Hello! - Teaching Tips

This is a helpful song for all those English pedagogy students who want to teach how to say hello in Kindergarden or Primary School. Besides, you can find vocabulary and entertaining ideas of how to make children be interested in this topic.

The Bath Song - Teaching Tips

In this video you can find interesting and useful tips and vocabulary about bathing in a song for children. It is very helpful for all the English pedagogy students who want to improve their skills working with children.

What are the Three Key Elements in Performance Objective?

Performance objectives contain three key elements: the student performance; the conditions; and the criterion (accuracy). More curriculum applications are disapproved due to poorly written performance objectives than due to any other single reason. The following is meant to be a quick overview of how to write acceptable performance objectives. For more detailed instruction on writing performance objectives, many books are available including Robert F. Mager's Preparing Instructional Objectives.

The Student Performance

This portion is the heart of the performance objective. This indicates the observable behavior that a student (not teacher) will do to demonstrate that the lesson has been learned. The verb used must be an action verb that is measurable (observable). As a result of training, the student may "define terms," or "list procedures," or "install a network card." All such behaviors are measurable. Other students may "apply a hair coloring agent," or "set the ignition timing of an engine," or "calculate the resistance of a circuit" depending upon the curriculum content.

Poorly written performance objectives indicate that the student will "learn" or "understand" or "become familiar with" the content of the curriculum. A teacher cannot observe a student "understanding" content. Applications are rejected if the performance objectives contain this type of non-measurable information. If a school has difficulty translating this into performance terms, we suggest that the school consider just what it is the teacher "sees" the student doing in order to know that the student understands. Additionally, we do not allow schools to indicate that "the student will score 15 out of 20 correct answers on a test." Although this is certainly observable, the test is merely a tool to measure the actual performance. If the test is a written one, the school should determine what is asked on the test. If the student needs to "explain the difference between…," then that is the performance that should be listed and not a reference to the test. If the test is a practical examination, the student performance that is observed during the testing is what should be placed in the performance objective. As noted above, there are many good resources available in libraries and bookstores offering additional examples of proper performance objectives.

The Conditions

Any equipment or material required in order for the student to be able to demonstrate the performance is listed here. If a mannequin is required in order for the student to demonstrate a particular haircut, the condition would be, "Given a mannequin,…" Other conditions might be "Given a sound card and a Pentium III computer motherboard…," or "Given a diagram of the circulatory system of a human…," etc. In some instances, there are no conditions for a specific performance. It is always assumed that the student performance follows instruction of the content (otherwise, why would the student need the instruction?) so a school does not need to write, "Given 30 clock hours of instruction on x …."

The Criterion (Accuracy)

The minimum level of acceptable accuracy for the performance is listed in this area. Many times this represents the minimum percentage of knowledge that needs to be demonstrated in order to pass the unit. However, it may also contain restrictions such as time frame, maximum errors, etc.

Examples of the criterions are "to a 70% level of accuracy," or "within a 30 minute period," or "with no more than five misspellings." If this is omitted, the performance is assumed to be 100%. In such cases, the performance is pass/ fail. In other words, if the student does not complete the performance perfectly, the student has not acceptably mastered the content. This is a perfectly valid criterion for many objectives.

An important note regarding criterion (accuracy) is that schools often list that all of their objectives have 70% accuracy standard or some similar statement. In reviewing the curriculum, that accuracy level is often found inappropriate for performance such as installing network cards, doing permanent waves, drawing blood, etc. Additionally, schools may not indicate that the criterion/accuracy is "to the satisfaction of the instructor" as that is too subjective. Again, the school needs to decide just what proficiency the instructor is looking for and list that as objectively as possible. A disapproved curriculum application results from inappropriate and/or subjective criteria. Schools are urged to consider each objective and make certain that the criterion (accuracy) is appropriate and objective to the student performance prior to sending the application for review.

Examples of Acceptable Performance Objectives:

What is a "Lesson Plan"?

A lesson plan is a teacher's detailed description of the course of instruction for an individual lesson. While there are many formats for a lesson plan, most lesson plans contain some or all of these elements, typically in this order:

- The title of the lesson

- The amount of time required to complete the lesson

- A list of required materials

- A list of objectives. These may be stated as behavioral objectives (what the student is expected to be able to do upon completion of the lesson) or as knowledge objectives (what the student is expected to know upon completion of the lesson).

- The set or lead-in to the lesson. This is designed to focus students on the skill or concept about to be instructed. Common sets include showing pictures or models, asking leading questions, or reviewing previously taught lessons.

- The instructional component. This describes the sequence of events which will take place as the lesson is delivered. It includes the instructional input—what the teacher plans to do and say, and guided practice—an opportunity for students to try new skills or express new ideas with the modeling and guidance of the teacher.

- Independent practice. This component allows students to practice the skill or extend the knowledge on their own.

- The summary. This is an opportunity for the teacher to wrap up the discussion and for the students to pose unanswered questions.

- Evaluation. Some, but not all, lessons have an evaluative component where the teacher can check for mastery of the instructed skills or concepts. This may take the form of a set of questions to be answered or a set of instructions to be followed. The evaluation may be formative; that is to say, used to guide subsequent learning, or summative; that is to say, used to determine a grade or other achievement criterion.

- Analysis. Often not part of a lesson plan, this component allows the teacher to reflect on the lesson and answer questions such as what went well, what needs improving, and how students reacted to the lesson.

- Continuity - the content/ideas/theme/rules etc. From previous day are reflected upon or reviewed.

The exact format chosen for a lesson plan will be driven by school requirements and personal tastes of the teacher, in that order. Unit plans follow much the same format, but are intended to cover an entire unit of work, which may be delivered over several days or weeks.