Consider your teaching approach and tailor it to fit your students' interests and intellectual needs. Break up the monotony of a long lecture with alternate teaching methods, such as videos, PowerPoint presentations or hands-on experimentation. Use these alternate techniques to accommodate students with other learning styles, such as visual and kinesthetic learning. For instance, instead of describing the process of cellular division, show a video or incorporate a short Internet clip of the division process to allow students to see the process in action.
Present information using cultural mediums and subjects that are familiar and enjoyable to your students. Incorporate the same teaching goals and techniques, but use a familiar vehicle to get the information across. As an example, substitute books like “Twilight” or a selection from the “Star Wars” genre in place of some of the more dated books on your reading list. Use these books to teach students to locate plot points, major themes, important characters and literary devices.
Engage your students in direct discussion, asking questions for them to answer and listening to their responses. If you notice significant interests from your students, evidenced by numerous questions on the same subject, integrate this interest into future lessons. For instance, if your government or social studies students ask repeatedly about unemployment statistics after hearing their parents discussing the issue at home, incorporate a lesson on unemployment. Include information about how the statistic is generated, what it means and the economic reasoning behind the full employment target statistic.
Incorporate group projects and student presentations into your lesson plans. Use these presentations as an opportunity to demonstrate to your students how to get involved with the lesson. Ask questions during student presentations and play the role of the attentive student. For example, if you assign your students poems to read and analyze for a presentation, sit in the audience and engage your presenters with questions about each poem. Ask them to consider alternate meanings for lines of poetry and encourage them to speculate on the author’s purpose.