Discussing A Topic In Class

I am done preparing most of my teaching materials. I am now reflecting on how I normally go about weaving materials and strategies to make for an interesting interaction with the students. Whenever I introduce a new topic, the session usually starts with a discussion of what the topic is, what is it all about, taking every opportunity to allow the students to connect it with what they know previously and to point out how they can possibly benefit from learning it.

I then proceed to discuss the concepts, using the chalkboard, overhead transparencies and/or slide presentation. I make handouts available to the students so they can focus on listening to the discussion and minimize note-taking. During the discussion, I throw questions of significance to the students, processing whatever their answers are so I can emphasize what I need to emphasize. A teacher needs good questioning and processing skills here.

After presenting and discussing illustrative examples, showing how a problem is approached and solved, I give the students the opportunity to the same with other problems. I ask them to work on similar problems and call them to present and discuss their solutions in front of the class. This helps the students gain confidence.

For practice, I also give them problems to solve with a partner (pairwork) in class and/or assignments which they will solve individually or with a partner outside the classroom. Sometimes, I also ask them to do online practice exercises, which provide appropriate feedback on the answers they give. Each of these may or may not be included in the computation of their grades. The discussion of the solutions to these problems in class is imperative. This ensures that the students make the most out of every opportunity to learn.