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for all groups to use at the same time, she plans lesson-relevant activities for groups to accomplish as they
are waiting to use the equipment. She creates an overhead slide with a schedule showing students which
groups use the equipment first and which groups use the equipment next. She prepares handouts to make
sure students understand what they are doing and why they are doing it at each step.
Providing needed training. Providing needed training refers to teaching students all the routines
and lesson-specific procedures that they need to carry out the day’s lesson efficiently. Effective teachers are
constantly teaching students general routines; sometimes they must also teach procedures specific to a
particular lesson, as when students are using special equipment in a particular lesson. Rachel has been
providing training in effective groupwork throughout the year. She begins the lesson with a short refresher;
she asks students what kinds of questions they are expected to ask each other during experiments (e.g.,
“What are our results?” “How can we explain these results?” “What do you think?” “Could you explain
your ideas more?” “What’s the evidence for this claim?”). She gives them the handout with step-by-step
explanations; she goes over the procedure with them and answers several questions. She then trains
students in two lesson-specific procedures. Students first practice feeling their pulse to make sure that they
can find it. Then she spends 3 minutes demonstrating to them how to use her apparatus to measure lung
volume. She has one group demonstrate how to do it to make sure that everyone understands.
Providing clear instructional signals during the lesson. Providing clear instructional signals
means clearly communicating to students what the instructional goals are, what the different parts of the
lesson are, and how the different parts of the lesson will help them achieve their goals. When providing
signals, teachers also provide cues to keep students informed about where they are in the sequence of
activities (e.g., “We’ll start with group work today”; “the purpose of the next activity is to take what you
learned from the group work and apply it to your own individual work”). Rachel clearly communicates with
students that the goal of the lesson is for them to generate their own scientific explanation—based on the
evidence they gather—of what happens to the human body during exercise. As they proceed through the
lesson, step by step, Rachel provides clear instructions to ensure that her students understand how each
activity will help them develop their explanation. When it is time for students to move to the different parts
of the room, she gives clear instructions on where each group is supposed to be at each step. After the
experiment, she reminds them what their goal is, and she coaches them on how to generate an explanation
using their data.
Monitoring students’ behavior during the lesson. When monitoring students’ behavior,
teachers keenly watch students to see how they are doing—not just whether they are on task but whether
they are mastering the key learning goals. During her science lesson, Rachel circulates among the class,
making sure that each group is carrying out the experiments correctly and that the students are asking each
other the questions that they have learned to ask. She gives help and feedback as needed. The teacher is
prepared for what to do if a student does not engage appropriately in the activity: If a nonverbal or verbal
warning does not work, she will have that student sit at her desk until he or she is ready to participate
properly. We will discuss more about monitoring students’ behavior in the next section.
Following up appropriately on the lesson. Following up appropriately on the lesson includes
making sure that students understand what the goal of the lesson was, collecting and filing away all student
work, ensuring that equipment is put away properly, and checking that everything is ready for the next
period (for secondary school teachers) or the next lesson (for elementary school teachers). Rachel follows
up on her science lesson by making sure that she saves 5 minutes at the end of class for the lesson wrap-up.
She first checks that all equipment has been collected and that everything has been cleaned up. When she
sees that a small amount of water has spilled next to one bucket, she asks the nearest student to wipe it up
with paper towels that she has stacked next to each bucket. Simultaneously, she collects students’ written
work, putting the papers she has collected into her file folder for that class period. Before the bell rings, she