1.2 Direct Instruction: Lecturing and Expository Teaching

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Direct Instruction refers to explicit, step-by-step instruction in which the teaching of facts, rules, and action sequences is most efficiently is achieved. Direct Instruction is a teacher-centered strategy in which the teachers are the major information provider.
Main Direct Instruction models are lecturing and expository teaching.

Lecturing
Lecturing is a method for communicating theories, ideas, and facts to students. Typically a structured presentation, a lecture should be designed to include certain procedures in order to be effective.The basic purpose of lecturing is the dissemination of information. Lecturing contains three main components or parts, the Introduction, Body and Conclusion.

Introduction

Use an introduction that will catch the listener's interest. Raise a question to be answered by the end of the lecture. Example: "By the end of the hour, you should be able to answer the question, 'Are essay test questions better than objective test questions?'"

Provide a brief overview of the lecture's content either verbally, with a handout, or through an outline on the chalkboard. Example: "In Victorian England the conflict between religion and science was well reflected in the literature of the time. Today we'll look at two poems, 'In Memoriam' and 'Dover Beach,' which illustrate this conflict."

Tell students how you expect them to use the lecture material. Example: "Today, I'll offer a specific model of evaluation and illustrate its applicability in several kinds of settings. When you meet in your discussion groups this week, you'll be asked to apply the model as you discuss the Brown vs. the Board of Education decision."

Define or explain unfamiliar terminology. Example: In physics, the term work has a precise technical meaning. The work done by a force F when the object on which it acts moves a distance [delta]s [instructor puts a diagram on the board] is defined by [delta] W=Fs [delta]s. It is assumed that F does not change much during the motion through the distance [delta]s. Fs denotes the component in F in the direction of the motion and can be positive, zero, or negative. Now let's look at this diagram and see how well you understand the definition of work.

The body of lecture

Allow for some flexibility in the amount of content to be presented in order to respond to student questions and comments.

Determine the key points to be developed during the class session. When every nuance, detail, or instance of a topic is discussed, or when too many ideas are presented and not well developed, students often lose sight of the main idea.

Organize material in some logical order. Suggested organizational schemes include: Cause-Effect: Events are cited and explained by reference to their origins. Example: One can demonstrate how the continental revolutionary movements of the late 1700's affected British politics at the turn of the century. Time Sequential: Lecture ideas are arranged chronologically. Rule-Example-Rule: A rule is stated, followed by an example; then the rule is restated. Example: A chemistry lecture may begin with the rule that atoms of unlike charges (anions and cations) are attracted to each other. The rule would then be illustrated using sodium (cation) and chloride (anion) which make common salt (NaCl). The rule that cations and anions are attracted to each other would then be repeated. Example-Example-Rule: A model or rule is preceded by appropriate examples.

Prepare examples to clarify and emphasize key ideas.

Provide transitions which show the relationships between key ideas.

Effectively incorporate audiovisual or support materials. See "Practical Suggestions for Using Visual Instructional Aids: Chalkboard, Slides, Transparencies."

Throughout the lecture check on student understanding by: Asking students to answer specific questions. Example: "Okay now, who can describe in his/her own words the theory of neuron transmission?" Checking on student understanding by watching the class from nonverbal cues of inattention, confusion or misunderstanding... Example: Look for puzzled expressions, loss of eye contact, talking, clock watching, frantic notetaking, and so forth.

Conclusion

Answer any questions raised at the beginning of the lecture.

Provide closure for the lecture. Suggestions include:
Briefly summarize lecture material and preview what lies ahead. Example: "Today I have identified five phases of the reflective thinking process. Tomorrow we will see how these phases can be useful for our understanding of human learning.
Relate lecture material to past or future presentations. Example: "During the next lesson, you will form discussion groups and get some experience applying the evaluation model discussed in class today to the first three case studies in your file.
Ask a student to summarize the lecture's key ideas. Example: "Who can summarize the key issues developed during today's lecture?"

Restate what you expect the students to gain from the lecture material. Example: "As I stated in the introduction, given the appropriate data you should be able to plot the appropriate supply and demand curves.

Ask for and answer student questions.

Delivery in lecturing; a speech is the way in which it is given. Nonverbal behaviors play a significant role in effective public speaking: they can enrich or elaborate the spoken message. There are basically two aspects to nonverbal behavior: body language and voice.
The following four elements make up body language in delivery :

Speaker-audience distance. The more objects and distance-psychological as well as physical-between speaker and audience, the more formal the atmosphere. If you desire to create a more informal atmosphere, you should reduce these barriers.

