2 Chapter I planning a comprehension instructional sequence lesson…

Classroom teaching practice

It has been demonstrated that quality of instruction is fundamental to student learning. For instance, Wang, Haertel and Warburg (1993) showed that classroom management and classroom interactions had effects similar in size to students’ cognitive competencies and their home environment. Likewise, when reviewing contemporary research on school effectiveness, Scheerens and Bosker (1997) concluded that characteristics of instruction have a greater effect on student achievement than those of the school environment. However, researchers agree that there is no single, well-defined best way of teaching. The effectiveness of classroom practice is domainspecific as well as goal-specific; it depends on the cultural context and professional traditions. Thus, TALIS seeks to identify different profiles of teaching practices rather than a single “optimal” type of practice. Classroom teaching practices were examined by teachers’ frequency estimations on a 5-point scale, ranging from “never or hardly ever” to “in almost every lesson”. Three indices were established (see Annex A1.1 for full details): • “Structuring practices” were measured with five items, such as “I explicitly state learning goals.” The other items include summary of earlier lessons, homework review, checking the exercise book, and checking student understanding during classroom time by questioning students. • “Student-oriented practices” were measured with four items, such as “Students work in small groups to come up with a joint solution to a problem or task.” The other items include ability grouping, student selfevaluation and student participation in classroom planning. • “Enhanced activities” were also measured with four items, such as “Students work on projects that require at least one week to complete.” The other items include making a product, writing an essay, and debating arguments. Teachers were asked to report their teaching practices for a particular class that they teach in one of their main subjects fields. “target class” was defined as the first ISCED level 2 class the teacher (typically) teaches after 11 a.m. on Tuesday

Conclusion

Students compare their answers in pairs or small groups. You should collect the information and prepare a statistical representation of the keu questions and answers. This will help to develop the sense of shared community in the class.

Explain and discuss.

Explain the mixed-level situation to the students and give a list of possible approaches to the teaching and learning. In pairs, the students rank the approaches/ideas according to their suitability for the situation.

Following feedback, you should highlight the strategies you plan to use.

A student contract

Developing with the students, or perhabs writing it yourself, a contract of behavior for activities is a useful device. “I will participate in group work”.

Tell them what you re going to

If you think your students are not mature enough to carry out of this kind of reflection, explain the situation to the class and tell them what strategies you will be using. If students know what to expect, you can hope thar will cooperate.All of the above work could be dane in the mother tongue , although I fell it is best done primarily in the target language (as it draws attention to the fact that this is a learning language issue.)

Overall,variety in the types of working groups ,and an open discussion of the class situation will help to deal with some of the difficulties that are present in mixed ability classes .The aim of these strategies is to create a positive working environment ,which is all part of ensuring better learning.