EDU 528, WEEK 3, PART 1: Characteristics and Skills of a Motivating Instructor

Slide # Topic Narration

Slide 1 Introduction Welcome to Methods of Teaching in Adult Education. In this lesson, we will discuss Characteristics and Skills of a Motivating Instructor.

Next slide.Slide 2 Topics The following topics will be covered in this lesson:

Expertise: the power of knowledge and preparation;

Empathy: the power of understanding and compassion;

Enthusiasm: the power of commitment and expressiveness;

Clarity: the power of organization and language; and

Cultural responsiveness: the power of respect and social responsibility.

Next slide. Slide 3 Expertise: the power

of knowledge and preparation

There is one thing that is quite refreshing about the skills of motivating instructors; that is their characteristics can be learned, and planned for everyone who instructs adults. There are five core characteristics of the skills of the motivating instructors. Here we will begin with expertise.

Expertise refers to the power of knowledge and preparation. Expertise is also known as substance, knowledge, or competence. To the instructor of adults expertise falls into three categories:

Knowing something is beneficial for adults;Knowing it well; andBeing prepared to convey or construct it with adults through an instructional process.

Teaching adults is challenging because as learners, adults are demanding. More adults have had more experiences than their instructor, therefore the instructor cannot influence them by using age, or experience or, even a title. Most of the adults know exactly what they want to learn. For example they want learning that will help them build new skills. Their main question when they come to the

instructor is “can you really help me?” To address this question, instructors must be able to connect their knowledge with the daily needs and lives of their students. Also taking into consideration of the learners’ perspectives and their prior knowledge.

There are a number of questions that instructors should ask themselves in order to determine whether they know their subject well, before they can instruct adults. An instructor should determine whether she or he can explain the material she is going to teach in her or his own words. Knowing the subject well also implies being able to generate a number of different examples. In a situation where the instructor is teaching a skill, then the instructor must be able to demonstrate that skill or use other resources that can do that. It is also important for the instructor to be aware of the limits and consequences of what she or he is teaching, and take into consideration the learners’ prior knowledge. Also important is the need for the instructor to be aware of the staff she or he doesn’t know. Intensive preparation is vital before any instruction is delivered. Thorough preparation ensures that as instructors we are completely familiar with the material we are presenting and we are not tied to our notes. Teaching becomes more of a conversation with students. The instruction flows well, and enables the instructor to read the learners cues, and the learners participate actively.

Next slide. Slide 4 Empathy: The power

of Understanding and compassion

The second characteristic is empathy. Because most adults learn mainly in response to their own goals and perceptions and not those of their instructors, instructors need empathy to be able to motivate these students. There are three parts of empathy for the instructors of adult learners. We will discuss each one of them separately.

First, as instructors, we must have a realistic understanding of the learners’ goals, perspectives, and expectations of what is being learned. An instructor must be familiar with ways of gathering information about the learner’s goals, perspectives, and expectations. Some of these methods include, experience or observation, written surveys, interviews, group sessions and forums, and conversations with colleagues, friends or family.

Regardless of the method used to gather information about students, instructors should always let students know the information they have gathered about them.

Second, as instructors, we must adapt our instruction to the level learners’ levels of experience and skill development. It is the responsibility of the instructor to give students the things that are within their reach-meaning not too easy or too difficult. There are always ways of finding out about our learners’ capabilities, such as interviews and paper-and-pencil tests.

The third thing to do as an instructor is to continuously consider the learners’ perspectives and feelings. Adult learners always want to know that their instructors care about them, and also understand them as human beings. Learners want us to listen to them. The way we listen to the learners tells them how much consideration we are giving them. Our body language and tone of voice can also send a message of our responses to students as to whether we understand their feelings or not. This is referred to as attunement. Empathy can also be conveyed through validation.

Next slide.Slide 5 Enthusiasm: The

power of commitment and expressiveness

The third characteristic is enthusiasm. This is the power of commitment and expressiveness. Enthusiastic instructors are people who value and care deeply about their subject matter. These instructors teach by expressing those feelings so as to encourage similar feelings in the learner. Enthusiasm has two basic criteria.

The first criteria is that as instructors, we value what we teach for ourselves and as well as for the learner. The fact that we have interest in our subject means that we value it. However, there are a number of ways in which we can demonstrate that that we value what we teach. Examples include:

Devoting time to understand the subject better;Becoming active members of organizations specialized in our subject; andReading magazines, journals, and articles in our subject area.

We can turn ourselves into enthusiastic instructors by

contributing in our fields through specialization.

The second criterion is that we must display our commitment with appropriate degrees of emotion and expressiveness. As instructors we must allow ourselves to have feelings about what we teach and be able to express them. For example, we can let students know how we are moved with their discoveries. We can also use dramatization and real-world examples to express our enthusiasm.

There is no universal instrument that can be used to measure teachers’ enthusiasm, but there are some indicators that are found in most of the instruments that measure teachers’ enthusiasm. Some of those indicators include displaying energy and vitality, and gesturing with both arms and hands.

As instructors, it is also important to be aware of some of the things that can destroy enthusiasm. Some of those things include:

Doing the same thing over in and again; Lack of success;Loss of purpose;Living in the; andPlateauing. Next slide.

