Instructor Skills
I find when I am introducing a new class of students to my class I am also introducing new concepts to them at the same time and must keep them involved and engaged from the beginning, I have found that if you sale the class to them they stay motivated and from day 1 all the way thru to the end and the only way to do that is to understand you are working with multiple intelligences with different life experiences.
Billy,
You make a number of good points in relation to keeping students engaged and focused on the content. The more we can help them see application and relevancy the greater their retention is going to be.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
I also find that students move around in their engagement in reaction to what is going on in their lives. Sometimes it is necessary to acknowledge that life happens and flexibility and compromise may be needed but not to the detriment of what learning needs to be compromised
Jolyn,
Good point and one instructors need to remember as they plan their instruction.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
Several months ago during a class I was going over a difficult concept and saw that about half of the class wasn't getting it and were not engaged.
I paused and then took a different approach: I started the lesson over, but I did it by solving a real problem that demonstrated the concept, and I made it an example I had never done myself and told the class this.
So I put myself on the spot and worked out the problem as I went along. I made small mistakes here and there and sometimes tried a couple of approaches to parts of the problem to see which worked best.
The class liked this a lot; suddenly nearly all of the students were engaged in a discussion. Later some of them told me that actually watching me work though a new problem helped them a lot as opposed to watching me go over something I had already solved.
They especially liked to watch me make mistakes on occasion; it made them feel like it was ok to make mistakes themselves.
Although it is a lot more work to teach this way I've been using this technique more and more over the last few terms, and it always seems to get the students engaged and active in their lessons.
Kevin,
You were offering your students relevancy and application to what you were teaching them. Both of these areas are powerful motivators to keeping students engaged.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
an instrutor needs to first assess the class to determine how to present the lesson plan,he or she then needs to present the material in a way all the students can understand.
William,
I agree. I use a pretest so I can baseline my incoming students and customize my instruction to meet them where they are and move them forward from there.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
I actually teach a 5 week class online and one of the challenges has to do with calming individuals who have a tremendous amount of anxiety because of the new material, the amount of material and the very short time frame in which to learn it all. It is important to keep them engaged in the class by reminding them and making them aware of how to apply the information.
Diane,
Tough job but one that you are meeting head on. It is always surprising to me that once the students get settled in and calmed down they start to experience success and with this success comes the needed boost in self confidence.
Gary
Dr. Gary Meers
I not only pretest, but I also try to create a dialoug with them to see also what kind of personalities I am going to deal with. This can help with my presentations in communicating with the class better.
