Here we are discussing our Bell Ringer activity before beginning work on our Supreme Court Cases foldable.
Teachers effectively engage students in learning by using a variety of instructional
strategies in order to meet individual learning needs.
– Virginia Department of Education
Delivery of content knowledge is just as critical as the information presented. Teachers must ensure that every student is being reached and being taught in the best possible way that they learn. Activities should be engaging and informative and planning is of the utmost importance to make sure that these instructional delivery ideals occur.
Click here to see a center I created to learn about landmark Supreme Court Cases in which students worked in small groups throughout the Forum to read about and find answers to questions presented about 5 landmark Supreme Court Cases.
There are copious ways to deliver instruction to students effectively and many teachers will differ on their preference; however the following three strategies prove to work the best: a variety of activities, making the content relatable and relevant to students, and the use of multiple intelligences, Bloom’s taxonomy, and differentiation when creating plans and activities.
Click here to see a lesson plan that incorporates a field trip to the Bedford World War II D-day Memorial. Once back in the classroom, students will work in groups to create their own World War II memorial in memory of a chosen battle to understand the thought, history, and architecture that goes into making our nation’s monuments.
Activities encourage active learning instead of passive learning and are an easier way to keep students interested. Active learning promotes higher level thinking from students such as analysis, synthesis and creativity, making content more easily recalled later, and more likely to stay with students for a longer period of time. The importance of active learning is to put the undertaking of education into the students’ hands and making the classroom a student-based learning environment instead of teacher based. Activities will be more effective if they reinforce previously learned concepts or topics and gradually build up students’ skills as well.
Click here to see a text set another teacher and I created about Slavery and the American Civil War. Throughout this text set, students see the effects of slavery on our American society as well as how it affected our nation after the American Civil War.