers for the complexities of teaching in today’s classrooms. For this reason we
have created a valuable, timesaving website—MyEducationLab—that provides you with
the context of real classrooms and artifacts that research on teacher education tells us are
so important. The authentic in-class video footage, interactive skill-building exercises,
and other resources available on MyEducationLab offer you a unique valuable teacher
education tool.
MyEducationLab is easy to use and integrate into both your assignments and your
courses. Wherever you see the MyEducationLab logo in the margins or elsewhere in the
Preface xiii
text, follow the simple instructions to access the videos, strategies, cases, and artifacts asso-
ciated with these assignments, activities, and learning units. MyEducationLab is organized
topically to enhance the coverage of the core concepts discussed in the chapters of your
book. For each topic in the course you will find most or all of the following resources:

Connection to National Standards Now it is easier than ever to see how your course-
work is connected to national standards. In each topic of MyEducationLab you will find
intended learning outcomes connected to the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and
Support Consortium (INTASC) standards. All of the Assignments and Activities and all of
the Building Teaching Skills and Dispositions in MyEducationLab are mapped to the
appropriate national standards and learning outcomes as well.

Assignments and Activities Designed to save instructors preparation time, these


assignable exercises show concepts in action (through video, cases, or student and
teacher artifacts) and then offer thought-provoking questions that probe your under-
standing of theses concepts or strategies. (Feedback for these assignments is available to
the instructor.)

Building Teaching Skills and Dispositions These learning units help you practice
and strengthen skills that are essential to quality teaching. First you are presented with the
core skill or concept and then given an opportunity to practice your understanding of it
multiple times by watching video footage (or interacting with other media) and then
critically analyzing the strategy or skill presented.

Video Examples Intended to enhance coverage in your book with visual examples of
real educators and students, these video clips (a number of which are referenced explicitly
in this text) include segments from classroom lessons as well as interviews with teachers,
administrators, students, and parents.

General Resources on Your MyEducationLab Course The Resources section on


your MyEducationLab course is designed to help you pass your licensure exam; put
together an effective portfolio and lesson plan; prepare for and navigate the first year of
your teaching career; and understand key educational standards, policies, and laws. This
section includes the following:
■ Licensure Exams. Access guidelines for passing the Praxis exam. The Practice Test
Exam includes practice questions, Case Histories, and Video Case Studies.
■ Portfolio Builder and Lesson Plan Builder. Create, update, and share portfolios and
lesson plans.
■ Preparing a Portfolio. Access guidelines for creating a high-quality teaching
portfolio that will allow you to practice effective lesson planning.
■ Licensure and Standards. Link to state licensure standards and national s
tandards.
■ Beginning Your Career. Educate yourself—access tips, advice, and valuable
information on
■ Resume Writing and Interviewing. Expert advice on how to write impressive
resumes and prepare for job interviews.
xiv Preface

■ Your First Year of Teaching. Practical tips to set up your classroom, manage stu-
dent behavior, and learn to more easily organize for instruction and assessment.
■ Law and Public Policies. Specific directives and requirements you need to under-
stand under the No Child Left Behind Act and the Individuals with Disabilities
Education Improvement Act of 2004.
Visit www.myeducationlab.com for a demonstration of this exciting new online teaching
resource and to download a MyEdLab guide correlating MEL course assets to this text.

Acknowledgments
In preparing this edition of Learning and Teaching, we want to sincerely thank the people
who have supported its development. We want to particularly thank our editor, Kelly
Villella Canton, for her guidance, support, and cooperation as we attempted to implement
a number of new ideas for this edition. She epitomizes what authors look for in an editor.
We also want to thank Annalea Manalili and Paula Carroll for their help in bringing the
project to fruition, as well as our reviewers: Norbet O. Aneke, City University of New York;
Christine K. Lemley, Northern Arizona University; Janet Schiavone, George Washington
University; and Alice M. Waddell, Mary Baldwin College.
Finally, we again want to thank the many teachers in whose classrooms we’ve worked
and visited, and on whose instruction the case studies in the book are based. They helped
make this text more real and true to the realities of classroom life.
P.E.
D.K.
1
Learning to Teach

1
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Chapter Outline Learning Objectives

When you’ve completed your study of this chapter, you


should be able to

Defining good teaching 1. Define effective teaching and explain how it influences
learning.

