Teaching Strategies Individual Reflection

The first conclusion comes to mind as a result of viewing the group project presentations is that teaching strategies investigated in this project need to be all blended and employed together in delivering any long-term teaching and learning experience. In other words, the teacher need to develop a course plan that carefully examines and considers the nature of the delivered topics, the targeted cognitive level, and the level of the students in order to devise a pedagogical framework that would best deliver the course and help the students to succeed in meeting its objectives. Such pedagogical framework needs to include various teaching and learning strategies to maintain the interest of the students.

For example, Direct Instruction and Interactive Lecturing are very effective when used in introductory scenarios. This is when introducing the basics of new topic that the students need to remember and understand first before progressing to higher cognitive levels. It is through Direct Instruction and Interactive Lecturing that the students start to build the base they need to be prepared to deal with more challenging scenarios. This is also the case in many courses that students need to finish in their first two years of their programs, where most courses are introductory courses to knowledge areas that the students are encountering for the first time.

Collaborative Learning and Project Based Learning can then be employed in delivering more advanced topics in a course or a program. Students can build on the basis that they remember and understand, that were acquired through Direct Instruction and Interactive Lecturing, to evaluate and create solutions for new problems. Collaborative learning is excellent strategy to analyze and evaluate Case Studies, where Project Based Learning motivates the students to create something new.  

Using different teaching strategies in different scenarios of nature of the subject, the targeted cognitive level, and the students level would also imply the necessity of aligning the assessment strategies to assess the same skills that the teaching strategies have developed. Therefore, in situations where Direct Instruction and Interactive Lecturing were mainly used, assessments strategies need to also focus on assessing students ability to remember and how deep they understand. On the other hand, Collaborative Learning and Project Based Learning should qualify students to demonstrate the ability to apply their knowledge in real-world scenarios to evaluate challenging situations and create a relevant solution.