Teaching Strategies Adopted by the Teachers in Science High School Handling II-Acacia Essay Example for Free

Teaching Strategies Adopted by the Teachers in Science High School Handling II-Acacia Essay Abstract The researchers sought to determine the teaching strategies of the II-Acacia teachers. This study intends to help various people. The data gathered in the study will be beneficial to the students, faculty, parents, DepEd, and future researchers. Through this study, the strengths and weaknesses of the teaching strategies can be determined. Specifically, it will seek answers to the following sub-problems: 1. What teaching strategies are used by the teachers? 2. What teaching strategies are most often and most seldom used by the teachers? 3. What are the implications of the findings to classroom instruction? 4. What are the recommendations to improve classroom instruction? The researchers used questionnaires. The questionnaires were distributed to teachers. Afterwards, the data was retrieved then organized in tabular form. Then it was copied in to the SPSS. Each teaching strategy employed in the II-Acacia was interpreted one by one. Then, a conclusion was derived. Introduction Since the beginning of time teachers started to pass on their knowledge to their students, over the years they started developing techniques for teaching from basic demonstration to the use of visual aids. Teachers have become an integral part in the society; they provide knowledge to make the child ready when we become adults. Teachers have different strategies to use for the students to learn. According to oregon. gov there are 4 varieties of teaching methods and these are Demonstration, Question and Answer, Role Play, and Short Lecture. As part of a teacher’s teaching strategy they also have a variety of teaching materials which they can use. These can be Audiovisual, Interactive computer, or Games. A teacher is nothing without a student. Students are the main reason why teachers exist. Students have learning techniques to suit them. According to mindtools. com students have 8 learning styles these are Sensory, Intuitive, Visual, Verbal, Active, Reflective, Sequential, and Global. Sensory learners prefer concrete, practical, and procedural information. They look for the facts. Intuitive learners prefer conceptual, innovative, and theoretical information. They look for the meaning. Visual learners prefer graphs, pictures, and diagrams. They look for visual representations of information. Verbal learners prefer to hear or read information. They look for explanations with words. Active learners prefer to manipulate objects, do physical experiments, and learn by trying. They enjoy working in groups to figure out problems. Reflective learners prefer to think things through, to evaluate options, and learn by analysis. They enjoy figuring out a problem on their own. Sequential learners prefer to have information presented linearly and in an orderly manner. They put together the details in order to understand the big picture emerges. Global learners prefer a holistic and systematic approach. They see the big picture first and then fill in the details. Research Problem The researchers want to determine what learning method is commonly used and evaluate it if the learning technique is really effective. This study evaluates and assesses the different teaching strategies of teachers utilized by the teacher in AQ Science High School. The researchers will use SPSS as the statistical tool to evaluate the data. Specifically, it seeks answers to the following sub-problems: 1. What teaching strategies are used by the teachers? 2. What teaching strategies are most often and most seldom used by the teachers? 3. What are the implications of the findings to classroom instruction? 4. What are the recommendations to improve classroom instruction? Related Literature and Studies Institutions of higher learning across the nation are responding to political, economic, social and technological pressures to be more responsive to students needs and more concerned about how well students are prepared to assume future societal roles. Faculty are already feeling the pressure to lecture less, to make learning environments more interactive, to integrate technology into the learning experience, and to use collaborative learning strategies when appropriate. Teaching methods are best articulated by answering the questions, What is the purpose of education? and What are the best ways of achieving these purposes? † For much of prehistory, educational methods were largely informal, and consisted of children imitating or modelling their behaviour on that of their elders, learning through observation and play. In this sense, the children are the students, and the elder is the teacher; a teacher creates the course materials to be taught and then enforces it. Pedagogy is a different way by which a teacher can teach. It is the art or science of being a teacher, generally referring to strategies of instruction or style of instruction. Resources that help teachers teach better are typically a lesson plan, or practical skill involving learning and thinking skills. A curriculum is often set by the Government with precise standards. These standards can change frequently, depending on what the Government states. A study from . asian-efl-journal, the bulk of research into Chinese students’ problem with plagiarism in both the Anglophone and Chinese contexts has