The search for effective teaching 2. Describe the search for a definition of good teaching.
■ Teacher characteristics and the search for the right method
■ Teacher effectiveness research: Teacher do make a
difference?
■ Understanding effective teaching: A focus on student
learning

Contemporary views of teaching and learning 3. Describe different views of learning and explain how
■ From behaviorist to cognitive perspectives they influence teaching.

■ Constructivism: Students as creators of understanding

Text themes 4. Describe different ways that teachers can help


■ Standards and accountability students with exceptionalities succeed in their
classrooms.
■ Exploring Diversity: The diversity of our learners
■ Technology and Teaching: Using technology to increase
learning

Learning to teach 5. Explain how the text themes–standards and account-


■ The importance of knowledge in teaching ability, diversity, and technology–influence classroom
teaching and learning.
■ Teacher decision making
■ Educational reform
■ Learning to teach in an era of reform
■ Standards-based professional development
■ Developing a professional portfolio

Using this book to learn to teach 6. Describe how to use this book to learn to teach.

This book focuses on effective teaching and the different ways teachers help students learn.
Next to the students themselves, teachers are the most important influence on student suc-
cess (Marzano, 2007). This chapter begins by examining effective teaching, and what you
can do to help your students learn. In this chapter we also describe the different compo-
nents of learning to teach, including the different forms of professional knowledge that
contribute to teacher expertise. In addition, we describe how decision making integrates
this knowledge into purposeful teacher actions.
Finally, in this chapter we introduce three themes that run through this text: standards
and accountability, diversity, and technology. Standards and accountability are reshaping

2
Learning to Teach 3
classrooms and influencing teacher decision making in myriad ways, ranging from planning
to instruction to assessment. We describe how standards influence each of these dimensions
of teaching in later chapters.
Exploring diversity, the second text theme and a feature in every chapter, examines how
different forms of diversity influence classroom teaching. Technology and Teaching, a third
text theme and an additional feature found in chapters, describes how teachers can use
technology to increase student learning.
To begin our discussion, let’s look in on a group of teachers talking about their stu-
dents. As you read the vignette, think about your own definition of effective teaching and
how you plan to help your students learn.

Three middle school teachers are eating lunch together on their 40-minute break
between classes. After weather and local politics, the conversation turns to teach-
ing, or, more specifically, to students.
“How are your seventh graders this year?” Paul Escobar asks. “I can’t seem to
get them motivated.”
Stan Williams replies with a frown. “I’ve got three basic math classes, and I’ve
spent the first two months reviewing stuff they’re supposed to know already. They don’t
seem to want to think,” he concludes, turning to the others with an exasperated look.
“Mine aren’t so bad,” Leona Foster replies. “In fact, the other day we had a great
discussion on individual rights. We were discussing the Bill of Rights, and I got them
to think about their rights and responsibilities in our school. Some of them actually got
excited about it. And it was even one of my slower classes. I was impressed with
some of their comments.”
“But how am I going to get them to think if they don’t even know how to multi-
ply or divide?” Stan answers in frustration.
“I know what you’re talking about, Stan,” Paul interjects. “I’m supposed to teach
them to write, but they don’t even know basic grammar. How am I supposed to
teach them subject-verb agreement when they don’t know what a noun or verb is?”
“Exactly!” Stan answers. “We’ve got to teach them basics before we can teach
them all the other stuff, like problem solving and thinking skills.”
“Hmmm. . . . It might be more complicated than that,” Paul replies. “I had a real
eye-opener the other day. . . . Let me tell you about it. I’ve been going to workshops on
using writing teams to teach composition. I tried it out, putting high- and low-ability stu-
dents on the same team. They were supposed to write a critical review of a short story
we had read, using television movie critics as a model. We talked a little about basic
concepts like plot and action and watched a short clip of two movie critics arguing
about a movie. Then I turned them loose. I couldn’t believe it—some of the kids who
never participate actually got excited.”
“That’s all fine and good for English classes, but I’m a math teacher. What am I
supposed to do, have them critique math problems? Oh, I give this math problem
two thumbs up! Besides, these are supposed to be middle school students. I
shouldn’t have to sugarcoat the content. They should come ready to learn. My job is
to teach; theirs is to learn. It’s as simple as that.”

