Xianxuan Xu, PhD, is a senior research associate at Stronge and Associates Educational Consulting. Dr. Xu received her doctorate from the College of William and Mary’s Educational Policy, Planning, and Leadership program. Her research interests are teacher effectiveness, professional development, and teacher and principal evaluation. She is also particularly interested in researching the relationship between culture and educational issues such as teaching, learning, and leadership. She has presented research findings at various U.S. conferences, including the American Educational Research Association, University Council for Educational Administration, and National Evaluation Institute. She is also a contributing author to Principal Evaluation: Standards, Rubrics, and Tools for Effective Performance and West Meets East: Best Practices From Expert Teachers in the U.S. and China.
Visit www.strongeandassociates.com to learn more about Dr. Stronge and Dr. Xu’s work.
To book James H. Stronge or Xianxuan Xu for professional development, contact [email protected].
Introduction
When teachers improve, students improve. John Hattie (2012) summarizes this point well, saying, “Teachers are among the most powerful influences in learning” (p. 22). A logical reaction to this point is to wonder how teachers exert this influence on student learning. Moreover, how do they support and sustain teacher growth school by school and year by year? This book focuses on the important practices of effective teachers, specifically instructional delivery.
To illuminate what occurs in highly effective teachers’ classrooms, we conducted a multiyear research study in which we examined the instructional practices and beliefs of national award-winning teachers in the United States and China (Grant et al., 2014). The findings from the study reveal that exceptional teachers in both countries:
• Consistently use a wide variety of instructional activities (in fact, about nine instructional activities per lesson, on average)
• Engage students to a high degree
• Focus on varying cognitive levels during instruction
Based on our study, we know that the number, types, and selection of instructional methods along with the connectivity among those methods are important to effective teaching.
Instructional Methods
Portions of this material appear in Stronge, Grant, and Xu (2015).
Hattie (2012) reports that what teachers do and how they teach, collectively, yield an effect size (ES) of 0.62—quite a high impact on student achievement. Specific instructional strategies independently produce a dramatic improvement on student learning as well—consider microteaching (0.88), metacognitive strategies (0.69), and direct instruction (0.59). In essence, instructional methods matter (Hattie, 2012).
One prominent instructional method, questioning, can be a highly effective tool when used properly, as it has an effect size of 0.46 (Guo, Tsai, Chang, & Huang, 2007; Hattie, 2012). Questioning not only provides students with an opportunity to think critically and become more informed about their learning but also yields important input for teachers to support instructional modifications (Stronge, 2007). Effective teachers and ineffective teachers use questioning in substantially different ways. Effective teachers ask both lower-order and higher-order questions to improve the comprehension of students of all learning abilities. In addition, the questions they ask are relevant to the intended learning outcomes and serve to facilitate learning activities. Ineffective teachers, on the other hand, ask about 93 percent of all the questions, according to a study of science classrooms (Reinsvold & Cochran, 2012). The study also finds that these teachers tend to provide little wait time, ask questions at the lowest cognitive level, and use closed-ended questions. Another case study finds that effective teachers ask higher-level questions approximately seven times more often than teachers considered ineffective (Stronge, Ward, Tucker, & Hindman, 2007).
There is no single classroom practice that is effective with all subject matter and all grade levels in all circumstances. And effective teachers recognize that no single instructional strategy can be used in all situations. Rather, they develop and call on a broad repertoire of approaches that have proven successful for them. Effective instruction involves a dynamic interplay among content to be learned, pedagogical methods applied, characteristics of individual learners, and the context in which the learning is to occur (Schalock, Schalock, Cowart, & Myton, 1993). Ultimately, subject matter knowledge, pedagogical skills, and an inspiration for instructional innovation and development can liberate individual teachers to explore the diversification and richness of daily practice.
An Overview of the Book
Based on a review of research on instructional delivery methods, Instructional Strategies for Effective Teaching is organized around ten key instructional methods.
1. Classroom discussion
2. Concept attainment
3. Concept mapping
4. Cooperative learning
5. Direct instruction
6. Mastery learning
7. Memorization and mnemonic instruction
8. Inquiry-based learning
9. Self-regulated learning
10. Meaningful feedback
Note that these are not the only methods that one can or should consider; rather, from the dozens available, we’ve selected ten methods that are well researched in terms of their impact on student learning and that effective teachers frequently use.
We present each of these ten instructional methods in its own chapter along with explicit strategies teachers can employ in the everyday life of an effective classroom. To make the featured methods relevant and useful, each chapter contains the following sections.
• An introduction to the instructional method
• What research says about the instructional method
• How to move from research to practice
To end each chapter, we include several handouts to help teachers use these instructional methods immediately. Our intent is for teachers and school leaders to take the methods they find useful right off of the page and put them into practice as seamlessly as possible.
Teachers can use many of the featured methods for self-assessment and reflection. They also help administrators assess instructional practices from the formative perspective. As table I.1 summarizes, we support three specific groups of educators in the important work of delivering effective teaching.
Table I.1: Goals for Each Audience
| Audience | Goals of Book |
| Teachers improving practice | • Self-reflection • Guided study • Teacher-directed growth |
| Teachers teaching teachers | • Mentor tips • Instructional coaching tips • Peer networks |
| Leaders supporting teachers | • Directed growth • Supervisor support for teachers • Coordinated curriculum |