given much attention to the culture/education versus language debate, and the development versus morality debate. This study explored the views of two groups of Chinese college English teachers in those regards, one with an experience of English-medium academic training (the PGDELT trainee teachers, n = 29) and the other without (the EFL in-service teachers, n = 30). All participants completed a questionnaire with a few being interviewed. The results indicated that (a) the EFL in-service teachers tended to see Chinese college EFL learners’ plagiarism more as a linguistic problem, whereas the PGDELT trainee teachers tended to see it more as a cultural/educational problem; and (b) the EFL in-service teachers seemed to take a moral perspective as indicated by their penalty-oriented approach to the learners’ plagiarism, whereas the PGDELT trainee teachers appeared to take a more developmental perspective as shown by their pedagogy-oriented approach to the learners’ plagiarism. However, while there seems to be strong evidence for the differences between the two groups in their perceptions regarding the culture/education versus language debate, there is only limited evidence for their different perceptions concerning the development versus morality debate. Moreover, the two groups were also found to differ to some extent in their perceptions concerning the causes of, remedial approaches, and punitive reactions to student plagiarism. Finally, the implications of this study are discussed and recommendations for future research presented. Most teachers and pupils have experienced misunderstanding in an English as a Foreign Language class. Take for example this episode of a teacher being puzzled by a pupil coming to the board, because he said, â€Å"Can’t hear! † (not â€Å"come here ! †). Communication is ruined if there is phonological misunderstanding. Troubetskoy explains that a learner is deaf to foreign sounds, which receive an incorrect phonological interpretation since they are â€Å"strained through the phonological sieve of one’s mother tongue†. As a result, there are numerous misinterpretations (1986, p. 54). This shows how tricky phonological appropriation can be for EFL teaching. By phonological appropriation, we mean matters of sounds, that is phonetics -the study of speech sounds , but also, rhythm and intonation, phonology â€Å"the abstract way phonemes function† (Roach, 2000, p. 44), as well as a mastering level of a linguistic form and its meaning, allowing a learner to use it in an authentic communication situation. Interaction is social and reveals how communication between the learner and other speakers leads to the FL appropriation. By interaction, we mean a language-dynamic communicative exchange among individuals in a functional pragmatic frame (Bailly, 1998, p. 135). This paper is based on both research and teaching, since its author is a researcher and a teacher trainer; it aims at raising this crucial question: Can oral interaction be a trigger to phonetic and phonological appropriation? To start with, this was posed to a group of 80 EFL supervisors coaching teacher trainees in partnership with the University School of Education in Reunion Island (IUFM de la Reunion, France) and their answers were staggering: Can interaction activities favour phonological learning? Yes: 9 No: 39 Don’t know: 32 Can discrimination activities favour phonological learning? Yes: 63 No: 13 Don’t know: 4 This quick survey shows that, unlike discrimination, interaction is not necessarily considered as a means of furthering phonological appropriation. By discrimination, we mean an auditory decoding process allowing the learner to match a speech sound with what he knows. The above-mentioned survey indeed raises many more questions: What about the consequent distinction between the conscious and unconscious process? What about the dichotomy between a form-focused versus a meaning-focused process? What is the respective role of input and output in phonological appropriation? To what extent can motivation help? The main problem raised here is whether cognitive psychology can address all questions, and what could be done to sort it out. It will therefore be worth wondering in this qualitative, descriptive, analytic and experimental study, whether oral interaction, which is now a full skill in the Common European Frame of Reference for Languages, can be seen as a real trigger to phonological appropriation. This study is built on a teacher trainee’s experience in Reunion Island, Indian Ocean. Reunion is the 23rd French region. L1 is Creole French; L2 is French. The major first foreign language taught at school is English (80% choose English, the others taking Spanish, German, Chinese or Tamil). Pupils start learning English as early as primary teaching at the age of 7. The teacher trainee involved is a 24-year-old French-speaking colleague who studied English both at the local university and abroad through an Erasmus exchange programmed. She passed the national competitive proficiency exam for EFL secondary teaching (known as CAPES). The University school of education tutor, who is also the author of this article, visits her in class three times in the year. The class involved is a B1 class (Threshold level in the CEFRL) of 24 fifteen-year-old teenagers. The school mentioned is a secondary high school. This group level is somewhat average with a majority of girls. The group personality is somewhat inhibited and