Body movement and stance. To communicate, you must compensate for distance by employing larger gestures and more volume. Body movement and posture can convey messages to your audience. "

Facial expressions. A significant portion of the emotional impact of a speaker's message is conveyed by facial expressions. Facial expressions tell students how you feel about them and yourself and give students cues to help them interpret the content of the message. "

Gestures. Purposeful movements of the head, arms, hands and shoulders accentuate or dramatize ideas.

Voice variables allow the speaker to make a message clear and interesting. Some of the vocal characteristics of good speaking are as follows:

Strength. Speak loudly enough so that the audience does not have to strain to hear.

Enunciation. Make an effort to speak crisply, avoiding slurring or skipping parts of words in order to limit the possibility of misunderstanding.

Pronunciation. Meet your audience's expectations in regard to acceptable pronunciation.

Rate of speech. In a large lecture, with students concentrating on note taking, a rate of 120-130 words per minute is comfortable.

Variety. Vary the characteristics of your voice in terms of rate, pitch, stress, pauses, volume and inflection.

Pauses. Pauses can provide emphasis and allow students time to think and take notes.

Expository Teaching
Expository teaching (ET) takes the form of a lecture recitation to full-class with explanations, examples, and opportunities for practice and feedback. Its format is a multifaceted presentation requiring not only large amounts of verbal explanation but also teacher-student interactions involving questions, answers, review and practice, and the correction of student errors.

Expository teaching sequence

  1.3 Expository Teaching Dimensions

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It is appropriate;

When the teacher must do partition, subdivide, and translate textbook and workbook material into a more digestible form before it can be understood by your students,

When the teacher wish to arouse or heighten student interest,

When the teacher must achieve content mastery of fundemantal facts, rules, and action sequences that may be essential to subsequent learning.

  Daily Review and Checking the Previous Day’s Work

The first ingredient in Direct Instruction, daily review and checking, emphasizes the relationship between lessons so that students remember previous knowledge and see new knowledge as a logical extension of content already mastered.

It also provides students with a sense of wholeness and continuity, assuring them that was to follow was not isolated knowledge unrelated to past lessons.

Daily review and checking at the beginning of a lesson is easy to accomplish:

Have students correct each other’s homework at the beginning of class.

Have studens identify especially difficult homework problems in a question-and-answer format.

Sample the understanding of a few students who probably are good indicators of the range of knowledge possessed by the entire class.

Explicit review the task-relevant information that is neccasary for the day’s lesson.

  Presenting and Structuring

The content within the lessons must be partitioned and subdivided to organize it into small bits. The key is to focus on one idea at a time and present it so that learners master one point before the teacher introduces the next point. For effective presentation, the suggestions are;

Stating lesson goal,

Focusing on one thought,

Giving step-by-step directions using small steps,

Orgazing material so that one point is mastered before the next point is given,

Having many and varied examples,

Checking for student understanding.

Some ways of structuring content are:

Part-Whole Relationships

Sequential Relationships

Combinatorial Relationships

Comparative Relationships

  Part-Whole Relationships

A part-whole organizational format introduces the topic in its most general form and then divides the topic into easy-to-distinguish subdivisions. This creates subdivisions that are easily digested and presents them in ways that always relate back to the whole. For example;

  Sequential Relationships

You teach the content according to the way in which the facts, rules, or sequences to be learned occur in the real world. For example;

y=a - b + cd/e, a=10, c=-1, d=2, e=-2 1.First, let’s determine cd; 2.Now, let’s determine cd/e; 3.Now, let’s determine b + cd/e; 4.Finally, let’s determine a – b + cd/e;

  Combinatorial Relationships

You bring together in a single format various elements or dimensions that influence the use of facts, rules, and sequences. For example;

PRODUCTS	Door Bell
	Automatic Fuse
	Accumulator
	Flora sans Lamb
		Magnetic	Heat	Light	Chemical
	THE EFFECTS OF ELECTRIC CURRENT

  Comparative Relationships You place different pieces of content side by side so that learners can compare and contrast them. For example;

Points of Comparison	Real Numbers	Natural Numbers
Closedness	(x,+,/,-)	(x,+)
Commutativity	(x,+)	(x,+)
Associativeness	(x,+,/,-)	(x,+)
Distribution	(x,+,/,-)	(x,+)