Handbook of psychology volume 7 educational psychology

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Teaching Processes in Elementary and Secondary Education

on achievement tests than students in classrooms where en-

gagement was lower). This work was more decidedly qualita-

tive and intended to develop a theory of effective elementary

teaching rather than quantitatively hypothetico-deductive (see

Strauss & Corbin, 1998). The theory that emerged was that ex-

cellent teachers do much well: (a) They develop a motivating

classroom atmosphere, (b) classroom management is superb,

and (c) their curriculum and instructional decisions sum to

excellent teaching for all students.

A Motivating Classroom Atmosphere

Effective elementary teachers create a motivating classroom

environment. Excellent teachers have both the physical envi-

ronment and the psychological input to the students aligned

to promote engagement and learning.

Physical Environment

The teacher has constructed a comfortable and inviting place

for learning, with many educational materials readily acces-

sible for students. For example, there are reading corners

filled with great books, listening stations with tapes of fa-

vorite stories, and math labs with concrete manipulatives

(e.g., play money, counting blocks) that appeal to students.

Charts and maps that can support teaching and learning are

hung so that they can be used during teaching and referenced

easily by students. The classroom is decorated with fun and

attractive items (e.g., brightly colored signs, posters that are

appealing to the eye). Some of the decorations are student-

produced work. The displays change frequently as the sea-

sons change, new topics are covered in class, and students

produce new products that can be showcased. Posters reflect

some of the psychological virtues the teacher espouses for the

classroom (e.g., exerting effort, making good choices, high

expectations), making salient the interconnections between

the physical and psychological classroom worlds.

Psychological Environment

Excellent teachers promote community in their classroom

and it shows—beginning with their communications (e.g., our

class, we work together). The teacher makes frequent connec-

tions to students, mentioning in passing a student’s achieve-

ment, alluding to the birth of a sibling, and expressing empathy

to a child who has a reason to feel blue (e.g., a grandparent is

ill)—that is, excellent teachers send the message that they are

interested in students’ lives, which are valuable. The teacher’s

communications are filled with respect for students, and the

students’ communications mirror that respect—for example,

with many please and thank-you comments. Teachers remind

students often about the virtues of being helpful, respectful,

and truthful with one another. Excellent teachers have gentle,

caring manners in the classroom, with positive interactions in

abundance. The teacher is often playful with the kids (e.g., ac-

tually playing with them during recess, kidding around with

them as they work). Excellent teachers typically have good

senses of humor—for example, laughing at themselves when

they make a mistake solving an arithmetic problem. Good

teachers model inclusion and embrace diversity by including

all of the children in the class and celebrating openly the

various traditions and backgrounds represented by students

(e.g., celebrating with genuine enthusiasm Columbus Day,

St. Patrick’s Day, and Martin Luther King Day). Cooperation

is encouraged (e.g., much cooperative learning), as is altruism

(students helping other students, making valentines for people

in nursing homes, collecting soda cans to donate the proceeds

to an adopted family in Guatemala).

The classroom is also a democratic place. There are seri-

ous discussions between students and teachers about class-

room issues (e.g., how disobedience should be handled, how

the needs of individuals can be balanced against the needs of

the entire class). Sometimes these discussions take up matters

of power and inequity (e.g., how kids don’t always get the re-

spect they deserve). Good teachers reduce such inequalities

by permitting the students to make up classroom rules and

to be involved in decision making (e.g., what novel to read

next). When students disagree, respectful disagreement is en-

couraged and compromises are sought (e.g., if the vote be-

tween two novels is split, it might be resolved by a coin flip,

with the decision to read the losing novel after the winning

novel is completed).

The teacher does much to create an interesting classroom.

He or she arouses curiosity (e.g., Listen carefully. You’ll find

out some of the answers to the questions we’ve been asking.

or Go ahead and open our new book—see anything interest-

ing?). The good teacher creates anticipation (e.g., Tomorrow,

I’m going to teach you how I figure out those percentages on

tests, which will be cool.).

Excellent teachers create classrooms emphasizing effort.

The teacher lets students know that they can do the assigned

tasks if they try, also making clear that the way smart people

became smart was by trying hard and thus learning much.

