This article was downloaded by: [Temple University Libraries]On: 12 November 2014, At: 07:07Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office:Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Theory Into PracticePublication details, including instructions for authors and subscriptioninformation:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/htip20

Staff development for teaching basic skillsBarak Rosenshine a & Linda Meyers ba University of Illinoisb University of Oregon , Eugene, OregonPublished online: 16 Aug 2010.

To cite this article: Barak Rosenshine & Linda Meyers (1978) Staff development for teaching basic skills,Theory Into Practice, 17:3, 267-271, DOI: 10.1080/00405847809542776

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00405847809542776

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the“Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, ouragents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to theaccuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and viewsexpressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the viewsof or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied uponand should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francisshall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses,damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly inconnection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content.

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantialor systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, ordistribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access anduse can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions

Staff Developmentfor Teaching Basic

SkillsBarak RosenshineUniversity of Illinois

Linda MeyersUniversity of Oregon,

Eugene, Oregon

^ taff development for teaching basic skills,particularly for less academically inclined children,has not been particularly effective. Inservice trainingtrends to be spotty, a day here and an inspirationalspeaker there, with little specific practice, feedback,and follow-up in the classroom. That training which isspecific has tended to deal with unrelated skills; clar-ity, enthusiasm, asking higher order questions, indi-vidualizing, management, which have not beenblended into a whole. Emerging from recent researchon instruction, however, is an instructional modelwhich has tentatively been labeled "direct instruc-tion." This model contains general principles whichcan form the basis for inservice teacher training inteaching basic skills. This paper attempts to describethis general model and some of the teacher trainingprocedures which have already taken place using thismodel.

The model is derived from recent correlationalstudies on reading and mathematics instruction in theelementary grades (for reviews, see Rosenshine, 1976;Medley, 1977). The results of correlational and ex-perimental studies published after these reviews werecompleted were consistent with the results cited bythese reviewers. Note the cautions, however. The re-search on which this model is based is limited toteaching of reading and math in elementary grades. Itis inappropriate to generalize beyond this. But it isalso inappropriate to label these skills as "rote." Ifreading comprehension and math problem solvingwere merely a matter of rote training, then our effortswould have long since raised achievement levels forless academically inclined students.

In broad outlines, the model is fairly simple. Forstudents to make reasonable progress in reading andmath one needs:

a) instructional settings which maximize stu-dent engagement

b) a procedure for teaching new material insmall steps

c) a method for correcting student errorsd) procedures for active student practicee) procedures for recycling students through

the new material until they achieve masteryf) monitoring daily work of each studentg) obtaining student attention and active stu-

dent practiceh) methods for monitoring weekly and

monthly progressi) sufficient time

Volume XVII, Number 3 267

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Tem

ple

Uni

vers

ity L

ibra

ries

] at

07:

07 1

2 N

ovem

ber

2014

Direct Instruction ActivitiesIn order to illustrate direct instruction, a number

of procedures from the Oregon Direct Instructionmodel are described below. Although a few of theskills are unique to the Oregon program, the descrip-tions were written to provide a general view of directinstruction.

Allocated Time. The allocated time for the DirectInstruction Model includes 30 minutes of small groupwork in each of three subject areas (reading, math andarithmetic) a total of 25 minutes of large group work inmath and spelling, and 70 minutes in seatwork and/orcriterion teaching time (make-up or remedial work)for a total of 3 hours and 5 minutes in reading, lan-guage, and arithmetic. In addition, it is suggested thatan hour and 45 minutes be devoted to story readingtime, social studies or science, art, music, or library,and independent reading or activity centers.

Small Group Setting. The students receive most oftheir instruction in a small group setting of 5-8 chil-dren who are at the same skill level and who canprogress at approximately the same rate. The rationalefor the use of rapid-paced, teacher-directed, smallgroup instruction is that it is more efficient than one-to-one instruction and superior to large group instruc-tion because a small group provides better teacherdirection, supervision, and individualization, andthe repetitious practice necessary for some importantskills can be made more fun by transforming drill intoa challenging game. The lowest performers in a groupare seated directly in front of the teacher so that theirperformance can be monitored constantly.