Slide 6 Clarity: The power of organization and language

Instructional clarity means teaching something in such a way that it is not difficult for learners to understand and is also organized so that the learners can follow smoothly and participate in the lesson. A number of studies have shown that instructional clarity is positively associated with learning. However, it is not easy to prescribe what an instructor can do to be certain of instructional clarity. Though this is the case there are two standards that can be considered as guidelines.

As instructors, we must plan and conduct instruction so that all learners can follow and understand. Here, there are a number of things that an instructor can do. Some of those things include- : Envision problems that learners will have learning the material- find ways of making ideas easier to understand, such as the use of graphics or analogies – use checkpoints in the form of questions- have a good introduction to the lesson, and- rehearsing

directions for learning activities such as simulations.

During instruction clarity can be achieved by doing a number of things such as signaling transitions from one major topic to another by using phrases such as “now we turn to.” Explanatory links such as then, because, should be used to put ideas together. It is also important to use words that are familiar to the learners.

We can also achieve clarity by providing a way for learners to comprehend what has been taught if it is not initially clear. There are a number of ways in which this can be done. For example, the instructor may review the difficult material. Sometimes instructor may ask students to complete the Instructional Checklist. The checklist helps the instructor to get feedback from the students to find out whether the learners understand the instructor. This information can help the instructor to come up with a way of helping the students.

Next slide.Slide 7 Cultural

ResponsivenessThe fifth and the last characteristic of a motivating instructor is cultural responsiveness. There are two qualities of cultural responsiveness- respect for diversity and social responsibility. There are three guidelines for cultural responsiveness that we will discuss here.

Firstly, as instructors we need to create a safe, inclusive, and respectful environment. Among other things, a safe learning environment provides students we the security they need to express themselves freely-give personal opinion, they are not afraid to show their lack of knowledge.

One way of ensuring that the students feel secure is to ensure that students have a non-blameful view of other people. Whenever problems and disagreements arise, instructors should use them as opportunities for further learning instead of assigning blame. However, avoiding blame should not be used a scapegoat for failure to engage in critical reasoning. In a safe, inclusive, and respectful environment, everyone is responsible for the construction of knowledge. This approach takes into consideration of the learners’ ideas, feelings and concerns and allows the learners to expose their thinking.

Secondly, we need to engage the motivation of all learners. It is always a challenge to deal with the learners’ lack of motivation to learn. Instead of working only with those students who seem to be motivated to learn, instructors should understand that all learners become intrinsically motivated when what they are learning makes sense and is also important to them.

Thirdly, we need to relate course content and learning to the social concerns of learners and the broader concerns of society. There is an undeniable connection between school and the society. School directly contributes to the construction of the individual and society. As instructors we have a social responsibility to promote equity and justice. The model of cultural competence can help instructors to be more equitable and effective with students coming from diverse cultural grounds. Culture competence has three critical elements; one of them is the self-understanding and awareness of one’s own cultural values and biases.

Next slide.Slide 8 Check Your

Understanding

Slide 9 Summary We have now have reached the end of this lesson. Let’s take a look at what we have covered.

We started our discussion by examining Expertise: The power of knowledge and preparation. Here we learned that, to the instructor of adults expertise falls into three categories:

Knowing something is beneficial for adults;Knowing it well; andBeing prepared to convey or construct it with adults through an instructional process.

We then examined, Empathy: The power of understanding and compassion. Here we learned that because most adults learn mainly in response to their own goals and perceptions and not those of their instructors, instructors need empathy to be able to motivate these students. We also learned that there are three parts of empathy for the instructors of adult learners. Namely

instructors must have a realistic understanding of the learners’ goals, perspectives, and expectations of what is being learner. Instructors must also adapt our instruction to the level learners’ levels of experience and skill development, and instructors must continuously consider the learners, perspectives and feelings.

Next, we discussed Enthusiasm: The power of commitment and expressiveness. Here we learned that Enthusiastic instructors are people who value and care deeply about their subject matter. Enthusiasm has two basic criteria: As instructors, we value what we teach for ourselves and as well as for the learner and secondly, we must display our commitment with appropriate degrees of emotion and expressiveness. We also learned that though there is no universal instrument that can be used to measure teachers’ enthusiasm, there are some indicators that are found in most of the instruments that measure teachers’ enthusiasm such as displaying energy and vitality and gesturing with both arms and hands. Instructors also need to be aware of things that destroy enthusiasm.

We then discussed clarity: The power of organization and language. Here we learned that studies have shown that instructional clarity is positively associated with learning. Though it is not easy to prescribe what an instructor can do to guarantee instructional clarity, there are two standards that can be considered as guidelines:

Instructors must plan and conduct instruction so that all learners can follow and understand; andInstructors must provide a way for learners to comprehend what has been taught if it is not initially clear.

Finally, we examined cultural responsiveness: The power of respect and social responsibility. Here we learned that there are three guidelines for cultural responsiveness:

Instructors need to create a safe, inclusive, and respectful environment;Instructors need to engage the motivation of all learners; andInstructors need to relate course content and learning to the social concerns of learners and the broader concerns of society.

The model of cultural competence can help instructors to be more equitable and effective with students coming from diverse cultural grounds.

This completes this lesson.