Elementary educators often use direct instruction to introduce new material and present difficult concepts. Direct instruction is a lecture-based format. Although progressivist trends in education have tended to disregard direct instructional methods in favor of more discussion-based formats, direct instruction is necessary in situations in which the educator must control the lesson to teach critical concepts. It allow educators to maintain focus on a topic.
Often, educators supplement direct instruction with discussion or other activities that involve students in learning. For instance, an educator may present a lesson on the Civil Rights movement with a lecture and encourage discussion by having students reflect on certain themes of the lesson. Discussion compels students to think critically and engage in learning. It also affirms each student’s role in the instructional environment, making students feel like active participants in their learning.
Elementary educators encourage collaborative learning to teach young learners the skills required to interact productively with peers. For instance, teachers arrange students in pairs or small groups and assign them a project or task. Collaborative projects compel students to work with people who have different tastes, preferences and ideas. These kinds of projects also expose students to different cultural and personal backgrounds.
An effective teaching strategy at the elementary level is to reinforce oral instruction with visual aids and hands-on activities. Specifically, teachers can use images or graphics with the lecture or write notes and concepts on the blackboard. For instance, if teaching students about a species of frog, a teacher could display pictures of the frog on an overhead projector. The teacher also could list characteristics or facts about the frog on the board so that students can take notes on what they see as well as hear. Students can also practice lessons and concepts with hands-on activities and experiments. For instance, students could make a three-dimensional clay sculpture of a frog based on what they've learned, or make models of a poisonous and a nonpoisonous frog.