Presenting New Material. New skills are usuallyintroduced by the teacher modeling or demonstratingthe skill. For example, to teach blending, the teacherbegins by saying, "Listen. Aaammm." This demon-stration shows the children the response that they willbe expected to give. After the modeling the teacherthen leads the children by responding with them. Thenext part of the task is, "Say it with me. Aaammm."This leading also serves as a model and the studentsare less likely to make mistakes when they respondwith the teacher. The last step in the task is, "All byyourselves. Saying the sounds in aamm. Get ready."This part of the task is the test, when the studentsrespond on their own. In sum, this procedure ofmodel-lead-test is used to introduce new material.

Correcting Incorrect Answers. When children giveincorrect answers, the correction procedures usuallyinvolve four steps which incorporate the model-lead-test procedure. For example, if the children stop be-tween sounds when sounding out the work "sad" theteacher would first model the correct answer (e.g. "I'mnot going to stop between sounds. My turn, Saaadd.")268 Theory Into Practice

and then lead the children in the correct answer (e.g.Do it with me without stopping — Saaad. Again.Saaad.") The third step would be to repeat the task inthe original form, requiring the students to answerindependently with no help from the teacher (thisstep is called testing.) The fourth step would be toreturn to the beginning of the format and repeat theentire task. This cycle of model-lead-test-recycle isrepeated until the entire format can be done withouterrors. Note that this procedure always involves thegroup and not merely the individual who made theerror. An important training task for the teacher isrecognizing when the children are firm and not keep-ing children on a task long after they have mastered it.

As the children become more competent, the stepof "presenting the correction to the group involvesprompts in which the children are asked to apply thestrategies they have learned. For example, if theteacher asks, "What does 4 + 2 equal?" and the groupanswers "5" the teacher would say, "No, 4 + 1 = 5, so4 + 2 equals how many?" The entire task would thenbe repeated.

In the Reading III program where rules and prin-ciples are taught, these same rules are used to correcterrors. Thus, when students become more advanced,errors in skills that have been taught using specificstrategies are corrected by applying those strategies.Thus, a misidentified word is sounded out, and amiscalculated problem is figured out using the appro-priate counting strategies.

Teaching To Criterion. Teaching to criterion, orworking on each task until all children are "firm" isthe most important teaching strategy. As written inthe Direct Instruction Manual, "All the children arerequired to respond to the questions so that each childis actively participating in the teaching-learning pro-cess and so that the teacher can know immediately ifeach child has learned the information. Errors thestudents make are handled as a group correction.Teachers are trained to correct the group so that otherstudents are prevented from making similar mistakes,the pressure is taken off the individual, the group iskept busy while focusing attention on an individualstudent.

Pacing. The suggested pace is quick. The teacherpresents tasks quickly, and asks questions to confirmthe children's understanding of the tasks. Hundredsof responses are required from the children for eachlesson. The teacher is expected to move brisklythrough the tasks both in order to maintain studentattention and also to cover more material. There is ahigh frequency of questions in each small group les-son. Hundreds of group and individual questions areasked during the allocated half hour.

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Tem

ple

Uni

vers

ity L

ibra

ries

] at

07:

07 1

2 N

ovem

ber

2014

Reinforcement. Praising the students for a goodperformance is a strong part of the program. Teachersare encouraged to give "task specific praise/' that is,letting the children know specifically what it was thatthey did that was good. In addition a classroom pointsystem is sometimes used to show children that thierwork leads to positive results. When a certain quota ofpoints is earned, the children exchange points forprivileges activities, awards, or small prizes such asbeing a line leader, doing other art activities, or re-ceiving merit certificates or crayons.

