Danielle Ruff

InTASC Standard 8: Instructional Strategies

For this particular InTASC standard, the teacher must implement a variety of

instructional strategies in the classroom that meet the needs of the students, help students

understand the material, and challenge them to apply their knowledge. As a teacher, instruction

should always be designed based off of the needs of the students. For example, during my middle

school rotation at Magnolia, it was appropriate for me to model to the students certain activities

before allowing them to complete the activity on their own. However, in my high school rotation,

it was not as necessary to always model an activity before allowing my students to complete it.

Students in middle school usually need more instruction and modeling because of their

developmental needs, so it was appropriate for me to give more guidance towards the students in

middle school. When planning for instructional strategies in the classroom, it is also important to

consider challenging students and using higher order thinking. A tool to use when planning for

instructional strategies is the Blooms Taxonomy framework. This framework is designed on a

hierarchy system, where teacher can ask questions or design activities from lower level thinking

gradually to the highest order of thinking. Using this framework will help me design

instructional strategies that gradually challenge students and make learning applicable and more

meaningful then just recalling information needed to pass an assessment.

What is this artifact?

The artifact demonstrating this InTASC standard is my microteaching lesson. I designed

a lesson and implemented the lesson to some of my colleagues. My colleagues had the

opportunity to critique both my skills as a teacher in the classroom as well as the instructional

strategies I used for the lesson.

How does this artifact demonstrate mastery of the InTASC or COE standard?

This lesson is designed for a seventh grade life science class on the topic of food chains

and trophic levels. I used specific instructional strategies for this lesson to introduce new

vocabulary and then an activity to apply their knowledge using the new vocabulary. The

instructional strategy that was specific for this lesson was to introduce vocabulary in a way

where students define the vocabulary terms based on their prior knowledge before delivering

them the actual definition. This strategy provided for a more student-centered and meaningful

activity because the students had to be active thinkers rather than just passively copying down in

their notes vocabulary terms and definitions. This strategy also helped me assess the student’s

background knowledge and any misconceptions the students have before delivering the content.

In what way does this artifact contribute to/relate to a positive effect on student learning?

The instructional strategies used in this lesson were intended to be engaging for students.

I wanted my “students” to be engaged in the vocabulary activity and in order to do that I made

the vocabulary activity student- centered. If I simply provided the terms and definitions to the

students and told them to memorize them, then they would be passive learners, not be thinking

and questioning the information and more than likely not retain any of the new vocabulary.

How does this artifact demonstrate the Planning-Teaching-Learning cycle (judging prior

learning, planning instruction, teaching, assessing, analyzing, and reflecting)?

The lesson demonstrates the “planning instruction,” of the Planning-Teaching Learning

cycle because I intentionally planned the vocabulary activity to be student-centered. I thought it

was important for students to be active participants in learning vocabulary and thinking about the

terms, so I designed instruction where students had to try to define the vocabulary terms on their

own based on prior knowledge, before actually being provided with the correct definition.