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Who'll Fill the Gap: continued
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Here are summaries of the typical, generalized patterns found in lessons from each of the three countries included in the video study:
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German Pattern
(4 parts)
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Japanese Pattern
(5 parts)
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United States Pattern
(4 parts)
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- Reviewing pervious material. [Can take many forms.]
- Presenting the topic and problem for the day.
- Developing the procedures to solve the problem. [Teacher-directed, but student-involved by offering suggestions and actually working at the board.]
- Practicing. [Usually seatwork/homework of similar problems to that solved in class.]
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- Reviewing the previous lesson. [Each lesson builds on the previous lesson.]
- Presenting the problem for the day. [Usually one key problem.]
- Students working individually or in groups. [Rarely groups before an individual solution is developed.]
- Discussing solution methods. [Solutions discussed are those generated by the students. Teacher may elaborate on some solution schemes.]
- Highlighting and summarizing the major points. [Brief, lecture-like, summary of the lesson content.]
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- Reviewing previous material. [Typically a warm-up while homework is checked.]
- Demonstrating how to solve problems for the day. [Teacher shows step-by-step how to solve the new problems.]
- Practicing. [Seatwork solving problems similar to that demonstrated by teacher. Can be small groups.]
- Correcting seatwork and assigning homework. [More practice problems assigned. Homework usually begun in class.]
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From my years of experience as a high school teacher and now as a supervisor of student teachers, I think the American description is accurate. The authors contend:
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[Common activities in each lesson pattern] play different roles. For example, presenting a problem in Germany sets the stage for a rather long development of a solution procedure... In Japan, presenting a problem sets the stage for students to work... on developing solution procedures. In the United States, presenting a problem is the context for demonstrating a procedure and sets the stage for students practicing the procedure. (p. 81)
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After viewing all the videos and their analyses, Stigler and Hiebert contend that teaching patterns evolve over time and are very consistent throughout entire nations.
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But where does this shared knowledge come from? One possibility is that it is imparted to teachers in teacher-training programs. Another possibility is that the knowledge is cultural, passed on from generation to generation through human interactions. We contend, as do other educational researchers, that although teachers learn some things about teaching from their formal training, mostly they learn from simple cultural participation. After all, teachers spend at least thirteen years in classrooms, as students, before they even enter a teacher-preparation program. (p. 83)
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Science Education Reform Index