introverted. Their fluency is slowed down by pronunciation difficulties. None has gone to an English speaking country before and all often feel self-conscious when they have to communicate in a foreign language. Our analysis will be threefold. We shall first examine an experience in this B1 class, in which phonology is acquired through phonological discrimination and tested through interaction. We will therefore deduce theoretical and practical issues. In a second part, we will enlarge our theoretical scope and try to find answers to our issues. Eventually, this will lead to a second experience and us to practical assumptions in the same B1 class, this time integrating oral interaction as a trigger to phonological appropriation. A comparison between the two similar assessments should be revealing: sound acquisition, word and sentence rhythm, intonation will be tested by three persons, the trainee for the sounds, the supervisor (a qualified teacher at that school) for rhythm, and myself (a lecturer and a trainer at the university school of education) for intonation. An average class situation was set up in November 2006 (Classe de seconde 4, 24 pupils, Lycee Boisjoly Potier, Tampon, Reunion) taught by our teacher trainee. The sequence was planned for three lessons. The cultural unifier was violence in New York. Two documents were studied: â€Å"Rudolph Giuliani† (Appendix 1) as a listening activity (Assou, 2004, p. 57), â€Å"New York City Mayor disturbed by police officer’s use of force†, November 28, 2006 (Appendix 2), as a reading activity. Once listening and reading, together with speaking will be over, phonology will be acquired through listening discrimination. A final interaction test should help to measure this acquisition. Related Studies The respondents from the college of Nursing and Health Sciences of ­ten preferred to use the following teaching methods: Lecture/Discussion Combination, Class Discussion and In-class Demonstration. They rarely preferred to use Jigsaw Method, Guest speakers, Oral presentations and Panel of experts. The data indicate that some faculty still hold the traditional passive view of learning which involves situations where materials are delivered to students using a lecture-based format. Although the findings of a study by de Caprariis, Barman and Magee (2001) suggest that lecture leads to the ability to recall facts and discussion produces higher level compre ­hension, a more modern view of learning where students are expected to be active in the learning process by participating in collaborative activi ­ties may prove more effective. A research on group-oriented discussion methods has shown that team learning and student-led activities not only produce favorable student performance outcomes, but also foster greater participation, self confidence and leadership ability (Perkins and Saris, 2001; Yoder and Hochevar, 2005). The results of the study of Hunt, Haidet, Coverdale, and Richards (2003) on the student performance in team learning methods show positive learning outcomes as compared to traditional lecture-based methods. In contrast to these findings, a study by Barnes and Blevins (2003) sug ­gests that active, discussion-based methods are inferior to the tradition ­al lecture-based method. However, a comparison of lecture combined with discussion versus active, cooperative learning methods by Morgan, Whorton, and Gunsalus (2000) demonstrated that the use of the lec ­ture combined with discussion resulted in superior retention of material among students. The Polytechnic Institute (PI) supports the curricula designed to culti ­vate and promote among the students high levels of scholarship, desire to seek understanding, a solid foundation in professional and personal responsibility, desire for service, and an ability/willingness to serve as leaders within both the engineering and architecture profession and soci ­ety. Thus, the graduate of PI must possess the ability to identify, formu ­late and execute solutions to multidisciplinary problems encountered in the practice of engineering and architecture. In order to realize these objectives, the faculty of the PI adopts certain teaching methods adapted to the subject matter, capacity of the students, situational needs and related to actual life situations and practices. The data show that the respondents from the Polytechnic Institute always preferred Lecture/Discussion Combination and role playing. Also they always preferred to use lab work and applied projects as teaching methods. They never preferred the Jigsaw Method; Index Card Exercise; Guided Imagery; Socratic Methods; ILPE Method and Brain Writing. The development of problem-solving skills is one of the primary goals of the PI curricula. Problem solving involves five basic components: rec ­ognize and define the problem; formulate the model and identify vari ­ables, knowns and unknowns; select an appropriate solution technique and develop appropriate equations; apply the solution technique (solve the problem); and validate the solution. Solution validation is one of the most important steps in this process and includes interpreting the solu ­tion, identifying its limitations, and assessing its reasonableness using appropriate approximate solutions or common sense. Allowing the stu ­dents to engage in lab work and project studies will help them develop problem solving skills. Also, role playing when properly used introduces problem situation dramatically, provides