The way students learn is constantly changing, and teachers must be able to adapt to those changes. Just because your teaching style was effective last year doesn’t necessarily mean that it will carry over to the next year. As educators, we will have to continue developing our teaching skills and styles to become the best teachers we can. Thus, it’s time all teachers start looking into other options that may best help their students learn. So, we will talk about some of the options out there and explain the benefits that go with each one.
One style of teaching that would benefit the classroom is a flipped classroom. According to Harvard University, a flipped classroom is when students cover the material by themselves before class. When the students get to class it opens lecture time for deeper intellectual discussions on the material, instead of spending most of the class in a lecture. Some of the benefits that a flipped classroom provides is that it allows students to learn at their own pace and it increases and encourages collaboration between students. Since you are not spending important class time lecturing, you can commit it to activities and projects that can increase students' understanding of important topics and subjects.
Another style of teaching that could benefit classrooms is feedback formative assessment. According to Stanford University, feedback formative assessment is an assessment you give to a student at the beginning of the semester and see where your students need to improve. Then, as a teacher, you would teach the content where your students need to improve the most. By the end of the semester, you would give them a test similar to the one at beginning of the semester to see how much your students improved. This is a great way for a teacher to know what you need to teach your students to get the most out of your class.
The next style of teaching that is useful is active learning. Active learning is when a teacher puts students in situations where they are questioned and uses discussion to help improve their understanding of the material. This can also involve other active structures that get students involved like doing debates, group work, and other forms of discussion. Some benefits include processing new material through thinking, writing, talking, and problem-solving. It also can help create personal meaning when working on activities, which can help increase motivation in students. Also, from a teacher’s perspective, it may help them understand the student’s thought process and how they think through problems. These are just a couple of the benefits of active learning, but overall, it’s supposed to help students retain information better. This is another option that will hopefully get your students more engaged in the material.
The last teaching style that we'll discuss is project-based learning. Project-based learning allows students to develop their creative skills and work hands-on when solving a problem. This style of teaching has students identify the problem and slowly develop their solution. Now I’m sure many teachers have heard of and even used this style of teaching, but we tend to see less project-based learning in the higher grade levels. I’m not sure why that is because it is still very beneficial. For example, in one of my college classes, I was told to create an art project in Desmos. With this, I was able to experiment with Desmos and develop a new skill. Not only did I learn how to use Desmos, but it allowed the creative side of me to come out and just have fun learning. Instead of dreading the project, I found it difficult to stop trying to add more details to my art project. So, what I’m trying to say is that project-based learning is a beneficial teaching style for all grade levels.
Now this isn’t to say that there aren’t other teaching styles to try. The goal of this is to illustrate that there are other options if you are struggling to get your students to understand and stay engaged with the material. Students and the way they learn will continue to change, and teachers must be able to adapt to these new changes. Every class in every year will be different and students will have different ways of learning. It can be challenging to change what you're doing, but at the end of the day, remember what your purpose is as a teacher. Your purpose is to teach your students to the best of your ability and hopefully to give them a brighter future.
Marcus Winter and Tanner Rakebrandt
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