Teach students step-by-step the necessary technical skills and knowledge of their trade. Use a textbook, manual or other teaching resources to go through the material. For instance, academics learn rhetoric and genre writing while engineers learn the fundamentals of math and physics and programs such as CAD.
Check back to ensure the students are learning. Integrate teaching techniques throughout the lessons such as a "minute paper" for students to summarize the technique or skill, or have them write on a slip of paper "most difficult idea" to go over more thoroughly areas that confuse them. (Reference 5)
Pepper throughout the course discussions with students on the differences between practice of the trade or craft and the role the practice of the trade has in society. Explain that not only does the craft consist of mastery of specific skills, but these skills transform the lives of others. Ask them what they think the meaning is. Use biographies or articles for them to better understand how the craft is perceived by various stakeholders such as the government, social services, youth, families, the environment or businesses.
Detail the values or set of meanings about the craft that the students would ideally practice as members of this particular craft and how they can do it. For those practicing the craft of writing, for instance, this might be conveying a set of messages about the world that encourages people to think more deeply about their role in society, or increases public debate and knowledge. While this is done through the tools of rhetoric, grammar and words, the impact is theoretically conceptualized.
Explain that both logic and intuition are necessary in practicing a craft throughout your course. As William V. Dunning, artist and writer, says: Both common sense and training are necessary for creative processes, from scientific, technical to artistic. (Reference 4)
Introduce students to the idea that as practitioners they are in the position to analyze their own work and that of others. Teach them critical analysis by encouraging them to identify what criteria are relevant and used to judge their own and others' work.
Encourage students to maintain a community of people in their line of work through membership in trade organizations or updating their skills as technology develops or theory changes.