Portfolio Post #10 -Teaching Strategies

The following is a chart of some teaching strategies that I found here. I found this exercise to be interesting because it allowed me to explore some practical strategies that I am hoping to apply in the coming year. To be honest, I would rank these equally as I believe that all are necessary for a well-balanced learning experience. All students learn in different ways, and effective use of all of these will allow many students to access learning.

Ranking of History Alive! Teaching Strategies Organizer 

Rank	Teaching Strategy	Rationale
1.	Experiential Exercise	While these may not necessarily be as effective if used every day; these certainly provide memorable experiences for students to apply and solidify what they have learned. I also think that these experiences allow for students with diverse strengths to participate fully.
2.	Problem Solving Groupwork	This kind of groupwork allows students to understand and apply each other’s strengths while working towards a goal. Contributing in this way will engage students and help them to support each other’s learning.
3.	Social Studies Skill Builders	I thought this strategy sounded effective because of the diverse range of skills that would be explored and because of their relevance to the historical inquiry process. Practicing these skills will allow the students to understand how the information arrives in their textbook as well as why it is important and how they can apply it.
4.	Visual Discovery	Being a visual learner myself, I think that visual discovery is an effective strategy for learning. I placed it at number 4 however, because the previous strategies incorporate visual and tactile experiences, or experiences that are more interactive. Visual discovery also allows students to interact with the material, but caters to a smaller group of learners.
5.	Writing for Understanding	Writing for understanding is an effective way to consolidate ideas. It allows students to process everything that they have done in the activities above, and to reflect on their experiences. I ranked this as 5th because writing, while important, tends to be the “go-to” for history teachers and it does not always allow students to apply their other strengths.