The teaching style refers to the general principles and management strategies followed by instructor to teach his or her students.
The choice of an effective teaching style normally depends on few areas i.e. class demographic, the subject under discussion, school’s mission and vision, and teacher’s philosophy.
Every teacher has his or her own teaching style but now, the teachers are required to adjust their traditional teaching styles into the approaches that best suit the current dynamics of education.
Importance of Knowing Your Teaching Style
It is important for a good teacher to engage his or her students through the way he or she disseminate the knowledge. A teacher is required to select such teaching style that caters the diversified needs and demands of entire class.
A teacher must do self-evaluation to assess his or her strengths and weaknesses in order to perform better in class. Self-evaluation will help a teacher to match his or her personal teaching style with the management requirements of the classroom. It will help him or her to assess what works best to teach effectively.
Different Teaching Styles
Lecture Style
The lecture style follows the authority model and is generally teacher centered. It mostly involves one way communication. The teacher prepares lengthy lectures and deliver them in class via one way presentations. In this particular teaching style the students are required to make notes to memorize the content taught during class.
Lecture style is acceptable in higher education where the strength of the class is usually huge and it becomes difficult for a teacher to reach out every student individually. The biggest disadvantage of this teaching style is minimum interaction between the teacher and students. Chances for a teacher to engage with his or her students are low that is why such teaching style is considered older and traditional one.
Coach Style
In this teaching style, the teacher acts as a demonstrator. This teaching is very much like lecture style. The teacher retains a formal authority in the premises of classroom. The only difference from the lecture style is that it includes multimedia presentations, various demonstrations and class activities.
Such teaching style gives teacher the room to incorporate different formats in class but it is generally difficult for a teacher to practice such teaching mode in the classes with larger strength. The coach style generally, is best suited in mathematics, music, arts and physical education classes.
Activity Style
In this style, the teacher acts as a facilitator. Teacher, being a facilitator, promotes self-learning among students. The goal is to enhance the critical thinking of students which can also boost various skills such as creativity, analytical skills and communication skills.
The biggest advantage of this teaching style is that it encourages the students to participate in class. It trains the students to ask questions where required, helping them to have class discussions to clear their concepts right away.
Sometimes, such teaching style becomes a real test for a teacher to interact with students. It require special efforts on the part of teacher to prompt learning in students and to keep them engaged with the class content.
Group Style
In this style, the teacher acts as a delegator. This type of teaching style is best suited for the subjects that require lab activities, creative writing, chemistry and biology experimentations etc.
In this style, the teacher plays a role of an observer that inspires students to work independently towards a single, common goal of the class. But sometimes, this teaching style deteriorate teacher’s authority in the class. The teacher is considered more as a consultant rather than a teaching authority heading the class.
Hybrid Style
This teaching style fuses the teacher’s personality and student’s needs. It gives teacher the room to tailor his or her teaching style according to the needs and requirements of the students. A lot of risk is also involved in this teaching style. It becomes very difficult for a teacher to remain focused in this particular mode of teaching.
Which Teaching Style is best for Students
No matter if a teacher is new in the profession or has experience of past many years, one thing must be clear that there is no one particular style of teaching that works best for all the students. Different students will react differently to a particular teaching style depending on their behavior, power to absorb knowledge, IQ level and level of commitment towards studies.
Teachers are advised to use hybrid approach to increase student engagement. Such mode of teaching has diversification including students from different levels of IQ and intelligence.
In short, modern modes of teaching require different types of teachers as well as different types of teaching style. The teacher must be expert in having smooth transition from an analyst to a facilitator depending on the strength of class, IQ level of students and the subject under discussion.
Conclusion
Knowing how to effectively engage student in the class depends on the teaching style of the teacher. Even though if a teacher prefers one teaching style over others, he/she must be open enough to adopt the particular style that works best for the class.
The teachers are required to try different styles to see the results and then adopt the style that meets the objectives of the class most effectively. Every teacher must challenge himself or herself to find the best possible ways to reach out every single student in the class.
The teachers are asked to use student-centric approach but that does not mean it has to at the expenses of teacher’s preferred teaching style. A teacher can fuse student-centric approaches with that of teacher-centric approaches to use them accordingly. It will bring out the best results making environment of the class lighter, more open towards class participation, a healthy teacher-student relationship and flexible learning.
Teacher can prefer a single mode of teaching but in this era of 21st century, it is appropriate to be open to change and have smooth transition between different styles of teaching.
