HOT TOPIC
DIRECT INSTRUCTION

• Howard Gardner's Comment on Gardner and Hirsch, Interview with Gardner about article appearing in NY Times
• Learning to Read and Write, Position Statement of the National Association for the Education of Young Children and the International Reading Association; check out the strategies section!
• Association for Direct Instruction
• Direct Instruction K-6, From Northwest Regional Lab site
• Carnegie Mellon Researchers Say Direct Instruction, Rather Than "Discovery Learning" Is Best Way To Teach Process Skills In Science
• Direct Instruction making waves, From The Catalyst, Voices of Chicago School Reform with critiques of direct instruction and info on brain research, intelligences and the develoment of young children.
• Six Promising Schoolwide Programs For Raising Student Achievement, AFT site that looks at six research based approaches to increase learning as measured on standardized tests.
• DIRECT INSTRUCTION IN EDUCATION, Paper from University of North Carolina at Wilmington
• Back to the Basics of Direct Instruction , From National Center for Policy Analysis
• Direct Instruction, From Advantage, Inc. in question/answer format
• Reading Instruction Handbook: Direct Instruction, From PSSA kit
• Direct Instruction Discussion Board, From National Teaching and Learning Forum, find out what teachers are saying about direct instruction.
• Direct Instruction: A Transactional Model, From Research for Better Schools
• Direct Instruction: Robert Slavin's Model, From Educational Psychology Interactive
• Blending Direct Instruction and Problem Solving Can Enhance Understanding, Retention, Transfer, and Maintenance of Knowledge, From OSEP/ERIC Newsbriefs
• Children as Machines To Be Programmed, Letter to Education Week by Alfie Kohn about direct instruction.

---

Discussion about Direct Instruction

Please use this space to add your comments about what you have read in links above. Send your comments to cokids@stargate.net. Please place "Direct Instruction" in the Subject heading and your message will be uploaded to this page.

Submitted by Beth Conant, 2 January 2000

I am concerned that many of these sites present direct instruction as the only way to present certain types of information. It seems to me that we are back into the old "Either/Or" argument similar to the one we've had for several years about whole language and phonics. It isn't a question of which one is better, but of how we will use these strategies with individual children who may need different mixes of both. To imply that one approach works with all children seems folly to me!

Certainly direct instruction is a strategy that should be used, but not to the exclusion of time each day for child choice and constructivism. Lilian Katz did some research several years ago that indicated that too much skill and drill in the early years squelched the desire of children to use the skills they were practicing. She argues for the importance of dispositions to learn. Seems to me that the information on DI has left out discussion of this concern. If too much DI leads children to dislike school and to lose interest in school-like activities, then we lose as much as we gain in the long run!

What do YOU think?

 I agree that there seems to be an either-or mentality on some of these topics. Piaget found the source of knowledge many decades ago and most of us were too busy memorizing his stages to take note. Social knowledge often is taught directly. Children learn manners this way and about Santa Claus too. Words are social knowledge although making meaning of them involves thinking. Thinking leads to another knowledge base, that of logic. Logic can not be taught by direct instruction!!! It must be constructed by each of us for ourselves. Then there is physical knowledge which can be known through our senses and consequently is basically experiential. So to argue against or for direct instruction is far too simple. We need to use lots of ways to learn. It's just that some of these ways are inappropriate for certain types of learning. The teaching of math through drill and practice is an example of inappropriate direct instruction. Children must think to form math relationships. A teacher can not tell you the logic of these relationships. You must make sense of them for yourself. Of course, there are lots of things you can do to support children thinking about math. I've been reading Connie Kamii's new edition of CHILDREN REINVENT ARITHMETIC this weekend. It is inspiring and full of ideas teachers are using to help children think about math. Good luck to us all.

Back to Index to Hot Topics