Effective Teaching Strategies
Strategies for Direct Instruction
- Specify clear lesson objectives
- Teach directly to those objectives
- Make learning as concrete and meaningful as possible
- Provide relevant guided practice
- Provide independent practice
- Provide transfer practice activities
Strategies for Students with Disabilities *
- Sequence – Break down the task, step by step prompts.
- Drill-repetition and practice-review – Daily testing of skills, repeated practice, daily feedback.
- Segment – Break down targeted skill into smaller units and then synthesize the parts into a whole.
- Direct question and response – Teacher asks process-related questions and/or content-related questions.
- Control the difficulty or processing demands of a task – Task is sequenced from easy to difficult and only necessary hints or probes are provided.
- Technology – Use a computer, structured text, flow charts to facilitate presentation, emphasis is on pictorial representations.
- Group Instruction – Instruction occurs in a small group, students and/or teacher interact with the group.
- Supplement teacher and peer involvement – Use homework, parents, or others to assist in instruction.
- Strategy clues – Reminders to use strategies or multi-steps, the teacher verbalizes problem solving or procedures to solve, instruction uses think-aloud models.
*Excerpted from Swanson, H.L. (1999). Learning Disabilities Research and Practice, 14(3).
Provided in partnership with The Council for Exceptional Children.