Good teachers send the message that school tasks deserve at-

tention and serious effort and that much good comes from

doing and reflecting on school work. When students have dif-

ficulties, the teacher encourages stick-to-itiveness, letting the

students know that they can succeed by persevering. The

teacher does not attribute either student successes or failures

to luck, ability, or task difficulty—factors out of the students’

control. The teacher downplays competition, emphasizing not

who is doing better than others in the class but that students

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163

are improving. The teacher encourages effort in many ways—

for example, often remarking Who can tell me? Who remem-

bers? Make your best guess if you are not sure.

Excellent teachers create classrooms downplaying perfor-

mance outcomes—that is, the teacher does not make salient

who is doing well and who is not. Grades are not made pub-

licly (e.g., by calling grades in or putting papers with the best

grades on display). The teacher does not criticize student mis-

takes. There are no academic games with obvious losers (e.g.,

a spelling bee) but rather academic games in which everyone

wins often (e.g., social studies Jeopardy in which students are

made to feel they are winners when they get the answer in

their heads).

Excellent teachers foster self-regulation. They give their

students choice in their work (e.g., allowing students to select

which books they will read). Students in excellent elementary

classrooms are expected to move from task to task on their

own rather than wait for teacher direction. Students are en-

couraged to set their own goals (e.g., how many books to read

in a month). The teacher honors student ownership of their

own work and control of it (e.g., Would you mind if other

children look at what you wrote?). In short, the teacher wants

students to be in charge of themselves.

The excellent teacher publicly values learning. The teacher

frequently makes remarks about the value of education, using

the mind, and achieving dreams through academic pursuits.

The teacher is enthusiastic about academic pursuits, such as

reading books and writing. The excellent teacher does not em-

phasize extrinsic rewards (e.g., stickers) for doing things aca-

demic but rather focuses on the intrinsic rewards (e.g., the

excitement felt when one is reading a particular novel, the

sense of accomplishment accompanying effective writing).

The excellent teacher also has high expectations about

students, communicating frequently to students that they can

learn at a high level (e.g., Wow, third graders, this is stuff usu-

ally covered in fifth grade, and you are doing great with it.).

Moreover, excellent teachers are determined that students in

their charge will learn. Even so, excellent teachers have real-

istic ambitions and goals for their students, encouraging their

students to try tasks they can accomplish—ones that with

effort are within their reach.

Excellent teachers create classrooms filled with helpful

feedback—especially praising students when they do well

and trying to do so immediately. Teachers do not give blanket

praise, but rather are very explicit in their praise (e.g., I really

like this story—it is a page longer than your last story, with

much better spelling and punctuation and a great ending.).

In summary, excellent teachers go to great lengths to cre-

ate a generally motivating classroom atmosphere. In fact,

the classroom day is saturated with teacher actions that moti-

vate. For example, Bogner et al. (2002) studied 7 first-grade

teachers and found that two were much more motivating than

were the others in the sample (e.g., their students were much

more engaged in academic activities than were students in

other classes). One of these two teachers used 43 different

motivational mechanisms to encourage her students over the

course of the school day, with many of these mechanisms

used multiple times; the other used 47 different approaches—

again, with many repeated multiple times. In both class-

rooms, the motivational attempts were always positively

toned and never punitive or critical of students. In contrast,

much more criticism and far fewer approaches to motivating

students were observed in the other five classrooms.

Dolezal, Mohan, and Pressley (2002) conducted a similar

study at the third-grade level. Their most engaging teacher

used 45 different motivating mechanisms over the course of

the school day, compared to far fewer motivational mecha-

nisms in other third-grade classrooms, in which students

were much less engaged. Excellent teachers create classroom

environments that are massively motivating: It is impossible

to be in their rooms for even a few minutes without several

explicit teacher actions intended to motivate student engage-

ment and learning.

Effective Classroom Management

The classroom management of effective teachers is so good

that observers hardly notice it—there is little misbehavior

in the classroom and rarely a noticeable disciplinary event.

This result is due in part to a classroom management strategy

that has at its core the development of self-regulated students.

Self-Regulation Routines

Effective teachers make clear from early in the year how stu-

dents in the class are supposed to act. The teacher communi-

cates to students that is important for them to learn and carry

out the classroom routines and act responsibly. There are rou-

tines for many daily classroom tasks (e.g., a hot lunch counter

can on the teacher’s desk, with students depositing their token

counter in the can)—tasks that can consume much time in or-

dinary classrooms (i.e., the lunch counter can eliminate the

need for the teacher to do lunch count during the morning

meeting). An especially important routine is for students to

learn that they are to keep on working even if the teacher is not

available; the internalization of this routine is obvious in effec-

tive classrooms because it does not matter whether the teacher

is in the room—everyone works regardless of the teacher’s ab-

sence. Early in the year, excellent teachers teach their students

how to work cooperatively, and for the rest of the year, coop-

erative learning is the norm. In short, just as excellent teachers

have high academic expectations of students, they also have

high behavioral expectations.

