Direct Instruction Method in TEFL Class

"dayoe pushpa"

"@dayupuspa"

Hi babe, my fingers can’t stop writing and typing. My brain couldn’t stop reminding. I wanna share so many previous experiences of mine which I haven’t shared yet. By the way, have you learned about EFL vs ESL? Or have you found the characteristic of good teacher and presented it at class? Or learned for the definition of approach, method, technique and then compared two opinions of different experts about those? Yea, I have learned all of them in my Teaching English as Foreign Language (TEFL) class.  And the latest one is talking about some methods. The first is Grammar Translation Method. And the recent one is Direct Instruction Method.

Are you familiar with direct instruction method? Probably one of your teachers uses this method to teach you. Perhaps. To say the truth, TEFL class is one of my favorite classes. I love the arrangement of the class. I love the lecturer’s spirit in teaching us. I love the chance which allowed the student showing their participation and then the lecturer made note for this. It indicated that the lecturer do appreciate our effort. No burden, absorb more. Hihi. 

Before I talk more about direct instruction method, I would explain in detail enough what we did in the Direct Instruction class. The presenter would explain what direct instruction is; the history of this method; the characteristics; its techniques; the strengths and also the weaknesses. Then among four presenters, one of them will do a simulation of learning and teaching process using direct instruction method and some of its techniques. The presenter do not only prepare for the presentation paper and slide, but also a lesson plan. In the end of the section, each others group will ask a question to the presenter’s group. The lecturer gives an addition, comment and also confirmation toward our discussion. The time flies so fast. It seems we began the discussion several minutes ago but in fact the time was up. Hiks Hiks. Hooray. 

The most part that I like is when the presenter does her simulation. Do you know why, we will get deeper understanding by looking at the direct practice. Practicality is better than just reading the material. Hohoho. I guess all of you will agree with what I’ve said. Won’t you? Just say yes. Hehe. 

Well, as what I’ve promised I will explain a bit about direct instruction itself based on our discussion at class. Direct instruction method doesn’t allow the student use their native language. It is a must for the student use English to communicate in the language class. Translation is a prohibition doing at class. What will happen when your student is blank about a meaning of a word or a material? In this case, you may not translate it to their native language. The thing that you should do is associating the meaning through action and demonstration, gestures, realia, pictures, examples or other means to describe it. Another thing that you can do is explaining the material in simple way which can be understood easily by the students. Also, in this method, vocabularies are more emphasis than grammar. In addition, it is more concern with speaking and listening rather than two other skills.  

Do you know some of direct instruction method‘s technique? There are eight techniques that can be chosen in direct instruction method. They are reading aloud; question and answer exercise; getting students to self-correct; conversation practice; fill-in-the-blank exercise; dictation; map drawing or map labeling; and paragraph writing. I would not explain it one by one in detail, because my purpose to write it as a reminder for me how this class is going and what a general description for direct instruction method is. Well this is time for me having my breakfast. See you at the next writing. Tha Tha. Hohoho. ^Dapus