Direct Instruction is one of the oldest teaching strategies in the world. Many educators criticize Direct Instruction as an “old fashioned” form of teaching in that it is stifling to students. I know I have experienced this strategy, and I am sure teachers who are teaching now probably have experienced this strategy as well in elementary school. Direct Instruction stresses basic skills, breaking them down into mini components. For example, there are four types of instructional strategies, such as deductive and inductive strategies, explicit teaching, and instructional theory into practice. Some of the direct instructional approaches are presentations, demonstrations, guided practice, and questions. These instructional a

Direct instruction is a research-based approach to teaching. It is best characterized by its teacher-directed and skills-oriented approach that uses small group instruction. Teachers and aides use carefully scripted lessons that explicitly introduce the children to key cognitive skills that have been broken into smaller units. For example, teachers introduce children to phonemic awareness before they are taught the letters. Students will progress from simple mastery of individual sounds to the blending of sounds to make words. Therefore, as children become proficient with simple words and sentences they are challenged with increasingly more complex material (Direct Instruction).

The Instructional Theory into Practice is a model used for planning and implementing instruction. This instruction is a teacher directed approach to instruction. Furthermore, the Instructional Theory into Practice is essentially a lesson design process that considers factors in making instructional decisions. According to Madeline Hunter, there are three categories that are basic to a lesson design. First, teachers should decide on what content to teach within the context of the grade level, student ability, and the lesson rationale. Second, teachers should decide what students would do to learn and to demonstrate that they have learned. Finally, teachers should also decide which research based teaching behaviors would most effectively promote learning (Hunter). Madeline hunter is best known for her seven step lesson design; anticipatory set, objective and its purpose, instruction input, modeling, check for student understanding, guided practice, and independent practice. To implement the three categories that were mentioned earlier, Hunter states that the seven elements should be used. She also states that when used as intended to select objectives and to plan instruction, the Instructional Theory into Practice is a useful tool. ITIP contains elements that educators have associated with effective teaching and learning.

Using an inductive approach a teacher might give the students examples of paragraphs with the topic sentence underlined. Using this strategy, the teacher would not mention to the students that they are studying topic sentences or provide a definition of a topic sentence. Instead, students would study the paragraph given and answer questions from the teacher. For example, what do the underlined sentences in these paragraphs have in common? Or can anyone provide a name for the underlined sentences? From these two questions, many ideas might be generated. The teacher then will need to focus students’ responses toward the concept of topic sentences (Saskatchewan). Therefore, this inductive lesson used examples and questions that helped students to recognize the principle of topic sentences. This approach is more indirect, but it can be very effective because students interact with the content to make meaning.

The direct instruction model is highly based on the assumption that the teacher is responsible for what children learn. The teacher imparts the necessary knowledge to all students (Direct Instruction). The instruction is programmed, however, the emphasis is placed on learning intelligent behaviors versus merely rote memorization. Teachers are also responsible for administering tests to monitor individual student progress. This continual assessment process allows the teacher to tailor instruction to best meet the needs of all children (Daniels, Hyde, and Zemelman pg 217).

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