Research that spans over two decades indicates that for effective teaching to take place there must be an orchestration of a variety of skills that have to be adapted to various contexts.
Students learn more when their teachers emphasize more on achievement of learning objectives. This is achieved by establishing expectations, allocating time, and use effective managing strategies to ensure maximization of academic time. Teachers are supposed to pace the students through the curriculum briskly but in small steps that allow high achievement of success. Teachers who want quality learning to occur in their classrooms deliberately pace and deliver content in ways that allow all learners to engage in intellectual activities that promote quality learning
There is a need for the correct pacing in class to keep students on task and provide engaging and motivating lessons that minimize class management issues. the lesson pacing has to be kept lively so as to prevent the students from engaging in off-task behavior especially when the lesson is long and boring or too difficult.
The teacher should assess the knowledge background of the students so as to be updated and plan for an appropriate variety of teaching strategies. This should be geared towards making the students interested and motivated.
For the English learning students’ class, the lesson has to be paced in accordance to language and intellectual abilities unlike in the other case without English learners.
The teacher is supposed to give reflection to the sequence of language development skills which include listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The teacher may formulate necessary alterations in the language of instruction according to individual student’s language aptitude, an important factor that also should determine the pacing of instruction. In English learning class, pacing modifications focus mainly on vocabulary and concept development; in the other case, the medium of instruction focuses on a process strategy to the subject matter. Instructional personnel should watchfully investigate course selections and assignments at the students’ instructional levels in the textbooks. Additional pacing modifications may include clearing up particular language terms in words familiar to the students while writing shorter and less complex sentences.
The teacher can also assign short homework tasks that require reading and teach the words that signal sequence. There is also modification in terms of inspection understanding of written language that may put across complex concepts.
For easy understanding, the teacher may rephrase story problems in simpler language by making use of shorter sentences and images.
Most consistent and replicated result findings link the student’s achievement to their opportunity to learn the material and to be specific the degree to which the teachers carry the content to the students personally through active instruction and move them all through the curriculum. The amount of content a student learns is correlated to the opportunity to learn, whether it is measured in terms of the pages covered in the curriculum or the number of items taught by the use of lectures or recitation. The movement of content from the teacher to the students depends on the complexity of the information. The easy content paces faster from the teacher to the student.
It is important for the teacher to provide modified instruction in English without oversimplifying the content. Difficult or complicated content material will not be interpreted or understood easily by the English learners therefore the pacing will definitely slow down.
Correct pacing will ensure that all students including the ELLs are held to the same high expectation of achievement and they must be evaluated to show that they uphold the content standards.
Reference
Hofmeister, A., & Lubke, M. (1999). Research into practice: Implementing effective teaching strategies (3rd ed.). Logan, UT: Utah State University.