opportunity for the students to assume roles of others and thus appreciate another point of view. Fur ­thermore, it allows the students to explore solutions and provides oppor ­tunity to practice the skills. The faculty of the College of Business Administration envision to contrib ­ute to the intellectual and personal growth and development of the students and to enhance the competence of the students to engage in all phases of business activity and management. In order to achieve these objectives, the data show that they always preferred Lecture/Discussion Com ­bination and Class Discussion but rarely preferred to use Jigsaw Method, Index Card Exercise and Panel of experts as teaching methods. This means that the faculty of the College of Business Administration believed that by using the Lecture method combined with class discus ­sion, the students would be able to acquire knowledge on the core areas of business, perceive the global nature of organizational and economic activities, recognize the role of law and ethics in business behaviour, un ­derstand and appreciate the impact of demographic diversity on organi ­zations and understand and appreciate the impact of sustainability and the natural environment on organizations, the impact of organizations on sustainability and the natural environment, understand organizations and the process of management, develop the ability to work effectively, inde ­pendently and collaboratively, and integrate core area skills in problem solving and decision making. The College of Arts, Sciences and Education brings together disciplines in the arts, humanities, mathematics, natural sciences, and social scienc ­es and education t o form the intellectual heart of the University. It fosters liberal education, promotes lifelong learning, research, creative activ ­ity, social and professional responsibility, and growth. To these ends, its faculty challenges students to think critically and intuitively, cross disci ­plinary boundaries, recognize and value diverse perspectives, and solve problems creatively by through the use of different teaching methods. Since the College of Arts, Sciences and Education is committed to a liberal education orientation, it must provide the students with oppor ­tunities for: expansion of the boundary of knowledge, preservation and enrichment of a countrys cultural heritage, development of personal and social adjustment, cultivation of intelligent citizenship, acquisition of self-discovery and self-understanding, development of an oral and writ ­ten competency, maximization of the capacity for critical and imagina ­tive thinking, and understanding of international relations and affairs. This awareness of the commonly held objectives of the college provided broad bases for the faculty’s use of various teaching activities and meth ­ods. Thus, in this college, learning should provide opportunities beyond the knowledge of the subject matter of a particular course. The courses should not be restricted to the instruction of abstract theories, but should afford opportunities for students to develop skills of effective oral and written expression, to improve their ability to relate to others, to learn to think critically and scientifically, and to feel the need for continuous growth even outside the university campus. The importance of such in ­tellectual and social stimulation beyond the mere knowledge parameters of the course content should be emphasized. The college has the following major departments: Natural sciences, Mathematics, Social Sciences, LLH/Communication and MAPE/Profes ­sional Education. It is assumed that the teaching methods used in the class may differ from subject to subject since the method that the faculty may prefer to use may depend on the goals of the subject. The goal of the Natural Sciences component of the curriculum is to help the students increase their scientific literacy and capacity to ap ­proach scientific materials intelligently, and to convey the general understanding of science as a way of looking at the world. In order to achieve these goals, the faculty of the Natural Sciences Depart ­ment often preferred to use Lecture/Discussion Combination, Team Project Method, lab work, Worksheets/Surveys, In-class Demonstra ­tion, Panel of Experts and Explanatory Discussion as their teaching methods. However, the data show that the respondents had never preferred to use guest speakers, applied projects, Simulation and the ILPE Method. The next data on the teaching method preferences are from the Mathematics teachers of the College of Arts, Sciences and Education. The findings of the study show that this group of respondents always preferred in-class exercises. This group of respondents never preferred to use Jigsaw Method, guest speakers, Videotapes, Report-Back Session, Role Playing, Panel of ex ­perts, Explanatory Discussion, Reflective Discussion, Debate, ILPE Method, Guided Imagery, Brain Writing and PBL as teaching methods. This implies that the faculty adopted these teaching methods in order to provide the students precision in numerical expression, logical thinking and problem solving. However, other instructional methods may also be proven effective for developing mathematical comprehension. The most important of these could be the use of hands-on, active learning tech ­niques in the classroom. Of equal import is the need to make students understand the utility of the material they are being