164

Teaching Processes in Elementary and Secondary Education

Explanations and Rationales

Excellent teachers do not simply pronounce rules. Rather, they

explain why the classroom community has the rules and regu-

lations that are in place. Explanations are also given as the

teacher makes important decisions (e.g., why the class is going

to the library tomorrow rather than today, why the class is

reading the current story and how it connects with the current

social studies unit). The message is clear that the classroom is

a reasonable world rather than an arbitrary one.

Monitoring

Excellent teachers monitor their classes and show high

awareness of what everyone is doing. Excellent teachers act

quickly when students experience frustrations or are getting

off task (e.g., asking a student with wandering attention what

he or she is doing and what he or she should be doing). When

excellent teachers detect potential disruptions, they respond

quickly and efficiently to eliminate such disruptions (e.g.,

giving paper towels to a student who just spilled, helping the

student so that the spill is cleaned up quietly). 

Discipline

There are few discipline events; the teacher does not have to

use discipline or disciplinary threats to keep students on task.

In fact, excellent teachers do not threaten their students. If

punishment is necessary, it is done quietly and in a way that

gets the student back on task very quickly. Thus, excellent

teachers never send students to a time-out corner; rather, they

swiftly move to correct the behavior and get the student back

to the work assigned at the place where the work should be per-

formed (e.g., whispering to the student We’ll talk at recess.).

Excellent Use of Other Adults

Excellent teachers use parent volunteers and classroom aides

well. Basically, these adults interact with the children much like

the teacher: They provide support as needed, always in a posi-

tive way. Such good use happens because excellent teachers

coach volunteers and aids well, making certain they know what

to do to be consistent with the ongoing philosophy, instruction,

and curriculum in the classroom. Excellent teachers often use

such adults to provide additional help to weaker students—for

example, listening to weaker readers read or helping weaker

arithmetic students with challenging problems. (Often, during

our visits, parents and aides told us how excellent the teacher

was, reflecting that good teachers inspire great confidence in

the other adults who work in their classrooms!)

In summary, excellent teachers orchestrate everyone in

their classroom well—through persuasion rather than coer-

cion. They are continuously aware of the state of their class-

room and the students in it, and they do what is required to

keep students engaged and productive. Their management

style is consistent with the generally positive atmosphere

in the classroom, with few reasons for punishment and few

punishments dispensed.

Curriculum and Instruction

Excellent teachers make curriculum and instruction decisions

that result in exciting teaching and interesting lessons. Stu-

dents learn content that is exciting; the lessons are presented

in interesting ways that match their abilities to deal with it.

Engaging Content and Activities

The books that are read and the lessons that are taught are in-

teresting to the students, with the teacher consciously select-

ing materials that will intrigue the class (e.g., because it

worked well last year). There are many demonstrations that

make abstract content more concrete and do so in ways

that connect academic content to the child’s world and larger

life (e.g., a lesson on biological adaptations that protect a

species includes exploring the parts of a rose plant and reflect-

ing on why it has thorns)—that is, students learn by doing.

When new content is covered, the teacher highlights for stu-

dents how it connects to ideas covered previously in the class

(e.g., when an information book is read about how the colors

of bears are matched to their habitats, the teacher reminds stu-

dents about the previous lesson on biological adaptations).

Such opportunities to connect across lessons are not acciden-

tal; the teacher plans extensively—both individual lessons

and the sequence of lessons across the year.

Lessons do not merely scratch the surface; rather, the

teacher explanations and class discussions have some depth. In

general, depth is favored over breadth in excellent classrooms.

Play and games are incorporated into instruction. Thus,

the class might play social studies Jeopardy to review for an

upcoming test or math baseball. The emphasis in these

games is decidedly on the content, however—the teacher

takes advantage of misses to provide reinstruction (i.e., the

misses inform the teacher about ideas that need additional

coverage and reexplanation). 

The students make products as part of instruction. Thus, it is

common in very good primary classrooms to see big books on

display that the class has written and produced. A science unit

on plants can result in a small forest in the corner of the room.