Individual Turns. Individual turns are included tomonitor the progress of specific individuals. Theseindividual turns are particularly important when itappears that the group has reached criterion, becauseat this point there may still be individuals who areweak. In practice, 70 percent of the responses arechoral, and 30 percent are individual turns.

Signals. As Brophy and Evertson (1974) learned,one of the problems with choral responding is thatmany students can echo the responses of others. In theDirect Instruction Program, teacher signals are used toindicate when the children are to respond. The use ofa teacher signal (e.g. pointing, moving the hand,clapping) requires the children to respond to unison.

Monitoring Student Progress. The ContinuousProgress Tests are given every six weeks in each of thethree subject areas: reading, language and math. Thetests cover the major content taught during the previ-ous six weeks. For each area which the group fails(e.g. symbol identification, word reading) specificlessons and tasks within these lessons are listed forreteaching. The Continuous Progress Tests can pro-vide information which allows the teacher to skiplessons if, for example, a group scores about 90 per-cent correct on two consecutive segments of the con-tinuous progress tests with no child requiring an in-dividual remedy.

Criterion Teaching Time. Criterion teaching time isa special 20 minute period in the afternoon whenchildren are firmed on tasks or lessons that aretroublesome. Individual children who need tutoring,children who have been absent, or children who areweak on certain tasks or skills receive extra teachingduring this time. The time can also be used to finish agroup lesson which was not finished during the regu-larly scheduled morning period because of an unex-pected event such as a fire drill or special assembly.

Teacher Training in Direct InstructionTeacher training in Oregon's Direct Instruction

usually consists of a five day workshop before ini-tiating the program followed by supervision andtraining in the classroom.

The objective of teacher training is to learn toperform the major skills in Direct Instruction. Theseinclude: securing attention, using signals, teaching tocriterion, individual turns, pacing, correcting incor-rect responses, monitoring student progress, andproviding individual remediation. The training itselfuses almost all of the Direct Instruction teaching skills.That is, teachers are taught through the model-lead-test procedure, instruction is recycled until 100 per-cent master}'is achieved, the trainer obtains attentionquickly and proceeds at a brisk pace, reinforcement isfrequent and specific, and the trainees are given ac-tive practice through choral responses in the groupsetting and through individual turns in small groups.The only elements of Direct Instruction which do notappear in training are continuous tests, use of work-sheets, and seating of the lowest performers close tothe trainer. The most critical elements in the teachingare also the most critical elements in the training:presenting and correcting using the model-lead-testprocedure, recycling until mastery is obtained, andactive practice. The group training sessions are fol-lowed by supervision and training in the classroom.This supervision can sometimes include the super-visor taking the teacher's group and modeling thedesired skills.

Training in presenting new material and in correctingstudent errors. Teacher training in the two major as-pects of the Direct Instruction program, presentingnew material and correcting student errors, followsthe same model-lead-test routine that is used in teach-ing and correcting students. That is, the trainer mod-els the desired teaching procedure, then leads theteachers in the procedure, and finally tests by havingeach teacher present in a small group. When workingwith a group of teachers, the trainer and the teacheralso perform the role of "students" and respond as atypical student would. For example, after a trainerdescribes the skill of teaching blends, the trainer thenmodels the skill with the teachers playing the role ofthe children. Next the trainer leads the teachers byresponding with them until they are teaching the for-mat confidently. The trainer then tests the teachers byhaving the teachers teach the format while the trainerresponds as the child. Any mistakes that the teachersmake are corrected by the trainer again modeling thebehavior then leading the teachers, and then havingthe teachers practice alone. This training loop con-tinues until the skill is mastered. Similarly, teachersare trained to handle incorrect answers, using themodel-lead-test sequence. Specific corrections arepracticed in inservice training so that the mistakesthat the students are most likely to make have beenidentified. In classroom practice, teachers tend to

Volume XVII, Number 3 269

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Tem

ple

Uni

vers

ity L

ibra

ries

] at

07:

07 1

2 N

ovem

ber

2014

make three types of errors: merely giving the studentthe correct answer, not correcting all student mis-takes, and not recyling to the start of a task when astudent makes a mistake. In classroom supervision,the supervisor works with the teacher and the groupby modeling the correct procedure and then leadingthe teacher in practicing the procedure.