taught. Students need to understand and appreciate the need for their courses. Many students leave their mathematics courses thinking that the material will never be used in their courses. It is essential that mathematics courses have some future value in their program of studies. The mathematics portion of a student’s curriculum should not be simply something â€Å"to get through. † This means that the faculty teaching mathematics and others must coor ­dinate their curriculum. They must teach concepts and methods that are applicable to current practice, and these methods must be employed in other curriculum within a reasonable time period after the students learn the techniques. In mathematics teaching, teachers provide students with adequate oppor ­tunities to engage in math activities to help them in the self-exploration and cooperation and exchange in the process to really understand and master the mathematics knowledge and skills, ideas and methods, and to learn valuable math. Thus, participation and learning efficiency of the method is used when appropriate relevant. The social sciences component of the curriculum aims to make the stu ­dents aware of the general problems and issues, especially those with relevance to the Philippine society; and to enhance students’ awareness of the importance of scientific approaches to the discussion and analysis of social issues. In order to achieve these aims, the faculty teaching the social sciences always preferred Brainstorming as their teaching method but rarely preferred Role Playing, Role Playing, Index Card Exercise and Panel of experts. Another data of the teaching method preferences are from the LLH/Com ­munication faculty of College of Arts, Sciences and Education. The data indicates that this group of faculty often preferred Lecture/Discus ­sion Combination, in-class exercises, Brainstorming, Class Discussion, Explanatory Discussion, Reflective Discussion and Simulation. Most probably these are the teaching methods that the faculty teaching LLH/Communication perceived that could provide the students with effec ­tive communication skills in both English and Filipino, foster critical understanding and appreciation of how people give expression to their experiences in the world, develop in the students the students to see the grammatical relationships between words, group of words and sentence within the discourse level; train the students in the effective use of ver ­bal and non-verbal symbols towards ethical speech communication; and develop in the students writing skills in their respective discipline. Like ­wise, these teaching methods will help them teach the students how to reflect on the totality of the human experience; formulate for themselves a human perspective that integrates all branches of knowledge in a pro ­found understanding of the individual as well as society; and contribute to the understanding of the beautiful and the good in human experience. They rarely preferred to use Jigsaw Method, Report-Back Session, Team Project Method, lab work, Worksheets/Surveys, Index Card Exercise, Guided Imagery and In-class Demonstration as teaching methods. The faculty teaching MAPE and Professional Education are committed to the production of quality teachers who could be at par with the other pro ­fessionals through a deliberate effort to improve instruction, research, and community extension. These efforts are reflected in their teaching meth ­od preferences. Simulation is an event or situation made to resemble real classroom situ ­ation as closely as possible. The faculty uses simulation most probably because it is an excellent venue for the education students to learn ex ­perientially since it provides opportunities for them to practice problem solving and psychomotor skills in a safe, controlled environment. In a simulation, students create connections mentally which is rarely, if ever, accomplished through conventional teaching techniques. Conse ­quently, the learning has a greater impact, plus the new knowledge and skills are retained much longer. It works because the students become more engaged with the subject matter than through more conventional approaches to teaching (lecturing, debates, discussion, videos, etc. Thus, compared with these traditional methods, this method of teaching and evaluating learners is more realistic, enhances both acquisition and re ­tention of knowledge, sharpens critical-thinking and psychomotor skills, and is more enjoyable. Simulation can be used to teach theory, assessment, technology and skills. The emphasis in simulation is often on the application and inte ­gration of knowledge, skills, and critical thinking. Unlike a classroom setting or a paper-and-pencil test, simulation allows learners to function in an environment that is as close as possible to an actual teaching situa ­tion and provides them an opportunity to think. The Team Project method is the appropriate pedagogy of choice of most faculty in the professional education courses, since it combines knowl ­edge with practical experience and improve interpersonal and commu ­nication skills which are essential to the knowledge growth and perfor ­mance of future educators. Furthermore, besides technical skills and knowledge, the MAPE and Professional education courses is required to give students opportunities to improve their interpersonal, collaborative and communication skills. It requires students to apply in practice per ­sonal competencies