Want Better Grades? Add these 18 Tricks to your Lecture Method when Teaching Kenyan Students

Want Better Grades? Add these 18 Tricks to your Lecture Method when Teaching Kenyan Students.

Today, I will discuss the 17 best tricks to employ when using the lecture method in teaching Kenyan secondary and primary students. I intend to help teachers in timely syllabus coverage, better student understanding, improved content retention and finally, better student grades.

Limitations Of Lecture Method In Teaching Kenyan Students.

It is confirmed from a number of researches that oral presentations to large groups of passive students do contribute very little to real learning. For example in physics, the standard lectures do not help most students develop conceptual understanding of fundamental processes in electricity and in mechanics. Similarly, a student’s performance in large chemistry lectured class hardly correlates with the lecturing skills and experience of the instructor.

How Can One Enhance Learning In Large Classes?

Teaching classes with a large number of students is usually a daunting task to many Kenyan teachers. With the ever upsurging influx of students, limited resources and the scarce number of teachers and not forgetting the strict ‘Matiangi rules,’ teaching is becoming problematic. Most of the time, it’s difficult to strike a balance between timely syllabus coverage and student understanding or grasping of content. But with efficient and effective lecture methods a teacher can attain the best out of any teaching lesson.

When lecturing is the chosen or necessary teaching method, one way to keep Kenyan secondary and primary students engaged is to Use the following 18 Teaching Tricks:

1. Master your content very very well.
Without a good mastery of content, you will not have the needed confidence to gain student trust. I guess you will fumble around, but if the students find out and believe me they will, you will be done.
2. Pause periodically: to assess student understanding or to initiate short student discussions. This gives them a mental breather.
3. Call on individual students to answer questions or offer comments. This can also be used to hold student attention; however, some students prefer a feedback method with more anonymity.
If they have an opportunity to discuss a question in small groups, the group can offer an answer, which rids off any one student from the spotlight. Another option is to have students write their answers on a card or paper. The card is then passed to the end of the row; the student seated there can select one answer to present, without disclosing whose it is.

4. Begin each class with something familiar and important to the students. Use what they can easily relate to. Example: Latest news, a joke, a question, etc. What you need here is creativity.
5. Don’t repeat materials directly as they are in the textbook. Don’t be a crammist! This will make a textbook remain a useful alternative resource.
6. While lecturing use paradoxes, puzzles, and apparent contradictions to engage students.
Keep linking your content to current events and everyday phenomena that students easily understand.
7. Use a reasonable and adjustable pace that balances between the content coverage and student’s understanding. Fast pace will make students get lost. And a slow one is boring too.
8. End each class by summarizing the main points you have made.
9. Talk to the students, and not the blackboard. I suppose this is self explanatory.
10. Always maintain eye contact with students in all parts of the room. Eye contact connects the two of you – the teacher and students.
11. Try to shift the mood and intensity while delivering the content. Watch performance on spoken word – you’ll get the idea.
12. Vary your tone and voice to continually hold the attention of the students.
13. Pay attention to delivery. This will help you determine the pace, mood and you will know if the students are with you or not in the learning process.
14. From time to time, give the students time to summarize their observations and to draw and note conclusions.
15. Move around naturally and slowly. Try not to be distracting to the students.
16. Up your game by employing the use of ICT. For example consider using PowerPoint slides, videos, films, CD-ROMs, and computer simulations to enhance your lecture presentations.
17. Students cannot take notes in darkened rooms.
The text needs to be large enough to read from the back of the room. Mind the lighting of the classroom and the size of text projected or written on the board. To confirm this, move to the back of the class and check whether your presentation or writing is comfortably visible.

If using the board, avoid blocking it with AV projectors or screens.

18. Vary presentation and display techniques.

Finally, discuss with your students on several learning strategies to effectively engage them during classes. Let them know those good strategies will result in the improvement of their academic performance. At the same time Request for honest student feedback after teaching. The feedback will help you in improving or improvising during your lecturing process.

If you are a teacher share with us your thoughts by commenting below.