The Story of Teaching: How to Teach Anybody, Anything, Anywhere
A Short Step-by-Step Guide for Families and Caregivers
By Dr. Annie Snyder, Sr. Learning Scientist
As emergency pandemic learning has become the temporary mode of education across the nation, teachers have suddenly received more public appreciation than ever before.
How do teachers do this every day? has become a common question among parents and caregivers who have suddenly found themselves in the position of becoming co-educators with their children’s school teachers.
It’s a good question. How do teachers do it?
While it is not possible to summarize the years of training, experience, and wisdom that professional educators bring to the table in a few paragraphs, there is a general path to learning that can hold true for any teaching and learning experience — and they can be used by teachers and caregivers alike as they work toward maintaining forward learning momentum.
To start along the path, it can be helpful to think about the art and science of teaching through the lens of storytelling.
In fact, it has long been recognized that good teachers are master storytellers, since all teachers know that a learning experience can be thought of as a tale to be told — a tale with a beginning, a middle, and an end (and sometimes, the juicy hint of a sequel yet to come).
In honor of teachers and parent and caregiver co-teachers everywhere, and to support all those telling a learning story, here we outline some of the steps anyone can use to teach anybody, anything, anywhere.
The story starts like this:
THE BEGINNING
Step 1: Figure out what you want to teach. Keep it small, manageable, and focused.
You might be tempted to try and tackle the major political themes of War and Peace in one fell swoop…but this might be a little much for your second-grader. Try breaking large topics down into the smaller chunks that can build up into that larger learning goal (and keep in mind the age and development of your learners as well. Green Eggs and Ham might be a better choice in this case).
Step 2: Imagine what it would be like to learn these skills and concepts for the very first time.
Remember when you drove a car in traffic for the very first time? Odds are, everything seemed pretty overwhelming: from how to turn the lights on, to not pressing the brake instead of the accelerator, to the fact that actual cars were on the road and you didn’t want to hit them. As you are getting ready to tell the story of your topic, remember that your learners are getting ready to go into traffic for the first time. What might they need in order to be ready?
Step 3: Figure out what your audience already knows.
The cool thing about the human brain is that its design allows learners to build upon and shape what it already knows, and that makes learning new things easier. The trick here is to figure out what the learner already knows — so you can build on that. You can do this by:
- Asking questions (“Hey, what do you already know about the Civil War?”)
- Giving a little quiz
- Asking them to try out a task to see what they can already do.
This will help you figure out which things to focus on in the next few steps.
THE MIDDLE
Step 4: Explain, model, demonstrate.
This is the step most people think of first when they think about teaching. As the teacher, this is the time to show off your own skills and knowledge, model how something can be done, and demonstrate with examples. Teachers often ask lots of questions and engage their learners in discussions during this time, to make sure their learners are following along. (Great teachers also use this time to note any places where they themselves might need to brush up on things.)
Step 5: Do it again, together.
In a lot of ways, this step is a lot like the one before it, but this time the learner is more actively involved in the process. Here, the learner is trying things out with the new skills and information, but the teacher is still ready to support the learner as needed. It’s important to keep in mind that failure, mistakes, and struggles are good and desirable at this stage. Some of the very richest learning happens during the time when the learner almost…but not quite…gets it.
THE END (or is it?)
Step 6: Practice, practice, practice.
Independent practice with new information and skills is the ticket to long-term learning. Practicing during the initial learning session is an important step in the journey, but it’s not the only step. The human brain actually learns best with spaced practice that occurs over time. Spaced practice allows learners to practice immediately after encountering new information and skills, and then again a few days later, and then yet again a few weeks later. In each practice session, learning is enhanced even further if teachers provide feedback, so learners know if they are still on the right track.
TO BE CONTINUED…
What happens next? At the end of the lesson, teachers will often do two quick things to ensure the learning moment is not lost:
- Review what was covered during the lesson, and
- Dangle a little hint about what might come next.
How these things happen is up to the teacher, but the more interactive they are, the more likely the learner will remember them.
For example, a teacher may ask probing questions rather than just reading a summary of the lesson (e.g. “we just learned about states of matter. Now look in your cup — I see ice cubes! Do you think those are solid, liquid, or gas? Do you think it’s possible for something to be two states of matter at the same time? Let’s find out tomorrow”).
THE AFTERWORD
As all teachers discover, an excellent learning experience, just like an excellent story, is unique to the storyteller and the listener. The story you choose to tell together, whether it’s about how to bake a cake or how to apply Pythagorean’s Theorem, will open up new adventures for both you and your learner — even when staying safe at home.
Dr. Anne Snyder, Senior Learning Scientist within the Applied Learning Sciences team at McGraw-Hill, holds a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from Columbia University. She joined McGraw-Hill in 2016 and previously held numerous roles spanning the education industry, including as an elementary school teacher.