D efining Good Teaching


“It’s as simple as that,”. . .or is it? Teaching has always been a challenging profession, but changes
both within and outside classrooms have made it even more challenging. Teachers are being
asked to teach thinking and problem-solving skills at the same time that students come from
4 Chapter 1

increasingly diverse backgrounds. Both students and teachers are being held accountable by
standards and high-stakes testing. Your personal definition of good or effective teaching is
becoming not only more crucial but also more complex.
But, what is effective teaching? How does effective teaching relate to learning? What
responsibilities do teachers have to motivate their students? What are the implications of
student diversity on the teaching/learning process? And, how can you use new technolo-
gies to promote learning?
These are important questions for teachers because they center on the question
“What is good teaching?” These concerns are particularly important to developing
teachers because your answers to these questions will influence the kind of teacher you
become. As you ponder these questions, thinking about yourself and the classrooms
you’ve experienced, each of you will construct a personal definition of effective teach-
ing. This individual response is as it should be: each teacher is as unique as each student.
But beyond this individual uniqueness, some strands exist that pull these questions
together.
Let’s consider these commonalities a bit further. Does your definition of effective
teaching apply to all levels? For example, are there similarities in the ways effective
kindergarten and high school teachers instruct? What about students? Would your
definition of good teaching apply equally well to low- and high-ability learners? And,
how about subject matter? Does an effective history teacher teach the same way as an
effective English or art teacher? Finally, how does time influence your definition? Do
effective teachers teach the same way at the beginning of the school year as at its close,
at the beginning of a unit as at the end, or even at the beginning of a lesson and at its
completion?
Each of you will wrestle with these questions, either implicitly or explicitly, as you
begin and continue your teaching career. The purpose of this book is to help you resolve
these questions based on the best information available to the profession.
The field of teaching is at a particularly exciting time in its history. Education has
always been one of the most rewarding professions, but at the same time, it continues to
be one of the most challenging. An effective teacher combines the best of human relations,
intuition, sound judgment, knowledge of subject matter, and knowledge of how people
learn—all in one simultaneous act. This task is extremely complex, and one of the factors
making it particularly difficult has been the lack of a clear and documented body of
knowledge on which to base professional decisions.
The situation has changed. Education now has a significant and rapidly expanding
body of research that can guide your teaching practice. That’s what this text is all about; it
is a book about teaching practice that is based on research. As you study the chapters, you
will be exposed to this detailed body of research, and you will learn how this research can
be applied in your classroom to increase student learning.
We developed this text around a series of themes that will be introduced in this
chapter. As your study continues, you will see how research helps teachers as they make
their professional decisions. This research, as with all research, is not perfect, but having
it as a foundation is a giant step forward (Richardson, 2001). This research marks a major
advance in education and is already finding its way into tests used to certify teachers
(Educational Testing Service, 2008), and into both preservice and inservice programs for
teachers. Your study of this text will provide you with the best information available to
the profession at this time.
Learning to Teach 5

T he Search for Effective Teaching


Historically, teaching has been a profession in search of a body of knowledge that could
inform classroom practice. In the past, educators often looked to teacher characteristics to
guide them, as we’ll see in the next section.