In training teachers how to teach to 100 percentcriterion (or, making sure children are "firm") theteachers are taught to judge when a group response ishesitant as well as when a response is incorrect. Intraining, the trainer gives hesitant responses, firmresponses, arid incorrect responses in an unpredicta-ble order so that the teachers become accustomed tolistening to the student response.

After training, many teachers still have a "softcriterion," they are willing to accept responses thatare hesitant. A supervisor who observes this problemmodels for the teacher by teaching the group until it isfirm. Next the teacher teaches the group while thesupervisor judges the group's progress. Chronicteaching problems will be discussed in conferencesand later inservice sessions. In training for this still,then, the Direct Instruction principles of frequent,active practice and modeling are used.

Pacing is the most difficult teaching technique totrain. Pacing is knowing when to speed up, when toslow down, when to pause before a signal, and whichwords to emphasize. In training, teachers are taughtwhich words in a task are least important, to say thosewords quickly, and to identify which words are mostimportant and to pause and emphasise those words.The trainer models and leads the teachers on each stepof the task. Skills are practiced with many examples sothat the teachers can see the similar patterns of impor-tant words.and rhythms.

After training, the supervisors continue tomonitor teachers teaching groups in the classrooms.Supervisors model appropriate pacing by teaching agroup for a teacher and then having the teacher teach asimilar task. Seldom does a teacher pace too quickly,the model is usually to demonstrate speeding up thepresentation. In this example, as in the skill of teach-ing to mastery^ trainer modeling is accompanied byactive practice and breaking down of the skill intospecific parts. Training in other skills (e.g. securingattention, using signals, calling on individual stu-dents) is handled in the same manner. Trainer'smodel, lead, and test and provide active practiceand specific reinforcement. Training in skills suchas using the Continuous Progress Tests, skipping orreviewing lessons, arranging for criterion teachingtime, or monitoring daily worksheets is usually han-dled in the classroom visits. The trainers conduct in-270 Theory Into Practice

service meetings to discuss continuous test resultsand implications for skipping or reviewing lessons,scheduling criterion teaching time, and monitoringworksheets. Unlike the training sessions that focus onmastering small group teaching techniques, these areinformation sessions to review and discuss proce-dures with the teachers.

Additional Teacher Training Materials. Consistentwith the small-step structured format of Direct In-struction, the teacher presentation books contain de-tailed scripts to guide the presentation of each task.Tasks of a given type follow the same format. The useof common formats for many tasks simplifies theteacher's job because the teacher prepares for a lessonby focusing mainly on new formats or variations offormats already known.

The daily lessons also specify the main goal ofeach task, where the children are likely to make errors,and the specific teaching techniques which need to beused. The teacher's guide for each lesson also containscommon teaching errors (e.g. failure to firm childrenon certain terms), procedures for evaluating the chil-dren's performance, correction procedures when achild makes an error, tests for individual children,and correction procedures for individual children.Knowledge of format, whether a teacher can use sig-nals, the teaching strategy, and the specified exam-ples, is a major item in evaluating individual teachers.

Further Implications for Teacher Training

The instructional principles described in theOregon Direct Instruction program seem quite similarto those used in other experimental studies whichinvolved teacher training. In the Texas First GradeReading Group Study (Anderson, Brophy, andEvertson, 1977; Ogden, Brophy, and Evertson, 1977)an experimental study involving middle class stu-dents, the major skills were quite similar to thosedescribed above. These included:

starting lessons quickly;seating the students with their backs to the classand the teacher facing both the reading groupand the class;using a high frequency of questions;giving task specific praise and task specificcriticism;after presenting new material, checking studentunderstanding by asking questions or havingthem repeat the explanation;giving clues to help them decipher words;handling incorrect answers by giving a clue;and, avoid simply giving the correct answer.