A sex education unit can include a class-made incubator in

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165

which chicks are hatched by the end of the lessons. Such prod-

ucts are a source of pride for students and do much to motivate

their interest in what is going on in the classroom. 

The message is salient that what goes on in school has clear

relevance to the world. One way this occurs is through use of

current events to stimulate classroom activities. Hence, a presi-

dential election can be used to stimulate literacy and social stud-

ies activities related to the presidency. Space shuttle launches

can be prime motivation for thinking about topics in astronomy,

exploration, or technology. The annual dogsled races in Alaska

can be used to heighten interest in the study of Alaska, the char-

acter issue of perseverance, or use of the Internet (i.e., the race

can be followed on the Internet, which has many resources

about the race available for students to explore).

There is no doubt that interest is high in classrooms staffed

by excellent teachers. One indicator is that students are all

doing activities connected to lessons (e.g., self-selecting

library books related to current content coverage). Another is

that the students are excited about any possibility of doing

more or participating more extensively (e.g., student hands

are always up to volunteer; students will stay in at recess to

finish composition of a big book or help distribute the con-

crete manipulatives for the next activity). When a student is

asked about what she or he is doing the student will often

give a long and enthusiastic response. The teacher’s selection

of interesting and exciting content goes far in creating an in-

teresting and exciting classroom.

Instructional Density

Excellent teachers are constantly teaching and providing in-

struction. Whole-group, small-group, and individual mini-

lessons intermingle across the day, and the teacher often takes

advantage of teachable moments (e.g., moments that provide

the opportunity to teach), such as when students pose ques-

tions. The teachers sometimes prompt students how to find an-

swers themselves and sometimes use the question as an

opportunity to provide an in-depth explanation. Students also

do much reading and writing because excellent teachers do not

permit students simply to sit and do nothing. Excellent teach-

ers teach in multiple ways—explaining, demonstrating, and

scaffolding student learning. Teacher-led lessons and activities

are sometimes complemented by film or Internet experiences.

Although many lessons involve multiple activities, the aca-

demically demanding parts of the lesson get the most time and

attention. For example, if students write in response to a

reading, they might be asked to illustrate what they wrote. The

illustration activity will never be the focus; rather, the teacher

makes it clear that the illustrating comes after reading and

writing and should be accomplished quickly. The dense

articulation of instruction and activities in excellent classrooms

requires great teacher organization and planning.

Balanced Instruction

Rather than embracing instructional extremes, excellent

teachers use a range of methods. Admittedly, because the

focus of our work is primary-level education, we know more

about this issue with respect to literacy. Engaging teachers

clearly balance skills instruction and holistic reading and

writing experiences, rather than embracing either a skills-first

or whole language approach exclusively.

Excellent teachers are not dependent on worksheets or

workbooks; they favor much more authentic tasks, such as

reading real books, writing letters that will be mailed, and

composing stories that end up in big books on display in the

classroom. Moreover, the real books that the students read

are great books—Newberry Award winners and enduring

classics—great stories that are well told and that inspire the

students. Such books are read aloud, read in small groups,

and then reread by students to one another and by students

with their parents at home. Practicing a book until it can be

read to proficiency is more successful when the books being

read and reread are so very appealing. Moreover, students

never just read one book at a time; typically, they are reading

several. Good books contain important vocabulary, which the

teacher covers before reading.

The excellent illustrations in good books provide much to

be seen and talked about by students—for example, when the

teacher does a picture walk through a book before reading it.

Part of instruction is that the teacher always encourages stu-

dents to read books that are a little bit challenging—ones that

can be grasped with effort. Much of reading instruction is

such matching of students to books, providing students with

opportunities to learn to read by doing reading.

Writing provides opportunity to teach higher-order com-

posing skills (i.e., planning, drafting, and revising as a recur-

sive cycle) as well as lower-order skills (e.g., mechanics and

grammar). Writing also reinforces reading skills. Thus, just

as students are encouraged to stretch words to sound them out

during reading, they are encouraged to stretch them to spell

them during writing. Instructional activities in excellent

classrooms provide complementary learning experiences and

orderly articulation of experiences, rather than a jumbled mix

of disconnected experiences that never comes together.

Cross-Curricular Connections

Reading, writing, and content learning often connect in excel-

lent classrooms. Thus, science and social studies lessons re-

quire reading and writing in response to what is read and