Teacher Characteristics and the Search for the Right Method

As researchers began to seek connections between teaching and learning, they initially
focused on teacher characteristics, such as neatness, sense of humor, or cognitive flexibility
(Rosenshine, 1979). Initial research asked whether teachers having these desirable traits
resulted in increased learning. For example, do students taught by a teacher with a good
sense of humor learn more and/or have better attitudes than those taught by a more serious
teacher? Unfortunately the question was oversimplified; magnificent teachers of many
different personalities can be found.
In hindsight, the research on teacher characteristics was not completely misguided.
Two teacher characteristics—teacher experience and understanding of subject matter—
have proved to be powerful variables influencing how teachers understand events in the
classroom and explain content (Berliner, 1994; Shulman, 1987). Veteran teachers are able
to use their experience to interpret the complex events that occur in classrooms and to
make the many split-second professional decisions that are needed every day. Similarly,
subject-matter expertise allows effective teachers to frame and explain ideas in ways that
make sense to students. We will return to both of these ideas later in the chapter.
The next wave of research focused on global methods, attempting to link certain teach-
ing strategies, such as inquiry instruction or discovery learning, with student outcomes,
such as scores on standardized achievement tests (Dunkin & Biddle, 1974; Medley, 1979).
This research was characterized by a belief that a particular type of teaching, such as dis-
cussion, was better than an alternative, such as lecture. To investigate this question, teachers
were trained in a particular technique and then asked to teach their students by this
method. The performance of their students was compared to the performance of students
taught by an alternate method.
Like research on teacher characteristics, this line of research was also flawed.
Researchers concluded that no one way of teaching was better than others and, instead,
teachers required professional decision making to adjust their teaching methods to situa-
tional variables that included the students themselves as well as the content being taught.

Teacher Effectiveness Research: Teachers Do Make a


Difference

As a consequence of the results or, more accurately, the nonresults of earlier efforts,
research on teaching finally focused on teachers’ actions in classrooms, attempting to
find links between what teachers actually do in classrooms and student learning. These
studies marked a new way of thinking about research in education. Unlike previous
work, this research focused on the teacher and the kinds of interactions teachers had with
students (Good & Brophy, 2008). Researchers identified teachers whose students scored
6 Chapter 1

higher than would be expected on standardized tests and other teachers whose students
scored lower. They then went into classrooms, videotaped literally thousands of hours of
instruction, and tried to determine what differences existed in the instruction of the
teachers in the two samples. Because these efforts focused on differences between less and
more effective teachers, it became known as the teacher effectiveness research (Good &
Brophy, 2008). A number of significant differences were found, which we’ll describe in
later chapters.

Understanding Effective Teaching: A Focus on Student


Learning
The effective teaching literature made an invaluable contribution to education because it
both confirmed the critical role teachers like you play in student learning and provided
teachers with a knowledge base to help them make their instructional decisions.
Despite impressive results, critics also identified a major shortcoming in the teacher
effectiveness research—it identified strategies that effective teachers use in their classrooms but
didn’t explain why they worked. In essence, critics were reminding us that students and student
learning should be our primary focus in teaching. These criticisms resulted in fundamental
changes in our views of effective teaching methods, with a major shift from focusing solely on
the teacher to also considering how students learn and how teachers could help.

C ontemporary Views of Teaching and


Learning
At the same time that perspectives on teaching were changing, similar changes were occur-
ring in the way researchers viewed learners and learning (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking,
2000). Behaviorist views of learning, which emphasized external influences in the form of
rewards and punishment, gradually gave way to more cognitive perspectives. These cogni-
tive perspectives emphasized students’ use of strategies to organize, store, and retrieve
information (Bruning et al., 2004). More recently, research has emphasized the critical role
that learners play in constructing new knowledge (Eggen & Kauchak, 2010). We analyze
these changes in the sections that follow.

From Behaviorist to Cognitive Perspectives

For the first half of the twentieth century, behaviorist views of learning predominated in
education. Behaviorism emphasized the importance of observable, external events on
learning and the role of reinforcers in influencing student learning. The goal of behaviorism
was to determine how external instructional manipulations effected changes in student
behavior. The teacher’s role was to control the environment through stimuli in the form
of cues and reinforcement for appropriate student behavior. Students were viewed as
empty receptacles, responding passively to stimuli from the teacher and the classroom
environment.
Over time educators found this perspective on learning to be oversimplified and
perhaps misdirected. Although learners do indeed react to stimuli from the environment,
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