Similarly, in the Missouri Mathematics Effec-

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Tem

ple

Uni

vers

ity L

ibra

ries

] at

07:

07 1

2 N

ovem

ber

2014

tiveness Project (Good, 1978) in which the 20 experi-mental fourth grade classrooms moved from the 25thpercentile to the 57th percentile in the SRA standard-ized test in 11 weeks, the instructional behaviorswhich the teachers implemented clearly represent di-rect instruction. The first eight minutes were spentcollecting the daily homework assignments and re-viewing the concepts and skills associated with thehomework. The next 20 minutes were spent on de-velopment. This began with the teacher explainingand demonstrating the new skills and concepts, fol-lowed by assessment of student comprehension byasking them to explain the process and supervisingthem as they worked two problems. Teachers wereinstructed to recycle this phase if students were mak-ing errors. Fifteen minutes were then spent on seat-work with the teacher helping students, letting themknow their work would be checked at the end of theperiod, and then checking selected students' work.About 15 minutes fo homework was assigned at theend of each class. Teacher also reviewed the pastweek's work every Monday, and the past month'swork every fourth Monday.

Thus, the general principles of direct instruction,academic focus, controlled practice, recycling untilmastery is achieved, and frequent review, are emerg-ing across a variety of studies in reading and mathachievement in the elementary grades. The fact thatindependent investigators developed similar skills isadditional validation of the concept of direct instruc-tion.

This general teaching paradigm appears to havethe following components:

1. use of instructional settings (small groups)which maximize student engagement;

2. teaching of new material in small steps;3. procedures for active student practice on

these small steps;4. procedures for monitoring student progress

at each step;5. procedures for correcting student errors;6. recycling of students, when necessary, untail

mastery is achieved;

7. monitoring of student progress throughweekly and monthly tests and reviewingwhere necessary;

8. sufficient time to complete the above ac-tivities.

The implications are that teacher training mightbe directed toward training in how to use this generalmodel and'or how to apply the model to specific con-texts such as first grade reading and fourth grademath. Given the empirical data on these three experi-mental studies, and the consistency between thismodel and reviews of correlational research (e.g.Rosenshine and Berliner, 1977; Medley, 1977) trainingteachers in such a model would seem more promisingthan training them in descrete skills such as clarity,enthusiasm, variability, and indirectness.

REFERENCES

Anderson, L.M., Brophy, J.E. and Evertson, C.M., AnExperimental Investigation of Teacher Feedback Behaviorsin First Grade Reading Groups. Austin Texas: R & D Centerfor Teacher Education, The University of Texas, 1977.

Becker, W.C., 'Teaching Reading and Language to theDisadvantaged." Harvard Educational Review, 1977, 54, pp.34-44.

Brophy, J.E. and Evertson, C.M., Process-Product Corre-lations in the Texas Teacher Effectiveness Study. Austin, Texas:Research and Development Center for Teacher Education,The University of Texas, 1974.

Good, T.L. "The Missouri Mathematics EffectivenessProject." Paper presented to the annual meeting of theAmerican Educational Research Association, 1978 Toronto.(School of Education, University of Missouri at Columbia).

Medley, Donald. "Teacher Competence and Teacher Effec-tiveness." Washington D.C. American Association of Col-leges for Teacher Education, 1977.

Ogden, J.E., Brophy, J.E., and Evertson, C.M. "An Ex-perimental Investigation of Organization and ManagementTechniques in First Grade Reading Groups." Austin, Texas:R& D Center for Teacher Education, The University of Texas,1977.

Rosenshine, B. "Classroom Instruction," In N.L. Gage(Ed.) The psychology of teaching methods. Seventy-fifty year-book of the National Society for the Study of Education.Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976, pp. 335-371.

Volume XV77, Number 3 271

Dow

nloa

ded

by [

Tem

ple

Uni

vers

ity L

ibra

ries

] at

07:

07 1

2 N

ovem

ber

2014