Teaching Strategies
Teaching is no longer a mere narration of information memorized by the teacher and presented to the learner. It has evolved into a science based on analysis, change, connection, and evaluation. Today, teaching has become a creative art that contributes to the advancement of learning and education. It requires both teachers and learners to keep pace with the knowledge explosion and to actively participate in all the science, thought, and knowledge that surrounds them.
A teaching strategy is defined as a planned, organized course of action that describes the procedures carried out by the teacher and learner to achieve the desired learning outcomes, and it is fundamentally based on learning theories.
Key Teaching Strategies
1. Teaching Management Strategy
This strategy is concerned with managing everything related to the educational process inside the classroom, including planning, organization, and maintaining classroom discipline. There are three main styles of teaching management:
* The Democratic Style: Encourages cooperation, respects students' points of view, and allows them to contribute to setting goals and choosing educational methods.
* The Authoritarian Style: Lacks a sense of trust between the teacher and students. The teacher relies on dominating decisions, and the language of punishment prevails.
* The Chaotic Style: Characterized by a lack of prior planning, allowing students to engage in activities without discipline. This leads to the waste of their creative abilities and the spread of negative behaviors.
2. Teaching Time Strategy
Time is one of the most important dimensions of the educational process. Educational time management is defined as the optimal investment of human and material resources to achieve pre-planned goals. Teaching time is divided into:
* General Time: Allocated for additional activities with future dimensions, such as parent visits.
* Productive Time: The duration for completing pre-determined tasks and activities.
* Preparatory Time: Used to prepare and equip the necessary tools and materials for subsequent lessons.
* Evaluative Time: Dedicated to assessing students' achievements and adding creative touches to them.
Causes of wasted teaching time include poor planning, poor management, and an excessive number of students in the classroom.
3. Teaching Facilitation Strategy
This strategy aims to make teaching and learning a humane process that provides opportunities for all students to grow and develop according to their individual abilities and readiness. In this strategy, the teacher's role is that of an educational facilitator, who helps the learner explore their feelings and abilities, and prepares a rich educational environment for thinking. The learner's role is to rely on themselves to face learning challenges, grasp concepts and values, and utilize the experiences of others.
4. Problem-Solving Strategy
The concept of problem-solving is defined as a set of detailed procedures that the teacher or learner follows to reach a successful solution to a problem, according to scientific and logical steps. This strategy differs from inquiry in that the search for knowledge concludes with finding a satisfactory solution to the problem.
5. Mastery Learning Strategy
This strategy focuses on the necessity of mastering educational material before moving on to new material. This helps students with low academic achievement reach advanced educational levels. It relies on specific criteria to measure achievement levels, which fosters a spirit of cooperation instead of competition among students.
