Contemporary school populations are growing increasingly diverse in many ways—students’ prior knowledge, learning experiences, interests, learning styles and preferences, motivation, and readiness to learn. As teachers, we need to acknowledge (and anticipate) this diversity and plan appropriately challenging instruction designed to meet their learning needs. Using a variety of instructional strategies can be a reasonable way to engage learners and tailor the learning conditions to optimize their learning. As we learn more about the science of how students learn, it appears that instruction is the key to providing an opportunity for active student involvement, the development of more sophisticated schemata, and the systematic development of critical and creative thinking skills. This holds true for all grade levels and content areas.

Evidence suggests that intentional teaching results in greater student learning and models can make our teaching more deliberate. Effective teachers form instruction around a clear set of purposes, and instructional models are designed to reach a variety of goals. Some of the models help students remember facts, some are focused on academic skills, while others provide a scaffold for students as they form concepts and create generalizations from a variety of data sources. All of these strategies are intended to scaffold students in knowledge construction and critical thinking.

In this course, students will first examine the science of learning as a foundation for our investigation of instructional models. We will explore the ways in which students differ, which will further inform our use of instructional models. The bulk of the course will focus on a variety of instructional models: their basic steps; what the models are designed to elicit in students; similarities and differences among the models; the role of teacher and student in the various models; and other considerations a teacher needs to factor in when employing these models.