and improve problem-solving skills such as explor ­atory searching, critical thinking and decision making (Hawking et al. 2001). The method also provides students with experiential learning op ­portunities to actively develop their knowledge and experience, as they cooperate in group projects. The discussion method is always a preferred teaching method since it involves the entire class in an extended interchange of ideas between the teacher and the students and among classmates. The members in the class may approach the discussion topic with many and varying points of view, however, the teacher focuses the discussion in the direction most conducive to effective and purposeful learning. In summary, the respondents from the College of Arts, Sciences and Ed ­ucation often preferred to use Lecture/Discussion Combination, in-class exercises and Class Discussion in teaching. Rarely, they preferred to use Jigsaw Method, Explanatory Discussion guest speaker, video tapes, Re ­port-Back Session, Role Playing, Reflective Discussion, Debate, ILPE Method, Guided Imagery and Brain Writing. As a whole the faculty of Aquinas University as reflected by the data, often preferred Lecture/Discussion Combination, Team Project Method, lab work, in-class exercises, oral presentation, Brain storming, Class Discussion and In-class Demonstration. They rarely preferred Jig ­saw Method, guest speakers, Index Card Exercise, Debate, ILPE Meth ­od, Brain Writing and Socratic method. Lectures although combined with class discussion (4. 34) remain the core teaching method in most the colleges. Their role is best suited to pro ­viding an overview of the subject matter and stimulating interest in it, rather than disseminating facts. Since this is the most preferred teach ­ing method, the faculty must remember that students would appreciate good quality lectures with clear objectives which could be placed in the course handbook, with the lecture summaries, clear overhead acetates or slides; a paced delivery; and appropriate handouts which would provide students with complex diagrams or difficult or critical text. The class discussion that follows could be used to clarify certain points in the lec ­ture. Thus, lecture when combined with discussion widens the intellectu ­al horizons of the student, making it possible for them to gradually move toward acquisition of self-discovery and self-understanding. It enables the instructor to correct error in literature and articles read by the student. Also, it affords opportunities for an instructor to explain a particularly equivocal ambiguous point of idea, or a complicated, difficult, abstract process or operation and resolves conflicting points of view and clarifies misunderstanding of different schools of thought. It could also enliven the learning situation by adding the voice, gesture and the personality of the instructor. The discussion that follows the lecture will promote interest by giving the students a share in the responsibility for the course and in search for knowledge. It compels the students to be active learners and motivates them by keeping the work within their intellectual bounds and by allying it with their aptitude. It enables the instructor to constantly appraise the students’ understanding of the issues under discussion. Discussion method is also a preferred teaching method since it sharp ­ens the students’ ideas and concepts by forcing them to express them in their own words. This facilitates intellectual comprehension and applica ­tion of new knowledge to life-situations. It permits the students to chal ­lenge statements with which they disagree or which they misunderstand, thereby facilitating the process of self-discovery and self-understanding and developing the sense of self-assertiveness. In addition, it develops in the students the skills essential to effective group discussion and verbal communication. The discussion method forces the students out of their classroom lethargy, so that every learner will react either in support or in opposition to the issue under discussion. In using this teaching method, each student learns to feel free to express his/her opinions, to argue with mutual respect and to defend his/her own stand in the light of logic and rationality. It also develops facility in oral expression, critical and cre ­ative thinking, and intellectual and imaginative problem-solving ability. Thus, lecture when combined with discussion sustains and strengthens most of the elements essential for productive learning. The provision of feedback and class participation heightens the learners motivation, facilitates the intellectual grasp of abstract concepts and the learning of problem-solving skills. The data also show that Brainstorming is an often preferred teach ­ing method. Alex Osborn describes it as a conference technique by which a group attempts to find a solution for a specific problem by amassing all the ideas spontaneously by its members† (http://www. moneyinstructor. com/lesson/brainstorming. asp. According to him in this process more ideas could be generated than in any normal dis ­cussion and that by producing more ideas, people had a better chance of finding useful ones: from quantity came quality. A key part of the process is to come up with wild or silly ideas because these in turn can spark off really useful ones. This finding of the study implies that brainstorming is often preferred as a group process so that the members of